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Comment by danans | Hacker News Reader

> I honestly don't understand why

When people are inhibited from meeting their basic needs legally by structural impediments to their progress like severe inequality, they sometimes try to meet their needs via methods that are destructive to society, like crime, whether petty or violent. That behavior is usually damaging to people, property, or the fabric of society.

This is a reason why such crime is strongly correlated with areas of endemic poverty.

People have a strong will to survive, one way or another. We can provide them the tools and resources to do so in a prosocial way, or spend the resources defending ourselves against the crime that results from poverty stricken circumstances.

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"When people are inhibited from meeting their basic needs legally by structural impediments to their progress like severe inequality, they sometimes try to meet their needs via methods that are destructive to society, like crime, whether petty or violent. That behavior is usually damaging to people, property, or the fabric of society."

We should note that there is such things as free shelter and food for homeless and anything above that is "wants" rather than "needs". Taking care of equal opportunity is fair, but doing anything else to accomodate individuals otherwise inclined to crime is not fair at all.

"This is a reason why such crime is strongly correlated with areas of endemic poverty."

I agree with the correlation, but I go further to say that poverty just accomodates crime (i.e. troublesome individuals having it easier in those areas for encountering less action towards prevention and countering deliquent behavior), and thus is at most an indirect factor to crime, not a direct one.

Japan, the safest country in the world has a GINI coefficient of 0.462. I don't think that's particularly good.

> We should provide them the tools and resources to do so in a prosocial way.

The reason why you default to this instead of simply defaulting to suggesting crushing any dissent (probably what was the default since the dawn of the modern era, and is the default in countries such as China) is because of moral values you have had instilled in you from your surroundings since birth.

You are reasoning about crime in Japan from it's GINI coefficient? Perhaps you should consider access to healthcare, housing, transportation, and education. Japan has a large social welfare state. Also, while low by world standards, Japan has a crime underreporting problem, especially crimes against women and foreigners.

>The reason why you default to this...is because of moral values you have had instilled in you from your surroundings since birth

Yes, like many people, I was priveleged to be raised to believe in justice, empathy, decency, and fairness. But I understand full well that those are not fundamental properties of the universe, but instead very useful fictions some societies have created. Do you not have a moral framework? Or is it perhaps:

> crushing any dissent (probably what was the default since the dawn of the modern era, and is the default in countries such as China)

Also, I've had stuff stolen from me and property damaged by people who probably wouldn't have done so if they had a better alternative.

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