It would appear that Debbie Adams, the 16 year old who fatally stabbed her cooking teacher back in 1999, is suing New South Wales for giving her access to knives. Granted, she was in a juvenile detention centre for an attack on her mother with a bread knife at the time, but does that give her the right to sue the state?

I despise many things about the world today. I know, I know; I’m only 21, what right do I have to talk about ‘the good old days’? Exactly the same rights as everyone else, as a matter of fact. Just because I was younger back in the good old days - when people took responsibility for their actions - doesn’t mean my opinion is worthless.

As I grew from a toddler to a child, and from child to teen, my mother instilled in me a quality that is apparently a rarity in today’s world: responsibility. Not only responsibility for the things I own, or the people under my care, but responsibility for my own actions, thoughts, reactions and responses. Responsibility for my self.

I have known about consequences since I was very young. It’s all very simple; say I had a toy, and in a fit of rage I threw the toy at the wall. Either the toy broke and it got thrown out, or my mother took the toy away. No matter what consequence followed, my mother made sure I knew that my action or reaction had influenced it.

What Ms. Adams did was wrong; she chose to stab her teacher with a knife while his back was to her, and as a direct result of that she was sent to prison. Regardless of how she got the knife, or what the circumstances were, she was apparently coherent and calm when the incident happened, and so should take full responsibility for it.

Should a juvenile detention centre be allowing the ‘inmates’ to handle sharp knives? Yes, absolutely! They were in a cooking class, learning skills for the outside world; something that could have benefited Ms. Adams in the future. Juvenile detention is not the ‘end of the road’, and programs are run to benefit young people there.

Should they perhaps have been watching her more closely, given that she was in juvenile detention for attacking someone with a knife? Probably, yes! The guards and teachers should have been alert and aware that she could possibly become dangerous. Does that mean the State made her do it? Not in my opinion.

For all we know, the teacher could have turned his back for a split second. Perhaps the guards were distracted, or busy with someone else. Maybe she was waiting for an opportunity, and nothing could have prevented it. Either way, Ms. Adams chose to stab her teacher; the State had nothing to do with it.

As far as I’m concerned, she should deal with the consequences of her actions.