Unforgiving youth

The BBC recently told us that young people, above all other age groups, oppose the release of the alleged terrorist Megrahi. On the BBC News website, Brian Taylor says:
     'Intriguingly, glancing at the figures in more detail, opinion against release appears particularly strong among younger people, with the elderly more inclined towards compassionate release. But, in all age groups, more oppose the decision than support it.'
     Interested in this, I set about talking to some of my schoolmates about their opinions on Megrahi. Their thoughts ranged from the deep to the flippant. However, one factor remained consistent: When first mentioned to them, none of the young people knew what I was talking about.
     I spoke first to Delara Allaverdi, 14. On asking her opinion on the Megrahi case, her response was: 'I don't have a clue what you're on about.' Following a short explanation of the Lockerbie bombing and the trial that followed, Delara's response was emphatically a 'no' to Megrahi's release, saying, 'He should stay in jail, he did something bad', and, 'He shouldn't die happy, he should die sad'.
     This response was common to most of the people I spoke to. Molly Brock, 14, said: 'He should not be allowed out of jail'. Ella Pollitt, 15, said that he should 'learn that his actions have consequences'. And Kira Sullivan, 15, was of the strong opinion that Megrahi should 'be executed instantly', although this was soon amended to the thought that 'letting him suffer was better, since he did commit a bombing'. When confronted with the idea that Megrahi was in fact innocent her reply was: 'He ain't innocent! He's a liar with guilt'.
     My questions provoked a fairly heated discussion in the middle of English class – the general consensus being that Megrahi should not under any circumstances be allowed back to Libya to die. Later however, I discovered a more merciful or at least more open-minded teenager. Owen Bose, 14, has a grandmother who in fact lives in Lockerbie herself. Owen said: 'If the guy is dying anyway he should be allowed to die in peace. And if it's true (that he’s innocent) he should be able to die in peace. But, if it's not true, he should die in captivity.'
     Owen's view was the calmest of all the responses I received. He tried to weigh up the pros and cons, and he seemed to understand the details of the case far better than anyone else. In terms of a compassionate response, I find myself most impressed with Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was killed in the Lockerbie bombing, and is still seeking justice for his daughter's death. Dr Swire is convinced of Megrahi's innocence, searching for answers in other places rather than using Megrahi as a scapegoat in his anger and sadness.
     Speaking as both a teenager and a Christian, (Scotland's main religion is Christianity, a faith founded on forgiveness...) I think that Megrahi should be allowed his right to die in his native country. To my mind it seems that evidence stacks up in favour of Megrahi's innocence, rather than his guilt, and that a painful death of cancer is punishment enough for any crime he may have committed. Whilst this is an opinion at odds to that of my peers, I can't help feeling that the young people of Scotland are commenting on a subject they don't quite understand – after all the Lockerbie bombing happened in 1988, before they were even born.
     The general public – even the ones alive at the time of the event – are somewhat hazy on the details of Megrahi's trial. Teens perhaps even more so. KG (she asked that I not use her name for this article), on being asked for her opinion, not only didn't know of Lockerbie, her response was, 'Are you talking about 747?'. It turned out she meant 9/11.
     Whilst I think it's great that young people are getting involved in current affairs and political issues, shouldn't they get the facts straight in their minds before making judgements? And with the death of Megrahi imminent, how can they do that, when even politicians aren't sure of themselves? At the end of the day, it is still all down to opinion, but opinion is shaped by real knowledge of fact. Until they have this – with all due respect to us teenagers – I'll be just a little suspicious of polls in which adolescent opinions set such a strong trend.