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And I would think that bad actors scale exponentially. It seems like it would be morally easy to steal from someone you have never met and will likely never see again. Much harder to steal from someone in a small community where everyone knows everyone.

This is just my conjecture, no real world experience or data. Would be interested in seeing if anyone had any.

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That's wishful thinking, sadly. Domestic abuse was rampant throughout history, and small communities, rather than correcting them within couples/family units, more often normalised/hushed these because of the abuser's role within the group. Dominant/subservient dynamics, source of most of bad actions, are not related to scale.

> … morally easy…

Maybe it's not about morality; maybe it's about getting caught.

1. The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment.

3. Police deter crime by increasing the perception that criminals will be caught and punished.

https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/247350.pdf

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