The time is January 2024. A few minutes after a Carnival Sunrise cruise ship left the port of Miami, Florida for Jamaica, Carnival Cruise Lines received an anonymous email saying: “Hey, I think someone might have a bomb on your sunrise cruise ship.” This triggered security protocols that involved both the US and Jamaican Coast Guard. More than 1,000 rooms on the ship had to be searched, and were. After a delay of many hours, the ship was ruled safe to sail and continued the cruise.
An investigation eventually traced the email to 19-year-old Joshua Darrell Lowe II of Bailey, Michigan. He confessed to making the false bomb threat, explaining that he was trying to prevent his girlfriend and her family from going on the cruise without him. Though Lowe could have been sentenced to five years in prison, U.S. District Judge Paul Maloney this month sentenced him to only eight months behind bars. The judge was apparently impressed by the teen’s letter to the Judge taking full responsibility for his actions, expressing remorse, and apologizing profusely.
There is no question that such an act is unethical as well as potentially dangerous. I am interested in whether our political and popular culture sends messages to the young, impressionable and stupid that this kind of extreme conduct in the name of love or other passionate feelings is admirable.






