Serious topic: how would you reduce violent crime?

[Darth Wong]

When you look at arguments about violent crime, it seems a helluva lot easier to bash solutions that don't work than to propose solutions that might work.

Everyone can point at the "let's ban all guns" argument and say that it won't work (it's impractical, and guns do not necessarily correlate to crime). Conversely, everyone can point to the "make sure everyone's armed" argument and say that it won't work either (there are lots of very heavily armed places in the US and violent crime still seems to occur).

Are there any sociologists or criminologists out there who actually have a solution to the prevalence of violent crime? This is a serious question; no stupid one-line answers please.

[weemadando]

I'm tempted to say that by creating a livable wage for social security and universal healthcare you could lower crime drastically. However, this requires several "ideal" elements, not the least of which is allowing drug rehab to fall under standard healthcare. By eliminating a degree of poverty you can cut some crimes. But without eliminating or at least inhibiting the drug culture you're going to be having just as much of a crime problem.

If one was to initiate a zero-tolerance policy on drug dealing and above then you could theoretically have a great effect of the system, but again this would create other flow on problems.

I'm also tempted to say that a greater emphasis on rehabilitation rather than punishment in the prison systems would be a great step forward as well.

[Dark Hellion]

Don't post thought provoking things at 1 Am will reduce a lot of violence.
But, seriously, I think education is the most important thing. Short of fascistic repression, no amount of punishment will stop people from commiting crimes. They still will have the lucky man syndrome (I'm the lucky one and won't be caught). In short, educated people are less likely to commit random violent crimes. Serial killers, and the like, will still exist, as they tend to come from the more intellegent stock of people anyways, but random gang violence would be greatly reduced. This is however, still idealistic, as dealing with modern crime actually affects eucation in a profound way. Kids learn on the street, police forces money comes from school coffers and schools are vandalised and trashed.
So, frankly, I think we may just have to live with the fact that at the current population densities in cities, violent crime is inevitable.

[Enforcer Talen]

cancel the drug war, improve the inner city standard of living, and up education. when you have a college degree, there's less need to kill someone for his pocket money.

[Glocksman]

Well, I've thought about it a little bit, but I'm no sociologist.

IMHO any serious plan to reduce crime would have to address the crime created because of the 'War on Drugs'. How many people are in prison for drug offenses? How many addicts turn to crime to support a drug habit because of the artificially high prices that dealers can charge for dope because of its very illegality? If their drugs are legally available and cheap, drug addicts won't have to turn to property crime or violent crime in order to feed a $300 per day habit.

I don't have specific numbers right at hand, but I recall reading that over half of all people in prison are their because of drug and drug related offenses. Remove the profit motive from the drug business by legalizing the prescription of drugs for those chronically addicted to serious drugs and removing all restrictions (except for age) on 'minor' drugs such as marijuana.

I would also make treatment available at no cost for those addicts who sincerely want to break the habit. Expensive? Most certainly. However it would be cheaper than the amount we currently spend to build and maintain our prison system.

In the US, the crime rates roughly (it's not an exact parallel) parallel the drug use rates. There are other factor in crime, but the corellation between drug use figures and crime rate figures cannot be overlooked.


There are still other factors involved in crime, but the WoD is the 500 kilo gorilla sitting in the corner almost none of the polticians want to talk about.

[kojikun]

Ditto Talens idea. The illegality of drugs is what promotes the vast majority of drug-related violence. Inner city conditions are also horrible, and if we could improve the quality of life in the inner city then people there won't be prone to criminal activity and violent crime. Also education is important. A well educated person has hope for his future, he can see that hope, he doesn't have to look at his future and see nothing but low paying jobs or shit like that, he can instead see well paying jobs where he doesn't have to resort to violence because he was given the opportunity and knowledge required to get to those good jobs.

[Glocksman]

I'm hesitant to speak on the subject of guns after the flamefest in the 'Bowling' thread , but I'll throw in my thoughts on guns and crime.


Note: this applies to the US only.

Basically, I think there's no real correlation between guns and crime. You have highly armed areas where there's almost no crime and you have highly armed areas where there's a lot of crime. The same thing is true in areas where the population is lightly armed.


On another board a couple of posters (myself included) compared New Brunswick with Maine WRT murder rates during the year 2000.

We found that both areas have roughly the same population and share much the same cultural values and beliefs (at least according to the Canadian on the board who suggested the comparison). The only real difference was in the gun laws, specifically the easy availability of handguns and handgun carrying permits in Maine as compared to NB.

We found that the murder rates were roughly comparable (a .13 difference in the year 2000)

The conclusion we came to in this instance was that the people in NB would be just as safe under Maine's much looser handgun laws, and that the people in Maine wouldn't be any more or less safe under Canada's much more restrictive firearms laws.

It's a very unscientific comparison, but it was an eye opener for the poster from NB because he was convinced that the easy availability of guns would result in Maine's having a much higher murder rate instead of one that's roughly comparable to the rate in New Brunswick.

It's not the guns.

[Howedar]

Education, education, education.

[Darth Wong]

Basically, I think there's no real correlation between guns and crime. You have highly armed areas where there's almost no crime and you have highly armed areas where there's a lot of crime. The same thing is true in areas where the population is lightly armed.

I'd agree with that; it's a social problem. Although I would suggest that a populace which feels it needs guns for self-defense may be more likely to be experiencing elevated crime.

On another board a couple of posters (myself included) compared New Brunswick with Maine WRT murder rates during the year 2000.

We found that both areas have roughly the same population and share much the same cultural values and beliefs (at least according to the Canadian on the board who suggested the comparison). The only real difference was in the gun laws, specifically the easy availability of handguns and handgun carrying permits in Maine as compared to NB.

We found that the murder rates were roughly comparable (a .13 difference in the year 2000)

The conclusion we came to in this instance was that the people in NB would be just as safe under Maine's much looser handgun laws, and that the people in Maine wouldn't be any more or less safe under Canada's much more restrictive firearms laws.

It's a very unscientific comparison, but it was an eye opener for the poster from NB because he was convinced that the easy availability of guns would result in Maine's having a much higher murder rate instead of one that's roughly comparable to the rate in New Brunswick.

It's not the guns.

Mind you, Maine is in the bottom 10% of states for crime (which is why the national murder rates between the US and Canada are so different while this particular comparison isn't), so there's obviously something unusual about it among the states. What makes Maine special?

[Glocksman]

NB also is among the provinces with the lowest homicide rates.

The lowest rates were in Newfoundland (1.1), New Brunswick (1.3) and Ontario (1.3). Both Ontario and British Columbia (2.1) recorded their lowest homicide rate since 1963.

From Statistics Canada

What both places have in common is that they're both rural and less heavily populated both in density and in numbers than most of the rest of the US and Canada.

[Glocksman]

Forgot to add:

The comparison wouldn't be valid for the entire country however.

I doubt that the population in Ontario is so similar to the population in Michigan. Just looking at the Detroit and Windsor murder rates is shocking.

[Darth Wong]

What both places have in common is that they're both rural and less heavily populated both in density and in numbers than most of the rest of the US and Canada.

That doesn't make sense. Ontario is the most heavily populated place in all of Canada, and its murder rate is among the lowest. Moreover, the FBI's crime stats show that it is the Southern states which have the highest collective murder rate, and they're relatively rural.

Again, what's unusual about Maine?

[Darth Wong]

Forgot to add:

The comparison wouldn't be valid for the entire country however.

I doubt that the population in Ontario is so similar to the population in Michigan. Just looking at the Detroit and Windsor murder rates is shocking.

Indeed. What's more shocking, however, is that the Southern states are the murder hotbed. That flies in the face of popular belief.

[Howedar]

I didn't know that. Its interesting.

But then who's generally the least educated? The South.

[Glocksman]

Shit, just thought of something else. Feel free to merge these 3 posts if you want.

The FBI UCR breaks down crime statistics into classes based on the population of the reporting areas (Group 1, 2, and so on).

From the 2000 Uniform Crime Report:

Group I cities (population 250,000 and up)
Group II cities (population 100,000 to 249,999) in parentheses
Group IV cities (population 25,000 to 49,999) in bold

Crime rates

Violent Crime: 1,093 (656.5) 396.2
Property Crime: 5,288.8 (4,981.8) 3,763.1
Murder: 13.1 (6.9) 3.4
Forcible rape: 45.8 (39.8) 30.5
Robbery: 413.4 (213.6) 103.5
Aggravated Assault: 620.9 (396.1) 258.9
Burglary: 1,009.7 (972) 693.6
Larceny Theft: 3,350 (3,370) 2,740.7
Motor Vehicle Theft: 929.1 (619.8) 328.7


Notes:
Violent crimes are offenses of murder, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault.
Property crimes are offenses of burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft.


I'd say population and population density have a lot to do with it.

[Howedar]

Its always nice when a common-sense assertation does actually have basis in fact

[RedImperator]

Forgot to add:

The comparison wouldn't be valid for the entire country however.

I doubt that the population in Ontario is so similar to the population in Michigan. Just looking at the Detroit and Windsor murder rates is shocking.

Indeed. What's more shocking, however, is that the Southern states are the murder hotbed. That flies in the face of popular belief.

It flies in the face of popular belief, but not historical fact. Prior to the Civil War, the number of murders--not the murder rate, the actual number of murders--in some southern states exceeded that of all of New England. A number of these were honor killings--either outright duels or murders of those who had somehow dishonored the family (usually involving an unmarried daughter--the term "shotgun wedding" was not, in those days, a metaphor).

[Darth Wong]

I'd say population and population density have a lot to do with it.

In the US, perhaps. In Canada, Toronto is by far the largest city but is tied for the lowest crime rate among all the cities.

According to the Toronto Police, there were 28 gun homicides in Toronto in the year 2002. To put a sense of scale on this, Toronto is the fifth largest metropolis in North America, behind Mexico City, New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. Toronto is larger than either Detroit, Philadelphia, Boston, Miami, Dallas, San Francisco, or Atlanta.

Population density is a popular scapegoat, but there's something else at work here.

[Stormbringer]

When you look at arguments about violent crime, it seems a helluva lot easier to bash solutions that don't work than to propose solutions that might work.

The best way to go about it is to rebuild the inner cities of America. Put the effort into real jobs programs, training, and incentives for businesses. And for fuck's sake, put money into the schools. Give the urban youth a safe, comfortable future and gang life won't be half so appealing. You don't need to legalize drugs, that's a side effect of poverty and not the cause. What needs to be done is offer a real alternative to the gang lifestyle. So far that hasn't happened for a number of reasons.

Also, have a justice system that means something. I think the prison system needs to get serious. The sentences ought to mean something, too often now it's revolving door bullshit. And prisons ought to be tought, learn a trade or something or rot. Rehabilitation is a noble goal but with prison being too easy and to short most criminals don't care.

What needs to be done is to make crime an unappealing prospect while at the same time maximising the potential for urban youth who do stay on the right side of the law and work hard.

[Glocksman]

Population density is a popular scapegoat, but there's something else at work here

It's a contributing factor, not the sole cause. I didn't mean to present it as such. Others have touched on the poverty and educational aspects of it.

Another aspect of US crime is the racial makeup. Blacks are both perpetrators of, and victims of, crime far out of proportion to their share of the overall population. Is it because they're black?

Of course not.

Is it because of the breakdown of the black family unit (as Senator Moynihan predicted back in the 1960's)? Very possibly.

The wholesale gutting of the industrial base that used to provide jobs in the larger cities doesn't help matters either.

One thing Canada does have that the US doesn't is a comprehensive Welfare and health care system. If the US adopted the Canadian social services model would the US crime rates drop?

[Darth Wong]

One thing Canada does have that the US doesn't is a comprehensive Welfare and health care system. If the US adopted the Canadian social services model would the US crime rates drop?

Personally, I believe they would. There is a welfare "slum" only about 5 minutes from my place, and you wouldn't know it unless you look closely. It doesn't have the "burned out tenement" look of a typical American city slum. There are shiny cars in the parking lot, a playground, and reasonably clean environs.

[Stormbringer]

One thing Canada does have that the US doesn't is a comprehensive Welfare and health care system. If the US adopted the Canadian social services model would the US crime rates drop?

Personally, I believe they would. There is a welfare "slum" only about 5 minutes from my place, and you wouldn't know it unless you look closely. It doesn't have the "burned out tenement" look of a typical American city slum. There are shiny cars in the parking lot, a playground, and reasonably clean environs.

There's no question that "the projects" are shitholes. That's a fact. But that has as much to do with the actions of the tenants themselves. Those that lived in the housing projects generally carried on the lifestyle that wound them up poor, or worse, in the first place. The government housing projects were pretty nice when they were put up. But the communties abused them, destroyed them, and in general fostered the decay which lead to the shit hole conditions.

A lot of the crime problem has to do with sheer hopelessness. American welfare is adequate, even if it's not extravagent. It's a survival ration, not a gourmet meal. But when you see visions of gangsters with their bling-bling then suddenly survival seems inadequate. Welfare along won't solve the problem. What needs to be done is offer an more palatable option than gangster life that is more than just scraping by.

Welfare alone won't solve the problem.

[RedImperator]

[The best way to go about it is to rebuild the inner cities of America. Put the effort into real jobs programs, training, and incentives for businesses. And for fuck's sake, put money into the schools. Give the urban youth a safe, comfortable future and gang life won't be half so appealing. You don't need to legalize drugs, that's a side effect of poverty and not the cause. What needs to be done is offer a real alternative to the gang lifestyle. So far that hasn't happened for a number of reasons.

You're never going to sell anybody on an alternative to the gang lifestyle when it's possible to live comfortably as a small-time dealer, and become fantastically wealthy as just a middling player. Worse, inner city culture glorifies the gangster life as the only way for blacks to succede in a world where whitey has stacked the deck against them (I'll add here that the disproportionate sentences for minority drug users and dealers when compared to whites hasn't helped dispel this idea). The only way you're going to destroy that lifestyle as an alternative to real productive work is to destroy the black market in drugs, and that means legalization no matter how little you like the idea.

Frankly, much of the damage has already been done--it's going to take generations to change the general attitude among poor urban African Americans that being successful at anything other than entertainment or defying the establishment is tantamount to being a race traitor, but at least we can put the pushers and distributers who are commiting the murders out of business, and the users who are committing the burgularies and robberies to pay for their habits now can get their fix with just their welfare check.

As for putting money into schools, that's absolutely necessary, but declining property tax revenues in a number of cities make that increasingly difficult. This is where I'm supposed to tell you how to fix the problem, but I've got no idea how. If you raise tax rates, you'll drive higher income residents out and ultimately lower your tax revenues. If you lower them, there's no gurantee you'll draw residents back in (I'm thinking Philadelphia here, which has been criminally mismanaged for so long I doubt anything this side of free blowjobs for all residents every Wednesday afternoon would get suburbanites to move back into city neighborhoods).

Also, have a justice system that means something. I think the prison system needs to get serious. The sentences ought to mean something, too often now it's revolving door bullshit. And prisons ought to be tought, learn a trade or something or rot. Rehabilitation is a noble goal but with prison being too easy and to short most criminals don't care.

The threat of hard prison time isn't a deterrent. New Jersey's state prisons are among the worst in the country. Rahway State Prison is so bad, the residents of the town of Rahway demanded that the board of corrections change its name (it's now known as East Jersey State Prison). Yet the state has had the fourth largest increase in prison population in the country in the last 20 years (and the highest rate of drug offenders incarcerated, just for your information), and in general its crime rate has correlated to the national average in the same time period. Most people who commit crimes, I would venture, do so under the assumption that they won't be caught.

And much as I hate to seem like I'm beating a point to death, a large factor in the revolving door problem is the sheer number of drug offenders that the justice system is forced to accomidate. In 1999, they represented 32% of all offenders in New Jersey state prisons, and that's not counting the ones taking up space in county jails or juvenile facilities.

What needs to be done is to make crime an unappealing prospect while at the same time maximising the potential for urban youth who do stay on the right side of the law and work hard.

You're going to have to legalize drugs to even begin to do this. Then you have to fix the schools, or you're just replacing drug dealers with welfare bums. Then you have to fix inner city culture. Have fun with that.

Fixing the cities will be a massive, society-wide multi-generational undertaking that frankly I doubt this society would ever be willing to undertake. Ending drug prohibition, however, will at least make some of the crime go away, which is the point of this thread.

[Hobot]

Glocksman, I fail to see the significance of your figures. Of course there's going to be more crimes where there are more people. As for your assertion that there is no correlation between guns and crime, you must be on crack.

Code: Select all

Percent of households with a handgun, 1991 (21)

United States  29%
Switzerland    14
Finland         7
Germany         7
Belgium         6
France          6
Canada          5
Norway          4
Europe          4
Australia       2
Netherlands     2
United Kingdom  1

Handgun murders (1992) (22)

                Handgun    1992          Handgun Murder
Country         Murders    Population    Rate (per 100,000)
-----------------------------------------------------------
United States   13,429    254,521,000    5.28
Switzerland         97      6,828,023    1.42
Canada             128     27,351,509    0.47
Sweden              36      8,602,157    0.42
Australia           13     17,576,354    0.07
United Kingdom      33     57,797,514    0.06
Japan               60    124,460,481    0.05

Murders per 100,000 of population, 1991 (21)

United States   8.40
Canada          5.45
Denmark         5.17
France          4.60
Portugal        4.50
Australia       4.48
Germany         4.20
Belgium         2.80
Spain           2.28
Switzerland     2.25
Italy           2.18
Norway          1.99
United Kingdom  1.97
Austria         1.80
Greece          1.76
Sweden          1.73
Turkey          1.45
Japan           1.20
Ireland         0.96
Finland         0.70

Oh and nice job choosing Maine to do a comparison:

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                         Weapons          Weapons
                Murder   Offense  Murder  Offense
State           Rate     Rate     Rank    Rank 
------------------------------------------------
Louisiana       20.3     142      1       4
Mississippi     13.5     135      2       8
New York        13.3     102      3      20
California      13.1     135      4       9
Maryland        12.7     104      5      19
Texas           11.9     139      6       7
Alabama         11.6      67      7      34
Georgia         11.4     149      8       3
Illinois        11.4      75      9      30(t)
North Carolina  11.3     132     10      10
Missouri        11.3     199     11       1
Nevada          10.4     141     12       5
South Carolina  10.3      77     13      29
Arkansas        10.2     126     14      13
Tennessee       10.2     131     15      11
Michigan         9.8     107     16      16(t)
Alaska           9.0     107     17      16(t)
Florida          8.9      68     18      33
Arizona          8.6     114     19      15
Oklahoma         8.4      91     20      24
Virginia         8.3     129     21      12
New Mexico       8.0      71     22      32
Indiana          7.5      59     23      38
West Virginia    6.9      77     24      28
Pennsylvania     6.8      49     25      40
Kentucky         6.6     106     26      18
Kansas           6.4      94     27      22(t)
Connecticut      6.3     116     28      14
Ohio             6.0      97     29      21
Colorado         5.8     140     30       6
New Jersey       5.3      94     31      22(t)
Washington       5.2      75     32      30(t)
Delaware         5.0      30     33      44(t)
Oregon           4.6      81     34      26
Wisconsin        4.4     165     35       2
Massachusetts    3.9      35     36      42
Nebraska         3.9      78     37      27
Rhode Island     3.9      60     38      36(t)
Hawaii           3.8      60     39      36(t)
Vermont          3.6       1     40      50
Wyoming          3.4      31     41      43
Minnesota        3.4      61     42      35
South Dakota     3.4      41     43      41
Utah             3.1      85     44      25
Montana          3.0      12     45      49
Idaho            2.9      52     46      39
Iowa             2.3      30     47      44(t)
New Hampshire    2.0      16     48      48 
North Dakota     1.7      25     49      46
Maine            1.6      23     50      47
--------------------------------------------------
Correlation              .67            .71
to crime (7)

Hey, look what happens when Canada introduces harsher gun control laws!

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In 1978, Canada passed C-51, a law which banned non-grandfathered automatic weapons, required the registration of other firearms, and generally tightened restrictions on their transportation and use. This was accompanied by a substantial drop in the firearm homicide rate:

Canadian homicide rate (per 100,000)

                  By      By other
Year    Overall   guns    methods
----------------------------------
1974     2.68     1.4     1.3
1975     3.09     1.4     1.7
1976     2.91     1.2     1.7
1977     3.06     1.2     1.8
1978     2.81     1.1     1.7  < C-51 passed
1979     2.66     0.9     1.8
1980     2.47     0.9     1.6
1981     2.66     0.8     1.8
1982     2.72     1.0     1.7
1983     2.75     0.9     1.8
1984     2.67     0.9     1.7
1985     2.80     0.8     1.9
1986     2.24     0.7     1.5
1987     2.51     0.8     1.7 

Averages:
74-78    2.91     1.3     1.6
79-87    2.61     0.9     1.7

Source: Stats Canada 88.

Poverty is not the sole reason for crime either, otherwise the US would have one of the lowest crime rates in the world (after the other industrialized countries that is). The real reason there is so much violent crime in the US is because of the huge social disparity between the rich and the poor. Look at countries like Japan and Norway where a huge percentage of the population is part of the middle class; their crime rates are miniscule. The US has the highest level of income inequality in the world:

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Inequality of income, 1991 (100 = most inequality, 0 = least inequality) (26)

United States   99
Canada          83
Netherlands     82
Switzerland     79
United Kingdom  78
Germany         66
Norway          60
Sweden          60

Poverty level, 1991 (27)

United States   17.1%
Canada          12.6
United Kingdom   9.7
Switzerland      8.5
Germany          5.6
Sweden           5.3
Norway           5.2

Children under the poverty level, 1991 (28)

United States   22.4%
Canada          15.5
United Kingdom   9.3
Switzerland      7.8
Sweden           5.0
Germany          4.9
Norway           4.8

If you want to reduce violent crime, you have to reduce the differences between people. For the US this means more social programs.

[haas mark]

I think one of the first steps to eliminating crime muust necessarily be an increase in education standards. After that, and increase in employment should be necessary. What would this do? This would make it easier for people to make something of themselves. Stricter enforcement in the areas of violent crimes may be necessary, as well as gun registration, etc., etc. And personally, I think that guns that are specifically used for the purpose of hunting MUST be only given to those that have hunting liscences, and unless they RENEW those liscences appropriately, their guns' registrations will be revoked.

~ver