TEENAGERS SAY CRIME PAYS

Sky News ^ | September 16, 2003

[demlosers]

Crime pays, four in 10 of British teenagers believe, according to a new survey.

And the figure is even higher in inner cities with six out of 10 teens in socially deprived areas thinking they could benefit from crime.

The survey is published as one young boy recovers in hospital after being stabbed for his mobile phone, and a young mother was stabbed seven times in broad daylight on a busy commuter bus after a confrontation with a bag snatcher.

Prison is by far the biggest deterrent against committing a crime but only 5% think community service orders work and just 1% say fines put them off crime.

But, according to the survey of 600 young people by insurers Norwich Union, 54% of teenagers are worried that either themselves or their friends and family would be victims of crime.

40% say crime pays

The study of young people aged 13 to 19 revealed that more than a third accept crime is part of their society.

Four out of 10 admitted to knowing someone who had committed a crime, with this figure doubling to eight out of 10 in socially deprived parts of Britain.

Norwich Union is now working with the crime reduction organisation Crime Concern to launch an anti-crime apprenticeship scheme.

Spokeswoman Jill Willis said: "As our research has shown, it is no longer sufficient to solely rely on preventative measures to reduce crime.

"If teenagers are growing up believing that crime does pay, we need hands-on approaches like the apprenticeship scheme to offer alternative ways of thinking about and tackling crime."

Last Updated: 05:34 UK, Tuesday September 16, 2003

[cyborg]

Well didn't we just cover the increasing trend if middle class whoring themselves for clothes? How sad.

[coloradan]

Good thing Britain has gun control, otherwise crime would be a way of life there!

[Mr. Mojo]

These teenagers who believe that crimes pays would be singing a different tune if the good people of Britain were allowed to bear arms, and blow their felonious asses away.

[TheOtherOne]

felonious asses away

Felonious Punk, sounds like a Jazz Band.

[Mr. Mojo]

Their big hit: (Black and) Blue Punk

[Dan Cooper]

"If teenagers are growing up believing that crime does pay, we need hands-on approaches like the apprenticeship scheme to offer alternative ways of thinking about and tackling crime."

Kind of like Fagin's training program in Oliver Twist?

[sport]

The democrat political party is living proof that crime pays and it pays big.

bill and hillary clinton are but two more examples of not only crime paying but also treason paying big.

[Diogenesis]

Terrorism pays for its inventor.

[Blackyce]

Crime does pay, otherwise it wouldn't keep happening. That's basic economics. "Crime doesn't pay" is just an uproven maxim we tell our children when we don't want to bother teaching them morality.

[FreedomCalls]

Why don't Brits just pull out their .45's and plug the little b'stards when they break into their houses? That will deter them from a future life of crime.

They did what? You're kidding. None at all -- not even "sporting guns"? How can they defend themselves? Surely the Conservative Party opposed it? What? They supported it? What about the gun clubs and national gun organizations? They supported it too? Then they deserve what they are getting.

[Pontiac]

Crime pays, four in 10 of British teenagers believe, according to a new survey.

And the figure is even higher in inner cities with six out of 10 teens in socially deprived areas thinking they could benefit from crime.

Teenagers like all people believe what they see with there own eyes.

When teens see drug dealers on every street corner wearing gold chains, when they see drug dealers driving expensive cars, using expensive cell phones and dating the best looking girls, they know that crime pays.

Prohibition does this to our society. Prohibition makes crime pay like nothing else can.

[45Auto]

Prison is by far the biggest deterrent against committing a crime

The best deterrent is knowing some irate citizen may be armed and trained and pissed off. Brits don't get it.

[WOSG]

They let their church get taken over by gay activists and heretics, and their streets are taken over by thugs and criminals.

And they are shocked to find only prison deters.

This is the price of the collapse of Cosnervative sentiment in Europe.

[anymouse]

Why do I see a Brazillian style vigilanti backlash coming in Brittan. Even runaway socialism causes a reaction among those fed up with a lawless society. Mostly they flee the country, but some stay and fight any way they can.

[Imal]

Wow, good thing they aren't in America, where a million kids are gunned down in the streets every day. It's true. Just ask the various centrally-funded gun control groups.

Compared to the rivers of blood running in the streets of America's cities, it sounds like the Brits have it pretty sweet.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go pry out the three bullets that landed in my body while I typed this post in gun-crazy Nevada. I still have my wallet, at least.

[Prodigal Son]

These teenagers who believe that crimes pays would be singing a different tune if the good people of Britain were allowed to bear arms, and blow their felonious asses away.

This assumes if Britons were allowed, they'd all suddenly go out and buy handguns. I'm under the impression handgun ownership was never widespread even when it was less restricted. They don't have the same cultural attitude towards guns as people in the US. If you talk to people here, they don't want guns. They police don't even want guns. So I don't think it is a safe assumption that simply making guns legal here would turn everyone into gunslingers on the streets.

I know people are going to pop off a lot of one liners about the Brits not deserving their freedom or whatever as a result of my comments- be my guest- but there it is.

[Prodigal Son]

Crime does pay, otherwise it wouldn't keep happening. That's basic economics. "Crime doesn't pay" is just an uproven maxim we tell our children when we don't want to bother teaching them morality.

Not necessarily true. Much of the criminal element lack the cognitive skills the rest of society have or simply weigh risk differently. To this type of mind, the death sentence might be a worthwhile risk to stealing a few dollars. It might be that a mind like this has a harder time imagining the consequences of his actions down the road and factoring that in properly against the immediate reward of appropriation. A mind like that is more likely to get caught than someone who carefully weighs immediate gratification against future reward. So, crime might pay for a day or a month or a year, but eventually the criminal will lose his freedom or life (to the State or to another criminal).

It's just according to how you define the payoff. If killing someone for 20 bucks is worth your life- well, sure crime pays. If risking your future freedom for a smash and grab and 80 quid, crime pays. They even got Pablo Escobar in the end and he was one of the most powerful criminals ever.

Criminals are among the less rational elements of society hence I don't think one can view them as plain old rational actors working on the profit motive. They're the rats that get their necks caught in the trap because they weren't clever enough to work out that steel spring mechanism and that cheese just looked to good to pass up.

[Susannah]

Four out of 10 admitted to knowing someone who had committed a crime, with this figure doubling to eight out of 10 in socially deprived parts of Britain.

Geez, I didn't know anyone could be socially deprived in a Socialist country.

[bernie_g]

Good point Prodigal Son, you've described the situation here accurately. Early 20thC it used to be that handguns were freely available but few people had them, those few tended to be ex-military types who'd had a use for them elsewhere and had kept them around as keepsakes. Who else would have a reason to own one? Nobody back then would dream that a handgun was needed for defence, in Britain.

Late 20th C the only people who had handguns tended to be a small number of collectors and hobby shooters, who mostly kept them in a safe at the range. Then after the Dunblaine massacre occured, hanguns were made for all practical purposes, illegal. Very few here protested. Most people didn't have a gun, didn't want a gun and thought people who did were creepy 'loner' types and potential mass-murderers.

The UK law doesn't ban long guns, so working farmers can get a shotgun licence quite easily, as can the few people who actually have a use for rifle licence; eg ghillies etc.

At present, we are given to understand by news reports, the situation is that if you are connected with the drug gangs, you can get both handguns and automatic weapons for a few hundred pounds. The latter items apparently tend to be East European military surplus, so we're talking about AKs, plus a few bits and pieces that come in from the Carribean along with all the cocaine. So guns are caricatured, widely in the UK culture, as tools for drug-dealers to murder each other with, not as legitmate tools for self-defence that the government has unjustly taken away from the population.

Oddly enough, that doesn't mean that UK people believe that they should be at legal risk for damaging burglars. It just means that when they think about defending their home from burglars, they aren't expecting the burglar to have a gun, and any damage they are planning to do to them is with some other tool. Usually an axe-handle or similar. They are not thinking primarily about killing anyone, that's obviously murder, unless you have clear reason to believe your life was in danger, instead they are thinking about giving them a good old-fashioned bashing with a big stick and a fright.

If you talk to your average UK citizen about their God-given right to bear arms, they'll look at you as though you were advocating female circumcision or something equally culturally alien. If you ask them why they should be in trouble for injuring a burglar, they'll agree that this is a violation of natural justice and be very upset about it.