hat leads to moral behavior. He cites a growing body of scientific evidence from a variety of academic disciplines that indicates that churches ameliorate or cure many severe socioeconomic ills. "Let [the liberal elite] argue church-state issues...all the way to the next funeral of an innocent kid caught in the crossfire," he says. "Our guiding principle should be, `Build churches, not jails'--or we will reap the whirlwind of our own moral bankruptcy."(5) DiIulio's "super predators" are born of abject "moral poverty," which he defines as: The poverty of being without loving, capable, responsible adults who teach you right from wrong. It is the poverty of being without parents, guardians, relatives, friends, teachers, coaches,clergy and others who habituate you to feel joy at others' joy, pain at others' pain, happiness when you do right, remorse when you do wrong. It is the poverty of growing up in the virtual absence of people who teach these lessons by their own everyday example, and who insist that you follow suit and behave accordingly. In the extreme, it is the poverty of growing up surrounded by deviant, delinquent, and criminal adults in chaotic, dysfunctional, fatherless, Hawkins 6Godless, and jobless settings where drug abuse and child abuse are twins, and self-respecting young men literally aspire to get away with murder.Scholars who study drugs and crime are only now beginning to realize the social consequences of raising so many children in abject moral poverty. The need to rebuild and resurrect the civil society (families, churches, community groups) of high-crime, drug-plagued urban neighborhoods is not an intellectual or research hypothesis that requires testing. It's a moral and social imperative that requires doing - and doing now. (9)It can be assumed -quite logically- by the lay person that the "super predator" is actually a young psychopath or psychotic. While these terms have become largely interchangeable, thanks i...
