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Other than those who commit grave offenses of bodily harm, I reserve my greatest disgust for the type of dirtbag who imposes these orders-of-magnitude greater c
by xp84 5mo ago
Other than those who commit grave offenses of bodily harm, I reserve my greatest disgust for the type of dirtbag who imposes these orders-of-magnitude greater costs on other innocent people for such a relatively low "reward." They'd burn the Mona Lisa for fuel, melt down the Statue of Liberty for scrap, anything if you let them.
I agree with another commenter here, the overlap of this mindset with tweakers is large.
- mslt 5mo agoI’d suggest considering empathy once you get past the anger, their former selves would be equally repulsed by their behavior, and for many I expect their current selves feel similarly despite their lack of control. The villains here aren’t the broken people.
- jdross 5mo agoThe villains are the people who let these people continue to commit crimes and make life worse for others in the name of empathy instead of quickly and forcefully moving them into compassionate care where they have any chance of recovering and joining the vast majority as contributors to society.
- Blackthorn 5mo agoCompassionate care does not exist for people like this.
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- alphager 5mo ago*in the US
- Blackthorn 5mo agoWhich, notably, is the place where this happened and therefore the place we're discussing.
- laughing_man 5mo agoThe villains are those of us who tolerate this kind of behavior in the name of compassion.
- TurdF3rguson 5mo agoYou shouldn't tolerate the behavior, but announcing disgust for people who are struggling is just not helpful.
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- laughing_man 5mo agoLots of people who are struggling don't become thieves.
- TurdF3rguson 5mo agoRight, like I said don't tolerate the behavior, but that doesn't mean every thief is an irredeemable piece of shit who doesn't deserve help or empathy. There should be something in the middle, I hope we can agree on that. We're talking about addiction and property damage here, not a homicidal psychopath.
- xp84 5mo ago> not a homicidal... Even murderers also get the same assumption, from the same liberal voices, that it's really due to their lack of opportunity. > but that doesn't mean every thief... Sure maybe, but I think a lot of the blowback that people who advocate for this more compassionate view of criminals are starting to see, is because it seems that they won't admit that any thief is an irredeemable POS, which reads as gaslighting to everyone (poor or not, even including other criminals) who has spent time around actual criminals. By doing things like California's Prop 47, which had the very real result of making it virtually impossible for most thieves to ever go to prison (at least the ones who can do math), we've codified into law that all thieves are just nice people who apparently had some kind of "misunderstanding" about property. So when someone has their work truck burgled or their business robbed for the 6th time, and the police won't even come because it was an "under $950" misdemeanor, they would rather see all theft dealt with harshly than keep the status quo.
- bandofthehawk 5mo agoIn general I agree with you, but it also makes me wonder how these people got to this point. I think most people would burn the Mona Lisa if it meant surviving through a cold night. Our society has failed these people in many ways.
- hyperhello 5mo agoI don’t see how to blame our society for copper thieves.
- bandofthehawk 5mo agoLack of healthcare, limited job opportunities, growing income inequality, are just a few reasons off the top of my head.
- paleotrope 5mo agoDrugs. It's usually drugs.
- bigbuppo 5mo agoLocal copper thieves that were busted stealing telco lines... they were just looking to make a quick buck regardless of legality or care for the impact it had on other people. They're more like tech company CEOs, really.
- peddling-brink 5mo agoAnd these thieves were already well cared for in a healthy society with all sorts of opportunities available to them regardless of social status, skin color, and mental heath? Crime goes down when the gap between the rich and the poor goes down.
- stickfigure 5mo agoSome people just want drugs.
- vostrocity 5mo agoA topic I'm interested in that is upstream of what you're saying is the propagation of meaning. If somebody has no idea what the Mona Lisa or the Statue of Liberty are, then we can't really bemoan that they would not ascribe any value to it beyond its raw material.
- dylan604 5mo agoI could understand looking at the Mona Lisa and not being impressed that it's something considered of great value. On the other hand, the sheer size of the Statue of Liberty makes that impossible to misconstrue.
- appreciatorBus 5mo agoSure, it’s impossible to misconstrue that the statue of that size has or had value to someone. But that still doesn’t mean it will have value to you. Someone who’s never seen it before, who has no exposure to the cultures that produced it or the discourse around it, can be impressed by the size, but otherwise not care. Worse, if such a person is actively hostile to the cultures that produce it, then learning that it is valuable to that culture will lead them to assign negative value to it.
- themafia 5mo agoThey didn't ask to be born and have never been given an opportunity to approve the society they're born into. The price of non-conformance is deprivation, punishment and incarceration. We should rethink this.
- JuniperMesos 5mo agoNo, the price of the specific kind of non-conformance where you vandalize radio stations to sell the copper cables for scrap is deprivation, punishment, and incarceration. Non-conformance is not problematic in and of itself, but copper theft and vandalism absolutely are.
- themafia 5mo agoThat's a rather narrow analysis. The larger point is that perhaps I don't want to negotiate a government currency and social structure in order to have shelter or to feed myself or to provide comfort. The people who attempt this often suffer those negative consequences precisely because the means to do so are often made illegal or difficult without large amounts of resources. Am I making an excuse for _this_ individual? No. Am I making a broader point about the sources of "crime" overall? Yes. The lack of caution in creating the current status quo has some obvious negative outcomes that could easily be legislated around. The impetus to do this is strangely missing.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 5mo agoThis could be made a serious felony. If the thief doesn't plan for or attempt to get say, 25% of fair market value or replacement cost (whichever is higher), multiply the penalty by 5 years, no chance of parole. Though I don't know if there are enough prisons for all those stealing catalytic converters.
- xp84 5mo agoThis is why Islamic countries have more severe punishments for thieves. At worst, they never commit a third offense.
- pjc50 5mo agoOr as mentioned upthread, a Henry Moore statue was stolen for scrap.
- odiroot 5mo agoDon't ever read about the Red Army marching west (and plundering) through Europe. You'll get a heart attack.