Sugar and spice and everything nice

Not.

Three girls from our town were sentenced recently for chiefing and sexually abusing another girl at an after-prom party last year. Two of them were on my daughter's soccer team back in grade school. They are strikingly pretty, financially well-to-do girls who have never had anything denied to them.

"I still have concerns about their lack of empathy and remorse," Judge Gleason said. "They need evaluation and treatment."

The judge was extremely angry and "nearly threw the book at the girls." I'm not sure which book it was -- maybe a Betty and Veronica comic book. One of the girls has been seriously grounded, at least according to her parents. The one who actually perpetrated the sexual crime had to spend the night in jail. She and the other juvenile are sentenced to 100 (for the "badder" girl; 80 for the "nicer" girl) hours of community service and five years of probation. They have to write a "sincere" letter of apology to the victim (how is that enforceable?) and, like, never do it again.

The dad who provided the alcohol at the party got 24 hours of community service and a $626 fine.

In the meantime, my daughter frequently sees one of the girls buzzing around town in her ever-so-cute chick car, and she's very likely shopping for this year's prom dress.

My daughter was out driving around with a friend of hers, who is a neighbor of one of the perps. The friend is a good Christian, sweet girl, also very pretty and also never had anything denied her. They passed one of the perps and the friend waved. My daughter was outraged. She thinks there should be social consequences -- glares and coldness and certainly not smiles and "Hi! How's it going?"

I'm inclined to agree. (I'm also inclined to envision a firing squad, but that's probably out of proportion.) But we're so damned non-judgmental that we treat the perps like princesses and the victim like a traveling tinker.