Crime and Punishment.

[budda]

As some of you might know I had my mobile nicked last night and this got me thinking.
I am, in the main a liberal, in that I think most actions (be they sexual, drugs etc.) that dont effect others should be allowed. This also extends to criminal punishment, which I think should be humane.

So, IF they by some miricle manage to catch the lads that nicked my phone, what should happen to them?

One of my ideas was community service, make them clean the streets, cut hedges etc. That way they have to work off their debt, but also keep them out of the prison system.

I also thought of some sort of humiliation, ie. Having to wear a sign that says what they did in a busy place for a day or so. That could work, but it has its draw backs.

But then the, 'zero-tolerance' approach of New York is really paying off, crime there is drasticly down, maybe thats the way forward?

My concern is that the drug laws are creating a whole generation of law breakers, so many people are growing up feeling that the Law is something that is unjust and unfair. If you've broken one law, why not any number of others? Of course I'm not saying that all drug users are robbers etc.

Any ideas?

[Blagsta]

string 'em up its the only language they understand

just pre-empting the right wingers

[Aladdin]

Definitively community service. Make them clean graffiti. Send them to council estates far away where they're known by no one, and assign them the job of protecting the old and vulnerable against local youngsters. That would show them how wrong their actions are much more efficiently than custodial sentences.

Trials where criminals have been made to confront their victims face to face in a police meeting room, and left to speak to them for a couple of hours have been enormously successful. It makes the offender see his victim as a human being, and one who does not deserved being robbed/mugged/assaulted. Many of those offenders would behave in the future.

[budda]

Yeah, but what would I say to some bloke who'd nicked my phone;

Me; "Its mine, why did you take it?"

Him; "Because I wanted it"

I think community service is the answer, theres always odd jobs they can be doing, but I do think that an element of humiliation could be useful too. Maybe make them wear orange over alls or something, in that way they would be a deterant to others too. Just a thought.

[byny]

Education
equality
better parenting

if we could get these things right perhaps kids wouldn't be stealing mobile phones

[budda]

There never will be equality, there will always be some with lots and some with not much.

I'd aggree that better efforts need to be made in education, trying to give kids something to look forward to, something to hope for.

Trying to make parents 'better'? A difficult thing to achieve, I suppose the best way forward is for better social welfare systems to support them.

[giantno1]

Your muggers didn't have a foreign accent by an chance did they Bongbudda? :D

[budda]

I'm certain they were actualy asylum seekers from Eastern Europe, definately. But then all crime is commited by those foreign devils isnt it.

Giant; Its nice to see that even you cant take your views on immigrants seriously

[Blagsta]

Originally posted by giantno1
Your muggers didn't have a foreign accent by an chance did they Bongbudda? :D

Please clarify. With your track record, this could be construed as being highly offensive.

[BeckyBoo]

Originally posted by Blagsta
Please clarify. With your track record, this could be construed as being highly offensive.

Got to agree with you on this one like.

[Man Of Kent]

Originally posted by byny
if we could get these things right perhaps kids wouldn't be stealing mobile phones

Yeah right.

Try getting rid of greed, though...

[byny]

Well - I'm not greedy enough to do harm to another person...guess someone must have taught me right from wrong...even when I was poor as a kid I knew the difference between what I needed and what I wanted!!

[BeckyBoo]

All kids are taught these days is if you nick something your gonna get a little slap on the hand. There is nothing to deter them from doing stuff like this. there needs to be more things made easily available to youngsters, something to get them of the streets.

[byny]

So how do you explain the many kids that don't do these things, what stops them...how come they know right from wrong.

Some kids don't need to be threatened with anything - they just don't do it.

[BeckyBoo]

Originally posted by byny
So how do you explain the many kids that don't do these things, what stops them...how come they know right from wrong.

Some kids don't need to be threatened with anything - they just don't do it.

That boils down to parenting though doesent it. Some parents kick the kids out soon as they get in from school, they come back in for their tea and the parents kick em out again.

Ive been brough up that crime is wrong, we dont take anything that aint ours. Ive also been brought up to know that if I want something that badly then I have to get the money to buy it or do without.

I was scared stiff of doing anything wrong and i knew the consequenses if I did do something wrong, these days some parents dont give a shit what their kids are doing as long as there kids aint hassleing them. Some parents dont even know were their kids are so how are these type of parents going to set an example ?

Maybe we start punishing the parents, its their responsibility to look after their kids so if the kids do something wrong then hammer the parents ? I dunno really.

[giantno1]

Originally posted by Blagsta
Please clarify. With your track record, this could be construed as being highly offensive.

Clarify what you socialist fruitcake? It's a question intended to remind you that immigrants to this country just add to the crime rate.

[solo]

Asylum immigration = Indiscriminate mmigration

Don't be surpeiws that feckless criminals come in under the Asylum umbrella

[Blagsta]

Originally posted by giantno1
Clarify what you socialist fruitcake? It's a question intended to remind you that immigrants to this country just add to the crime rate.

Ahhh, so you were being racist. Thought so.

[Blagsta]

Originally posted by solo
Don't be surpeiws that feckless criminals come in under the Asylum umbrella

Don't be what? "surpeiws"? Whats that? :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused:

[giantno1]

Originally posted by Blagsta
Ahhh, so you were being racist. Thought so.

Ofcourse, ofcourse, whatever you say. I want this country to be safe for my children to grow up in even if you dont.

[Aladdin]

Originally posted by giantno1
Ofcourse, ofcourse, whatever you say. I want this country to be safe for my children to grow up in even if you dont. Better make sure you nobody lives within 20 miles of you then. Especially white people, since so many crimes are commited by them.

[giantno1]

White people of what nationality? 'white eastern europeans' do commit alot of crime, I agree Alladin... well done for getting something right.

[Aladdin]

Why, the English of course. More crimes are commited by them than by anyone else.

Oh dear! What are you going to do now?

[giantno1]

Continue living in the hope that one day, before it's too late, you socialists will realise that your paradise will never come about.

[Blagsta]

There you go making assumptions again. :rolleyes:

I suggest that it is you living in some kind of paranoid delusional fantasy land. One where the purity of the white Aryan race will prevail over the nasty swarthy foreigners. Straight out of a Blood & Honour magazine.

Get real you fool.

[giantno1]

Paranoid? More like cautious. If you want every man, woman and child on this earth to have no secrets, share all their possessions, completely trust one another without question and live in communal bliss then so be your opinion. But it's not going to happen.... no thanks to the Islamic extremists who preach hatred of the West, the mindless school drop-outs who wander the streets mugging others, and the illegal immigrants who come to the UK in the view of making a 'quick buck' or two.

[BeckyBoo]

God what is wrong with you people ?

Why is colour being draged to every thread ?


It really is getting tedious now.

[Jim V]

right, I'll give this topic one chance to get somewhere near what it's supposed to be discussing or it's closed

[Karl Marx]

Jim V, your authocratic rules and regulations have no place here. You are opressing the wills and minds of the working masses!!!

[Jim V]

remember that bit where you agreed to follow the rules of this moderated discussion board? I would have thought you would have something more constructive to add concerning the roots of crime or the implications of various types of punishment.

[Blagsta]

Originally posted by giantno1
Paranoid? More like cautious. If you want every man, woman and child on this earth to have no secrets, share all their possessions, completely trust one another without question and live in communal bliss then so be your opinion. But it's not going to happen.... no thanks to the Islamic extremists who preach hatred of the West, the mindless school drop-outs who wander the streets mugging others, and the illegal immigrants who come to the UK in the view of making a 'quick buck' or two.

What on earth are you on about? :confused: :confused:

[Blagsta]

Originally posted by Karl Marx
Jim V, your authocratic rules and regulations have no place here. You are opressing the wills and minds of the working masses!!!

you're obviously a pisstake troll...not a very good one at that :rolleyes:

[morrocan roll]

when i was a kid we hadn't even heard the word vandalism and as for crime ...it would never have entered our heads for two reasons ...1. there was nowt worth nicking. realy ...there wasn't this massive consumerism where we had to own anything at all.
a plank with some old pram wheels nailed to it and a bike was about all there was to be owned. and 2. if you crossed certain lines you got a serious clobbering ...we grew up with fear and respect of our fathers, teachers and the old bill. all of them could inflict pain and yes that threat created respect.

[byny]

I grew up with respect, not fear; I'm sure there are plenty of kids growing up these day with respect and values and a knowledge of right and wrong who don't do these things, and not just because they were beaten or bullied into being 'good'.

[Aladdin]

Could it be possible that council estates are partly to blame for the rise in vandalisim and general street crime (compared with, say, the 1950s)?

Don't get me wrong, it is great that the state provides affordable accommodation for the less well off. But was it really a good idea to create massive complexes of cheap and hideously ugly flats where no outside traffic and trade ventures in? Wouldn't have been much better for the government to simply acquire existing flats and accommodate families amongst traditional residents, instead of creating 'guettoes'?

[BlackArab]

Aladdin, I'm not sure about Madrid but in Barcelona, the first big difference I noticed is that most of the housing seemed to be flats and there is a fair few estates especially on the way to the airport. Do you not get the same social problems in Spain, you do in France and Ireland on their estates.

[morrocan roll]

Originally posted by byny
I grew up with respect, not fear; I'm sure there are plenty of kids growing up these day with respect and values and a knowledge of right and wrong who don't do these things, and not just because they were beaten or bullied into being 'good'. we weren't beaten and bulluied ...thats just a modern view. a whack round the head of your local copper was always a possibility. a possibility that we would often challenge.
there was a copper with a huge chin ...known to all the kids as chinny ...whenever he appeared we'd start shouting CHINNY CHIN CNIN and then scarper fast ...if you got caught you got a whack! simple as that. also few mums had to work in those days ...so mum was always on hand for a jam butty and a cuddle. modern life does put a whole new set of pressures on people.

[BlackArab]

Plank and pram wheels! the memories come flooding back, two ropes for steering with and then launch yourself down the hill with no idea on how to stop the thing.

Is this why you never see kids with plasters on their knees anymore. :lol:

[morrocan roll]

Originally posted by BlackArab
Plank and pram wheels! the memories come flooding back, you old sod!

[BeckyBoo]

Originally posted by Aladdin
Could it be possible that council estates are partly to blame for the rise in vandalisim and general street crime (compared with, say, the 1950s)?


Oh Dear !!!!

Go back to the 50's and people didnt have big posh houses on little estates, they didnt have no money. Back in them days it was about survival, making broth to last a couple of days. Kids got hand me down clothes, money was not readily available as it is now.

Are you telling me that people in private estates dont turn to crime ?

I beleive its the up bringing of kids. Lets give you an example :
Theres a little twat of a kid who from the age of about 4 has been allowed to play outside in a busy street where I live. Him at that time being 4 years old did not understand that it was wrong to vandalise a car by kicking it. The big kids thought it hilarious that this boy would climb on car bonnets and jump up and down.
Were was his Mother ? Oh thats easy she was sat in her house taking no notice where her 4 year old was or what he was doing. She was never around to say to him thats wrong. This kid is now 7 and he is a right little sod, I beleive he is already on that road to being in trouble with the police.
This kids mother once shouted to him (and I heard every word)
"get your fucking arse in this fucking house NOW" because he didnt do as she said she grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him home, him screaming all the way saying "sorry Mam, sorry Mam".

Where you live plays an important factor, you could live in the best estate in town if your child mixes with the wrong type of kid (like the one I mentioned) then where is your child going to pick stuff up from ?

[Aladdin]

Originally posted by BlackArab
Aladdin, I'm not sure about Madrid but in Barcelona, the first big difference I noticed is that most of the housing seemed to be flats and there is a fair few estates especially on the way to the airport. Do you not get the same social problems in Spain, you do in France and Ireland on their estates. No, from my experience and for what people tell me today, we don't get nearly a small fraction of the vandalism/petty street crime you see in here.

That's not to say there aren't muggings, or stabbings, or other crime because there is. But you would be very pressed indeed to see groups of youths vandalising, terrorisng people on the street or nicking mobiles from other kids. Let alone drinking cans of beer and smoking when they're 12.

[BeckyBoo]

Originally posted by BlackArab
Plank and pram wheels!

oh god I remember them :lol: :lol:

Now I need to remember what we called them :lol:

[Aladdin]

Originally posted by BeckyBoo
Oh Dear !!!!

Go back to the 50's and people didn’t have big posh houses on little estates, they didn’t have no money. Back in them days it was about survival, making broth to last a couple of days. Kids got hand me down clothes, money was not readily available as it is now.

Are you telling me that people in private estates dont turn to crime ?

I beleive its the up bringing of kids. Lets give you an example :
Theres a little twat of a kid who from the age of about 4 has been allowed to play outside in a busy street where I live. Him at that time being 4 years old did not understand that it was wrong to vandalise a car by kicking it. The big kids thought it hilarious that this boy would climb on car bonnets and jump up and down.
Were was his Mother ? Oh thats easy she was sat in her house taking no notice where her 4 year old was or what he was doing. She was never around to say to him thats wrong. This kid is now 7 and he is a right little sod, I beleive he is already on that road to being in trouble with the police.
This kids mother once shouted to him (and I heard every word)
"get your fucking arse in this fucking house NOW" because he didnt do as she said she grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him home, him screaming all the way saying "sorry Mam, sorry Mam".

Where you live plays an important factor, you could live in the best estate in town if your child mixes with the wrong type of kid (like the one I mentioned) then where is your child going to pick stuff up from ? Sure, some kids/youngsters will turn to crime regardless of where they live. But you must admit it is much easier for other youngsters to form gangs and/or indulge in petty crime if they live in a run-down estate where drug dealing and dodgy characters abound than if they live in a 'normal' (for want of a better word) Victorian residential street with a local community of mixed social and economic background.

Of course it has an influence. A massive one. For starters in a council estate the 'bad apples' are all together and thus stronger, and have a bigger influence on their environment than if they lived at different addresses mixed with others.

[BeckyBoo]

Originally posted by Aladdin
Of course it has an influence. A massive one. For starters in a council estate the 'bad apples' are all together and thus stronger, and have a bigger influence on their environment than if they lived at different addresses mixed with others.

Your portraying council estates as bad, ive lived in a council estate all my life and I think ive turned out ok.

My parents used to smack me, I vividly remember my Brother pinched some money which was in the drawer. My Dad got all of us together and told us whoever had pinched it had half an hour to admit what they had done, if none of us admitted it we were all going to get the belt. My Brother owned up, because our parents had taught us right from wrong, yes he stole it but he then knew he had to admit to it because lying to Dad was wrong. Dad would have belted us all theres no doubt about that, although as a kid with Dad angry we thought it would be a good hiding but in reality when I look back now it wold have been a little tap with the belt.

Some very well known rich peoples kids have been into trouble, they have everything they could ever want. Big house, money, rich friends and they still turn to crime so really that kinda blows your theory out of the window.

[BlackArab]

Originally posted by Aladdin
Sure, some kids/youngsters will turn to crime regardless of where they live. But you must admit it is much easier for other youngsters to form gangs and/or indulge in petty crime if they live in a run-down estate where drug dealing and dodgy characters abound than if they live in a 'normal' (for want of a better word) Victorian residential street with a local community of mixed social and economic background.

Of course it has an influence. A massive one. For starters in a council estate the 'bad apples' are all together and thus stronger, and have a bigger influence on their environment than if they lived at different addresses mixed with others.

Its got be more than that I grew up on an inner city council estate in the 70s where that wasn't the norm, personally I would agree with Becks and say the problem is with the parents and to a certain extent society.

Oh yes but then I do remember a certain politician declaring proudly there is no such thing as society. Funny how these problems seemed to stem from the 80s onward.

[Aladdin]

I wouldn't dream of suggesting poor people are all destined to commit crimes, and rich kids are free of it. You're not getting me.

What I'm saying is that as well as the kids whose parents can't be arsed (as you have pointed out) and who are likely to offend, there are many kids out there who are vulnerable. Who regardless of the education they might have received from the parents by be influenced by some youths simply by spending time with them. Most children are likely influenced. There is not a lot anyone can do.

Now, suppose you observe 100 of such vulnerable kids who live in council estates (and who therefore will come in contact with a fair amount of crime and wrongdoers) and 100 more vulnerable kids who live in a traditional neighbourhood.

What proportion of the first group will end up being influenced by wrongdoers? Well I don't know the numbers; I'll I know is that it'd be a much higher proportion than the second group of kids, who will seldom come into regular contact with dodgy characters, vandals and the likes.

Surely you agree with that?

[BlackArab]

Originally posted by BeckyBoo
oh god I remember them :lol: :lol:

Now I need to remember what we called them :lol:

Go-carts :)

[BlackArab]

Originally posted by morrocan roll
you old sod!

Jumpers for goalposts...two and in...headers and volleys:cool:

[BeckyBoo]

Originally posted by Aladdin
Surely you agree with that?

To a degree yes, its when I see you write council estate its like whoaaaa hold on there mate ;)


Black Arab we had a made up name for them, something like bogey or sommat like that :lol:

[morrocan roll]

Originally posted by BeckyBoo
oh god I remember them :lol: :lol:

Now I need to remember what we called them :lol: bogies ....raggers ...trashers.

[morrocan roll]

Originally posted by BeckyBoo
Oh Dear !!!!


This kids mother once shouted to him (and I heard every word)
"get your fucking arse in this fucking house NOW" because he didnt do as she said she grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him home, him screaming all the way saying "sorry Mam, sorry Mam".

now a parent like that clouting a child would be terryfying and bullying the child. that is not a parent who would know how to give disciplin and love at the same time. that kind of parent doesn't know about teaching where the boundaries lay. with parents like that ...kids have little chance of growing up decent.

[BeckyBoo]

Originally posted by morrocan roll
...kids have little chance of growing up decent.

Exactly, I feel sorry for the poor kid :(

I wouldn't care he is the most bonniest kid ive ever seen. Once he was talking to me, well actually I told him off for doing something anyways he said nobody loves me :( . He would have been about 6 I think and I felt dead sorry for the poor kid.......even though he can be a little shit.

[budda]

The problem is a mixed one, its not purely a matter of bad parenting, or of the deterant factor, or where they grow up.

I would aggree that there has been a change in attitude in a lot of people, there is now a desire to get very rich, very quickly.

Instant stardom and riches is very attractive to some one living on a 'sink hole estate' where the prospects of good employment isnt exactly high.

Crime pays too well, there is NO way that a 16-18 year old can make money faster than dealing.

You need to give kids hope, something to loose. If you feel you have no prospects then what have you to loose?

Mixed housing helps kids see that there is another way of living than on benefit, scrapping by for money everyday.

There needs to be a mix of deterant and schemes to help the kids in the first place.