|
I find myself conflicted on the issue of juvenile crime. There is an angel on my shoulder and a devil on my shoulder. Or maybe I should say the devil is in my knee jerk. All of these progressive ideas about crime and restorative justice and such appeal to me but my knee jerk reaction has a very different idea. There have been trends of teenagers stealing kias for fun. They have also done smash and grab robberies by organizing in large numbers. Some of the businesses that they have targeted have shut down after losing all of their inventory in one go. Then you see complaints about the lack of grocery stores in these children's neighborhoods. I wouldn't open a grocery store there either. According to the devil on my shoulder, there is something to be said for retributive justice and a lot of that comes down to emotional need. Seeing these so-called Kia boys get off scot free after causing enormous uncompensated losses in their victims is not very satisfying emotionally. We're seeing so many juvenile crimes that I would have considered completely unthinkable and beyond the pale when I was growing up. I wasn't a perfect angel. I did graffiti. I skipped school sometimes. The thought of shooting someone or stealing a car was utterly unthinkable to me. Those are offenses that are utterly beyond the pale. The level of destruction from some of these children makes me wonder if they are just straight up psychopaths. And when they get arrested, they wind up on the street again. Or they have a punishment that feels like a slap on the wrist, but a slap in the face of their victims. These are crimes that make even me angry. Here in Chicago we're having issues with what are called euphemistically, “large group gatherings” where large groups of teenagers are gathering in the loop and wrecking the whole place or beating up random people they see for no discernible reason. There's too many of them in one place for anyone to handle. At least a very frightening and traumatic circumstance for people who are just bystanders. And there's no punishment. The angel on my shoulder says that we don’t have a fair system. We don’t even have a criminal justice system, we have a punishment system, a suffering system. The impact of incarceration is the destruction of families with the remaining family members being set up for additional failures and incarceration as the owners of the private prisons get rich off free labor. The children come from homes that have been broken by the impact of redlining, institutional racism, violence, and poverty stress. That is all assuming they even get the correct person. Frequently the court backlog and the power of the state cause defendants to be forced to confess. It’s far worse with juveniles. These children are not exactly engaging in protest when they do these group gatherings or they steal and wreck Kias for seemingly no reason. But there is a proverb that a child rejected by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth. In the case of the large group gatherings, there has been a loss of free, third places in their communities. All the other ones have driven them out or they cost money the kids don’t have. I can’t speak to 12 year olds stealing Kias specifically but I have to imagine that the complete loss of hope or plan for the future has to have had an impact. There used to be jobs out there for people without academic aptitude where you could make a decent living wage with union working conditions without a college degree. We lost those and Aid to needy families because of NAFTA and neoliberalism. K-12 students lose out on instruction because of the lack of trauma informed structure and discipline that leads to them getting suspended and arrested for acting out or maybe they never had someone at home who made them go to school in the first place. There are communities where even the Kindergarteners have attendance problems. Many of them have trauma and lead poisoning and it affects their behavior. They get passed through the system like kidney stones and get to grade levels where the content is utterly alien to them because they didn’t learn the prerequisite skills. What I want to know is how do we find the right balance when it comes to enforcing the law? How do we find justice? Both victims and juvenile offenders have suffered. The victims have taken massive losses or died as a result of juvenile crime. Those victims and their families need closure and satisfaction. Those people vote. They will vote progressives out of office in favor of reactionaries and authoritarians like Eric Adams. Juvenile offenders need to have a justice that reckons with their traumas and the very real history of institutional racism and lack of hope. Locking them up may hold them accountable but also puts them further behind, until eventually they become adult criminals and then permanent residents of the jail. So what is to be done by Chicago policy makers and judges?
|
#
?
Nov 23, 2023 03:12
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 12:17 |
|
|
Maybe tape your jerking knee to the chair? You are a victim of fearmongering. Youth arrests are down over 40 years including a 7/8 reduction in arrests for property crime. Teens of today are almost certainly more law abiding than in any time in your lifetime, including and especially when you were a teen yourself. https://www.ojjdp.gov/ojstatbb/snapshots/DataSnapshot_UCR2020.pdf Tuxedo Gin fucked around with this message at 02:27 on Nov 25, 2023 |
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2023 01:22
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:I did graffiti. Let's focus in on this. Mentally send yourself back to the "you" who did such things. Now as your past self we can ask some questions. 1) Why did you do it? 2) Would those affected by the graffiti (extending at least, to the person who has to clean it up) think you suffered more than a "slap on the wrist" for doing so? 3) What would the punishment (if caught) have to be increased to in order for teenage you to not do graffiti? 4) If you were in a group of friends doing graffiti, would you stop your friends if it suddenly became a violent gathering? 5) Were you a psychopath as a minor? 6) If the state is powerless to prevent graffiti, how can it prevent joyriding?
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2023 12:07
|
|
|
I can't speak to the other stuff because it doesn't happen nearly as often, but you mention Kia thieves. Thousands of Kias and other cars have been stolen in my city this year, much more than prior years, and it's really loving frustrating. Someone having their car stolen and totaled can literally ruin their entire life due to our lovely car-centric way of life in the US. Cars are very expensive, and without one, most people can't get to work, can't take their kids to school/other places, get groceries, etc. It should be taken seriously. I don't enjoy seeing some kid's life get ruined, but they keep being let go with a slap on the wrist because they're minors, and as a result everyone in the city loving hates them and the judges who keep letting them go, and I can't really blame them. You can help fix the problem by creating more third spaces for kids to go, promote after school programs, etc, but nobody should ever just get let go after stealing someone's car. Some of the same kids keep doing it over and over because they are let out with no consequences each time. It's insane.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 01:06
|
|
|
Queering Wheel posted:
Yeah that is what I am thinking too. I want our approach to crime to be proactive but car theft is unthinkable. Like you said, it ruins people's lives. I saw a story where some teenage girls tried to steal an uber driver's car, murdered him, and the camera footage showed one of the girls, before fleeing the scene where they murdered this grandpa say "oh no, my phone!" Their initial defense was that it was the uber driver's fault that they murdered him because he didn't just let them go with his car, the only thing he had to make a living with. It's heartless, soulless, behavior and that man's family deserves more justice than being locked up until they are 21. Murder and carjacking are not kid stuff. Graffiti is kid stuff. Shoplifting is kid stuff. Fistfights are kid stuff. (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/teens-get-maximum-sentence-death-uber-eats-driver-n1273276) I am sorry that their parents raised them bad but the rest of us need to be safe from them. Other children who don't have third places do not engage in these behaviors. Tnega posted:Let's focus in on this. Mentally send yourself back to the "you" who did such things. Now as your past self we can ask some questions. 1) Attention and amusement, and because I had a sharpie 2) I didn't get caught, though the harm of bathroom graffiti is fairly trivial 3) With bathroom graffiti the likelihood getting caught is pretty small but virtually any certain punishment would work. The key is that the likelihood of getting caught means punishments are not good deterrents. 4) I can't see my friends at the time becoming a violent gathering to be honest. 5) I think bathroom graffiti is normal behavior 6) Well I do think one bit of deterrence is to have better locks on the cars and to censor kia theft videos on social media. I also think that if these kids see their friends getting slaps on the wrist for grand theft auto and destroying someone's livelihood, that it encourages them to do it more. But if their friend goes away for a long period of time, they might rethink their destructive hobby. People die because of what they do. Nobody dies because of bathroom graffiti.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 03:09
|
|
|
My answer is that I do not balance the rights of juvenile criminals against victims, or at least I wouldn't in any system I was designing. I'd build it based on the systems you see that are designed explicitly around rehabilitation.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 05:12
|
|
|
What are these free thrid places that no longer exist because I don't really remember having any growing up in the 90s either. The "free" option was go to the mall and look at stuff you couldn't afford. Everything cost money back then too.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 06:15
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:Yeah that is what I am thinking too. I want our approach to crime to be proactive but car theft is unthinkable. Like you said, it ruins people's lives. I saw a story where some teenage girls tried to steal an uber driver's car, murdered him, and the camera footage showed one of the girls, before fleeing the scene where they murdered this grandpa say "oh no, my phone!" Their initial defense was that it was the uber driver's fault that they murdered him because he didn't just let them go with his car, the only thing he had to make a living with. It's heartless, soulless, behavior and that man's family deserves more justice than being locked up until they are 21. Murder and carjacking are not kid stuff. Graffiti is kid stuff. Shoplifting is kid stuff. Fistfights are kid stuff. (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/teens-get-maximum-sentence-death-uber-eats-driver-n1273276) Thank you for answering, we can use those answers to speculate on the mindset of the juveniles I'm question. 1) With the Kia thefts, attention and amusement probably fits. (There is also the somewhat novel addition of Internet Clout, but that would be covered under Son of Sam laws typically) I have not read any peer reviewed studies on the matter, it seems unlikely that these cars are usually being stolen with the intent of depriving their owners of their future use. 2) With the Kia thefts, assuming the teenagers did not intend to deprive the owner of the vehicle, we are left with the cost of repairing windows/steering columns. (We can address totaling cars eventually) Quick napkin math gave a cost of $4000 for the Kia repair. Obviously this is much greater than the cost of bathroom vandalism. (I have seen estimates of $200, but i think that is of the smashing toilets variety.) Yes, this is a large difference in financial burden. 3) With Car Theft/ / Joyriding, you have an escape vehicle, so getting caught is also fairly small. (Again, Napkin math puts it at 7% [70,000 arrests for 1,000,000 reported thefts]) 5) "Normal" is quite subjective. I, for instance have never engaged in bathroom graffiti. 6) First off, depending on jurisdiction, the intent to deprive the owner of the vehicle is the difference between joyriding and "Grand Theft" Auto. "Proving beyond a reasonable doubt" that a minor intended to keep or sell the vehicle is going to be hard. As for the solutions: Installing better locks is only realistically going to be done as part of a recall. (Good luck.) Censoring the videos won't work, firstly because the information is already out there, secondly, unless you are Clarence Thomas, teens have free speech rights and breaking into a car is not a crime. (Breaking into a car without permission is). And thank God for that, or me helping my friend get into his car when he locked his keys in would been a crime. The final additional solution is trying minors as adults, which like every other part of the legal system is informed by race and class. As an addendum, I see this as an unfortunate non-theoretical example of the ethical problem of forgiveness: if a crime can be "absolved" (for lack of a better word) though certain actions, those crimes then have a specific price to perform. A less harrowing example being parking fines, if the advantage you gain from breaking a parking law is less than the fine, it is irrational not to break the law.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 06:58
|
|
|
Tnega posted:Thank you for answering, we can use those answers to speculate on the mindset of the juveniles I'm question. That last bit is interesting because the same logic could be applied to murdering someone. We don't actually fine people for committing murder unless of course they are a corporation. And I know lots of companies that make dangerous products have these math formulas about civil and criminal liability versus the gains and profits from committing the crime, such as knowingly releasing a dangerous product that kills people or under staffing a chemical plant that blows up and kills a whole community. I understand some people might respond to my earlier points by saying we just need a communist revolution and capitalism is always going to produce these outcomes and such but I feel like we need a shorter term, smaller scale answer than waiting for a Messiah. Here in Chicago our mayor is Brandon Johnson and he seems committed towards models of justice that are more forgiving that appealed to the better angels of our nature. I like that I like that better. But in the short term, I'm seeing next door posts and r/crimeinchicago Reddit posts. There's a lot of anger and reactionary resentment out there that has to be responded to because those people vote. There's a real emotional need that people have to see justice done against people who steal catalytic converters or steal Kias but get light sentences because of their age or who get released from custody only to commit another crime. There's a whole blog called CWB Chicago that stirs up these people. You can say those people are racist and ignorant and they are but they also vote. These are problems and they do need to be addressed in the short term if only to prevent Kim Fox or Brandon Johnson from getting replaced by someone like Eric Adams. We need more long-term solutions but we aren't going to get them if these people aren't in office long-term.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 07:20
|
|
|
If you took the concept of restorative justice to its logical conclusion, it seems like the answer to the Kia theft question is to have the state immediately replace the vehicle, so the victim is harmed as little as possible, and then worry about the offender after. The simplest solution being that they now owe the state, like they had taken a student loan, but that runs into the issue of it essentially making it consequence-free for people with money. I guess maybe they could make it so it's only payable in organs and/or body parts? Really though, how you actually deal with the offender is a much tougher question, but (essentially) fungible property theft/destruction is like the least difficult question to answer if you're trying to apply the concept of restorative justice: Just replace the stolen item. Sure, there might be some emotional damage too, but it's not like assault or battery where it might be impossible to even get close to restoring the victim.banned from Starbucks posted:What are these free thrid places that no longer exist because I don't really remember having any growing up in the 90s either. The "free" option was go to the mall and look at stuff you couldn't afford. Everything cost money back then too.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 10:44
|
|
|
A Buttery Pastry posted:If you took the concept of restorative justice to its logical conclusion, it seems like the answer to the Kia theft question is to have the state immediately replace the vehicle, so the victim is harmed as little as possible, and then worry about the offender after. The simplest solution being that they now owe the state, like they had taken a student loan, but that runs into the issue of it essentially making it consequence-free for people with money. I guess maybe they could make it so it's only payable in organs and/or body parts? Really though, how you actually deal with the offender is a much tougher question, but (essentially) fungible property theft/destruction is like the least difficult question to answer if you're trying to apply the concept of restorative justice: Just replace the stolen item. Sure, there might be some emotional damage too, but it's not like assault or battery where it might be impossible to even get close to restoring the victim. That is a good idea, though with teen murderers and robbers, I'm not sure what you would do.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 10:49
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:That is a good idea, though with teen murderers and robbers, I'm not sure what you would do. Define murderer in this case. A juvenile running someone over while joyriding a stolen Kia is probably closest to involuntary manslaughter while intoxicated, morally. They both have impared judgment (ether from being a dumb hormonal teenager, or being drunk). And, in California, for instance the former can be as little as a misdemeanor. I bring this up, not to approve of DUI, but rather as part of a broader point: If we seek justice and not vengeance from our legal system, it must generally be consistent rather than arbitrary and / or capricious. To loop this back to the data there were 249 arrests for kia/Hyundai thefts from June 2022 to July 2023. Compared to 2,131 arrests for DUI. Is there an uptick in car theft? Yes, to what it was in 2004. If you want to actually push back against the bloodlust, you need a better story than "kids are all teaching each other to steal cars on the commie site" Data will not work, (because they know a person who knows a person who knows a person affected, you will be arguing against their lived experiences) rather, you need a villain. In this case, your vilain is Kia and Hundai who refused to add a $30 part.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 12:51
|
|
|
Tnega posted:Define murderer in this case. A juvenile running someone over while joyriding a stolen Kia is probably closest to involuntary manslaughter while intoxicated, morally. They both have impared judgment (ether from being a dumb hormonal teenager, or being drunk). And, in California, for instance the former can be as little as a misdemeanor. I bring this up, not to approve of DUI, but rather as part of a broader point: If we seek justice and not vengeance from our legal system, it must generally be consistent rather than arbitrary and / or capricious. I was thinking about those cold-blooded and heartless 14-year-olds who murdered that guy in DC and only got 7 years in jail. It was on camera that right after they left the wreckage of the car where they killed a man, they were more concerned about their expensive phone. I've talked to kids who've done stuff like this when I briefly worked at a school. They maimed an elderly teacher's assistant and said that they were glad that she was in the hospital and "gently caress that bitch" and they were more concerned with the fact that they were going to jail (to be let out in a matter of hours) then that they almost killed somebody. They can do stuff like this that I never would have considered and just not show a smidgen of remorse.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 15:12
|
|
|
those drat millennials
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 16:36
|
|
|
Again, the numbers are significantly lower than before. An almost two-thirds reduction in violent crime arrests of juveniles compared to 15 years ago, and around 75% reduction compared to 25 years ago. You are giving examples of extreme outliers. There are adult psychopaths, too. Not everyone is one. Please respond to the actual statistics that I posted after the OP, rather than things you have heard about that make you feel bad/scared.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 18:44
|
|
|
Tuxedo Gin posted:Again, the numbers are significantly lower than before. An almost two-thirds reduction in violent crime arrests of juveniles compared to 15 years ago, and around 75% reduction compared to 25 years ago. I saw what you said. But outlier or not they make the news, as does the punishment. People still fear going outside that makes a difference.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 20:16
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:I saw what you said. But outlier or not they make the news, as does the punishment. People still fear going outside that makes a difference. Is this thread supposed to be about social control and sensationalist media narratives rather than the actual crimes and criminals?
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 20:19
|
|
|
Bel Shazar posted:Is this thread supposed to be about social control and sensationalist media narratives rather than the actual crimes and criminals?
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 20:27
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:Yeah that is what I am thinking too. I want our approach to crime to be proactive but car theft is unthinkable. Like you said, it ruins people's lives. I saw a story where some teenage girls tried to steal an uber driver's car, murdered him, and the camera footage showed one of the girls, before fleeing the scene where they murdered this grandpa say "oh no, my phone!" Their initial defense was that it was the uber driver's fault that they murdered him because he didn't just let them go with his car, the only thing he had to make a living with. It's heartless, soulless, behavior and that man's family deserves more justice than being locked up until they are 21. Murder and carjacking are not kid stuff. Graffiti is kid stuff. Shoplifting is kid stuff. Fistfights are kid stuff. (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/teens-get-maximum-sentence-death-uber-eats-driver-n1273276) im going to go out on a limb and say that 'car theft' and 'carjacking + murder' are different categories any given fistfight has a (substantially) higher chance of long-term injury or death than stealing an unattended, parked kia
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2023 23:39
|
|
|
yeah I've wrestled with the "car theft is one of the worst forms of property crime in practical effect and should not be painted with the 'property crime isn't real crime' brush" thing, and arrived at the same conclusion as Pastry et al: replace the car and any lost wages, handle the criminal end in some humane and rehabilitative fashion, especially if it was stupid joyriding rather than theft-theft I also agree that the opening question is the wrong question. The rights of criminals should have little to nothing to do with the rights of victims. Make the victims whole, treat the criminals however will work out best for society, which usually means rehabilitation.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 01:11
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:I saw what you said. and chose to ignore truth because it doesn't fit your fear-mongering narrative? The entire premise of your "problem", that the youth of today are more violent and more criminal than before, has been proven to be false, yet you continue the narrative as if it were a reality.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 02:13
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:I was thinking about those cold-blooded and heartless 14-year-olds who murdered that guy in DC and only got 7 years in jail. It was on camera that right after they left the wreckage of the car where they killed a man, they were more concerned about their expensive phone. "Only" got 7 years in jail? For a 14-year-old, that's half their lives up to that point. Moreover, it's a particularly important 7 years in their education and socialization. They're spending their entire teenage years in prison, and getting out at age 21 with no money, no skills, no way to make a living, and no social connections aside from their families, their middle school classmates, and their fellow inmates. They'll be thoroughly unprepared for living on their own, and while most of their age group was learning how to live independently and make independent life decisions, they spent those years in the highly regimented prison life. Educationally, they'll have a prison GED and probably not much more.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 03:06
|
|
|
Main Paineframe posted:"Only" got 7 years in jail? For a 14-year-old, that's half their lives up to that point. Moreover, it's a particularly important 7 years in their education and socialization. They're spending their entire teenage years in prison, and getting out at age 21 with no money, no skills, no way to make a living, and no social connections aside from their families, their middle school classmates, and their fellow inmates. They'll be thoroughly unprepared for living on their own, and while most of their age group was learning how to live independently and make independent life decisions, they spent those years in the highly regimented prison life. Educationally, they'll have a prison GED and probably not much more. Well, maybe they should have thought of that before they beat someone half to death. After all, 14 year olds are well known for their abilities to think things through, which is why there's no point in having a separate juvenile system of justice... Now, there's a difference between stupid teenage poo poo and psychopathy that these attempted murderers displayed. The former can presumably be handled through a separate juvenile system, but for the latter, I can't see a solution beyond locking them up sooner rather than later. The real controversy, I think, is a situation such as those five kids in Michigan who were throwing cinder blocks off an overpass and got someone killed. That is stupid teenage poo poo that managed to get someone killed, and they did get tried as adults, incorrectly in my opinion, but felony murder is a different matter to joyriding in Kias. Let the punishment fit the criminal as well as the crime.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 04:07
|
|
|
Tuxedo Gin posted:and chose to ignore truth because it doesn't fit your fear-mongering narrative? The entire premise of your "problem", that the youth of today are more violent and more criminal than before, has been proven to be false, yet you continue the narrative as if it were a reality. Youth crime arrest numbers being lower doesn't necessarily mean that the remaining crimes committed aren't worse in nature, or at least just as bad. If the current juvenile incarceration system is designed around a broader scope of child crime then it probably needs to be rethought if the majority forms of crime are on the more extreme part of the spectrum.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 07:36
|
|
|
Zachack posted:Youth crime arrest numbers being lower doesn't necessarily mean that the remaining crimes committed aren't worse in nature, or at least just as bad. If the current juvenile incarceration system is designed around a broader scope of child crime then it probably needs to be rethought if the majority forms of crime are on the more extreme part of the spectrum.  There does appear to be a corona-correlated bump in general violent crime and youth murders in the years not included, but then it seems to me that the challenge is to find whatever changed there to make the previous excellent progress reverse. Prevention, rather than trying to change a cure that appears to have been working.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 08:31
|
|
|
A Buttery Pastry posted:Like I said: Hey thanks for posting this. Is there any chance there could be gaming the system or policy makers managing the data to make the benchmark they are judged on any better? Also do you know if there is one for car theft?
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 10:10
|
|
|
Some quick googling tells me the Kia theft problem is because the cars lack basic anti- theft measures and can be started with a screwdriver, a flaw which has apparently gone viral on tiktok.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 15:46
|
|
|
Dubar posted:Some quick googling tells me the Kia theft problem is because the cars lack basic anti- theft measures and can be started with a screwdriver, a flaw which has apparently gone viral on tiktok. This happened to our Soul and it sucked. The cops just took the kids home and even had to pay to get it unimpounded.
|
|
#
?
Nov 27, 2023 17:26
|
|
|
Semi-related to this there's a very good article in the New Yorker about Kip Kinkel, one of the first mass school shooters who carried his out ten months before Columbine. A lot of it is about his relationship with his sister but there is some about how the victims and families all wanted him to rot, but it seems like in the 25 years since, having been medicated for his schizophrenia, he's a good person who is stuck in prison with no possibility of parole unless he gets resentenced. I can copy/paste it in here if people want, just didn't want to post a massive wall of text without checking. e: yeah I know ironic av/post combo
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 03:25
|
|
|
banned from Starbucks posted:What are these free thrid places that no longer exist because I don't really remember having any growing up in the 90s either. The "free" option was go to the mall and look at stuff you couldn't afford. Everything cost money back then too. Been to a mall lately? The ones here, even in the middle class suburbs, have explicit no loitering policy and don't allow teenagers to be around without parents. When I look back at my own teenage days, the poo poo we did just doesn't exist anymore. Movie theaters are mostly gone, and the ones that still exist open in the late afternoon and want $12-15 a ticket. Can't hang out at arcades, as those don't exist anymore. Can't hang out at the mall, as they have the above policies. Can't hang out in a city park without the cops showing up to give them the stink eye. School grounds are all fenced and monitored now, so can't even hang around there. The last real 'third space' is the public library, and it's underfunded to hell so it's got little to interest them. Main Paineframe posted:"Only" got 7 years in jail? For a 14-year-old, that's half their lives up to that point. Moreover, it's a particularly important 7 years in their education and socialization. They're spending their entire teenage years in prison, and getting out at age 21 with no money, no skills, no way to make a living, and no social connections aside from their families, their middle school classmates, and their fellow inmates. They'll be thoroughly unprepared for living on their own, and while most of their age group was learning how to live independently and make independent life decisions, they spent those years in the highly regimented prison life. Educationally, they'll have a prison GED and probably not much more. Not to mention a felony on their record that means they'll probably never get a better job than line cook, since the last industry that really hires ex-cons is food service. Liquid Communism fucked around with this message at 03:49 on Nov 28, 2023 |
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 03:46
|
|
|
L. Ron DeSantis posted:Semi-related to this there's a very good article in the New Yorker about Kip Kinkel, one of the first mass school shooters who carried his out ten months before Columbine. A lot of it is about his relationship with his sister but there is some about how the victims and families all wanted him to rot, but it seems like in the 25 years since, having been medicated for his schizophrenia, he's a good person who is stuck in prison with no possibility of parole unless he gets resentenced. It's sad that a mistake he made at such a young age has denied him a chance to have a real life. How about this, when the victims he murdered rise from the grave and resume their lives, he can get out of jail and resume his.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 03:54
|
|
|
Hobologist posted:Well, maybe they should have thought of that before they beat someone half to death. After all, 14 year olds are well known for their abilities to think things through, which is why there's no point in having a separate juvenile system of justice... I'm honestly not sure whether you're being sarcastic here. The first part seems sarcastic, but the second part seems serious. That said, you're missing the point. It's not just a problem for them. When somebody is booted out onto the streets without the basic knowledge needed to function in society (because they spent their crucial schooling and socialization years in prison), that's also a problem for society. Because if they don't have any decent options for making a legitimate living then they'll probably fall right back into crime, simply for lack of other options. That's the fundamental reasoning behind rehabilitative justice. No matter how mad you are at someone's crimes, the fact of the matter is that once they're done serving their time, they're going to be back out in society and we're all going to have to live with them. Because of that, it's in everyone's best interest to help make sure that inmates are reformed into functional members of society, because their removal from society is usually only temporary.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 04:12
|
|
|
Liquid Communism posted:Been to a mall lately? The ones here, even in the middle class suburbs, have explicit no loitering policy and don't allow teenagers to be around without parents. The ones around here either don't have that policy or don't enforce it. There's always unsupervised young people around since there's a high school pretty close to one of the more active malls.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 05:16
|
|
|
Main Paineframe posted:I'm honestly not sure whether you're being sarcastic here. The first part seems sarcastic, but the second part seems serious.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 06:38
|
|
|
well you see i think you start with a humane and not psychotic perspective which eliminates two of your options, and then to avoid paying literally millions of dollars to keep someone in jail forever, you maybe try to get them to be a functioning member of society again
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 07:23
|
|
|
From a purely pragmatic standpoint, rehabilitation is less expensive anyway. It is not cheap to keep someone locked up, having them instead be a tax paying citizen is good financially for society.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 07:56
|
|
|
Liquid Communism posted:From a purely pragmatic standpoint, rehabilitation is less expensive anyway. It is not cheap to keep someone locked up, having them instead be a tax paying citizen is good financially for society. Verviticus posted:well you see i think you start with a humane and not psychotic perspective which eliminates two of your options, and then to avoid paying literally millions of dollars to keep someone in jail forever, you maybe try to get them to be a functioning member of society again These are good points. Someone might counter that irrespective of impacts of deterrence there is a message to be sent when people are given sentences about what society values and what it condemns and that if murderers and mass shooters are let out it means their crimes are more tolerated than they should be. Immanuel Kant defended retribution. Other theories of punishment than restorative justice or rehabilitation exist. Those folks might say that rehabilitation makes the punishment good for the criminal, which they don't deserve and that deterrence is using people as a means.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 08:16
|
|
|
Zoeb posted:These are good points. Someone might counter that irrespective of impacts of deterrence there is a message to be sent when people are given sentences about what society values and what it condemns and that if murderers and mass shooters are let out it means their crimes are more tolerated than they should be. Immanuel Kant defended retribution. Other theories of punishment than restorative justice or rehabilitation exist. Those folks might say that rehabilitation makes the punishment good for the criminal, which they don't deserve and that deterrence is using people as a means. This seems somewhat incoherent and adrift from the original question of juvenile punishment. To the latter, I think society at large generally assumes that a young person (I don't know if 18 is a useful line but let's say it is) is much more able to be rehabilitated than an adult due to their lack of development; therefore, having a justice system that treats them differently makes sense, although the current framework of "seven years at 14" seems both too much and too little, and doesn't send any sort of meaningful message on societal values. I guess I'd be ok with executing Kid Damian from The Omen. I think if you have the actual antichrist and he's summoning devil dogs and decapitating/impaling people with "accidents" then ok give him the chair, or probably some other method that he can't turn around on everyone because they're all standing in a pool of water.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 09:12
|
|
|
Prison sentences aren't deterrents anyway. Even the DoJ is up front about it: quote:1. The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful Their opinion is that custodial sentences primarily make prisoners incapable of committing similar crimes while in prison, but do not generally have any provable effect on recidivism, although prison experiences do exacerbate it.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 10:50
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 12:17 |
|
|
Verviticus posted:well you see i think you start with a humane and not psychotic perspective which eliminates two of your options, and then to avoid paying literally millions of dollars to keep someone in jail forever, you maybe try to get them to be a functioning member of society again Liquid Communism posted:From a purely pragmatic standpoint, rehabilitation is less expensive anyway. It is not cheap to keep someone locked up, having them instead be a tax paying citizen is good financially for society.
|
|
#
?
Nov 28, 2023 17:56
|
|