Mentions the druggies in passing twice (once in a quote) and an astronomical crime level (160 per 1000 people? So I have a 16% chance of being a victim??) but zero mention of either at the end of the article in terms of fixing the issue.

Zero info on who the government hundreds of millions is going towards to help the problem (let me guess: a bunch of nonprofits who won't solve the problem).

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dofm 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

> and an astronomical crime level (160 per 1000 people? So I have a 16% chance of being a victim??)

Not even close, unless you own a shop (in which case, in some areas, life can undeniably be exasperating and miserable). The vast majority of high street crimes are shoplifting or possession (or drinking in alcohol control areas) and an astonishingly large number are attributed to a tiny, tiny number of people.

There are high crime areas in most towns in the UK where you will feel pretty safe, because the crime is simply not directed at you.

When it does spill over into personal violence, it is the aforementioned handful of people with drug problems. It’s worth noting that one incident involving three people is likely to result in a dozen recorded crimes. And a British town of sixty thousand people will have so few of these prolific individuals that they themselves commute to neighbouring towns to steal.

Worth remembering also if you are an American that in the UK we have not decriminalised marijuana, so there are drug possession and small-scale dealing crimes in there too.

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bartekrutkowski 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

I would kindly disagree. In my rather "posh" and "good neighborhood " little village I've had 3 house robberies (well, one robbery and 2 attempts) in the span of 14 months, and I have myself witnessed two shop robberies as I was in Sainsburys for milk and eggs.

The crime is there, can be absolutely overwhelming and police does absolute f*k all about it (after the robbery they didn't even bothered to shop up, I was told over by phone to collect the evidence myself and bring it to the police because "we are solving these crimes from the office" by the investigating officer. They didn't solve that one).

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asdff 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

Posh might be part of the issue. In my area seems like most home robberies are in wealthy neighborhoods, where no ones home and there might be nice jewelry to steal instead of my sad ancient tv.

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lifty 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I’m wondering why societies choose to put up with this?

	▲	tonyedgecombe 2 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		We don’t, burglaries have been on a decades long decline in the UK. One person’s anecdote is not data.
	▲	not-kinsale-joe 2 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		What do you mean?

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nsoam 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

> an astonishingly large number are attributed to a tiny, tiny number of people.

That sounds like something that would be extremely easy to fix!

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dofm 2 days ago | parent [-]

It’s not, particularly, without unjust laws like three strikes.

For one thing, it’s a revolving cast of a few dozen people at any one time (people do go to prison, get rehabilitated, move on or get moved on). For another, they are often vulnerable or exploited: a lot of shoplifting is done to order, to supply the black market.

The UK does need to take shoplifting more seriously, but it’s important to understand that it is a consequence of both the design of retail (self-checkout and fewer staff) and of the cost of living.

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nsoam 2 days ago | parent [-]

There is nothing unjust about being expelled from society when you are found to be too damaging.

What is unjust, though, is to be the victim of criminals who benefit from knowing exactly what the threshold is to not being removed from society.

	▲	dofm 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		Three strikes, in particular, is inherently unjust. There's no serious argument that it is not. Silly fake faux-old-testament solutions like this don't actually work, as is demonstrated by the fact that most crime has fallen faster since they were abandoned.

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nekitamo 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Not only that, this specific town was the first one where the allegations about grooming gangs and police acquiescence emerged:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotherham_child_sexual_exploit...

It sounds like a very rough place, with very incompetent police.