I was talking about the propensity of many on the left to equate acknowledgement of higher crime rates among minorities with racism. Instead it appears they insist everyone ignore this or pretend it isn’t so, thus my “head in the sand” analogy.
My argument is that if it was as simple as doing what Toronto and Norway have done, others would have done it. And further, that the reasons they haven’t done it is because they can’t – for the aforementioned innumerable reasons.
There’s a term for things that are one of a kind and unduplicatable. I originally heard the term in regard to Steve Jobs. It’s ‘sui generis’. What I’m saying is that in terms of this discussion, Toronto and Norway are sui generis.
Yeah, but how long did it take between the first time someone dummied out that there were invisible animals living all around us that can cause infection and widespread acceptance of that mode of infection?
Sometimes it has been done successfully before but no one noticed or it got laughed out of notice.
Sometimes things haven’t been given enough time to demonstrate their utility and discover / work out flaws.
Yeah, I addressed the racism thing. And you are right. The tendency to dive in to be the least fill-in-the-blank of the group is beyond counter-productive.
But your argument seems to be based on our countries having traditionally marginalized people and Norway not having the same. Thus the comparison between Norway and North America is invalid.
I would suggest that humans are animals and, like animals, we will acclimate, over time, to whatever environment we are in be that personally, culturally or genetically. Timeframes are different.
It doesn’t matter much what the personal, cultural or genetic heritage of the person they are likely to benefit - measurably - more than people imprisoned under the American system.
What reason do you have to believe this is true?
I can think of a very good reason why it hasn’t been done in the United States—it’s very difficult politically to get officials to attempt justice reform and stay with them long enough, because tough on crime is politically popular and much easier to get funding for.
Support this argument.
… Because you say so?
Sorry but I’ve got to leave for the rest of the day. Maybe more later. And thanks, I appreciate the tone and nature of your posts.
Given that you said flat out in post #23 that you didn’t even bother reading the article in question, It appears to me that you appear to have no interest in facts at all.
So do you have a single cite for any of these ugly opinions that you call facts? If they are actually facts, you should be able to back them up, right?
You need prison reform to make rehabilitation possible. All his plan does is put fewer people in jail, which can be a good idea for some cases, but isn’t really a rehabilitation plan.
SA’s OLDE TYME ICE CREAM PARLOR
“HOME OF THE [del]31[/del] [del]20[/del] [del]14[/del] [del]6[/del] 1 FLAVOR[del]S[/del]”
- Listens to the sound of crickets *
That’s what I thought.
I don’t entertain specious cite requests. If you seriously want to believe that diversity doesn’t breed conflict and that racial discrimination doesn’t breed higher levels of crime you are most certainly welcome to maintain that belief.
It hasn’t been duplicated because its** hard**. Not because its complicate or mysterious. You need to spend many years following the advice of professionals and ignoring emotion-driven calls for harsher and more retributive justice.
It would take a massive political effort to try something like that in the US. And it would cost more votes than politicians are willing to lose.
You don’t entertain cite requests because you don’t have any. You literally justified your argument further up the page by claiming that “everyone knows” a fact that you had just made up.
Okay, I’ll bite.
Why is that astonishing? If - for instance - a burglar is stealing more than that a year then imprisoning her is saving the community money. Or are you suggesting that the $42K cost of incarceration is astonishing? Do you think we should just put prisoners in oubliettes and not provide them the means to reform?
Having difficulties counting to two, there?
And the reason it hasn’t been done in other places is because people in those places keep saying that it can’t be done, as evidenced by the fact that it hasn’t been.
No. The problem with your argument is that you don’t have one. You claim that all this crime is caused by minorities and that the root cause of it is racism, which seems to imply that racism doesn’t exist in these other places. I can assure you that racism exists everywhere.
Ah, you say, racism may exist, but there isn’t the diversity of population on which the racism can act – which is exactly what you did say earlier, very explicitly: “diversity breeds conflict”. But Toronto, in the example I gave, is one of the most diverse areas in the world, yet far safer than any major US city, despite the GTA alone being four times the population of Philadelphia.
So which is it? Are these other places like Toronto relatively crime-free and with low rates of recidivism because they’re not racist, or is it because they’re not diverse? Turns out, they can be both of those things, and still not have the crime problems we’re talking about if the right kinds of policies are implemented, the kind that are anathema to many conservatives and that you automatically dismiss out of hand because of imaginary “differences” that are somehow insurmountable obstacles to policies you happen to dislike.
Thus, racism exists, but as can be seen from my cites above, active policy measures are being taken to combat it, and as cited earlier, a focus on rehabilitation for convicted offenders has led to much lower rates of recidivism than experienced in comparable US jurisdictions. These are all policy measures that can be undertaken anywhere, instead of sitting back and declaring crime and recidivism to be an insoluble problem because of all the blacks.
The central problem with your positions on these matters is that they’re utterly inconsistent with facts and evidence.
Which practices in the article are you most concerned about? I’m assuming you’ve read it by now, given that you’ve posted more words to this thread than are contained in the article.
He’s too busy weeping for the citizens of Toronto, who live in a blasted hellscape because they aren’t racist, or something.
I live in Philly. Like many Philadelphians, I’m a bleeding heart left wing liberal. I voted for Krassner. I’d do it again.
I do NOT (despite what some would claim) want leniency for all crimes and all criminal. For instance, I want Mumia Abu Jamal executed. I’m happy keeping rapists, murderers and such behind bars for a very long time- sometimes for life.
IME- most prostitutes need (and would accept) help, not punishment. Pennsylvania has medical marijuana. But, the governor and nimbyism keep dispensaries from being built. Philly’s Mayor Kenney (who I also voted for) said that he wanted recreational marijuana made legal here and that PA could use its bizarre system of liquor stores to sell (and proift on) weed.
IN closing, we have Mummers and you don’t!
That assumes that prison is a significant deterrent to crime, but the statistics belie that belief. There is a very high rate of recidivism among criminals who have been in the prison system, and that strongly suggests that prison is NOT a deterrent to crime.
It reminds me of the assertion that there would be a statistically significant rise in murders in those states that chose to eliminate the death penalty.
It was the exact opposite of a deterrent in my case. I may have sold a little bit of pot before I went to prison, but I was basically a law abiding citizen. While in prison, I met all sorts of interesting people who helped me become a much more effective criminal. I met my major cartel connection in prison, which led to a career of selling a shitton of cocaine. I also spent a lot of time working out due to boredom, so I came out stronger and more dangerous than I went in. Then I got out, tried to find a legit job with a criminal conviction, and realized how badly the deck was stacked against me. Eventually, I reached a point where it was a choice whether to just embrace being the criminal I apparently was now, or starve. Guess what I chose?
So I came out far, far more crooked than I went in. Most of the guys I know who have spent time in prison would agree with that statement.