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Of course, my point was that he is not different from those in Oakland perpetrating these crimes in kind, but only a matter of degrees; there is a point where h

Of course, my point was that he is not different from those in Oakland perpetrating these crimes in kind, but only a matter of degrees; there is a point where he too would commit unethical acts if he became desperate enough. And that is the ultimate point here, we are all capable of committing crimes if we became desperate enough. This is a property of humanity, not just of a group of morally depraved oaklanders. Thus it makes sense to address the issue in a systemic fashion, i.e. jobs and opportunity.

twoodfin 13y ago
And that is the ultimate point here, we are all capable of committing crimes if we became desperate enough. We are? I can imagine committing a violent crime if I were not in control of my faculties, or if I were being blackmailed in some horrible (and manifestly illegal) way. But there are many, many poor people who do not commit crime when sound of mind and body, and it's rather disrespectful to the important notions of free will and human dignity to assume that they just haven't been ground down to their limit yet.
- hackinthebochs 13y ago
  Well I'm not a big believer of the layman's usage of "free will" to begin with (in fact I believe it to be self-contradictory), so I'm sure we could have a long discussion on the subject. But from a different perspective, I always find it laughable when people like to claim that they or us in modern times are (or should be) so far above certain types of behavior, violent or otherwise. Human history is a trail of tragedy perpetrated by regular people no different from you and me. To think that you are somehow different than all those that came before is pure egoism.
  - twoodfin 13y ago
    Human history is a trail of tragedy perpetrated by regular people no different from you and me. To think that you are somehow different than all those that came before is pure egoism. This is sophistry. Of course some people are different from others. Only a tiny minority of people living in the U.S. will commit violent crimes over the course of their lives, despite a much larger minority living in poverty or facing other hardships. Those who commit violent crimes are different by choice. If you don't think those of sound mind are responsible for their own actions, it's hard to see how you can think of democratic society as anything but a doomed experiment.
    - hackinthebochs 13y ago
      >Only a tiny minority of people living in the U.S. will commit violent crimes over the course of their lives And this is a result of the society we live in (welfare state, etc), not a fundamental property of us as a people. Take all those things away and you will see a very large increase in violent crime. My point is that the difference between those who commit crimes now and those that don't is simply a matter of degrees. Nothing you've said contradicts that. Of course people are responsible for their own actions; what people are not are analytical machines that consider all possible scenarios independent of emotions and drives. It is the drives and emotions that strongly bias our internal scoring system for various decisions. So in this sense we are prone to acting irrational when it is in our best interest (from the perspective of our primitive brain). Society is constructed to allow us to provide for our basic needs so that we can suppress our basic instincts and make the best rational decisions collectively. Democracy does not crumble in the face of partially irrational actors.
    - rhizome 13y ago
      If you don't think those of sound mind are responsible for their own actions, Pretty big assumption here, don't you think? Poverty can drive a person crazy, and when national economic policies proscribe mandatory unemployment so that oligarchs will stop crying about wage prices, bad things can be seen as being designed into the system. There are no rational actors, just self-interested ones.

twoodfin 13y ago

And that is the ultimate point here, we are all capable of committing crimes if we became desperate enough. We are? I can imagine committing a violent crime if I were not in control of my faculties, or if I were being blackmailed in some horrible (and manifestly illegal) way. But there are many, many poor people who do not commit crime when sound of mind and body, and it's rather disrespectful to the important notions of free will and human dignity to assume that they just haven't been ground down to their limit yet.

hackinthebochs 13y ago
Well I'm not a big believer of the layman's usage of "free will" to begin with (in fact I believe it to be self-contradictory), so I'm sure we could have a long discussion on the subject. But from a different perspective, I always find it laughable when people like to claim that they or us in modern times are (or should be) so far above certain types of behavior, violent or otherwise. Human history is a trail of tragedy perpetrated by regular people no different from you and me. To think that you are somehow different than all those that came before is pure egoism.
- twoodfin 13y ago
  Human history is a trail of tragedy perpetrated by regular people no different from you and me. To think that you are somehow different than all those that came before is pure egoism. This is sophistry. Of course some people are different from others. Only a tiny minority of people living in the U.S. will commit violent crimes over the course of their lives, despite a much larger minority living in poverty or facing other hardships. Those who commit violent crimes are different by choice. If you don't think those of sound mind are responsible for their own actions, it's hard to see how you can think of democratic society as anything but a doomed experiment.
  - hackinthebochs 13y ago
    >Only a tiny minority of people living in the U.S. will commit violent crimes over the course of their lives And this is a result of the society we live in (welfare state, etc), not a fundamental property of us as a people. Take all those things away and you will see a very large increase in violent crime. My point is that the difference between those who commit crimes now and those that don't is simply a matter of degrees. Nothing you've said contradicts that. Of course people are responsible for their own actions; what people are not are analytical machines that consider all possible scenarios independent of emotions and drives. It is the drives and emotions that strongly bias our internal scoring system for various decisions. So in this sense we are prone to acting irrational when it is in our best interest (from the perspective of our primitive brain). Society is constructed to allow us to provide for our basic needs so that we can suppress our basic instincts and make the best rational decisions collectively. Democracy does not crumble in the face of partially irrational actors.
  - rhizome 13y ago
    If you don't think those of sound mind are responsible for their own actions, Pretty big assumption here, don't you think? Poverty can drive a person crazy, and when national economic policies proscribe mandatory unemployment so that oligarchs will stop crying about wage prices, bad things can be seen as being designed into the system. There are no rational actors, just self-interested ones.