The Herald Sun is reporting that a teenager accused of a daylight machete attack outside Luna Park has been granted bail, despite police concerns that it is “only a matter of time before an innocent bystander suffers serious injury, if not death.”
And herein lies the problem. Much of Victoria’s violent crime wave stems from one simple fact: bad behaviour carries almost no consequences. The state government has a duty to wield the sword in defence of the innocent, yet it has thoroughly abdicated that responsibility, allowing crime to effectively flourish unchecked.
It’s a simple law of human behaviour: you get more of what you reward. In the case of crime, zero consequences are the reward. Offenders know they can act with impunity, receiving little more than a slap on the wrist.
As Ecclesiastes 8:11 puts it: “Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed quickly, the heart of the children of man is fully set to do evil.”
This is exactly what we are witnessing. The question is not whether authorities can be tough on crime—it’s whether they will. And so far, the answer appears to be no.
Swift, painful, and public consequences would end violent crime almost immediately. The proof of that is that you don’t need to convince a criminal not to put his hand in the fire twice.
