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Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
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On July 27 2023 19:42 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On July 27 2023 19:18 Mikau wrote:On July 27 2023 19:11 BlackJack wrote:On July 27 2023 18:38 Salazarz wrote:Also I didn't say a 6 year prison sentence would make someone less likely to commit a crime. I said a 6 year prison sentence would guarantee they only commit their crimes one every 6 years instead of 6 times every 1 year. Surely you don't object to the logic behind that. It's hard to get arrested for burglary 5 times in 1 year if the first time you are in jail for the rest of the year, wouldn't you agree? Just hang them all, that'll guarantee they never commit more than one crime ever. Surely you don't object to logic behind that. Alternatively since people here seem to think longer sentences don't reduce crime then that must mean shorter sentences don't increase crime. The logical conclusion to that is that 0 days in jail is just as effective a deterrent as any other sentence so just get rid of prisons altogether - you won't have any increase in crime and you don't have to spend money on prisons. If by 'people' you mean the prevailing research, then yes. You can strawman that all you want, your position simply isn't supported scientifically or by reality. Sorry, what's the strawman here? That's literally your argument - being harder on crime does not reduce crime. By that logic a punishment of 1 day in jail is just as effective as any other sentence so why even have a prison system at all? Do you just want retribution or what? shockingly the world isn't black and white.
The threat of a prison sentence would stop me from jaywalking, because its a risk I don't need to take and I have a lot to lose.
Would the death sentence stop me from murdering my wife's lover in a fit of rage? probably not since at that time I'm hardly thinking coherently. The notion of consequence doesn't even enter my mind.
Would a harsh prison sentence stop a junky without a job, living on the street from stealing so he can score another hit? No it won't because he is desperate and needs his fix.
The serial recidivist who goes right back to crime tends to not see any alternative solution to his present problems. Be it food, drugs or just money to live off of. No amount of potential punishment is going to stop them because, again, they see no other solution. Their only choice is to steal.
Giving them 1 day or 100 years doesn't change their thought process. You can throw them in jail for life so they can't steal but that isn't solving the underlying problem that society failed so badly that a person had no other choice but to turn to a life of crime.
The US has one of the largest % of population in prison. Clearly just throwing more and more people in jail for longer and longer isn't working...
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Unsurprisingly, when faced with a complex problem like the justice system in a society, even if we were to agree on the goals and on how to rank them, and then had an oracle that managed to implement them perfectly, it would probably STILL not work to prevent crime. Someone who shoplifts a bunch and then ends up stabbing someone when released from prison is tragic. But maybe that is the cost you have to accept for not just hanging every single petty criminal on their first offense.
Do I truly believe that? No. I am pretty much 100% in agreement with what Drone has been saying here. But I just wanted to point out that even if we all agreed on what the justice system should do AND had a perfect implementation of that, it would STILL fail some people.
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Norway28553 Posts
study on how new york reduced its crime rate in the 90s
Authors find that a) it is complicated but b) it was overall more attributed to increased law enforcement than to increased economic prosperity.
To reiterate, im not a fan of tough on crime approaches. But the way I see it, the argument against isnt that it fails to reduce crime, but that there is a bunch of collateral damage and that it is less necessary in a more egalitarian society - something I already vastly prefer even if you disregard the element of crime.
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On July 27 2023 22:19 Liquid`Drone wrote:study on how new york reduced its crime rate in the 90sAuthors find that a) it is complicated but b) it was overall more attributed to increased law enforcement than to increased economic prosperity. To reiterate, im not a fan of tough on crime approaches. But the way I see it, the argument against isnt that it fails to reduce crime, but that there is a bunch of collateral damage and that it is less necessary in a more egalitarian society - something I already vastly prefer even if you disregard the element of crime.
Uhm... Increased law enforcement is not the same as harsher penalties at all?
Actually enforcing laws seems to be a pretty good idea, why else would you have laws?
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On July 27 2023 22:19 Liquid`Drone wrote:study on how new york reduced its crime rate in the 90sAuthors find that a) it is complicated but b) it was overall more attributed to increased law enforcement than to increased economic prosperity. To reiterate, im not a fan of tough on crime approaches. But the way I see it, the argument against isnt that it fails to reduce crime, but that there is a bunch of collateral damage and that it is less necessary in a more egalitarian society - something I already vastly prefer even if you disregard the element of crime.
The problem with looking at crime rate reductions in the 90s or 2000s is that crime reduced in America in everywhere. Some people will attribute this to increased budgets or some strategy that was implemented by police, but reality is more likely that crime decreased due to reduction in environmental lead.
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I really like "environmental lead". I probably won't consciously steal that in the future, but I may do it anyway.
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Norway28553 Posts
On July 27 2023 23:40 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:Show nested quote +On July 27 2023 22:19 Liquid`Drone wrote:study on how new york reduced its crime rate in the 90sAuthors find that a) it is complicated but b) it was overall more attributed to increased law enforcement than to increased economic prosperity. To reiterate, im not a fan of tough on crime approaches. But the way I see it, the argument against isnt that it fails to reduce crime, but that there is a bunch of collateral damage and that it is less necessary in a more egalitarian society - something I already vastly prefer even if you disregard the element of crime. The problem with looking at crime rate reductions in the 90s or 2000s is that crime reduced in America in everywhere. Some people will attribute this to increased budgets or some strategy that was implemented by police, but reality is more likely that crime decreased due to reduction in environmental lead.
One of the first things stated in that link is that rates decreased more in NY than elsewhere in the US. Again, multiple factors can all be true, the study, nor I nor anybody else posting claims that a tough on crime approach is some panacea. But to me it is intuitively true that a) harsher punishments can in some instances influence criminal behavior, b) being more likely to be caught can in some way influence criminal behavior, c) taking criminals off the streets can to some degree reduce crime rates, and I specifically remember New York going from one of the most crime ridden cities in the US to one of the safer ones between the 80s and the 2000s.
While I am not a fan of harsher punishments for 'crimes of the poor', I do favor a tough on crime approach (more focus on uncovering + harsher punishment) for say, tax evasion. I think more would be deterred from doing just that if the probability of punishment and punishment were to increase.
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Cracking down on crime does not work — just look at the murder rate in El Salvador — it’s been completely unchanged despite the efforts of Bukele
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On July 28 2023 00:34 Liquid`Drone wrote:Show nested quote +On July 27 2023 23:40 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:On July 27 2023 22:19 Liquid`Drone wrote:study on how new york reduced its crime rate in the 90sAuthors find that a) it is complicated but b) it was overall more attributed to increased law enforcement than to increased economic prosperity. To reiterate, im not a fan of tough on crime approaches. But the way I see it, the argument against isnt that it fails to reduce crime, but that there is a bunch of collateral damage and that it is less necessary in a more egalitarian society - something I already vastly prefer even if you disregard the element of crime. The problem with looking at crime rate reductions in the 90s or 2000s is that crime reduced in America in everywhere. Some people will attribute this to increased budgets or some strategy that was implemented by police, but reality is more likely that crime decreased due to reduction in environmental lead. One of the first things stated in that link is that rates decreased more in NY than elsewhere in the US. Again, multiple factors can all be true, the study, nor I nor anybody else posting claims that a tough on crime approach is some panacea. But to me it is intuitively true that a) harsher punishments can in some instances influence criminal behavior, b) being more likely to be caught can in some way influence criminal behavior, c) taking criminals off the streets can to some degree reduce crime rates, and I specifically remember New York going from one of the most crime ridden cities in the US to one of the safer ones between the 80s and the 2000s. While I am not a fan of harsher punishments for 'crimes of the poor', I do favor a tough on crime approach (more focus on uncovering + harsher punishment) for say, tax evasion. I think more would be deterred from doing just that if the probability of punishment and punishment were to increase.
But rates decreased more in NYC than elsewhere because they were higher there as you point out later in the same paragraph that NYC was a crime ridden city. Saying you improved your math score more than me because you went from 50% to 90% and I only went from 60% to 90% isn't useful no? Does NYC have less crime than most cities in America? No it does not, although it has improved significantly in per capita crime.
There is another theory from Levitt that changes to abortion law caused less unwanted children to come of age in the 90s and 2000s which caused the drop in crime rates. All of these are contributing factors most likely, but the question is how much of that can be attributed to policies implemented by people like Giuliani versus environmental or federal law changes. I think the latter are far more prominent and we shouldn't give credit to "broken windows" policing. I can agree that it has an effect, but is it something you'd want implemented in Norway for your police?
On July 27 2023 23:39 Velr wrote:Show nested quote +On July 27 2023 22:19 Liquid`Drone wrote:study on how new york reduced its crime rate in the 90sAuthors find that a) it is complicated but b) it was overall more attributed to increased law enforcement than to increased economic prosperity. To reiterate, im not a fan of tough on crime approaches. But the way I see it, the argument against isnt that it fails to reduce crime, but that there is a bunch of collateral damage and that it is less necessary in a more egalitarian society - something I already vastly prefer even if you disregard the element of crime. Uhm... Increased law enforcement is not the same as harsher penalties at all? Actually enforcing laws seems to be a pretty good idea, why else would you have laws?
Broken windows policing is when you heavily enforce/punish minor crimes because those same people will be the murderers of tomorrow.
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On July 27 2023 22:19 Liquid`Drone wrote:study on how new york reduced its crime rate in the 90sAuthors find that a) it is complicated but b) it was overall more attributed to increased law enforcement than to increased economic prosperity. To reiterate, im not a fan of tough on crime approaches. But the way I see it, the argument against isnt that it fails to reduce crime, but that there is a bunch of collateral damage and that it is less necessary in a more egalitarian society - something I already vastly prefer even if you disregard the element of crime.
As a kid I remember those times. When Rudy Giuliani became mayor, he overhauled the NYPD. Crime rates dropped as a result, and New York City police had a reputation for being the toughest mofos in the country that nobody in their right mind wanted to mess with. My teachers would always sing praises about how tough and badass they were. Every time my parents saw a police car in traffic, they would give them a wide berth and let them pass for fear of being pulled over. Bootleggers selling VHS tapes that were recorded in movie theaters would pack up and run the instant they saw any sign of cops approaching them from blocks away (though most cops would just let them go, if you respected them enough to run).
For that era, the cops' egos matched their reputation, and I would hear rumors about them. Like they were all trained to shoot twice, once in the heart and once in the head, so no witnesses would be left alive. And stuff like an hour long car chase in New Jersey that resulted in several dead victims, but the moment the perp drove into New York he was shot dead, prompting jokes about how incompetent the New Jersey police were.
That's not to say, there weren't cases of police brutality either. I remember one where cops assaulted a victim by shoving a broomstick in "the place where the sun doesn't shine," as my classmates would put it. Poor guy. At least the cops were charged and the victim got some money.
Even before becoming NYC mayor, Giuliani had a reputation for being tough on crime for taking down the mafia. He was like Giovanni Falcone, except he didn't get blown up in a car bomb. His "tough on crime" approach and the ensuing low crime rates made him very popular with the citizens of NYC. When 9/11 happened and he was forced to rise to the occasion, his popularity and approval rating shot up even higher, if they weren't already. He finished his second term looking like a goddamned saint, and was even "knighted" by Queen Elizabeth.
It's a damn shame Giuliani's reputation is in the shitter now. I guess it shouldn't come as a surprise, as that's the fate of anyone who associates themselves with Trump. The NYPD's reputation also took a nosedive some time after. I don't remember the exact year or the details, but there was a case where two officers died in the line of duty in such an incompetent and comedic fashion that even the exchange students, outside of NYC, who I was talking to knew about it. It was at that point I realized the NYPD wasn't like I remembered, and jokes about how incompetent the NYC cops were began to surface.
As a law-abiding citizen, I would prefer that people fear the police (or should I say law enforcement) more. The meaner the cops are, and the more the people fear them, the better. And my neighbors would agree. I believe that the less people fear cops, the more willing they are to commit crimes. I don't feel things have gotten bad enough in society where I have to go out and protest, risking a nightstick to-the-head encounter with the police. I feel fine with the status quo for now, as are many around me, that you won't find any of us butting heads with law enforcement in an effort to correct what one may deem to be social injustices perpetuated by the government or plutocracy, as those issues don't really affect our immediate lives.
I'm ready to make exceptions and concessions in forming my own opinions though. Like, if union workers are striking and protesting for higher pay and more time off, I'll support them with my thoughts and prayers (and maybe a donation). I'd also agree sending the police (or worse the military) to violently shut them down would be wrong. It all depends on the issue at hand, and whether I agree with it or not.
I was playing a game in 1998 and came across this scene + Show Spoiler +
When my friends and I saw that, we all said the same thing: "Yup, that's the NYPD all right." Lol, I miss those times.
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I’m firmly of the opinion that Giuliani’s anti-crime rep is completely unearned and to the extent there’s credit to be given out, it should go to guys like Jack Maple. The “Broken Window Theory” stuff is about as classic a correlation =/= causation case as you can find, but the heroic myth is still as widespread as ever.
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Norway28553 Posts
I do not have any strong opinions on 90s guiliani. Today he is obviously insane and repugnant. No real opinion on the broken windows theory either. The paper I linked does not speak strongly of that either, only stating that '..it does not deter crime as much as some advocates argue, but it does have some effect, particularly on robberies and motor vehicle theft'. Seems plausible enough imo.
What the paper states did have an effect is increasing the police force by 35%, and that arresting burglars reduced burglaries, arresting car thieves reduced car thefts, etc. That also seems entirely plausible to me. It's not even that I support the policy (I'm actually thinking the norwegian penal system is too punitive), but thats because the negatives outweigh the positives, not because of an absense of positives.
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On July 28 2023 01:57 ChristianS wrote:
I’m firmly of the opinion that Giuliani’s anti-crime rep is completely unearned and to the extent there’s credit to be given out, it should go to guys like Jack Maple. The “Broken Window Theory” stuff is about as classic a correlation =/= causation case as you can find, but the heroic myth is still as widespread as ever.
It also typically completely neglects the rampant 4th amendment violations (that haven't really stopped since) that came with it.
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(Edit: @Drone, I hadn’t read any responses after that before posting)
Yeah, I mean, I’m skeptical of anybody that tells too confident a causal story (especially a local one) about 90’s crime rates, considering crime was insanely high and nobody knew why or what to do about it, and then it dropped precipitously everywhere, all at the same time, again without anybody really knowing why. Like, if bee populations are dying off everywhere, it’s natural to seek a causal explanation, but it should be pretty obvious somebody insisting “it’s because this farmer in Iowa switched pesticide brands” doesn’t have the whole story.
In New York specifically, it more or less coincides with Jack Maple essentially “moneyballing” the police, reworking the whole system around measuring and responding to crime rates. It’s a nice success story, and plausible enough to me, although the next thing that happens is terrible and predictable: police departments everywhere rebuild themselves around gaming crime statistics, which has all kinds of negative side effects. Sometimes they’re incentivized to lower them, resulting in department-wide efforts to downscale any reported crimes; other times they’re incentivized to raise them, resulting in (at best) upscaling reported crimes or (at worst) sending out cops to find somebody, anybody, to ticket or arrest.
A bit of a digression: my dad’s Mormon LDS, and he used to tell me stories about when he went on his mission to Brazil. Apparently there were monthly meetings at the mission where leadership would talk strategy about how to improve performance. One month it was “We’ve had a lot of first meetings this month, but a pretty low percentage lead to people requesting follow-up visits. So this month we’re really pushing to get that percentage up!” The next month it was “Okay, the percentage went up, but now first visits are down. Let’s try to get out there and make more first visits!” But it was obvious what was happening: when they wanted more first visits, missionaries would report any brief conversation in the street as a “first visit.” When they wanted better conversion to follow-up visits, they’d only report “first visits” of people that seemed genuinely interested.
This is a fundamental challenge in data-driven approaches even if you’re genuinely trying to solve the problem. But another element to this is that when police departments get good at manipulating the stats, that gives them political leverage. Wanna get elected on a platform of criminal justice reform? Well how do the cops feel about your reforms? If they don’t like them, there’s a pretty good chance crime rates will be up next time you’re up for re-election. It doesn’t really matter whether your underlying philosophy about “addressing root causes” or whatever was right, because before you can worry about *actually* lowering crime you have to first figure out how to *seem* to lower crime, or you’ll just get kicked out of office.
Although that might be less of a factor these days because people just don’t care if the stats say crime is down. Trump’s whole “American Carnage” campaign was just completely dismissive of the fact crime rates were down basically everywhere; they just kept shouting “criminals are destroying your country” anyway and voters bought it. Or that SF recall election for Chesa Boudin or w/e that BJ keeps bringing up? My understanding is that crime statistics didn’t even show an increase! But a right-wing meme campaign made her name synonymous with rising crime anyway, so she was gone.
At any rate, the net result is that when you have places (like SF!) clearly going through some dramatic and destabilizing changes, the only response available to governments is authoritarian: mandatory minimums, more cops, more military equipment, bigger police budgets. Anything else is political suicide, even though that’s basically the same shit local governments were trying in, like, 1982 and it didn’t really work.
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Part of the reason crime rates can increase after declining is that people run and hide when faced with an existential threat. They don't disappear. Criminals are no different. The idea that just going after them harder will result in crime never returning in an ugly way is simplistic and immature. The idea was proven wrong many times, for example from 1920 to 1933 when alcohol prohibition led to a massive increase of the black market, culminating in frequent gang violence and many deaths starting with Torrio and continuing with Capone. The authorities were practically helpless for the longest time. Even conservatives agree that it was not the gang bosses, but prohibition itself, that caused the rise in gang violence and other criminal activities. The initial intent was good, but the outcome was a complete disaster.
"The Prohibition Era began in 1920 when the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which banned the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors, went into effect with the passage of the Volstead Act. Despite the new legislation, Prohibition was difficult to enforce. The increase of the illegal production and sale of liquor (known as “bootlegging”), the proliferation of speakeasies (illegal drinking spots) and the accompanying rise in gang violence and organized crime led to waning support for Prohibition by the end of the 1920s. In early 1933, Congress adopted a resolution proposing a 21st Amendment to the Constitution that would repeal the 18th. The 21st Amendment was ratified on December 5, 1933, ending Prohibition."
https://www.history.com/topics/roaring-twenties/prohibition
It's strange that such fundamental lessons of history can be taught to people, and yet they don't draw the right conclusions. They keep making the same mistake in concept in various other areas, as if the historic lesson had no broader meaning.
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On July 27 2023 23:51 NewSunshine wrote:
I really like "environmental lead". I probably won't consciously steal that in the future, but I may do it anyway.
According to freakonomics the main reason was.... drumroll... More liberal abortion laws. More parents who did not think they could take care of their children 20-30 years prior did not have them.
The criminals were never born.
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On July 28 2023 04:14 Slydie wrote:Show nested quote +On July 27 2023 23:51 NewSunshine wrote:
I really like "environmental lead". I probably won't consciously steal that in the future, but I may do it anyway. According to freakonomics the main reason was.... drumroll... More liberal abortion laws. More parents who did not think they could take care of their children 20-30 years prior did not have them. The criminals were never born.
Well, if you're suggesting that, by contrast, Right-wingers rolling us back 50 years and banning abortion did so knowing it would exacerbate a host of social problems including poverty and crime, so that they can then point to the existence of those problems as evidence that we're not electing enough right-wing officials into office, and that it's some kind of vicious cycle...
Well, I'd be shocked at the thought.
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EPT
