The All Things Political Topic - Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.

[rjshae]

2 hours ago, BruceVC said:

A pity, they should have let him shoot himself or  " suicide by cop " 

I take the view that eighty years spent rotting away in a high security prison is a worse punishment than execution. It's a disincentive for those who would follow. Plus scientists can perform experiments on his brain.

[Hurlshort]

28 minutes ago, rjshae said:

I take the view that eighty years spent rotting away in a high security prison is a worse punishment than execution. It's a disincentive for those who would follow. Plus scientists can perform experiments on his brain.

Scientific work aside, I don't know why people think handing out long prison terms discourages crime. There doesn't seem to be any connection to the huge boom in prison population and crime rates.  

[Malcador]

Just now, Hurlsnot said:

Scientific work aside, I don't know why people think handing out long prison terms discourages crime. There doesn't seem to be any connection to the huge boom in prison population and crime rates.  

Well, we need revenge.

[Gfted1]

See! If we had UBI, UHC and UFH people wouldnt be forced to steal to survive.

What are the most common crimes in the United States? - Criminal Justice Degree Hub

[BruceVC]

33 minutes ago, Hurlsnot said:

Scientific work aside, I don't know why people think handing out long prison terms discourages crime. There doesn't seem to be any connection to the huge boom in prison population and crime rates.  

Nah, it makes people feel much better who live in countries that are beset by crime to know people are incarcerated for breaking the law and committing serious crimes  

 

[BruceVC]

1 hour ago, rjshae said:

I take the view that eighty years spent rotting away in a high security prison is a worse punishment than execution. It's a disincentive for those who would follow. Plus scientists can perform experiments on his brain.

That is also a good point and also considering the influence of African American gangs in US prisons I cant imagine he  would have a great time 

[rjshae]

21 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

Nah, it makes people feel much better who live in countries that are beset by crime to know people are incarcerated for breaking the law and committing serious crimes  

Sounds like an argument for execution then. My issue with that is the cases where people have been unjustly convicted of violent crimes they did not commit. E.g. Thomas James. Perhaps though some day we'll be able to reprogram criminals with a neural interface?

[BruceVC]

26 minutes ago, rjshae said:

Sounds like an argument for execution then. My issue with that is the cases where people have been unjustly convicted of violent crimes they did not commit. E.g. Thomas James. Perhaps though some day we'll be able to reprogram criminals with a neural interface?

It depends on what you want to achieve when people commit heinous crimes, many people want the person to feel consequences for this type of mass shooting

So this 18 year old man will spend the rest of his life in jail as opposed to " suicide by police " which is quick 

So I agree with you that execution is not the right type of justice for this type of crime  

[Gfted1]

Its a known FACT that most prisoners are just poor schmucks that got dealt a bad hand in life and had no choice but to turn to a life of crime. Working is hard, F-that! If we simply provided everyone free money, shelter, medicine and education then the prisons would be virtually empty in a generation. The solution is so easy, just remove all of the things in life that requires effort and we will sail into nirvana on gossamer wings. 

[Hurlshort]

1 hour ago, Gfted1 said:

Its a known FACT that most prisoners are just poor schmucks that got dealt a bad hand in life and had no choice but to turn to a life of crime. Working is hard, F-that! If we simply provided everyone free money, shelter, medicine and education then the prisons would be virtually empty in a generation. The solution is so easy, just remove all of the things in life that requires effort and we will sail into nirvana on gossamer wings. 

[rjshae]

People being what they are, I'm a bit skeptical about promises of utopia. Even the wealthy (who have everything they could possibly need) still commit crimes; they just have better lawyers. Do we get free high end lawyers as well?

[Gromnir]

2 hours ago, Hurlsnot said:

image

the thing is, you are being reasonable, and that is a flawed starting point. first step is you need imagine total lack o' self awareness coupled with a me and mine mentality which challenges credulity. school lunches for kids is bad 'cause is free for them. welfare is bad 'cause even if the vast majority o' adults receiving welfare benefits do so for less than six months, they are undeserving; likely using the free money to buy drugs and alcohol. programs which tax me and mine to provide benefits for they and them is necessarily bad even if those programs may be shown to benefit society as a whole.  however, if a program is designed to tax the "fat cats" so everybody else benefits, including me and mine, then is good.

unreasonable? sure but not necessarily irrational. rationality may be maintained even if the initial premise is unreasonable. as long as internal consistent, unreasonable may be rational. regardless, you gotta start with embracing a comical unapologetic me and mine perspective which am guessing is difficult for hurl.  good luck with that.

HA! Good Fun!

Edited May 17, 2022 by Gromnir

[Gorth]

5 hours ago, Gfted1 said:

Its a known FACT that most prisoners are just poor schmucks that got dealt a bad hand in life and had no choice but to turn to a life of crime. Working is hard, F-that! If we simply provided everyone free money, shelter, medicine and education then the prisons would be virtually empty in a generation. The solution is so easy, just remove all of the things in life that requires effort and we will sail into nirvana on gossamer wings. 

(bonus points if anyone is old enough to recognize it)

[Gromnir]

instant recognized as lemmings... 'cause am old.

HA! Good Fun!

[Agiel]

With Elon Musk being South African and a self-proclaimed “free speech absolutist” I’m curious if he’s familiar with Polish artist Krzysztof Wodiczko.

Projection of a swastika on the South African embassy in London during Apartheid. Projection was taken down two hours later for being a “public nuisance.”

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by Agiel

[BruceVC]

8 hours ago, Gfted1 said:

Its a known FACT that most prisoners are just poor schmucks that got dealt a bad hand in life and had no choice but to turn to a life of crime. Working is hard, F-that! If we simply provided everyone free money, shelter, medicine and education then the prisons would be virtually empty in a generation. The solution is so easy, just remove all of the things in life that requires effort and we will sail into nirvana on gossamer wings. 

Absolutely. Its much easier to make constant excuses and justify various social ills and levels of crime  in countries like the USA, and other Democracies like UK and SA,  than for citizens to take real responsibly for their lives

Its always the same argument ..." the system is against me, I had no choice ". And what makes it worse is you have these " experts "  with their university  studies and big words who use the media to tell us " this is exactly correct and is a societal  outcome of inequality". This is the common argument in SA for high levels of crime and violence and our SJW and liberals always repeat this spurious and ineffective approach to addressing much of our social woes 

But their is never any personal responsibility and yet in the majority African countries who have much worse poverty and much worse true inequality there is less crime   

 

[BruceVC]

4 hours ago, Gorth said:

(bonus points if anyone is old enough to recognize it)

Not sure but it looks very violent....I hope it was banned 

[Gorth]

Just now, BruceVC said:

Not sure but it looks very violent....I hope it was banned 

I was my favourite game when it came out

 

9 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

But their is never any personal responsibility and yet in the majority African countries who have much worse poverty and much worse true inequality there is less crime  

Who taught people to take personal responsibility? Humans are born with a few innate abilities, selfishness being one of them. Take your hand out of a burning fire being another. Basic stuff that ensures the individuals survival. For everything else, you need someone to teach you. Where is this mindset supposed to come from?

[BruceVC]

4 minutes ago, Gorth said:

I was my favourite game when it came out

 

Who taught people to take personal responsibility? Humans are born with a few innate abilities, selfishness being one of them. Take your hand out of a burning fire being another. Basic stuff that ensures the individuals survival. For everything else, you need someone to teach you. Where is this mindset supposed to come from?

I dont know who teaches most people their moral compass and that breaking the law is wrong, I guess family structures?

I just know their is much less violent crime and the type of social unrest we see in SA than basically every African country, outside of conflict areas., and as I said the levels of poverty is much worse and social services much less in these African countries 

So the inequality argument is unconvincing as a justification for most criminality ?

 

[alanschu]

9 hours ago, Gfted1 said:

Its a known FACT that most prisoners are just poor schmucks that got dealt a bad hand in life and had no choice but to turn to a life of crime. Working is hard, F-that! If we simply provided everyone free money, shelter, medicine and education then the prisons would be virtually empty in a generation. The solution is so easy, just remove all of the things in life that requires effort and we will sail into nirvana on gossamer wings. 

[Gorth]

15 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

I dont know who teaches most people their moral compass and that breaking the law is wrong, I guess family structures?

I just know their is much less violent crime and the type of social unrest we see in SA than basically every African country, outside of conflict areas., and as I said the levels of poverty is much worse and social services much less in these African countries 

So the inequality argument is unconvincing as a justification for most criminality ?

 

Maybe SA is the exception? Got any numbers?

I could've shared the first 30 links showing that poverty and crime are related. But instead I'll just point out an interesting correlation. Poverty doesn't lead to more economic crime, but it leads to significantly more violence (and violent crimes, like gang violence, domestic violence, you name it)

 

According to this, SA has the 3rd highest crime rate in the world (2022 numbers)

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/crime-rate-by-country

 

[alanschu]

4 hours ago, Gromnir said:

the thing is, you are being reasonable, and that is a flawed starting point. first step is you need imagine total lack o' self awareness coupled with a me and mine mentality which challenges credulity. school lunches for kids is bad 'cause is free for them. welfare is bad 'cause even if the vast majority o' adults receiving welfare benefits do so for less than six months, they are undeserving; likely using the free money to buy drugs and alcohol. programs which tax me and mine to provide benefits for they and them is necessarily bad even if those programs may be shown to benefit society as a whole.  however, if a program is designed to tax the "fat cats" so everybody else benefits, including me and mine, then is good.

Reading this and with topical news of the day reminds me of Joyce Arthur's column about how "The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion" which is a ton of anecdotes from health care providers about the times that anti-abortion activists received abortions.

https://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/articles/anti-tales.shtml

Some fascinating stories of people literally returning to protesting outside the same clinic the next day, to others judging the other people in the same waiting room it they were waiting in. (It was the latter that your post reminded me of)

[alanschu]

11 minutes ago, Gorth said:

Maybe SA is the exception? Got any numbers?

I could've shared the first 30 links showing that poverty and crime are related. But instead I'll just point out an interesting correlation. Poverty doesn't lead to more economic crime, but it leads to significantly more violence (and violent crimes, like gang violence, domestic violence, you name it)

 

I was curious and just did a (possibly naive) google search and South Africa is listed as the country with the worst wealth inequality by Gini Index in the entire world, according to https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/wealth-inequality-by-country

Top 10 Countries with the Highest Wealth Inequality (World Bank Gini index):

1. South Africa - 63.0%
2. Namibia - 59.1%
3. Suriname - 57.9%
4. Zambia - 57.1%
5. Sao Tome and Principe - 56.3%
6. Central African Republic - 56.2%
7. Eswatini - 54.6%
8. Mozambique - 54.0%
9. Brazil - 53.4%
10. Botswana - 53.3%

Edited May 17, 2022 by alanschu

[Gorth]

2 minutes ago, alanschu said:

I was curoius and just did a (possibly naive) google search and South Africa is listed as the country with the worst wealth inequality by Gini Index in the entire world, according to https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/wealth-inequality-by-country

Top 10 Countries with the Highest Wealth Inequality (World Bank Gini index):

1. South Africa - 63.0%
2. Namibia - 59.1%
3. Suriname - 57.9%
4. Zambia - 57.1%
5. Sao Tome and Principe - 56.3%
6. Central African Republic - 56.2%
7. Eswatini - 54.6%
8. Mozambique - 54.0%
9. Brazil - 53.4%
10. Botswana - 53.3%

Sorry, you just missed my edit

I'll just continue my post here then with a quote (these are crime figures, not poverty index):

1. Venezuela (83.76)
2. Papua New Guinea (80.79)
3. South Africa (76.86)
4. Afghanistan (76.31)
5. Honduras (74.54)
6. Trinidad and Tobago (71.63)
7. Guyana (68.74)
8. El Salvador (67.79)
9. Brazil (67.49)
10. Jamaica (67.42)

"South Africa has the third-highest crime rate in the world. South Africa has a notably high rate of assaults, rape, homicides, and other violent crimes. This has been attributed to several factors, including high levels of poverty, inequality, unemployment, and social exclusion, and the normalization of violence. South Africa has one of the highest rape rates in the world. More than 1 in 4 men surveyed by the South African Medical Research Council admitted to committing rape."

 

[alanschu]

3 minutes ago, Gorth said:

Sorry, you just missed my edit

I'll just continue my post here then with a quote (these are crime figures, not poverty index):

1. Venezuela (83.76)
2. Papua New Guinea (80.79)
3. South Africa (76.86)
4. Afghanistan (76.31)
5. Honduras (74.54)
6. Trinidad and Tobago (71.63)
7. Guyana (68.74)
8. El Salvador (67.79)
9. Brazil (67.49)
10. Jamaica (67.42)

"South Africa has the third-highest crime rate in the world. South Africa has a notably high rate of assaults, rape, homicides, and other violent crimes. This has been attributed to several factors, including high levels of poverty, inequality, unemployment, and social exclusion, and the normalization of violence. South Africa has one of the highest rape rates in the world. More than 1 in 4 men surveyed by the South African Medical Research Council admitted to committing rape."

 

All good. Was just interesting to hear the discussion about wealth inequality when it seems like South Africa in particular is not a particularly good counter example to the idea that wealth inequality is at least correlated (if not in some way causal) with crime rates.

Your last line illustrates other factors beyond just inequality that can also play a part though, so have a solid from me

My link also had this to say about South Africa:

"South Africa’s income inequality has become worse over the years. The top 1% of earners take home almost 20% of income and the top 10% take home 65%. That means that 90% of South African earners take home only 35% of all income. Incomes in South African remain to be racialized, gendered, and spatialized, meaning that white people are more likely to find work (and work that pays better) than their black counterparts; female workers earn about 30% less than male workers; and urban workers earn about double that of those in the countryside."

Sharing that just to show how inequality can permeate and exacerbate other issues within a country.

It's part of why I shifted away from my Libertarian-esque "fiscally conservative, socially progressive" politics. Ta-Nehisi Coates' A Case For Reparations was a very seminal reading in demonstrating to me how (in his example) racism, something I erroneously held as social and not economical, played a significant role in materially disadvantaging certain communities. What was especially eye-opening for me was the story of Bill and Daisy Myers. When they moved into an all-white neighbourhood, there was a lot of resistance based on "obvious" racism. What hadn't really clicked for me before, though, was a quote from a white owner about how he was sure the Myers were perfectly fine people, but when he saw them all he saw was the value of his house going down $20,000. An example of someone that is ostensibly not-racist, but ultimately upholding a racist system because to not do so meant real material costs. In this way I realized that social/fiscal stuff were a lot more intertwined than I had originally given credit.