I'm interested to know your stand on this.
They should receive the applicable sentence, regardless of circumstances (I am Ti)
They should receive the applicable sentence, regardless of circumstances (I am Fi)
Different factors e.g. financial circumstances, past record must be taken into account (I am Ti)
IDifferent factors e.g. financial circumstances, past record must be taken into account (I am Fi)
I'm interested to know your stand on this.
This has nothing to do withand
.
Usually, you won't punish someone with the applicable sentence, regardless of circumstances, unless you're an autistic bureaucrat.
I'm not voting because I won't commit to Ti vs Fi (and no I'm, as you say, "taking the piss") I think that if a person gets caught then circumstances should be considered and punishment applied accordingly. That said, I don't believe in people being punished simply because they committed a crime (as in all crimes should be punished/all perpetrators must be caught). If you can get away with it and nobodies dead, maimed or taken a personal loss (notice I said personal, not corporations) then more power to ya in my opinion. I personally wouldn't turn somebody in even if they did break the above "rules", and I'm not a revenge/vindictive person who needs to see others punished when they wrong those I know, beyond social punishments such as telling others of their "sins". I do understand the need for laws though, and have no problem with others living in a world defined by them.
The only circumstances I would personally involve the cops in would be for safety sake, my own or those I'm close to.
Let the punishment fit the crime and the spirit of the law given greater supremacy over the letter of the law.
Johari Box"Alpha Quadra subforum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious." ~Obi-Wan Kenobi
The law already takes into account the possibility of different circumstances. No crime is perfectly equal to any other crime, so of course it is up to each judge to inflict the punishment he finds optimal. I tend to be in disagreement with the notion of punshiment and law and be more in line with what Bionicgoat says here, but that's another story.
Actually, I am not really against the law. Oftentimes the law (at least, here) is very well organized and reasonable. People that create laws are cultured, civilized and really care about the well-being of society. The real problem is police. I hate the police, and I would find it awesome if all policemen died in very much pain.
Obsequium amicos, veritas odium parit
I don't know about the 'dying in pain' thing :-), but I don't like their mentality either. They're not really promotors of the law - they're slaves to it, because they don't have any real authority to circumvent it or apply mercy. And government workers annoy me - I guess it's not their fault really, but I hate how they just 'do their job' without considering the circumstances of the particular case.
When I first moved to Melbourne for instance, I got on a tram having never been on one before, and I bought a concession ticket because I had a student card. And this ticket inspector gets on and looks at my card and tells me that you have to get a sticker or something put on the card before they'll recognise it. So I think "yeah ok, that's a stupid rule .. but anyway", and I tell her that I've just moved down from Queensland so I didn't know, and I show her my Qld driver's license, and I think that's that. Then, I couldn't believe it - she proceeds to write me out a ticket! She was like 'you can appeal this if you don't want to pay the fine'. How stupid is that! I have to go through all this trouble of appealing when this woman could have simply utilised her brain and not given me a ticket. If I had a job like that where I wasn't allowed to take into account different circumstances I would go insane.
"Language is the Rubicon that divides man from beast."
There has to be some form of consistency, but things like previous record should be considered. And killing someone in self-defense should be weighed differently than premeditated murder or a "crime of passion".
I think of the legal system as pretty much a way to provide the highest degree of safety to society, not about evaluating and punishing right and wrong. Sentences should be about preventing the same person from doing something like that again and preventing others from doing it. It's about cause and effect relationships.
I don't like it, but I don't know of a better option that's realistic.
This is kind of interesting, because although not taking into account circumstances at all is ridiculous, this is exactly what happens with statutory or mandatory sentences. Some politicians who want to look tough on crime like to talk about this, and unfortunately others actually pass it into law for various offences. And alot of people think mandatory sentences are a good idea, though I've never worked out why. Perhaps the one person who voted for that could tell us.
LII![]()
I heard something interesting a little while back, and I think I've mentioned it here before.
One of the politicians in my state was pushing for a tough mandatory sentence for those who commit homicide against black people. His idea was criticized as being an attempt to keep black people in prison for longer.
So the wealthy should suffer more for committing the same crime because they are otherwise suffering less? That is simply bad karma (and very socialist, which is politically if not morally superficial in actual practice)...your example is already accommodated under current law as degrees of murder (1st, 2nd, 3rd). However, I think that you may be referring to objective vs subjective ethical issues. Mandatory law is much easier to enforce (and respect) than are de facto tendencies, and it is also more easily communicated as a complete and consistent set of ethics (with the exception of Gödel's Law). However discrepancies in the applicability of a benchmark crime due to novel circumstances or ambiguous evidence require judicial proceedings and so allow for interpretation. In practice, jury trials and minimum sentences essentially define the limits of arbitrary and literal interpretation. BTW I was considering a similar poll: do you think that a preference for sensory over intuitive information metabolism might contribute to a stronger tendency to rely upon visual identification for typing purposes?
"inveniemus viam aut faciemus"
I too am an admirer of Hannibal Barca.
Have you ever read Polybius, Livy, or Appian?
As someone schooled in U.S. criminal law, I can assure you that the circumstances surrounding the crime (and the offender's individual life situation - depending on the judge) are almost always factored in during sentencing.
How do the people here feel about criminal law in general? Do you see the point of criminal law as being deterrence or retribution? Or do you think we should move towards a more rehabilitative model?
In practice, I think the main point is as a deterrent. As I think people have already mentioned, maybe this is because it could be quite expensive to move towards a rehabilitative model. However I would have thought there are long-term costs in simply concentrating on deterrence - for example, low-grade criminals can go into prison and come out high-grade criminals thanks to the company they keep. Or, if there isn't really any effort to rehabilitate someone, they might just go and offend again - back into prison and back out. Like a revolving door. What a waste of a potentially productive life (not to mention a set of potentially avoidable crimes affecting the community). The government has to fork out huge sums to keep tabs on these possible repeat offenders as well as maintaining the prison systems. This seems like a rather depressing approach. Deterrence is very important, but how can we know whether rehabilitation is or not until we give it a real go? Luckily some countries are. For example, people might be interested in reading about this experimental prison is Norway: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6983186.stm
I don't think the point of it should be retribution. This is because I am repelled by the notion of revenge replacing justice. Two wrongs do not make a right. Anyway, proportionate punishment for its own sake seems potentially counterproductive to me - it is both rehabilitation and deterrence that has the potential to improve safety in society, and these should always be the motives behind a Criminal justice system rather than getting carried away with an eye for an eye.
LII![]()
So it's either the object or the subject, eh? Why not both?If someone breaks the law...
They should receive the applicable sentence, regardless of circumstances (I am Ti)
They should receive the applicable sentence, regardless of circumstances (I am Fi)
Different factors e.g. financial circumstances, past record must be taken into account (I am Ti)
IDifferent factors e.g. financial circumstances, past record must be taken into account (I am Fi)
Why not factor in the motivation of the subject to violate the object? (the level to which the subject enjoyed violating the law?) On that token, assess whether the subject was right in what they did. Did the existing conditions justify the subject's reaction to the object? Were they merely fighting unjust oppression?