Comment by prepend | Hacker News Reader

Comment by prepend | Hacker News Reader

I would like to see better research on this.

My immediate instinct makes me think it’s due to less cops doing cop stuff, leading to fewer arrests, leading to more people out and about.

Cops seem to be a sort of leviathan suppressing crime by being a tyrant that catches many innocents through false arrests, harassment, police shootings, etc. So if police are reforming and stop their activity the upside is that there’s a bit more justice, but downside is that oppression may result in more homicide.

I think it’s a net positive to have more social justice with maybe more homicide.

I also irrationally wonder if, like the previous drop in homicide being attributed to removal of atmospheric lead [0], maybe people are staying in their house more and there’s some soon to be discovered building material that’s making us more violent. People didn’t think lead in gasoline was that big of a deal, but I’m sure happy it’s no longer used.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead%E2%80%93crime_hypothesis

Article awhile back talked about how about 8% of the population avoids crimes only out of fear of punishment.

Remove that fear and a significant segment of the population will go on a rampage.

I'm not sure I can believe this. This implies that the only punishment available is that of the law enforcement. While society has a variety of methods under the umbrella of punishment such as shunning, 3rd-party intervention and such.

It's incredibly easy to get away with crimes, as anyone who's been the victim of a crime will attest. The justice system is pretty selective in the crime that it cares to solve. The criteria for pursuit seems to be: is it profitable? did it happen to an important person? or was it perpetrated by a person who doesn't matter?

The police will happily spend hours sitting on the side of the road writing traffic tickets, but if a group of guys kick your ass on the street, good luck getting them to do more than fill out some paper work. Even if there's solid evidence, they perps still need to be people the police are willing to go after.

Also, in America, it's already the case that ~40% of homicides go unsolved. It's almost a coin toss whether you'd actually get away with it.

That's extremely vague. What crimes does the survey talk about? There's a big difference between speeding in your car, and mass murder. I obey speed laws because I don't want a ticket, I don't obey murder laws because I'm afraid of prison. I avoid murder because it's wrong. I'd bet that 8% number goes way down the more serious the crime gets.

> I think it’s a net positive to have more social justice with maybe more homicide.

I mean, best of luck with that, but in general, those things really don't happen concurrently. How do you fund... anything, when those who can pay tax can leave, and those who invest privately can do so somewhere the investee won't be murdered or shaken down?

Social justice is taking the bus to the interview. Neither exist without, at least, some law and order.

> I think it’s a net positive to have more social justice with maybe more homicide.

One thing that's genuinely complicated about this is that the communities most affected by over-policing are simultaneously under-policied [0] (and more likely to be the victims of violent crimes).

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/underpolicing-cities-...

Unless there's some Minority Report like precognition in place (monitoring people's web searches in real time perhaps?), I don't see how cops can prevent murders (except for repeat offenders perhaps).

I'd rather think that the threshold for criminal activity is lowered whenever the outlook is bleak and stress is high.

3% of the population commits 57% of all crime. So you could incapacitate those individuals prior to them committing murder. IE: put them in prison for 20 years for theft, then they can't commit murder. Let them out when their testosterone drops below criminal thresholds (in their late 30s)

That’s what I was thinking. If I get picked up for jaywalking, then I’m in the clink for a few weeks and can’t commit other crimes, etc etc

> commits 57% of all crime

how is the portion of crimes committed measured? number of charges?

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