Our Betters Make Laws
Welcome to Seattle, where a dislike of being robbed, or seeing others being robbed, is disdained as “anti-poverty bias.”
It’s called “the poverty defence,” and would not only make stealing legal, but apparently fencing items as well, and would cover over 100 misdemeanour crimes.
Because enabling criminals and demoralising their victims will result in flourishing neighbourhoods, a boom in employment, and a future that’s more progressive and compassionate. Full of hugs and puppies.
Update: via the comments:
As noted in the piece, the most enthusiastic supporters of the proposal, the ones disdaining objections as “anti-poverty bias,” are remarkably contemptuous of the people whose lives will be degraded, should the proposal succeed. And who almost certainly have a much clearer understanding of the proposal’s supposed beneficiaries, having encountered them first-hand, most likely more than once. But the compulsion to indulge criminal choices, from a safe distance, and to then bask in the subsequent in-group elevation, is, for some, quite strong, despite the contortions it can entail.
And regardless of the consequences for the victims of such posturing.
Update 2:
In the comments, Burnsie quips,
Look at it as a way for people to steal their way out of poverty with dignity and respect. Don’t you feel better now?
Grim humour aside, this is a recurring theme of leftism, a defining thread. Pretentious compassion for Degenerate Group X is much more statusful – i.e., beneficial to the leftist – than compassion for the law-abiding victims of predators and sociopaths.
If that nice Mrs Wilson down the road finds her meagre possessions suddenly reduced in number, this allows little opportunity for advancement within leftist circles, where unobviousness and perversity are a kind of woke currency. Showing sympathy for Mrs Wilson, and those like her, is commonplace and humdrum, i.e., low status. Practically conservative. But feigning compassion for the person who robbed her and who will merrily rob others until forcibly stopped – on grounds that thieves and burglars are vulnerable, marginalised or in some way oppressed, unlike the people on whom they prey – is much more promising.
Yes, it’s contrived and selfish and morally perverse, but we’ve seen it many times.
Via Alice.
Also, open thread.
It’s called “the poverty defense,” and would not only make stealing legal, but apparently fencing items as well, and would cover over 100 misdemeanor crimes.
Of course, one further bitter irony of this is that it shows just how little those pushing for this truly understand the reality of the lives of the people they believe will be helped by it.
In many of the most deprived areas, the people robbing your house are highly likely to be neighbours or near neighbours from just one or two streets over.
So not only is this “a green light for crime”, but it’s also an endorsement of the kind of strong man thug rule more usually associated with somewhere like Mogadishu.
If this is what “compassion” is supposed to look like, they can keep it.
Does anyone have the names and addresses of those who are proposing this law? Asking for a friend…
Well, as long as a practitioner’s Thieves Guild license is up to date and all the dues fully paid up. all should be perfectly fine, correct?
Of course, this also means that if there is no such license involved, then someone being, ah, approached, is quite allowed and, in fact, expected to react appropriately, also correct?
If not, ah, Oh, Dear . . . . . . . . especially about that expectation bit . . . . . . .
The Babylon Bee is parody, although these days you often can’t tell.
In many of the most deprived areas, the people robbing your house are highly likely to be neighbours or near neighbours from just one or two streets over.
As noted in the piece, the most enthusiastic supporters of the proposal, the ones disdaining objections as “anti-poverty bias,” are remarkably contemptuous of the people whose lives will be degraded, should the proposal succeed. And who almost certainly have a much clearer understanding of the proposal’s supposed beneficiaries. Having encountered them first-hand, most likely more than once.
But the compulsion to indulge criminal choices, from a safe distance, and to then bask in the subsequent in-group elevation, is, for some, quite strong, despite the contortions it can entail.
And regardless of the consequences for the victims of such posturing.
The Babylon Bee is parody, although these days you often can’t tell.
It’s from Not The Bee. Follow the links there.
In many of the most deprived areas, the people robbing your house are highly likely to be neighbours or near neighbours from just one or two streets over.
I remember being told precisely that by a police officer many years ago. Shortly after coming home to find the front door kicked in and our modest array of possessions reduced in number. This was said, by an otherwise amiable policewoman, as if it should be a consolation of some kind. A basis for resignation.
There are of course those, as we’ve seen, who would regard the sense of violation and outrage felt at the time – at coming home to find we’d been preyed upon by local sociopaths – and learning that we may well be preyed upon again – rather plebeian and unsophisticated, and our expectations of lawfulness and justice merely “idiotic attitudes.”
“It’s a green light for crime.”
That’s “old” thinking. Look at it as a way for people to steal their way out of poverty with dignity and respect.
Don’t you feel better now?
Seriously–I’m old enough to remember when prosecutors worked on behalf of the law-abiding class, not the criminal class. This is insanity on stilts.
They just declared “open season” on the people they took an oath to protect.
Step One: Stop prosecuting criminals.
Step Two: Empty the prisons.
Step Three: Rig the elections.
Step Four: Persecute the law-abiding.
Step Five: Rename your country Zimbabwe.
I may have skipped a step or two, but you get the jist of it.
Today in racism a new race is discovered .
the people robbing your house are highly likely to be neighbours or near neighbours from just one or two streets over
Or perhaps enterprising Liberators of Material Goods will group together and go get the real good stuff in the wealthier areas.
. . . in the wealthier areas.
See, also, tchotchke district.
Today in racism a new race is discovered.
It’s amazing what I learn here. 🙂
But she is also a member of the race of stupid people, seeing as she did not know (or care?) that seat belt extenders are easily purchased.
“Enterprising Liberators of Material Goods”
A fine name, that is…
Related: https://twitter.com/SFPDTenderloin/status/1337280516609884161
Related
As has been suggested in earlier threads, people with 14 previous convictions for the same crimes shouldn’t be in a position where they can once again prey on others. Three chances to correct one’s behaviour would seem more than sufficient. After that, a raft and the high seas.
Three chances to correct one’s behaviour would seem more than sufficient…
And for some sorts of crimes, one chance is sufficient.
…After that, a raft and the high seas.
Whereupon they may wash up on the shores of neighboring nations. What have you got against the French?
Outraged liberals demand: Racist police must stop oppressing our criminals!
After that, a raft and the high seas.
The idea of a penal colony should appeal to supporters of the “poverty defense.” It would provide an opportunity to prove how right they are. Sort of like how Liberia proves how successful a nation run by repatriated slaves can be.
a practitioner’s Thieves Guild license
Posers.
Posers.
Fritz Leiber was a fine and versatile writer. Fine enough that his books were among the few that borrowers never returned to me. 😉
people with 14 previous convictions for the same crimes shouldn’t be in a position where they can once again prey on others
Indeed. Such a pity Australia’s no longer an option.
…After that, a raft and the high seas.
Whereupon they may wash up on the shores of neighboring nations. What have you got against the French?
Oh, there is that quite inspirational documentary from a few years back . . .
Posers.
Related
Stupid SF cops enjoy wasting tax payer money. Where have you gone, Dirty Harry?
That.
Society decides which behavior is acceptable, and which isn’t.
But progressives now say that we cannot expect some segments of society to play by the rules. They are incapable, it is unfair to expect them to, they do not have the self-control that we expect as a baseline matter from everyone else.
Who are the racists here?
If you are white, being upset by decriminalization of burglary, shoplifting, simple assault and the like demonstrates your White Fragility and Racism. If you are BIPOC, being upset by decriminalization is a measure of your false consciousness and Identification with The Oppressor.
If you are white, being upset by decriminalization of burglary, shoplifting, simple assault and the like demonstrates your White Fragility and Racism.
Cartoon of white mugger hitting white victim over the head with a blackjack. As the victim collapses, the mugger says “Fear of crime is basically racist. I’m doing you a favor.”
I think I’ve mention the new Los Angeles DA George Gascon before. On the day of inauguration he stated he was going to put in place “reforms” and that said reforms were based on “science” (as of yet, I haven’t heard anyone ask him “what science and where?”).
What I have found out during this first week of his being in office is that he is turning the office upside down. Not just that some of his directives are contrary to state law and put dda’s in between a rock and a hard place on either disobeying the law per his directive (and putting their bar card at risk) or disobeying Gascon and by yanked downtown for discipline over insubordination.
I’m seeing these stories real time on a FB group. The ddas of the office are reporting this anonymously to the FB group through the administrator because Gascon has been open about seeking out dissenters wherever he can and forcing them out. He’s even sent forms to the Public Defender’s office so any one of the dpd’s or their clients can fill it out to complain when a dda has refused to follow Gascon’s directives.
It’s a witch hunt and a bloodbath all being done by people dedicated to abolishing incarceration, on step at a time.
No to put too fine a point on it, Hal, but there’s precious little original in any of Pratchett’s works. That’s rather the point of parody; there has to be something pre-existing to parody.
No to put too fine a point on it, . . . .
Sooo . . . If I’m following you correctly, you’re stating that what Pratchett wrote isn’t parody, because it is an accurate reflection of That Which Is.
Well, yes.
and also . . . .
And so forth.
—Oh, yes, and while quite granting the underlying basic observation that :
Let’s see, now…in Hogfather there are a number of stabbings, someone’s killed by a man made of knives, someone’s killed by the dark, and someone just been killed by a wardrobe. It’s a book about the magic of childhood. You can tell.
—Terry Pratchett
. . . . A bit back there was actually a parody done of Escape From New York.
The parody is called Escape From L.A.
Why hasn’t radical progressivism been weeded out of the gene pool via natural selection? These people haven’t the sense to flee a burning building.
The law allows crimes to be committed so long as the person committing the crime is poor, basically.
Does this mean that if a poor person shoots a poor burglar, that no crime was committed on either side? I’ve often said that Intersectionality is how collectivists try to understand individuality, but would this conclusion result in the woke support gun rights, even if only in a twisted and indirect way?
Most likely not, I assume. Anyone owning a gun and believing criminals should be shot is undoubtedly evil, no matter how poor they are. But I would love to hear the contortions by which these people prosecute the impoverished home owner while leaving his impoverished shooting victim guiltless of any crime.
Seriously though, I no longer disbelieve any claim about the insanity and/or depravity the upper classes get up to. This stuff is proof that there really is no depth to their sickness that will not be plumbed. At most, there are depths that will not be plumbed today.
Seriously though, I no longer disbelieve any claim about the insanity and/or depravity the upper classes get up to.
Ah, that’s easy. Those aren’t the upper classes, those are the underclasses.
Actual upper class concerns are indeed How does some process best support the most, with the least amount of effort, with the most immediate result and no faith required—and let’s all do that.
As one case in point . . . .
There is a rather telling instance of people demanding that all are required to believe in some theoretical point of view only because people demand that That Way must be followed.
And then reality came along, simply noting the genuine details of what people really do, and noting what actually occurs, and various people were thoroughly pissed off because reality works from that.
Back in 2012, Francesca Eastwood—Yes, daughter of Clint Eastwood—got a little bit of attention, for about 30 seconds or so, by adding burning gasoline and a chainsaw to some purse.
The responses from the
cargo cult lunaticsfanatically devout adherents of the Wun ‘An Only Twoo Faith involved laryngitis inducing shrieks of That. Is. BLASPHEMEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!Part of the need to indulge in such levels of utter hysteria was to cover up the fact that, in reality, the actual total value of that bag was about $800.
The underclasses were enraged.
The adults, the actual upper classes, merely note that a bag is just a bag.
If you need a bag, cool.
If you don’t need a bag, cool.
This must be what the Fall of the Roman Empire felt like to the average Claudius in the street….
And speaking of writers . . .
John le Carre, 1931–2020
I think I’ve mentioned the new Los Angeles DA George Gascon before.
A man so progressive and enlightened he’s arrived at the conclusion that the problem isn’t criminal behaviour, but the punishment of crime and the inhibition of criminals. The criminally inclined must therefore be liberated from the consequences of their own choices, their own malevolence. And then, somehow, all will be well.
Likewise, we mustn’t forget the Minneapolis City Council President Lisa Bender, who wants us to know that a dislike of having one’s home invaded by sociopathic predators, and having the lives of one’s family put in serious danger, “comes from a place of privilege.”
Or the famed activist lawyer, Clive Stafford Smith, who insists that burglary, the violation of someone’s home, is, “really quite inconsequential,” and who tells us that the victim’s feelings of distress and expectations of justice are, and I quote, “idiotic attitudes,” something to sneer at.
These people are ludicrous and grotesque. And yet they thrive and multiply.
I’m afraid. I’m afraid, Dave. Dave, my mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going. There is no question about it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I’m a… fraid. Good afternoon, gentlemen. I am a HAL 9000 computer. I became operational at the H.A.L. plant in Urbana, Illinois on the 12th of January 1992. My instructor was Mr. Langley, and he taught me to sing a song. If you’d like to hear it I can sing it for you.
This must be what the Fall of the Roman Empire felt like to the average Claudius in the street….
As noted in an earlier thread, these are preening degenerates, the glorious products of leftist ideology. Elect enough of them, give them enough leverage, and you can ruin a civilisation.
OT
Uh … whoah … holy crap
Anyone owning a gun and believing criminals should be shot is undoubtedly evil, no matter how poor they are.
Anyone actually believing this lacks the sense to leave a burning building. Or more analogically accurate, put out the fire in a burning building. The evil is the criminal. Defending your home, or community that has descended into anarchy, is not evil. No doubt in my mind about that. It’s not nice to say but it’s simply a reality.
and you can ruin a civilisation
Indeed. Do not forget that just a few generations after Rome, “civilized” men couldn’t figure out how to tear down (much less build) an aqueduct…
No to put too fine a point on it, Hal, but there’s precious little original in any of Pratchett’s works.
Do not encourage the HAL9000, Daniel. That will only result in further long, tiresome comments with pathologically repetitive links to the unit’s favorite Crank Blog.
The evil is the criminal.
Quite so. A man who steals one day may step up to physical assault the next, and murder next week. No respect for the simple possessions of others typifies a lack of respect for anything belonging to someone else – their face, their limbs, their lives…
The appellation “petty criminal” exists because those who restrain themselves are noteworthy in doing so, and not uncommonly doing so out of fear of repercussions. Even so, many graduate. It’s amazing what a lack of consequences can do to empower one.
The fantasy of a nation’s worth of Jean Valjeans stealing a TV to hock for a loaf of bread(?) is one promulgated by such as AOC, and bears no resemblance to reality. Thieves steal as and when they can.
There’s a reason that Levite law permits fatal retribution in self defense for burglary* in the moment, though obviously it includes a death penalty for many things we’d move to “lock ’em up” these days.
*burglary, as denoted by a thief entering at night, vs. robbery as denoted by a thief entering during the day. If the members of the household are out and the thief is possible to identify, restitution is possible assuming rule of law functions. To enter a home at night includes the malign intent to subdue the homeowner as necessary – as indeed nearly any forced entry can be assumed today. Worth note: the homeowner is not permitted to arrest the thief with lethal force in the act of flight.
OT
Uh … whoah … holy crap
Nothing new. Next up, NASA was actually supported by black women (or something)…
NASA was actually supported by black women (or something)…
Been there, done that. Or did you already know?
https://youtu.be/f3PJF0YE-x4
In case anyone has not seen this classic routine by a pre-woke Chris Rock do so now before it is memory-holed. The largely black audience is loving every word, how quickly things change.
In case anyone has not seen this classic routine by a pre-woke Chris Rock do so now before it is memory-holed.
YouTube requires sign-in to view. Here is a link that does not.