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If you had a leak at your home, what would you do? Will you buy a mop and then a larger mop? Or will you seek a plumber to find the source of the leak?
Putting the mop to work while you await the plumber would seem sensible. However, not calling the plumber allows the problem to persist and become more damaging.
But we do the same thing with our discussions on crime. We describe our crime problem as a bad people problem to be solved by having soldiers, police and prisons.
This posture appears to be true whether it is Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley and his $100 million plan or the UNC with their trotting out of people like Johnny Abraham and others.
We argue that we need more severe penalties and personal firearms. The lack of these two is why our crime rate is escalating, or so we are being led to believe.
(via Ministry of National Security)
Illegal firearms are now the chief cause of murders—they account for more than 80% of murders at present.
Rather than stop the leak, we look for quick fixes. Consider the cynical calculations of the value of Gary Griffith versus Philip Alexander for the next General Elections.
Should we brace ourselves for more “gun talk” than sensible analyses and targeted actions? Scare the population and promise all will be well? Did we not see that movie recently?
Hearing the presentations at the People’s Roundtable last month was refreshing. The presenters brought context to our problem. They had ideas about how we may keep our communities safe.
Professor Emerita Rhoda Reddock was the keynote speaker. She traced the collapse of our social policy programmes under the guidance of the Washington and IMF gurus.
We moved away from secure wage employment and decreased guaranteed social benefits. We were no longer interested in community living but instead praised the individualism that glorified greed.
We, unwittingly or not, adopted a devil take the hindmost posture in dealing with our economy. Income and social inequality soared. We shunted off the burden of caring for the marginalised to underfunded and undermanaged non-governmental organisations.
Short-term job contracts without any social protection benefits became the norm. We created a new term—the working poor—to describe our middle class.
Schools were increasingly starved of the requisite resources. Hospitals became places to spend a day before seeing a doctor. Retail prices were arbitrarily raised, leaving many unable to meet their family’s needs.
The pressures of life and substance abuse have led to an increase in homelessness. Psychologist Sule Joseph comments:
“Our culture is moving away from more traditional values and more into our capitalist functioning. In that capitalist structure, the idea is, ‘the strong survive, and the weak just fall by the wayside’.
“Our culture prioritises material gain and individual success, often neglecting the most vulnerable members of society. This societal shift and the accompanying judgment and scorn further marginalise individuals who do not conform to societal norms of financial success and material possessions.”
Photo: Ghansham Mohammed/ Wired868
Royal Bank’s Independence Square is now the ‘official’ dormitory with the closure of the Riverside Plaza. There are plans to build a new centre, and we await the results.
One thing is clear: life is a real struggle for many. Vagrancy is one manifestation of this complex social issue. Criminal activity is another.
Minister Donna Cox admits a truth about our homeless people: “…these people would have come from families and may be fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters…”
(Copyright Lee Jeffries)
People do not choose poverty. However, poverty has a negative influence on the development of children. Children born into poverty have poor impulse control and low self-esteem.
The schools in their communities do not help them achieve their desired educational goals. The risk of becoming a victim—physical and sexual abuse is widespread—is significant. The trauma the children face can seriously impact their decision-making, choices, and actions.
Alcohol and drug use deadens their pain but often clouds their minds.
This situation leads to these young people having different values regarding life’s prospects. They tend to pay less regard to events in the future. Because they are forced to scrounge for their daily needs, the future becomes less central in their decisions.
Consequently, they do not consider the length of jail sentences or even their lives. When crime detection rates are low, the possible pain of jail is seen as remote. This low rate also boosts their confidence that they will not be held.
As a result, extending the sentences will hardly work since few are caught doing the crime. Each time they get away with committing a crime, the more emboldened they become.
The problem is, therefore, not the severity of the possible sentence. It is: can society identify and capture the criminal?
Deputy Director of the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) Michelle Solomon-Baksh, in her presentation, identified this issue. We have to be able to detect the perpetrators and develop the supporting evidence to put them away. She left unsaid that an increased ability to solve crimes in a given period has two effects.
Firstly, it reduces crime during that period since criminals must update their assessment of their ability to remain undetected. It also reduces crime in future periods since improved detection inhibits the commission of crime.
Photo: TTPS
Crime detection advances are, therefore, more potent than increased penalties.
These two contributions are not at odds with each other. Instead of engaging in macho-man type exercises aimed at bullying the residents of depressed communities, we should consider their advice.
Reddock focused on alleviating the pain in the communities that gives rise to the deviant behaviour. Her solution was to recreate the social policies to provide families a fighting chance to become better citizens.
Solomon-Baksh urged us to develop the tools and capacity to detect crime and to ensure that the financial incentives are removed. Both approaches are required.
As a country, we have to decide whether we will continue to make crime a politically divisive issue or seek the good of our nation. We, the citizens, should be discerning and agitate for the correct diagnoses and prescriptions.
Gun talk by politicians does not work.
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