9 ms·

The SF city government seems to have realized that there's another way to make crime "go down": refuse to prosecute for anything, ideally make it pointless for

by floren 5y ago

The SF city government seems to have realized that there's another way to make crime "go down": refuse to prosecute for anything, ideally make it pointless for the cops to even show up, until people stop bothering to report crime. Wow, shoplifting is at record lows!

nikanj 5y ago
Same with bike theft in Vancouver. Nobody bothers reporting it, so the statistics aren’t too bad
- the-dude 5y ago
  Isn't there any incentive for your claim on your theft insurance?
  - blacksmith_tb 5y ago
    It's fairly uncommon to have insurance specifically for your bicycle, so most people would be filing claims against their renters' (if they have it) or homeowners' insurance. Given the size of those deductibles ($500 is the US average for homeowners', I would think Canada is similar [1]) lots of people would just buy another bike that costs less. 1: https://www.insurance.com/home-and-renters-insurance/home-insurance-basics/homeowners-insurance-deductibles-choose-right-one.html https://www.insurance.com/home-and-renters-insurance/home-in...
    - desmosxxx 5y ago
      even for claims above deductible but still relatively minor (2-3x maybe?) it might not be worth it financially (in the long run) depending on your provider and any previous claims of course
    - the-dude 5y ago
      In NL you can insure your bike for theft upon purchase ( or later ).
hncurious 5y ago
I don't know if that was the intention or not, but that is precisely the outcome of SF policies.
- nitrogen 5y ago
  It seems to apply to traffic, too. Sabotage the road system to prove that driving is terrible. A few extremely major streets were basically off road driving for a year while I was living there. Light timing is terrible at several intersections, guaranteeing gridlock. Traffic cops get stationed at the next intersection over, so nothing changes. Mission accomplished: fewer cars on the road! But no money coming in either.
BitwiseFool 5y ago
I will never not share Goodhart's Law when the opportunity arises: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure". You couple that with redefining what counts as a 'crime', and bam, you get the situation SF is in right now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law
eplanit 5y ago
Exactly. Stop calling criminal activity "crimes", and then the stats look great. And, the local SF media participates and pushes the "crime is actually down" narrative: https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/san-francisco/stats-show-crime-in-san-francisco-down-in-2021/2592418/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/san-francisco/stats-sh...
neither_color 5y ago
We're approaching a strange post-empirical world where the right chart or graph can be used to justify any public policy, and often changing how the data for the chart is collected, analyzed and presented is easier than solving the issue. The collective anecdotes of thousands/millions of people can be dismissed because the chart says otherwise. Disagree that crime in your neighborhood has dropped? Just because your car has been broken into and your neighbor got robbed doesnt mean there's a trend. Anecdotes arent data. Do you have a source for that?
- seph-reed 5y ago
  This is a toughy. People who don't believe in covid vaccines -- for instance -- are living in a world of anecdotes, untrusting of easily manipulable data. But it's where we're at. In a world where you can't trust the data and your friends are addicted to consuming propaganda, what the fuck is truth?
- ZeroGravitas 5y ago
  In your opinion, did the multi-decade drop in American crime, regularly discussed by academics who have some tentative theories to explain it, happen or was it all faked? https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/americas-faulty-perception-crime-rates https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/amer...
  - j_walter 5y ago
    That was real and everyone can agree on that based on what they see as well as the data. However you can't go to a single SF neighborhood and find people that think crime has dropped recently. There are boatloads of articles about people having their cars broken into so often they leave them unlocked because replacing windows was so expensive. Videos of people shoplifting while security stands by and does nothing because of the laws. Articles about criminals that kill someone but had been in and out of the system for years with fairly severe crimes but always let off by a rouge DA or out on bail (or without bail because bail is racist). https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/sf-da-announces-homicide-charges-against-parolee-in-fatal-nye-hit-and-run/2436773/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/sf-da-announces-homici...
SV_BubbleTime 5y ago
Shoplifting is at record lows. Shoplifting is at record highs. Ah, forced perspective.
neutronicus 5y ago
Baltimore, too But the nice neighborhoods are hiring private security and in some cases threatening tax revolt
babyshake 5y ago
In The Wire, this is called juking the stats.
- kmstout 5y ago
  "Making robberies into larcenies. Making rapes disappear. You juke the stats, and majors become colonels." --Prez
AtlasBarfed 5y ago
That is a bad idea. It leads to vigilantism, or even worse, local organized crime steps in with attendant protectionism racketeering. With the American System each year failing a larger and larger percentage of the population, while the upper elites continue to hoard wealth and starve the government, then it makes more and more poor people turn to illegal means to make money. Much like drug gangs in the inner city. However this will also turn into the nasty spiral of gang-controlled neighborhoods chasing out legit economic activity and becoming even more poor. What we need is a decent civil society. But America is an oligarchy and they've figured out how to use social media to block any meaningful populist progressive reform by organizing a sufficient opposition with astroturfing and fake news.
- floren 5y ago
  Yep, but if the police aren't going to do anything I find it hard to blame the people in SF Chinatown who started doing their own patrols: https://www.sfchronicle.com/local/article/S-F-Chinatown-patrols-met-with-hope-ambivalence-16061455.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/local/article/S-F-Chinatown-patr...
- dantheman 5y ago
  Do you think the government is starved? At what level of spending would it not be starved?
- jokethrowaway 5y ago
  The government is incompetent at protecting people. Call the police and you'll see how it goes. And this is happening while the government is spending 13B per year. I wonder, where does the money go, if basic services are not provided? I'd rather spend my money on a network of competing private protection companies if I didn't have to pay taxes for the police. Once the system is in place you can create all sort of charity based options - or tax funded, if you like the idea of forcefully stealing money from citizens' profit - to grant protection to those who can't afford it.
  - floren 5y ago
    > I'd rather spend my money on a network of competing private protection companies if I didn't have to pay taxes for the police. I'd prefer to fix the cops rather than sign up for a MetaCops subscription in my burbclave.
pjc50 5y ago
Unintentional consequences of the California three strikes law perhaps? Prosecutors unwilling to hand out mandatory 25 year sentences for petty theft?
- Stronico 5y ago
  Nice catch actually
- liber8 5y ago
  This is not how the three-strike law works. You don't get a life sentence for petty theft. Under Penal Code section 667(e), you can receive a life term if you are convicted of a serious or violent felony AND you have twice before been convicted of serious and violent felonies. See https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=PEN&sectionNum=667 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio...
  - hncommenter13 5y ago
    That is how the law works after it was amended in 2012.[1] From the time of adoption in 1994 until 2012, even relatively minor crimes could result in a life sentence.[2] [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/27/us/california-convicts-are-out-of-prison-after-third-strike-and-staying-out.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/27/us/california-convicts-ar... [2] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-archives-steven-bell-the-bicycle-thief/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-archives-steven-bell-the-bic...
908B64B197 5y ago
You can do the same thing in education by closing down magnets schools and lowering the bar for everyone...
- rahimnathwani 5y ago
  You don't even have to close them. Just remove merit-based admission, in the name of equity. Then, because many students won't be able to keep up, the 'magnet' school will lower standards.
pvtprop 5y ago
Corporations want taxes cut to nothing and complain when the public doesn’t want to protect their private property. Funny how that works. I notice it’s WSJ complaining. More “government is inept” sentiment to justify private armies.
- esyir 5y ago
  This is Sf, California. Hardly a bastion of small government.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
acchow 5y ago
If we stop labeling lots of things crimes, then of course crime rates go way down.

by floren 5y ago

nikanj 5y ago

Same with bike theft in Vancouver. Nobody bothers reporting it, so the statistics aren’t too bad

the-dude 5y ago
Isn't there any incentive for your claim on your theft insurance?
- blacksmith_tb 5y ago
  It's fairly uncommon to have insurance specifically for your bicycle, so most people would be filing claims against their renters' (if they have it) or homeowners' insurance. Given the size of those deductibles ($500 is the US average for homeowners', I would think Canada is similar [1]) lots of people would just buy another bike that costs less. 1: https://www.insurance.com/home-and-renters-insurance/home-insurance-basics/homeowners-insurance-deductibles-choose-right-one.html https://www.insurance.com/home-and-renters-insurance/home-in...
  - desmosxxx 5y ago
    even for claims above deductible but still relatively minor (2-3x maybe?) it might not be worth it financially (in the long run) depending on your provider and any previous claims of course
  - the-dude 5y ago
    In NL you can insure your bike for theft upon purchase ( or later ).

hncurious 5y ago

I don't know if that was the intention or not, but that is precisely the outcome of SF policies.

nitrogen 5y ago
It seems to apply to traffic, too. Sabotage the road system to prove that driving is terrible. A few extremely major streets were basically off road driving for a year while I was living there. Light timing is terrible at several intersections, guaranteeing gridlock. Traffic cops get stationed at the next intersection over, so nothing changes. Mission accomplished: fewer cars on the road! But no money coming in either.

BitwiseFool 5y ago

I will never not share Goodhart's Law when the opportunity arises: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure". You couple that with redefining what counts as a 'crime', and bam, you get the situation SF is in right now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law

eplanit 5y ago

Exactly. Stop calling criminal activity "crimes", and then the stats look great. And, the local SF media participates and pushes the "crime is actually down" narrative: https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/san-francisco/stats-show-crime-in-san-francisco-down-in-2021/2592418/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/san-francisco/stats-sh...

neither_color 5y ago

We're approaching a strange post-empirical world where the right chart or graph can be used to justify any public policy, and often changing how the data for the chart is collected, analyzed and presented is easier than solving the issue. The collective anecdotes of thousands/millions of people can be dismissed because the chart says otherwise. Disagree that crime in your neighborhood has dropped? Just because your car has been broken into and your neighbor got robbed doesnt mean there's a trend. Anecdotes arent data. Do you have a source for that?

seph-reed 5y ago
This is a toughy. People who don't believe in covid vaccines -- for instance -- are living in a world of anecdotes, untrusting of easily manipulable data. But it's where we're at. In a world where you can't trust the data and your friends are addicted to consuming propaganda, what the fuck is truth?
ZeroGravitas 5y ago
In your opinion, did the multi-decade drop in American crime, regularly discussed by academics who have some tentative theories to explain it, happen or was it all faked? https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/americas-faulty-perception-crime-rates https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/amer...
- j_walter 5y ago
  That was real and everyone can agree on that based on what they see as well as the data. However you can't go to a single SF neighborhood and find people that think crime has dropped recently. There are boatloads of articles about people having their cars broken into so often they leave them unlocked because replacing windows was so expensive. Videos of people shoplifting while security stands by and does nothing because of the laws. Articles about criminals that kill someone but had been in and out of the system for years with fairly severe crimes but always let off by a rouge DA or out on bail (or without bail because bail is racist). https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/sf-da-announces-homicide-charges-against-parolee-in-fatal-nye-hit-and-run/2436773/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/sf-da-announces-homici...

SV_BubbleTime 5y ago

Shoplifting is at record lows. Shoplifting is at record highs. Ah, forced perspective.

neutronicus 5y ago

Baltimore, too But the nice neighborhoods are hiring private security and in some cases threatening tax revolt

babyshake 5y ago

In The Wire, this is called juking the stats.

kmstout 5y ago
"Making robberies into larcenies. Making rapes disappear. You juke the stats, and majors become colonels." --Prez

AtlasBarfed 5y ago

That is a bad idea. It leads to vigilantism, or even worse, local organized crime steps in with attendant protectionism racketeering. With the American System each year failing a larger and larger percentage of the population, while the upper elites continue to hoard wealth and starve the government, then it makes more and more poor people turn to illegal means to make money. Much like drug gangs in the inner city. However this will also turn into the nasty spiral of gang-controlled neighborhoods chasing out legit economic activity and becoming even more poor. What we need is a decent civil society. But America is an oligarchy and they've figured out how to use social media to block any meaningful populist progressive reform by organizing a sufficient opposition with astroturfing and fake news.

floren 5y ago
Yep, but if the police aren't going to do anything I find it hard to blame the people in SF Chinatown who started doing their own patrols: https://www.sfchronicle.com/local/article/S-F-Chinatown-patrols-met-with-hope-ambivalence-16061455.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/local/article/S-F-Chinatown-patr...
dantheman 5y ago
Do you think the government is starved? At what level of spending would it not be starved?
jokethrowaway 5y ago
The government is incompetent at protecting people. Call the police and you'll see how it goes. And this is happening while the government is spending 13B per year. I wonder, where does the money go, if basic services are not provided? I'd rather spend my money on a network of competing private protection companies if I didn't have to pay taxes for the police. Once the system is in place you can create all sort of charity based options - or tax funded, if you like the idea of forcefully stealing money from citizens' profit - to grant protection to those who can't afford it.
- floren 5y ago
  > I'd rather spend my money on a network of competing private protection companies if I didn't have to pay taxes for the police. I'd prefer to fix the cops rather than sign up for a MetaCops subscription in my burbclave.

pjc50 5y ago

Unintentional consequences of the California three strikes law perhaps? Prosecutors unwilling to hand out mandatory 25 year sentences for petty theft?

Stronico 5y ago
Nice catch actually
liber8 5y ago
This is not how the three-strike law works. You don't get a life sentence for petty theft. Under Penal Code section 667(e), you can receive a life term if you are convicted of a serious or violent felony AND you have twice before been convicted of serious and violent felonies. See https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=PEN&sectionNum=667 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio...
- hncommenter13 5y ago
  That is how the law works after it was amended in 2012.[1] From the time of adoption in 1994 until 2012, even relatively minor crimes could result in a life sentence.[2] [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/27/us/california-convicts-are-out-of-prison-after-third-strike-and-staying-out.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/27/us/california-convicts-ar... [2] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-archives-steven-bell-the-bicycle-thief/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-archives-steven-bell-the-bic...

908B64B197 5y ago

You can do the same thing in education by closing down magnets schools and lowering the bar for everyone...

rahimnathwani 5y ago
You don't even have to close them. Just remove merit-based admission, in the name of equity. Then, because many students won't be able to keep up, the 'magnet' school will lower standards.

pvtprop 5y ago

Corporations want taxes cut to nothing and complain when the public doesn’t want to protect their private property. Funny how that works. I notice it’s WSJ complaining. More “government is inept” sentiment to justify private armies.

esyir 5y ago
This is Sf, California. Hardly a bastion of small government.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

acchow 5y ago

If we stop labeling lots of things crimes, then of course crime rates go way down.