7 ms·

Broken windows theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory

• AverageDude 4y ago
  They applied that in my suburb and media kept comparing it with racism. They stopped doing that from last year and car jacking and other violent crime is on the rise again. I could never understand how “Broken Window” is racist? And I am a minority. Whatever the fix for institutional racism is need not be contradictory to Broken Window. They can work together.
  • Pxtl 4y ago
    Because "broken window" is too often taken to mean "come down hard on loiterers, grafitti vandals, people who lack the money to maintain property standards, etc"... instead of focusing on violent crime. Now obviously there's a real debate to be had about how severely petty theft and vandalism should be punished. I mean, George Floyd was killed over a counterfeit bill. But once you get into violent crime everybody is on the same page. But basically, in order to get all the violent crime under control, you need a hefty police force. And a hefty police force means a lot of cops roving around hassling poor people and people of color who are just trying to live their lives, which is what the left-wing activists get angry about. Figuring out how to get effective policing without intrinsic racism/classism that always seems to come with that is a big challenge.
    • bart_spoon 4y ago
      > Because "broken window" is too often taken to mean "come down hard on loiterers, grafitti vandals, people who lack the money to maintain property standards, etc"... instead of focusing on violent crime. The broken windows theory isn’t about violent crime, it’s literally about property crime and offenses like vandalism. The idea is that when that kind of petty crime goes unchecked, the crime situation in the area spirals, both in terms of quantity and severity, eventually leading to more violent crime. You can disagree with the theory all you want, but to assert that the issue is that it should only apply to violent crime is to fundamentally misunderstand the assertion the theory is making.
      • deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      • sirmarksalot 4y ago
        I thought the issue was that "broken windows" was used as a metaphor for all low-level infractions, and not literally interpreted as "fix the windows and clean up the graffiti" as the studies recommended. This then got implemented as quotas on police departments, leading to opportunistic, biased policing and the de facto criminalization of poverty. As a result, the term "broken windows" now carries a ton of baggage, and is sometimes used as a racist dog whistle.
        • tekknik 4y ago
          Pretty much every phrase carries a ton of baggage to someone, it’s impossible to speak without offending at least one person. What some, or even a majority, go on to redefine it as does not change its original meaning. If a place looks like a dump people will treat it like a dump. You and wherever you read this from is conflating the issue with racism.
          • paulryanrogers 4y ago
            Language is fluid. You can deny a new meaning, yet if you're in the minority then you may suffer for it. Most engineers aren't working on siege works any more.
            • tekknik 4y ago
              We will quickly end up with no words if we continue this language hijacking path. English is a very contextual language. If a phrase or word is racist then the entire sentence is racist. I can recall an instance where I used the phrase "you people" on the internet. Clearly impossible for me to know the peoples race I was speaking to, yet they claimed it racist because some racist people somewhere also speak English. How about we listen to what people are actually saying instead of twisting meaning to fit a narrative to further control speech? For those that are offended by speech and are demanding, essentially, the removal of the first amendment, it is a learning opportunity that words don't actually harm, only actions.
    • AverageDude 4y ago
      The problem that US faces has been solved by other western countries. Australia has way more safer cities than USA. But the key is to not to politicise everything under the sun. Let the police do their job and whenever there is a misconduct it will be handled by the review board.
      • girvo 4y ago
        Though it’s not like Australia is perfect either: https://www.ccc.qld.gov.au/about-us/our-history/fitzgerald-inquiry https://www.ccc.qld.gov.au/about-us/our-history/fitzgerald-i... (And that’s just one state, every single state has had similar issues with this in their police forces)
        • AverageDude 4y ago
          That goes without saying that nothing is perfect. Even Toyota cars breakdown too (see turbo issue in Land Cruisers) but the fact is that they breakdown less than the other brands. Life is imperfect. We have to pick the least imperfect system.
      • jibe 4y ago
        Maybe the key is to be an island? Hard to reproduce in the US. Maybe the key is to not have a legacy of slavery? No something the US can undo.
        • AverageDude 4y ago
          Could be. But my point is, whatever it is, we need to address it. Living good and safe shouldn’t be a luxury.
        • msikora 4y ago
          You mean like Canada?
        • throwaway202303 4y ago
          Most countries had slavery. Many still do. Using a legacy of slavery to not enforce the law is part of the reason liberal US cities are crime infested
    • daniel-cussen 4y ago
      [dead]
    • dgb23 4y ago
      Might be a chicken and egg problem but countries with low crime rates typically have well educated police who apply deescalation, plus much higher social security and public service standards. It’s very simple. People who are never looked after by their community, but only harassed, beaten and killed, will not see themselves as part of that community but as an enemy.
      • ajeet_dhaliwal 4y ago
        Violent criminals do not suddenly appear on the streets from out of a portal from another dimension. They start out as babies, then toddlers then children. Something goes very wrong, neglect and lack of guidance, developing a delusional reality of the world , and by the time they are adults are unable model how the world actually works and cope to sustain themselves. Desperation and short-term thinking sets in, and violent crime follows. Social values really matter. Countries with low crime rates don't have them because the police are educated about deescalation. That is important too and I support that, but the police are largely irrelevant to the underlying issue. This is coming from someone who grew up thinking social conservative types and people going on about social values needed to relax. I was wrong and realized that when I had children. Children absolutely need stability, reassurance, love and guidance from their mother and father, it's absolutely critical.
        • gond0r 4y ago
          "Something goes very wrong, neglect and lack of guidance, developing a delusional reality of the world" violence is inherent to animal life and it does not require delusion. that's like saying an alligator is delusional for attacking a deer.
          • ajeet_dhaliwal 4y ago
            Talking about humans here, not alligators.
      • stef25 4y ago
        What percentages of beatings and killings are perpetrated by members of the community vs members of the police force, I wonder.
    • stef25 4y ago
      A test was done (in the Netherlands I believe) where they'd put an envelope with cash in a letterbox (sticking out, still visible). In a street with lots of graffiti, more people stole the envelope than in streets without.
    • shortrounddev 4y ago
      Don't remember where, but I saw an economic paper that said that, while Giuliani's theory of brutalizing vandals to prevent murders didnt have any evidence to support it, New York saw a reduction in murders when the cops started responding to murder calls. Police are good for exactly one thing: responding to violence with violence
  • oconnor663 4y ago
    If you're new to the debate, you might want to look up the term "stop and frisk". I think some people group that under the broader umbrella of "broken windows policing", but other people don't, and that difference in meaning can make things more confusing.
  • daniel-cussen 4y ago
    [dead]
• komali2 4y ago
  Is probably a fallacy of correlation being tied to causation. > The policy targeted people in areas with a significant amount of physical disorder and there appeared to be a causal relationship between the adoption of broken windows policing and the decrease in crime rate. Sridhar, however, discusses other trends (such as New York City's economic boom in the late 1990s) that created a "perfect storm" that contributed to the decrease of crime rate much more significantly than the application of the broken windows policy. Sridhar also compares this decrease of crime rate with other major cities that adopted other various policies and determined that the broken windows policy is not as effective. > In a 2007 study called "Reefer Madness" in the journal Criminology and Public Policy, Harcourt and Ludwig found further evidence confirming that mean reversion fully explained the changes in crime rates in the different precincts in New York in the 1990s.[38] Further alternative explanations that have been put forward include the waning of the crack epidemic,[39] unrelated growth in the prison population by the Rockefeller drug laws,[39] and that the number of males from 16 to 24 was dropping regardless of the shape of the US population pyramid. As always, the wikipedia article is a good place to start to look into further sources: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory It's time to let "broken window theory," and bloodthirsty, punitive "justice" strategies, die.
  • uejfiweun 4y ago
    I dunno man - to be honest, nowadays it seems you can find a study to back up any side of the debate, especially with highly politicized issues like this. I'm certain that there are studies out there showing that broken windows policing was in fact the main contributor to the decrease in crime.
    • komali2 4y ago
      > to be honest, nowadays it seems you can find a study to back up any side of the debate, especially with highly politicized issues like this Perhaps this is true, and perhaps this is a part of the issue the usa has with "different facts for both sides." > I'm certain that there are studies out there showing that broken windows policing was in fact the main contributor to the decrease in crime. I'm going to challenge you on this because I feel like this basically just contributes to the problem. Think about what you wrote, you're "certain," certain that studies exist showing our that broken windows policing works, and thus you believe it works. You arrived at a conclusion of the world with, genuinely, no evidence. You don't even know if the evidence exists! In fact you arrived at two conclusions: that your conclusion is correct, and that a lot of other people proved this with good studies. Now I challenge you to simply read the wikipedia article on the subject in its entirety and pay close attention to the "criticism" section. I've done this because I care deeply about the issue, and I've also read the various studies linked. For me, I found the "for broken policing" studies to be dubious and problematic, and the criticisms to be valid. As a result, my understanding of the world is that broken window policing doesn't work, the basic theory is a misunderstanding of actual mechanisms, and that the application of broken windows policing pulls resources from more effective solutions while also delivering inequitable justice to society. So, when you're read up as well, do you still disagree with me?