Petty theft does not put lives at risk.

I cannot imagine how anyone with minimal understanding how the world workd could suggest that is a "petty" concern.

That’s irrelevant to this discussion.

Data points illustrating how society handles actual criminal infractions with victims are very much relevant in the context of a suggestion that we pull out all the stops to prosecute any particular civil infraction that has no immediate victims.

The suggestion is that you report it, as a safety issue, not that you then go on to demand justice for this not-exactly-heinous non-crime. The police are not going to send in the SWAT team and divert their best men to the case - they're going to note it down in a file somewhere. Come on.

("Oh god. This guy sounds just like... oh. It is dsfyu404ed." - me, often enough to have noticed this is a thing, reading the comments here on articles about cars.)

>The police are not going to send in the SWAT team and divert their best men to the case - they're going to note it down in a file somewhere. Come on.

Right, that's exactly the response we don't even give to all sorts of crime with a victim unless the victim is very pushy about getting a police report filed. If we're not going to at least make some token effort to enforce petty theft and vandalism laws then I see no value to society of making a point of giving that level of enforcement to even lesser crimes.