Solution to Reducing Crime

[holbritter]

Of course you do repeat making mistakes, maybe not the same ones but you keep on not being perfect, correct? Are you the first to throw a stone?

Well, I'm not a criminal, so I'm ahead of the game. Continuing to excuse people for repeated bad behavior only enables them.

 

[Brochacholomigo]

I still think that's because they know there will not be a punishment that severe. Now I'm not talking about intentional murder or the likes. However, for example, how do we end up with someone in their 30's who has been convicted of more than 4 or 5 times for assault and we hear about their record because they finally killed someone. What was a strong punishment that allowed someone to commit that many crimes, and be free to eventually kill someone. After the first couple of times, they know they will be out soon. So of course they aren't deterred.

IDK. But if the threat of harsher punishment doesn't work on some people, nothing will, because they just don't care.

It's never worked. In medieval times, we used to chop people's hands off for stealing, and most ever other crime merited execution. People still got their hands and/or heads lopped off anyway. Preventative punishment has been a failure since the dawn of civilization.

 

[grip]

Well, I'm not a criminal, so I'm ahead of the game. Continuing to excuse people for repeated bad behavior only enables them.

Be not so quick to judge or someone far above you may bring a sentence upon your unseen crimes. Trust me, you are not other peoples judge of bad behavior.

 

[holbritter]

It's never worked. In medieval times, we used to chop people's hands off for stealing, and most ever other crime merited execution. People still got their hands and/or heads lopped off anyway. Preventative punishment has been a failure since the dawn of civilization.

Stop with the good points, or I might have to change my answer!

Ok. Then how about those that are on the fence about committing another crime? Wouldn't some think twice about it? I can't believe it wouldn't deter anyone.

 

[Conaeolos]

Some argue that investing in more police and imposing harsher sentences for all crime will help reduce it. Others say the problem in poverty and that investing in infrastructure nationwide, education, especially in impoverished areas is a better solution.

What do you think?

First major problem is recidivism. Crimes are not caused by just anyone slipping up but select groups of people who don't share pro-social values, yet currently our system basically has two levels of restriction as a response. Probation & incarceration. One isolates you from society for an arbitrary amount of time. One makes gives you arbitrary objectives(which any normal person should be able to meet)and they call it integration. Neither do anything to address the motives for criminality. Fines are even worse.

To address recidivism we need clear stages where in the length of incarceration are based on ability to integrate not a sentence. Criminality should be a label which needs to be earned off not a temporary measure. Punishment is a stupid deterrent that clearly doesn’t work.

 We need effective and hardnosed rehabilitation/containment.
https://www.nij.gov/topics/corrections/recidivism/Pages/welcome.aspx

As other have said decriminalize all non-violent offences. It makes no sense for you to be incarcerated for tax fraud or drug trafficking or petty theft[sometimes even manslatter]. You should be labeled, fined, restricted and monitored. Maybe mandatory education, skills training, counselling or psychiatric medication. Incarceration even propagates worse problems as non-violent but juvenile parents are removed from their children[as no one doubt violent parents are worse].

What happened when Portugal decriminalized all drugs - Business Insider

Breakdown of the family and community still at the heart of the problem and bleeds into adults unprepared for the difficulties of responsible adulthood. You see this in all the hot bed communities. Poverty is a code word for single parent households or households with permissive, authorization or neglectful parenting styles. Churches/Mosques are often no longer alternatives interest in producing well adjusted(moral) adults. Extra curricular activities have greater and greater barriers and restrictions. Media and culture emphasis childhood and juvenile lifestyles full of drugs and fun which scoff at responsibilities. Community leaders are often more interested in political action than shaping educated, decerning and responsible adults.

Crime prevention beings with encouraging pro-social values in our children and our communities!

https://books.google.ca/books/about...venile.html?id=vFXztgAACAAJ&redir_esc=y&hl=en

 

[holbritter]

Be not so quick to judge or someone far above you may bring a sentence upon your unseen crimes. Trust me, you are not other peoples judge of bad behavior.

Yeah, ok. Have a good night.

 

[lurchadams]

First major problem is recidivism. Crimes are not caused by just anyone slipping up but select groups of people who don't share pro-social values, yet currently our system basically has two levels of restriction as a response. Probation & incarceration. One isolates you from society for an arbitrary amount of time. One makes gives you arbitrary objectives(which any normal person should be able to meet)and they call it integration. Neither do anything to address the motives for criminality. Fines are even worse.

To address recidivism we need clear stages where in the length of incarceration are based on ability to integrate not a sentence. Criminality should be a label which needs to be earned off not a temporary measure. Punishment is a stupid deterrent that clearly doesn’t work.

 We need effective and hardnosed rehabilitation/containment.
https://www.nij.gov/topics/corrections/recidivism/Pages/welcome.aspx

As other have said decriminalize all non-violent offences. It makes no sense for you to be incarcerated for tax fraud or drug trafficking or petty theft[sometimes even manslatter]. You should be labeled, fined, restricted and monitored. Maybe mandatory education, skills training, counselling or psychiatric medication. Incarceration even propagates worse problems as non-violent but juvenile parents are removed from their children[as no one doubt violent parents are worse].

What happened when Portugal decriminalized all drugs - Business Insider

Breakdown of the family and community still at the heart of the problem and bleeds into adults unprepared for the difficulties of responsible adulthood. You see this in all the hot bed communities. Poverty is a code word for single parent households or households with permissive, authorization or neglectful parenting styles. Churches/Mosques are often no longer alternatives interest in producing well adjusted(moral) adults. Extra curricular activities have greater and greater barriers and restrictions. Media and culture emphasis childhood and juvenile lifestyles full of drugs and fun which scoff at responsibilities. Community leaders are often more interested in political action than shaping educated, decerning and responsible adults.

Crime prevention beings with encouraging pro-social values in our children and our communities!

https://books.google.ca/books/about...venile.html?id=vFXztgAACAAJ&redir_esc=y&hl=en

Best response I've seen so far. Well thought out!

 

[Lord of Planar]

It's never worked. In medieval times, we used to chop people's hands off for stealing, and most ever other crime merited execution. People still got their hands and/or heads lopped off anyway. Preventative punishment has been a failure since the dawn of civilization.

Times were harsher, and people had to do such things to survive. Today, they don't have to. It is a choice not taken for survival.

 

[TurtleDude]

How about decriminalization of victimless crimes.

yep get rid of

1) laws against using drugs

2) many weapons offenses

3) some agriculture matters

and at the state level-the same plus prostitution offenses

 

[Lord of Planar]

yep get rid of

1) laws against using drugs

2) many weapons offenses

3) some agriculture matters

and at the state level-the same plus prostitution offenses

How about just saying get rid if victim-less crimes...

 

[TurtleDude]

How about just saying get rid if victim-less crimes...

well that works for me but some would say not paying taxes or stuff like that is "victimless"

 

[Brochacholomigo]

Stop with the good points, or I might have to change my answer!

Ok. Then how about those that are on the fence about committing another crime? Wouldn't some think twice about it? I can't believe it wouldn't deter anyone.

I recall being quite interested in stealing a few packs of gum when I was younger, and eventually deciding that it wasn't worth the risk of being caught. At no point did I stop to consider exactly HOW bad it would be if I were caught. I've talked with a niece and a friend who did shoplift, and similar methods of thinking were at work.

Much like the author in the article, I've come to the conclusion that simply improving the efficacy of crime detection would lead to less people committing crime, even if tacking on more punishment is rarely effective.

However, I would much rather address the root causes of crime than to inject metaphorical steroids into the state and local police forces (very, very expensive steroids that come directly out of our pay checks, no less). We know that there is a correlation between poor family life & economic problems with high crime areas - let's just focus on addressing the state of America's economy and societal issues, and crime should largely sort itself out. And if improving infrastructure and GDP doesn't solve the problem, we can always just spend some of our excess wealth on improving internal security.

As for how to go about improving our economy, I'm not entirely certain how to go about that, but I'd start by legalizing pot across the nation. Weed's no worse than alcohol, and every state that has gone the legalization route has opened up a lot of economic opportunity and seen a lot of revenue flowing in. Second, I'd like to reduce the time patents stay in effect by a decade or two - particularly in the medical field, we've seen a lot of literal monopolies on products pop up that stifled industry and artificially raised prices. It's fine for a company to recoup losses from R&D, but it's not okay for a single company to utterly dominate an entire market for years on end. I'm no economic mastermind, so I don't have too many other specific solutions beyond those, but that's where the other several hundred million Americans come in. Someone has to know how to fix this!

Fixing families is... more difficult. I honestly have no idea how to deal with the sorry state of the American household, and I don't believe it's a problem that could be solved with legislation anyway. However, I do believe that this issue is as tied to the economy as crime is, so alleviating the lack of opportunity in many areas may very well help bring stability back to families. I'm also fine with alternative families - I'd much rather a kid have to wonder why he has two daddies than to wonder how long it'll be before he gets shunted off to another foster home run by more strangers that don't give a damn about their charges.

However, the best solution may be to work harder on rehabilitating criminals, instead of punishing them. A lot of life-long lawbreakers started out as troubled kids with problems they couldn't deal with, who lashed out and got into legal trouble for various reasons. Once they get into the system, they just get worse and worse, and many of them will never break their own pattern. Again, I can't pretend to know how to adress this problem, but we could easily develop a few experimental prisons modeled after other nations with liw recidivism rates.

 

[Brochacholomigo]

Times were harsher, and people had to do such things to survive. Today, they don't have to. It is a choice not taken for survival.

And yet the psychology of the human mind has yet to evolve to suit our different circumstances. We still have criminals who worry more about whether they will be caught than how much trouble getting caught entails, and it makes sense to work with the human brain, not against it.

 

[Brochacholomigo]

First major problem is recidivism. Crimes are not caused by just anyone slipping up but select groups of people who don't share pro-social values, yet currently our system basically has two levels of restriction as a response. Probation & incarceration. One isolates you from society for an arbitrary amount of time. One makes gives you arbitrary objectives(which any normal person should be able to meet)and they call it integration. Neither do anything to address the motives for criminality. Fines are even worse.

To address recidivism we need clear stages where in the length of incarceration are based on ability to integrate not a sentence. Criminality should be a label which needs to be earned off not a temporary measure. Punishment is a stupid deterrent that clearly doesn’t work.

 We need effective and hardnosed rehabilitation/containment.
https://www.nij.gov/topics/corrections/recidivism/Pages/welcome.aspx

As other have said decriminalize all non-violent offences. It makes no sense for you to be incarcerated for tax fraud or drug trafficking or petty theft[sometimes even manslatter]. You should be labeled, fined, restricted and monitored. Maybe mandatory education, skills training, counselling or psychiatric medication. Incarceration even propagates worse problems as non-violent but juvenile parents are removed from their children[as no one doubt violent parents are worse].

What happened when Portugal decriminalized all drugs - Business Insider

Breakdown of the family and community still at the heart of the problem and bleeds into adults unprepared for the difficulties of responsible adulthood. You see this in all the hot bed communities. Poverty is a code word for single parent households or households with permissive, authorization or neglectful parenting styles. Churches/Mosques are often no longer alternatives interest in producing well adjusted(moral) adults. Extra curricular activities have greater and greater barriers and restrictions. Media and culture emphasis childhood and juvenile lifestyles full of drugs and fun which scoff at responsibilities. Community leaders are often more interested in political action than shaping educated, decerning and responsible adults.

Crime prevention beings with encouraging pro-social values in our children and our communities!

https://books.google.ca/books/about...venile.html?id=vFXztgAACAAJ&redir_esc=y&hl=en

Ah, geez, your post is basically a straight upgrade of the one I just finished writing. Oh, my poor ego...

 

[ThoughtEx.]

Legalize drugs...

 

[ThoughtEx.]

well that works for me but some would say not paying taxes or stuff like that is "victimless"

They didn't vote for Trump obviously, everyone who's anyone knows, if you don't pay taxes you're a genius...

 

[TurtleDude]

They didn't vote for Trump obviously, everyone who's anyone knows, if you don't pay taxes you're a genius...

other than trump hate I don't see what that has to do with this thread

 

[ThoughtEx.]

other than trump hate I don't see what that has to do with this thread

Trump's a criminal, but if we keep non violent criminals out of jail, he will likely never see prison. Win/win for both sides. Fearless leader won't go to jail when he eventually gets caught red handed, and we'll stop wasting so much money locking black kids up. Which might lead to less fear of the police from the black community.

So all we have to do, is convince Trump it's in his best interest. And boom, real change.

 

[TurtleDude]

Trump's a criminal, but if we keep non violent criminals out of jail, he will likely never see prison. Win/win for both sides. Fearless leader won't go to jail when he eventually gets caught red handed, and we'll stop wasting so much money locking black kids up. Which might lead to less fear of the police from the black community.

So all we have to do, is convince Trump it's in his best interest. And boom, real change.

that's just plain goofy but ending the war on drugs would go along way in easing tensions between the cops and young black males

 

[ThoughtEx.]

that's just plain goofy but ending the war on drugs would go along way in easing tensions between the cops and young black males

If I've learned anything from the past year or so, the goofiest **** is what's going to work. Say it out loud, Donald Trump is President of the United States. Tell me that isn't the goofiest **** you've ever heard.

At one point I know someone in the GOP said, "This is dumb enough, it just might work..."

 

[TurtleDude]

If I've learned anything from the past year or so, the goofiest **** is what's going to work. Say it out loud, Donald Trump is President of the United States. Tell me that isn't the goofiest **** you've ever heard.

sure beats saying The clinton crime family is back in the oral office!

 

[ThoughtEx.]

sure beats saying The clinton crime family is back in the oral office!

Yeah, because Donald isn't a bigger criminal than Hillary and Bill combined...

 

[Moderate Right]

As the prisons get full, execute the worse of them to make room for more.

If the worse now becomes the asshole who vandalized his neighbors property in the first degree, then... oh well...

I'm OK with getting rid of people who commit first degree cries against other.

The left seems to have this hangup of being embarrassed about our prison population. Your egos are so huge you would rather have career criminals roam free amongst us than to admit we have more scumbags than any other country on the planet. The solution is to build more prisons. It can easily be paid for by decreasing the police forces and courts, who will no longer be needed as much arresting the very same people over and over. I am actually against capital punishment. I find it hypocritical to be for the sanctity of life (anti-abortion) and yet be for capital punishment. That doesn't jive.

 

[LadyMoonlight]

Poverty does not cause crime. I, and my sister and brothers grew up in poverty, none of us have committed any crimes. My son and daughter were raised in poverty, never committed crimes. There are millions upon millions of people in poverty in the world and they don't commit crimes either. Saying poverty is the cause of crime, is like saying there are no rich criminals because, well, no poverty therefore no need to commit a crime. It's nonsense. Bad parenting, weak people and smacks on the wrist and excuses (the latest, most popular excuse being "Oh, but I have a mental illness") for people who do commit crimes is the problem.

 

[Lovebug]

Neither. Infrastructure, somewhat.

Investing in education simply means more highly educated unemployed and underemployed. That's not working for India, who requires masters degrees to be a train conductor.

The best thing we can do to reduce crime is to remove the motives for crime, which are primarily economic.

So, what's the best way to grow an economy and create demand for workers, of all skill and education levels?

Work is a great crime reducer, so are purpose and dignity. We have too many low wage jobs, and for many it is easier to sell drugs or commit other crimes.
I also think that the superficial worlds in which we live lures many into thinking that what we want should be easy to get. I.E., I remember my parents renovating the old family home for years and years. They bought a home that needed a lot of loving, and worked on it as money allowed, because kids came first.