I started thinking about the Paris Hilton thing, and back to the couple of folks I know who’ve been stopped by the cops or put in jail, and it seems they all share something, regardless of social status, economic well-being, or moral compass: a total lack of responsibility for their actions, and the feeling that someone other than they brough this upon themselves.
I understand it’s a bad thing, it sucks, but they never seem to draw the conclusion that they did something to cause this, but rather choose to blame countless other cultural trends, people, institutions, etc. What is that?
Because, if they’re persecuted, it’s the other people who are bad and wrong. If they actually consider their actions in light of personal responsibility and consequence, then they can only come to the conclusion that their behavior is unethical, immoral, and illegal, and as such, must be changed.
Changing behavior is difficult. So is acknowledging past wrong-doing. Most people would rather expend energy on denial than change.
You know, I buy that up to a point, but it’s not as if these folks have a hard time with the concept of fairness, they just don’t apply it to anything outside their situation. It reminds me of that social enlightenment scale, whatever it’s called, where some folks just don’t pass the elementary school level of awareness of their place in the world.
I say this in spite of the fact that I spent a fair bit of time growing pot and would have felt persecuted as hell if I were properly called to account for it; this is because during that time I was (not to put too fine a point on it) a total dumb-ass.
It’s a triangle: A - Victim, B - Attacker, C - Rescuer.
The initial criminal is a “B”, but once he’s in jail he puts himself into the “A” role, and tries to get sympathy from others (“C”) to help him get out, or to get someone to sorry for him, or whatever.
Then you’ve got to take into account that birds of a feather flock together, so deadbeats hang out with deadbeats. Joe gets busted for B&E but all his buddies didn’t, therefore Joe feels persecuted. They all feel unfairly singled out since they know there are sooooo many other bad guys who didn’t get jailed, see?
Well, I probably still wouldn’t blame you for potentially feeling persecuted, depending on the details. If it was just a little bit for yourself and friends–then I think the state has no business interfering with your private life, and so I couldn’t look at the crime of growing pot in the same way that I’d look at robbery or assault. I don’t think people who broke the Prohibition law in the 1920s deserved jail either, unless they committed other crimes as part of their illegal activities.
On the other hand, if you were selling to kids on the playground, etc., etc…
I intentionally drop a hammer on my foot, and feel that it is not right that it falls down, I am a dumbass, because this is the way the world works, gravity and stuff.
I intentionally commit a crime, and feel that I should not go to jail, nor should anybody who committed the same acts I did, what conclusion am I to draw if I am arrested? Don’t get caught?
“Do the crime, do the time” is one of the most nonsensical thought terminating cliches ever. Laws are a product of other bipedal apes, their execution is as well, and that is not part of “the way the world works” – it wasn’t always like this, it isn’t inherent in every vertebrate, and it sure as hell can’t be compared to gravity. People who don’t get caught are just a part of the status quo as those who do.
If you do not feel regret for your actions, and are willing to stand by them, you are being treated unjustly from your perspective. You might be a hypocrite or egocentric if you think that only you are being treated unjustly, but doesn’t suddenly make you wrong about yourself.
Most criminals have a huge, unjustified sense of entitlement. Which is largely why they became criminals in the first place. They feel they deserve an HDTV, but they can’t afford one, so they just take it. So when they get arrested and sent to prison, it’s a grave misjustice, because, after all, they were only taking what’s rightfully theirs.
Because they are trying to excuse their actions, and “I had a right to !” and “She/he deserved it !” are time honored excuses. Or because they really ARE being persecuted - it’s not like our justice system is remotely free of bias. Or because they see other people with more money/connections/whatever get treated with kid gloves while they get stomped on, and interpet that as persecution for them instead of as special treatment for the elite; we are more culturally receptive to complaints of persection than complaints of privilige.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of people with a very tenuous grasp on reality.
My ex-wife had a tremendous persecution complex. Now, she’s never been in jail as far as I know, but it was that huge Entitlement complex and a complete lack of personal responsibility in combination.
Everyone in the world was “being mean” to her.
She maxed out her credit card before we got married. Shortly thereafter, she lied to me and said that she only owed between $1000 and $1500 on it. Two months later we started to get calls from the collection agency.
She wasn’t making the minimum payments. Because they were not allowing her to use the card anymore. (Of course, that’s what happens when you exceed your credit limit) So they were being mean to her, and therefore she was not making the minimum payments, in order to PUNISH THEM.
She intended to do this until they allowed her to use the card again.
Insane much?
No matter how much I tried to explain reality to her, it didn’t matter. They were being mean to her, she was punishing them. Period.
The main difference between a convict and you is, you’ve never gotten caught. There are few people over the age of 12 who haven’t done something that warrants jail time. Have you ever shoplifted? Bought pot? Driven drunk? There are people in jail for these things, and it’s pure happenstance that you aren’t one of them.
Paris Hilton probably figures that most cars on the road have some kind of undotted i’s and uncrossed T’s, and she’s being singled out because she’s famous. I’m not sure she’s wrong.
Are you white? Think back to all the times you’ve been pulled over by the cops in the past two years, or been followed around a department store. Now compare notes with a friend who’s black. Black folks aren’t any likelier to commit crimes, but they’re a lot likelier to be incarcerated. There might be a justified sense of persecution there.
Are you serious? I honestly don’t think I have EVER done anything that warrants jail time. I’ve broken laws, certainly, but all of the minor misdemeanor sort. Do you really think that people who neither steal, nor commit acts of violence, nor use drugs are such a tiny minority?
I agree with you that Krokodil’s perception of how many people commit these kinds of crimes is overblown, and I think this is actually what leads to the persecution complex. If you justify committing crimes by assuming that “everyone” does it, then you are bound to feel persecuted when you see others seemingly getting away with it, and you don’t.
Well, about 1/4 of the population has tried those “marijuana cigarettes” I believe. Probably a lot more have driven over .08. Most people I know have sampled an adult beverage under 21. And pre 9/11 at least you would have been hard pressed to find someone at my university without a fake ID.
I have personally been to jail (albeit briefly, and more like the lobby of the jail) for walking home from a bar after a few. I think feel like we have plenty of stupid laws, and I would feel prosecuted if I was ever jailed (again) for breaking one of these laws.
Receive consensual oral sex: 10 years
Now I don’t want to debate whether these people deserve jail or not, or if they’ve done anything or not, but I’d like to point out that I do not know a single individual who has not committed a single act similar to those in the links above. Throwing stuff out of the window of a car, smoking pot, have sex/oral sex before they’re 18, find insecurities in software and websites, made stupid baggies with crushed aspirin as pranks, shot somebody with a slingshot. Yeah, some of those are really dumb ass things to do, but can somebody who goes their entire life without committing one say that they’ve truly lived :-)?
I’m an attorney and I spend a significant portion of my time representing or otherwise interacting with accused and/or convicted criminals.
In my experience, a significant portion are pretty much as you describe. However, about an equal portion admit their guilt, take their licks and try to play the system to get the best deal they can. Of course, you don’t hear much from the latter group, which makes your perception understandable.
My take? Criminals are pretty much the same as anybody else. You’ve got whiners, schemers, lowlifes, dumbasses, the outright evil and the just unlucky in about the same proportion you’d find in your workplace.
Um, groman? Without debating whether the people deserved jail or even committed crimes, these links don’t really argue your point well. The first two are cases of mistaken arrest by improperly trained officers. There’s a difference between “this shouldn’t be illegal but it is” and “law enforcement personnel mistakenly thought this was illegal and some poor schmo went to jail even though they shouldn’t have.” A few others are sensationalized… the woman in the third link was not arrested for being raped, it’s just that the circumstances of her rape brought her to the attention of authorities. She was arrested for having outstanding warrants, which I don’t really think is all that common.
You seem to be saying, “some of our arrestable offenses are so stupid that it’s hard NOT to commit so-called ‘crimes.’” That’s a fair point, but I don’t think it really answers what I said.
I will say that, as a gay man, if I lived in a different state or country (or were a generation older) I would certainly have committed arrestible offenses. It’s certainly possible to be a fine upstanding person and break silly laws, but I think it’s also pretty common not to have committed arrestible offenses.