Burglers in Narborough

[Chuck T Masala]

So did he!

 

[consty]

If anything, consty, you're being far too liberal yourself

If we simply killed all of the criminals, then we would guarantee that the rest of us (and our precious property) would be safe for ever more

Why take the risk of simply punishing them, or locking them away for an all-too-brief period of time ? That's the talk of crazy cardigan-wearing nutcase softly-softly do gooders

Just gas the feckers, and have done with it. Job done

ooch Homer, that hurt a bit... There is no relish or pleasure from me in advocating this policy for criminals. It's aim in the end, is to slash the prison population not increase it. It will take a couple of generations, but that's what would happen. My aim is not to punnish offenders out of vengence or but to stop them becoming offenders in the first place - and to nip this type of behaviour in the bud when people first transgress so that they rapidly return to the straight and narrow... and stay there. 85,000 people in jail now is too many, as are the thousands lost to drugs and crime who blight our communities today.

And don't mock the property theft arguement as an unworthy objective to preserve 'our precious property'. Anyone who has had their homes burgled experience it as a hugely emotional trauma and a violation and do not see this as mere property theft of their oh so precious property {mock, mock}. What about the pensioner that has had their dead mothers' and grandmothers' jewellry stolen? Or a family that has had their computer taken with precious family photographs on it? Or a child's bike stolen... and so on. BTW, you might be comfortable enough to afford house contents insurance (not that it makes up for any of the pain of being a victim), but many peoples' misery is compounded because 40% of victims cannot afford that insurance and are not covered.

Macky says I would spend millions on brutalising people and not deal with the root cause. If you do think I would not like a kinder, easier option you are wrong. But firstly, you must appreciate that these people actually brutalise themselves with their own behaviour. To stop that behaviour by taking them out of circulation is a first step to taking them away from brutalisation and doing them some good. Why do you say prison is brutalising anyway? It is unpleasant - but that is somewhat part of the remedy and that is the way it has to be. But it should NOT be brutalising... are you thinking of pre 1950's UK prisons and current US prisons, chain gangs and the like? That's not the kind of prison policy or prison conditions I support.

As for root causes... we could go on forever about that. But it is a fallacy to simplistically ascribe it to poverty today. And like I said in an earlier post - if you try and do something for 'deprived' people such as build a community centre in a deprived area it will be vandalised on the first day, burgled on the second, and burnt down on the third. The first thing that has to be done is to take out the vandals, the burglars and the arsonists and put them in jail. Then you build the centre.

 

[Macky]

ooch Homer, that hurt a bit... There is no relish or pleasure from me in advocating this policy for criminals. It's aim in the end, is to slash the prison population not increase it. It will take a couple of generations, but that's what would happen. My aim is not to punnish offenders out of vengence or but to stop them becoming offenders in the first place - and to nip this type of behaviour in the bud when people first transgress so that they rapidly return to the straight and narrow... and stay there. 85,000 people in jail now is too many, as are the thousands lost to drugs and crime who blight our communities today.

And don't mock the property theft arguement as an unworthy objective to preserve 'our precious property'. Anyone who has had their homes burgled experience it as a hugely emotional trauma and a violation and do not see this as mere property theft of their oh so precious property {mock, mock}. What about the pensioner that has had their dead mothers' and grandmothers' jewellry stolen? Or a family that has had their computer taken with precious family photographs on it? Or a child's bike stolen... and so on. BTW, you might be comfortable enough to afford house contents insurance (not that it makes up for any of the pain of being a victim), but many peoples' misery is compounded because 40% of victims cannot afford that insurance and are not covered.

Macky says I would spend millions on brutalising people and not deal with the root cause. If you do think I would not like a kinder, easier option you are wrong. But firstly, you must appreciate that these people actually brutalise themselves with their own behaviour. To stop that behaviour by taking them out of circulation is a first step to taking them away from brutalisation and doing them some good. Why do you say prison is brutalising anyway? It is unpleasant - but that is somewhat part of the remedy and that is the way it has to be. But it should NOT be brutalising... are you thinking of pre 1950's UK prisons and current US prisons, chain gangs and the like? That's not the kind of prison policy or prison conditions I support.

As for root causes... we could go on forever about that. But it is a fallacy to simplistically ascribe it to poverty today. And like I said in an earlier post - if you try and do something for 'deprived' people such as build a community centre in a deprived area it will be vandalised on the first day, burgled on the second, and burnt down on the third. The first thing that has to be done is to take out the vandals, the burglars and the arsonists and put them in jail. Then you build the centre.

I'm sorry Consty but I think that is all utter nonsense.

While the sale & supply of drugs is controlled by black market criminals, you will never deal with the problem of burglary & mugging.

 

[Steven]

ooch Homer, that hurt a bit... There is no relish or pleasure from me in advocating this policy for criminals. It's aim in the end, is to slash the prison population not increase it. It will take a couple of generations, but that's what would happen. My aim is not to punnish offenders out of vengence or but to stop them becoming offenders in the first place - and to nip this type of behaviour in the bud when people first transgress so that they rapidly return to the straight and narrow... and stay there. 85,000 people in jail now is too many, as are the thousands lost to drugs and crime who blight our communities today.

And don't mock the property theft arguement as an unworthy objective to preserve 'our precious property'. Anyone who has had their homes burgled experience it as a hugely emotional trauma and a violation and do not see this as mere property theft of their oh so precious property {mock, mock}. What about the pensioner that has had their dead mothers' and grandmothers' jewellry stolen? Or a family that has had their computer taken with precious family photographs on it? Or a child's bike stolen... and so on. BTW, you might be comfortable enough to afford house contents insurance (not that it makes up for any of the pain of being a victim), but many peoples' misery is compounded because 40% of victims cannot afford that insurance and are not covered.

Macky says I would spend millions on brutalising people and not deal with the root cause. If you do think I would not like a kinder, easier option you are wrong. But firstly, you must appreciate that these people actually brutalise themselves with their own behaviour. To stop that behaviour by taking them out of circulation is a first step to taking them away from brutalisation and doing them some good. Why do you say prison is brutalising anyway? It is unpleasant - but that is somewhat part of the remedy and that is the way it has to be. But it should NOT be brutalising... are you thinking of pre 1950's UK prisons and current US prisons, chain gangs and the like? That's not the kind of prison policy or prison conditions I support.

As for root causes... we could go on forever about that. But it is a fallacy to simplistically ascribe it to poverty today. And like I said in an earlier post - if you try and do something for 'deprived' people such as build a community centre in a deprived area it will be vandalised on the first day, burgled on the second, and burnt down on the third. The first thing that has to be done is to take out the vandals, the burglars and the arsonists and put them in jail. Then you build the centre.

Where do you go when this fails? What is your Plan B? As the American General said "If you haven't got a Plan B you haven't got a plan".

 

[consty]

I'm sorry Consty but I think that is all utter nonsense.

While the sale & supply of drugs is controlled by black market criminals, you will never deal with the problem of burglary & mugging.

It isn't nonsense because the problem persists in a context of most burglars nd junkies doing what they do for long periods before they are caught (if ever). My policies would mean you would be caught virtually each and every time. Punnishment is no great deterrent when you are unlikely to be caught, but it has a massive impact if you are certain to be caught.

I think that you know that I am somewhat knowledgeable about the sale and supply of drugs and of the people who do it and consume it. It is as you say currently controlled by black market criminals and this initself undoubtably causes a lot of problems. Whilst sympathetic to the legalisation cause I am against legalisation in the end because a legal drug habit would still be expensive - it's just that your average junkie would be burgling one house a week instead of five. He therefore still needs to go to jail to be cleaned up and to commence the journey where he faces up to his behaviour so that he does not do it again.

Your legalised drug society would have even more junkies than we have got now. Demand rises when price falls. If the price is kept high, they will start buying from the underworld again. Even if some positives result from what you advocate and there is a small reduction in the amount of junkies and some reduction in crime, thousands of people will be enslaved to drugs which is no life (legal or not) and this cannot be allowed to happen.

 

[consty]

Where do you go when this fails? What is your Plan B? As the American General said "If you haven't got a Plan B you haven't got a plan".

Interesting... I do have thoughts on that. But remember that my policies rest on once the offenders are in jail - and back in jail when they do it again until they finally learn to stop - that there is a massive extension of local facilities for leisure, treatment, counselling, work, employment, and more.
I'm in the middle of working on something else right now and have to get back to your question, but this is the crux of it. I would adjust the balance if things were not working out as you ask - i.e longer or shorter sentences, more or less officers, more informants, and more of the 'nice' stuff listed in the first paragraph.

 

[fludie]

Burglary would be too much effort for Fludie.

:icon_wink

 

[Steven]

Interesting... I do have thoughts on that. But remember that my policies rest on once the offenders are in jail - and back in jail when they do it again until they finally learn to stop - that there is a massive extension of local facilities for leisure, treatment, counselling, work, employment, and more.
I'm in the middle of working on something else right now and have to get back to your question, but this is the crux of it. I would adjust the balance if things were not working out as you ask - i.e longer or shorter sentences, more or less officers, more informants, and more of the 'nice' stuff listed in the first paragraph.

One further comment, your policies rely on there being crime, mine don't. :icon_bigg :icon_wink

 

[Melton Fox]

your policies rely on there being crime, mine don't. :icon_bigg :icon_wink

I think it's a fairly safe bet, Stevo :icon_lol:

 

[consty]

One further comment, your policies rely on there being crime, mine don't. :icon_bigg :icon_wink

...but how did you get to that destination (a much reduced crime rate)? My policies are entirely about achieving that. I've seen no posts from you yet on this.

 

[Steven]

...but how did you get to that destination (a much reduced crime rate)? My policies are entirely about achieving that. I've seen no posts from you yet on this.

As my old granny used to say "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure". To this end the money you are spending on prisons I would be spending on beat Policemen/women, for example.

Surely it must be clear that to everyone that preventing a crime from happening is a much more simple and effective strategy than allowing the crime to happen, catch or not the criminal, successfully convict him/her in the that it will somehow deter someone from repeating the cycle all over again. Moreover on a cost basis it has to be cheaper.

Why don't we do this you may ask? The cynic in me says it is because crime then becomes an issue that politicians try to use to get themselves elected. After all at every election the Lab/Con axis will try and outbid each other as to who can be the toughest on crime. :icon_roll

The Blair Brown axis have doubled the number of criminal offences and yet have not doubled the resources to support that. It means, amongst other things, that the concept of a criminal record (which I have yet to get :icon_bigg ) has become trivialised. Simply it has become far to easy to get.

It also means that the range of offences to charge someone with has grown and naturally the Criminal Justice system chooses the path of least resistance, and pursues cases they feel they can get a conviction and everything else goes into a not catalogued or eternal pending tray.

Last we need to look at what is criminal. Look at the schizophrenia and hypocrisy surrounding the drugs laws. I choose this topic because in some areas 80% of crime is down to drugs. Some drugs are illegal because of the damage to your health and other harmful substances are pumped into the air, smoked and drunk to cause more harm than all the illegal drugs. Can someone explain that to me? I think I can, it has just become another item for the Lab/Con axis to wrestle over. :icon_roll

There are no easy answers but starting from where you start from leaves you with no room for manoeuvre, and removing the Politicians and the Criminal Justice system from what is now "criminal" might also be helpful. :icon_wink

 

[Macky]

It isn't nonsense because the problem persists in a context of most burglars nd junkies doing what they do for long periods before they are caught (if ever). My policies would mean you would be caught virtually each and every time. Punnishment is no great deterrent when you are unlikely to be caught, but it has a massive impact if you are certain to be caught.

I think that you know that I am somewhat knowledgeable about the sale and supply of drugs and of the people who do it and consume it. It is as you say currently controlled by black market criminals and this initself undoubtably causes a lot of problems. Whilst sympathetic to the legalisation cause I am against legalisation in the end because a legal drug habit would still be expensive - it's just that your average junkie would be burgling one house a week instead of five. He therefore still needs to go to jail to be cleaned up and to commence the journey where he faces up to his behaviour so that he does not do it again.

Your legalised drug society would have even more junkies than we have got now. Demand rises when price falls. If the price is kept high, they will start buying from the underworld again. Even if some positives result from what you advocate and there is a small reduction in the amount of junkies and some reduction in crime, thousands of people will be enslaved to drugs which is no life (legal or not) and this cannot be allowed to happen.

Your theory is complete & utter unworkable nonsense.

There are vast amounts of people already enslaved, as you put it, to hard drugs.
The question is, how do you intervene?
To you follow your idea would mean imprisoning huge amounts of the population with absolutely no benefit.

My way would involve removing the need to pay for their drug habit by having them prescribed whatever drug they need. Thus saving the country billions of pounds, saving millions of people the misery of burglary, removing the proceeds of those burglarys from going into the black market economy and preventing vulnerable people from being victimised.

 

[consty]

Thanks for your replies.

Steven: "As my old granny used to say "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure". To this end the money you are spending on prisons I would be spending on beat Policemen/women, for example."
But this is part of my remedy too. Everyone seems to have focussed on my proposal to dramatically increase the prison population and ignored my prevention suggestions (which also include radical social policies to increase resources in local communities by the way). Your granny was a wise woman. It's a shame modern politicians have never listened - perhaps because the police cost so much and the prisons certainly do, might account for their deafness. We need a huge expansion in policing. The introduction of communmity support officers as well as the continued role of specials all need massive expansion in number and some expansion in their powers which would all be cheap on the public purse along side an expanded regular police force to start the crime-cracking ball rolling. Prisons need supplementing with thousands of cheap prison camp places - It can be done and is being done in the US. On top of this we need we to fund a massive infrastructure of informants at street level operating in all our inner city pubs, clubs, snooker halls, betting offices and the like. These two policies alone - mine and yours - will net thousands of offenders. Where we probably differ is that you would probably give 80& a community sentence whereas I would give 80% a custodial sentence - but at least we are agreed on policing/prevention (though you may not like the informants part).

Macky: "To you follow your idea would mean imprisoning huge amounts of the population with absolutely no benefit. My way would involve removing the need to pay for their drug habit by having them prescribed whatever drug they need. Thus saving the country billions of pounds"

Imprisoning=no benefit you say? That is because in today's Britain it has little benefit, in large part, among other failings, because you have little chance of being caught. But that changes with my ideas overnight - what you've absolutely got to keep in mind is that crime would no longer be a game of roullete with little chance of the police landing a number on you. I'm changing the rules. The police win everytime - you nick, you're nicked; you deal, someone will squeal (inform). When offenders are inside, especially prolific offenders, crime falls. In Britain today, they are soon released - often without a custodial sentence or with a short one. And then it goes on. In my way, they are banged up so often and so regularly and with such certainty that they will give it up.
You say "My way would involve removing the need to pay for their drug habit by having them prescribed whatever drug they need. Thus saving the country billions of pounds."
To use a favourite phrase of yours Macky, this I am afraid is certainly nonsense. Your way would cost billions. Your way is worse than nonsense; it is surrender and moral relativism gently heated into a deadly warm teaspoon puddle for injecting into the nation's social vein. Your remedy would make us groggy with unreason and when we woke up from our stupor we'd find thosands more junkies than we've got now - but it would be alright because the state will be spending £200 a week on each junkie for his drugs so no need for them to burgle. Wonderful. But the problem with this £200 per junkie (or whatever it is with all the bureaucratic costs included) is that it adds up to the very billions you are talking about saving. On top of this we'll have the benefits bill for each one on top because most of them will be on it. We will be losing tax payers moving over from gainful employment to junkiedom and young people to junk before they ever became tax payers. How many billions is that? Watch the amount of junkies rise to 1 million people pretty quickly. At what point do you try and put that genie back in the bottle - when its approaching 2 million people raising their hungry arms for more shots of their shots of oblivion? This is a nightmare vision and I urge you to reconsider.

 

[Melton Fox]

I dare anybody to read it.

 

[Durham Fox]

I dare anybody to read it.

I gave up after line 2 of the first >4 line post

 

[Macky]

I gave up after line 2 of the first >4 line post

You did better than me.
Consty my friend, nobody is going to bother reading such nonsense, why do waste your time? That is just a wall of words that nobody is interested in.
I'm far too drunk to be bothered by all thaaat bolocks. Being verbose doesnt make it more beliewvable. It just looks liikebollocks. and without readingf a word of it (I'm incsaapable) I can conrfidently say that it is aaabsoluyte bollocks)

Seig heil! Seig heil!!

 

[Steven]

I dare anybody to read it.

I did. However it is just a reiteration of earlier posts.

 

[Melton Fox]

I did. However it is just a reiteration of earlier posts.

I didn't read them earlier so I'm none the wiser.

 

[consty]

You did better than me.
Consty my friend, nobody is going to bother reading such nonsense, why do waste your time? That is just a wall of words that nobody is interested in.
I'm far too drunk to be bothered by all thaaat bolocks. Being verbose doesnt make it more beliewvable. It just looks liikebollocks. and without readingf a word of it (I'm incsaapable) I can conrfidently say that it is aaabsoluyte bollocks)

Seig heil! Seig heil!!

Well at least read the part that addresses your suggestion to prescribe drugs to people on demand. I think you out-bollocked me in the bollocks stakes there.
And you really should cut out the seig heil salutations. I am certainly no nazi as I have a lifetime of socialist, anti-racist and trade union activism. Or maybe you have defected to their cause. The BNP is getting quite big these days.

 

[consty]

I did. However it is just a reiteration of earlier posts.

Not so. There was a large new bit critiquing the legalisation of drugs. I am suprised this escaped your erudite eyes as unlike Macky I take it that you are not pissed out of your brains (by his own admission) when you are reading/writing posts.