| Matt Beckwith 2004-12-28, 11:16 am |
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Trooper wrote:
> Again, criminals are poor, and their little criminal children are
poor. So
> of course they live in poor communities and perpetrate their crimes
there.
> Just because a normal person is poor, will in no way, turn them into
a
> criminal. Ethics are ethics. You dont steal to buy food, you go to
the
> food bank. Criminals cause crime, not the poor.
Yes, there are 2 schools of thought among sociologists: That social
conditions (such as poverty) breed crime, and that crime is a moral
choice not related to social conditions. I think that the former is
correct, but that doesn't mean there's not a moral choice. To take an
extreme example, if you are destitute and can only survive by stealing,
you steal. This is especially true if your children would starve if
you didn't steal. You could go ahead and starve, or let your children
starve, simply because it's immoral to steal. I wouldn't, but you
certainly could.
Also, I don't agree that criminals are poor. White collar criminals
are generally speaking not poor at all. And many politicians are
criminals, they just haven't been caught yet. Then there are all the
people who cheat on their taxes and get away with it.
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