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[SalmonGod]

The question is what self-defense options are available when the organizations responsible for upholding that principle are themselves undermining it.

[smeeprocket]

I don't actually approve of it, I'm just having a hard time feeling sympathy when it happens to rapists (Steubenville) and murderers (police.)

And that's why we have laws and courts instead of trial by popular demand: It's wrong regardless of who it happens to. If you start undermining this principle you get into alll kinds of trouble ideologically...

but it doesn't really make sense for the rapist to go to jail for 2-3 years and the doxxer of the rapist being shielded because he is a minor (if you rape somebody, you aren't a minor, that status should be revoked) potentially getting 10 years.

[Helgoland]

It's even worse if you consider crimes against property: Someone who pirates stuff professionally can get ten or twenty years, while rapists -- who have without a doubt committed the worse crime - get maybe five. It gets me thinking too. But the question that always stops me is: Can you find a better way? Because there needs to be a sort of hierarchy of punishment among similar crimes: You steal more, you do more time. And locking rapists up for life would be rather disproportionate as well...

[smeeprocket]

it shouldn't be about locking people away anyway, it should be about creating a space, possibly not a dangerous, humanity stripping, hostile space, for them to be rehabilitated. Yes, that even includes the rapists.

Personally, I don't think petty theft should ever result in jail time. That individual could just as easily be under house arrest or on probation. Theft isn't the kind of "this person is dangerous to society" crime we should reserve prison for.

Don't get me wrong, there are cases when people should be locked away for life. Serial rapists and killers would fall under that. But prison should always, even in those cases, focus on rehabilitation and helping those people better themselves.

Very few people enter prison, and come out fixed, and even if they do, the requirements afterwards are so crushing that it's almost impossible not to end up back in jail or doing something illegal.

[Helgoland]

Smee, I'm in Europe, we already do that stuff

Petty theft results in jailtime in the US? That's fucked up. I meant burglaries, armed robberies, that kind of stuff. Stuff that needs to be counteracted by rehabilitation behind bars. That's where the hierarchy I mentioned comes into play.

What would you consider a just sentence for your average rapist? What would you consider a just sentence for your average recidivist burglar? A guy who held up a gas station? A guy who robbed a bank? These are concrete questions with answers that may be counterintuitive to our immediate sense of justice.

[Leafsnail]

And that's why we have laws and courts instead of trial by popular demand: It's wrong regardless of who it happens to. If you start undermining this principle you get into alll kinds of trouble ideologically...

What if the laws and courts refuse to punish a certain class of individual no matter what they do?

[smeeprocket]

US has the 'Three strikes' system where the third crime you commit WILL end in jailtime, IIRC. People have been sent to prison for stealing cookies.

depends on the state, actually.

Florida, for example, has a ten twenty life law for gun crimes. A women was recently put in jail for a good amount of time for firing a shot into the ceiling to try and scare off her abusive ex-husband. And yes, she was black. Because this is Florida and everyone here is the maximum level of awful.

[UXLZ]

And that's why we have laws and courts instead of trial by popular demand: It's wrong regardless of who it happens to. If you start undermining this principle you get into alll kinds of trouble ideologically...

What if the laws and courts refuse to punish a certain class of individual no matter what they do?

What were they again? Off the top of my head I think it's mostly:
Politician
Celebrity (sports players in particular)
Police
Uber rich

Anything else? Or are one of these wrong?

[Helgoland]

And that's why we have laws and courts instead of trial by popular demand: It's wrong regardless of who it happens to. If you start undermining this principle you get into alll kinds of trouble ideologically...

What if the laws and courts refuse to punish a certain class of individual no matter what they do?

You do the same thing you do when you've dialed a wrong number: Hang 'em up and try again.

Sorry, that pun works better in German and when applied to politicians: Aufhängen, neuwählen!

[SalmonGod]

And that's why we have laws and courts instead of trial by popular demand: It's wrong regardless of who it happens to. If you start undermining this principle you get into alll kinds of trouble ideologically...

What if the laws and courts refuse to punish a certain class of individual no matter what they do?

What were they again? Off the top of my head I think it's mostly:
Politician
Celebrity (sports players in particular)
Police
Uber rich

Anything else? Or are one of these wrong?

White people, depending on context.

Example:  Bundy Ranch stand-off, where white people pointed guns at police for extended periods of time, and nothing happened.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

US has the 'Three strikes' system where the third crime you commit WILL end in jailtime, IIRC. People have been sent to prison for stealing cookies.

It depends on the state. Some states don't have three strikes at all, and the severity of the laws vary wildly. California's, for example, is infamous because it mandates life imprisonment on the third strike.

The other issue is that they are generally counted by way of "serious criminal offenses". If that sounds kind of vague to you, you're correct. This makes the enforcement of strikes inconsistent and often arbitrary.

[Leafsnail]

Also strangely enough the fact that some of his supporters killed two cops was not immediately used as a way to try and discredit his movement.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/09/las-vegas-shooting-cliven-bundy_n_5473662.html

[smeeprocket]

that's because white people don't actually commit crimes. They just sort of sidestep the law.

Black people and other minorities though, filthy criminals the lot.

[TheDarkStar]

Sorry, that pun works better in German and when applied to politicians: Aufhängen, neuwählen!

This made me laugh.

[Toady One]

Posts removed, a few warnings...  there've been a lot lately, but I gather it is a tense time all around for a variety of reasons.  Please stay on track, read carefully, maintain dignity, contemplate forum guidelines, remember the person on the other side of the screen...  all kinds of stuff to do, but I believe in you.