How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by throwaway894345 on Sunday October 30, 2022 @03:23PM (#33397682)

Well, we tried pulling back policing and slap-on-the-wrist prosecution policies and violent crime is surging. How long until friendship, positive energy, and rainbows kick in and bring crime levels down? There are more constructive solutions to the prison problem--notably solving frontend problems + prison reform, but locking up violent offenders is part of "solving frontend problems" so we can't exactly stop doing that and hope to make up the difference by investing in after school programs. Any serious solution to crime has to be "lock up offenders and X" rather than "letting offenders run rampant and X".

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by PuppyTailWags on Sunday October 30, 2022 @03:55PM (#33398017)

> we tried pulling back policing and slap-on-the-wrist prosecution policies and violent crime is surging

Firstly, where is pulling back policing happening? I don't know of a single city that has actually reduced their police size to any real sense?

Additionally, how do we know this isn't just correlation and not causation? Inflation is higher, more people are addicted to things, housing insecurity is rising.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by alex_sf on Sunday October 30, 2022 @04:15PM (#33398204)

> Firstly, where is pulling back policing happening?

Most metropolitan areas. Seattle [1][2] and Minneapolis [3] have both established public policies of not responding to, citing, or arresting for a wide range of offenses.

> I don't know of a single city that has actually reduced their police size to any real sense?

Minneapolis has reduced the number of police officers, through various means, by 30%. [4]

> Additionally, how do we know this isn't just correlation and not causation?

Because we have multiple studies proving a causal relationship. [5][6]

[1] https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/sea...

[2] https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/seattle-police-bellevue-oth...

[3] https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-poli...

[4] https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/minnesota-supreme-cou...

[5] https://rss.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/rssa.12142

[6] https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/426877

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by PuppyTailWags on Sunday October 30, 2022 @05:51PM (#33399171)

If this is true, then why are the places with the least crime also not the places with the most police? I'm genuinely asking out of curiosity.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by alex_sf on Sunday October 30, 2022 @06:58PM (#33399907)

Crime has multiple causes, and multiple solutions. One proven solution is increased police presence. It isn't required, though.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by PuppyTailWags on Sunday October 30, 2022 @07:59PM (#33400388)

Thanks for educating me about it!

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by rmasters on Sunday October 30, 2022 @07:02PM (#33399960)

I'm not the person you asked, but if I rephrase your question to "Then why do some places with low crime have less police?", then the answer just seems to be common sense.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by YZF on Sunday October 30, 2022 @03:59PM (#33398049)

"Crime is surging" seems to be the current thing in the political discourse. That's how conservatives are attacking liberals these days in the US and in other places. It's mostly not supported by numbers (at least I checked where I live).

Crime rates have multiple causes to them, many go years back.

Maybe we should try to address the root causes instead of locking up more people? We have tough times economically, many reasons for people to despair, endless incitement to violence as means of resolving disagreements or other problems.

At the very least, a harsher approach to law enforcement has to be coupled with some path forward to address the other issues.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by pessimizer on Sunday October 30, 2022 @04:39PM (#33398423)

> That's how conservatives are attacking liberals these days in the US and in other places.

Primarily as a completely organized and funded way to attack recently elected "progressive" city officials. After the enemy prosecutor/sheriff disappears, the crime wave evaporates as fast as the complaints about kids in cages did when Biden took over.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by YZF on Sunday October 30, 2022 @04:50PM (#33398525)

You mean migrants at the border ;) Elections in the age of social media.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by alex_sf on Sunday October 30, 2022 @04:17PM (#33398219)

Sure, let's try to reduce the crime rate. Let's also not just ignore crimes and refuse to imprison people for them.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How I Survived a Year in ‘The Hole’ Without Losing My Mind by throwaway894345 on Monday October 31, 2022 @10:56AM (#33406651)

You are mistaken. Homicides are up 60% in the US since the pre-BLM era. This is widely acknowledged among criminologists and isn’t some “conservative misinformation”. Lots of research indicates at a causal relationship between the BLM protests and crime surges, including research that compares crime rates in individual cities before and after a major BLM protest. At some point I should just compile a canned list of papers so I don’t have to dig up links every time this talking point comes up.

[ Parent | on HN ]