To reconsider my feelings re. Death penalty.

[FoxgloveFairy]

Just read a story about a young guy in the US who broke into a house and, not finding anything to steal, decided to rape the female occupant. A 101 year old woman. Not a string-em-up advocate, but just looking at the arrogant grin on this young man's face in court, I feel right now I could be persuaded.

[whatwhatinthewhatnow]

I disagree with the death penalty on the basis that taking someones life is wrong. Call it murder or corporeal punishment, you are still taking away a life. Just because it is court ordered, does not make killing right.

You cannot say killing is wrong and then kill as punishment.

[elephantspoo]

whatwhatinthewhatnow - I completely agree with this. I do not believe it is wrong, I believe that circumstances dictate what is right and what is wrong, but everyone has their own opinion, and that is as it should be. Society draws a balance from those differing opinions and chooses what to do with criminals as it sees fit. This is how we control crime in our country. Our choices as a society result in policy, and policy is the lever that controls our crime rates. Some poeple are happy to pretend we do not control our crime rate, and that our actions and choices have no effect on the levels of crime, but the evidence is all around us that they do. We get the crime levels that our policies produce.

Icimoi - Do you have any solution to offering justice to a rape victims, that does not involve spending more money that clearly the rapist is not going to provide? Do you think that rape is treated just fine the way it is by society? Do you believe that they should be locked up for life? In regard to work, do you believe they should be taught to fill in forms on compuers, or package goods, or do you believe maybe asking them to do manual labour may be equitable? Is asking a prisoner to dig drainage ditches too close to slavery (as some claim)?

And I don't get why 'teaching' a rapist to 'open up and talk about raping people', explore what the victim might feel, and why they might get off on raping women, constitutes rehabilitation and prevents them from raping more women upon release. Maybe they they are 'taught' to empathise with the girls they rape, and that makes them feel bad, so they don't rape girls again, but I don't see much evidence that that sort of rehabilitation works. Nor do I see a link between 'education' and rape. I don't think rapists are raping girls because they didn't learn to read or write well in school, so I don't see that teaching them and giving them books will prevent them raping women in the future.

Now I'm not saying don't give them books. I fundamentally believe access to books is a basic human right. I am just saying I don't see the link between raping a 101 year old woman and any form of 'rehabilitation' that can be demonstrated to remove a guys wish to rape old ladies.

[Dutch1e]

Foxglove, your husband's idea of dumping them on a inhospitable island is a good one but not new. It's called Australia

[elephantspoo]

Lol
It worked for that generation, and it made money, but as detractors would point out, innocents were also sent to the colonies, and they were forced to work. Too un-PC for today's rapists. They reoffend less if you let them play Xbox.

[ghostyslovesheep]

Elephants as a 'rape victim' (I prefer the term survivor) I ask you not to speak for me - I am opposed to the death penalty and other draconian ideas of 'justice'

so please stop talk for and about 'rape victims'

thank you

also women and children get raped - not just 'girls'

[elephantspoo]

ghostyslovesheep - I have no issue with people being opposed to the death penalty. Opposition to killing is why we have the system we do, and in our society balance is struck in what is seen as the most equitable way to suit the wants of all of society.

But I am curious. Do you advocate punishing rapists, and what punishment do you personally believe to be just? Do you think rehabilitation through counselling and education work? And do you think rapists are likely to rape again if free to do so?

You see I've asked these questions and no-one seems able to answer. I accept that a return to capital punishment is both draconian and extreme. But other than rile against the notion, I have seen no alternate proposal from the thread.

So, as a survivor, did the system serve your needs well? Was the perpetrator's sentence just?

[writtenguarantee]

But other than rile against the notion, I have seen no alternate proposal from the thread.

several people have given one: much higher sentences.

No doubt some rapists and murderers are beyond the pale and irredeemable, in which case life in prison is the only option.

This is how we control crime in our country. Our choices as a society result in policy, and policy is the lever that controls our crime rates. Some poeple are happy to pretend we do not control our crime rate, and that our actions and choices have no effect on the levels of crime, but the evidence is all around us that they do. We get the crime levels that our policies produce.

You have asserted this repeatedly and amongst your statements the most untrue.

In Britain, Canada and the US (and I think much of the rest of the world, but I am talking about those three countries because I know), crime has been falling for about 25 years, and most of that fall is a big mystery to criminologists. They have explanations for different places (for example, NYC simply flooded the city with police), but it really doesn't explain the fall in crime even locally, much less globally. They have also had to bin a lot of conventional wisdom during this time. A lot of people predicted that the market crashes in the late 90s and late 2000s would lead to a spike in unemployment and that crime would shoot up. It didn't. So, why crime is going down remains a mystery to people who study the subject.

Except apparently to you. You seem to think there is a direct correlation between crime and punishment. That turning the punishment dial directly affects crime and we can fine tune the crime level as we please. It's all within our control. I am pretty sure you are alone in that view.

[writtenguarantee]

I should say the UK has followed the fall in crime pattern a little less than north america (where, especially in america, the fall has been dramatic).

[DoraGora]

The fall is US crime is proportional to the rise in its incarceration rate. Oddly enough, though, albeit from a lower base, the fall in the Canadian crime rate has also been precipitous, over a similar period, without a corresponding rise in prison population. Though, it probably doesn't need stating, Canada is not the USA!

[PigletInABlanketJohn]

Crime falls about 20 years after certain things:

Liberalisation of abortion laws

Removal of lead from petrol.

It has no particular correlation with severity of prison sentences.

You might not believe me. Have a look.

[writtenguarantee]

The fall is US crime is proportional to the rise in its incarceration rate.

but it's not more murders (where the big fall has occurred) and rapists in jail. The big rise in prison population is due to the war on drugs.

[elephantspoo]

If there is no evidence that prison sentencing reduces crime, and no evidence that incarceration has in any way any impact of the amount of crime in society, then it serves no purpose. Why not either release all criminals and their incarceration has no measurable benefit to society, but a definite measurable cost, or just put a bullet in everyone's head, which would quite definitely illuminate any possibility of recurring crime.

Your contention that society has no means of controlling crime with prisons runs contrary to every argument everyone has made against capital punishment.

In regard to any of these statistics, however, I expect they are as accurate as all other government sponsored statistics, with no bias, political intent or obfuscation whatsoever. I trust them a little less than those I get from my dog.

I assume if we are at a point where you contend that there is no means of controlling rape and murder in society with incarceration, and a belief that capital punishment will only exacerbate the issue, your only course of action remaining is aether to educate rape and murder out of children in school, or legalise it. I really don't understand your view.

[elephantspoo]

Perhaps if we started recording crimes, and employed third parties without vested interests in the outcomes, we would see statistics that reflected what was happening in society, as opposed to what was required at the ballot box. Honesty is not the sort of idea you'd want in a 'civilised' society mind you. It has a nasty habit of spreading.

[writtenguarantee]

If there is no evidence that prison sentencing reduces crime, and no evidence that incarceration has in any way any impact of the amount of crime in society, then it serves no purpose. Why not either release all criminals and their incarceration has no measurable benefit to society,

read again. That's not what I said. I said you can't simply fine tune the amount of crime by changing penalties. there are other more significant factors. It's not the case that we can say we want 13 less murders and adding 1.3 years to the sentences will achieve that.

In regard to any of these statistics, however, I expect they are as accurate as all other government sponsored statistics, with no bias, political intent or obfuscation whatsoever. I trust them a little less than those I get from my dog.

So, you don't believe in statistics because they don't agree with your worldview? So, what do you base your ideas on, if not the available numbers?

[DoraGora]

The obvious problem with numbers is that it all depends on what you do with them. They're not an unqualified good.

[elephantspoo]

So, you don't believe in statistics because they don't agree with your worldview? No, I don't believe in statistics supplied by non-transparent political sources, because their accumulation is concealed, subjective, and politically motivated.

You honestly believe you live in a country with a 1.3% inflation rate?! You honestly believe we have a 6% unemployment rate? You honestly believe the country is grew wealthier by 1.7% last year?

When there is no way in hell you can buy this Christmas' food and fuel for only 1.3% more than you did last year; When the greatest job losses are in the country are in full time skilled labour, and the greatest job increases are in low skilled minimum wage, part time and zero hours contracts, and when last year we did not include hookers and drug smuggling into our GDP figures, but this year do; that looks a lot like fake statistics generated to present a political point, and fed to the sheep with all the other shit they consume on their televisions. And you are now telling us that crime figures are accurately recorded, presented, and comparable to previous years figures because they have been calculated in exactly the same way as before, not manipulated or in any way obfuscated to meet the political need?

[writtenguarantee]

and what statistics tell you all that? Unless you have collected them yourself (I highly doubt it) you have less than possibly flawed statistics. You have nothing. so you doubt the inflation rate? On what basis? The unemployment rate is fudged on it's definition, not in the gathering procedure.

Statistics are not collected by the govt in many cases. They are collected by the ONS. So your charge is that they are manipulated either by redefining what to include or sheer fraud? On what basis? Crime statistics wobble. It's not a steady downward decrease. Some years it goes up. Sometimes it goes down even when the govt changes hands. Why? why wouldn't they be manipulated up? Statistics are gathered after the year to which the pertain.

You simply have no basis for your assertions. if you doubt all statistics we have nothing to talk about. We can't talk about your anecdotal evidence.

[elephantspoo]

I merely point out that your 'statistical, evidence does not constitute fact. There is no evidence that it is accurate, not that it is collected or collated accurately.

In regard to those concerning this country's actual inflation rate, joblessness, and GDP, I can absolutely prove that the reported figured are far from accurate. I can absolutely prove a trending in the reporting of those statistics towards following the needs of the government of the day, stretching back to the mid-80's. But that falls out with the scope of this thread, indeed this forum, and I am sure no-one wants to read it. I certainly don't intend to write about it here. Anyone who wishes to study economics and politics is well aware of how and why statistics are published by governments.

If your only anecdotal evidence is a bunch of figures garnered by an unaccountable body for a political organisation, then I see no facts to back up your assertions. If you can point to an independent study carried out by a university or some such faculty, then I'd welcome the link. But as I say, I have been studying politics and economics long enough to know how and why statistics are published by governments.

[writtenguarantee]

But that falls out with the scope of this thread, indeed this forum, and I am sure no-one wants to read it.

convenient.

if your only anecdotal evidence is a bunch of figures garnered by an unaccountable body for a political organisation, then I see no facts to back up your assertions.

National statistics aren't my anecdote and they are for better or for worse the best we have. they are the most reliable numbers we have except, apparently, all the figures that fall out of the scope of this thread. So, I guess there is nothing left to discuss.

[elephantspoo]

If you really want evidence that the inflation figures are manipulated, the GDP figures are calculated differently each year to bias public opinion, and the unemployment rate is miscalculated and recalculated to conceal the employment landscape... Political obfuscation if you will, then start a thread and I'll provide the data and the sources. I'll even host the documents on my own server so that the links remain active for posterity.

Nations produce statistics, not primarily as a means of measuring development, but as a means of controlling the perception a population has of society around it.

That aside, do you have any solution to crime in general, or specific offences if you wish, that does not involve throwing more money at it?

We could open that up to all issues in society... Declining standards in British Education. Lack of employment. Declining performance of the NHS. Failing public transport. The list is endless. Do you have any solution to any of society's problems that does not involve spending ever increasing amounts of money taken from taxpayers to fund non-taxpayers, or written as debt for our children to pay? If we cannot solve society's problems WITHOUT spending more and more money from the future debt burden of our children, they will live in a country where poverty, crime, and tyranny are the norm.