Poll: An unlocked car is stolen, who is to blame?

[Smithnikov_v1legacy]

It is scary how many people hereblame the car owner for doing nothing wrong. He commited no crime and made noones life harder. what the hell are you blaming him for someone else stealing shit?

Remmeber when people used to leave their houses unlocked? Were they also committing crimes?

It's not even that edgy really. I've asked the same questions here to people IRL who sing that "well, the guy who was robbed should have some responsibility in it too". I leave em stammering or re-thinking every time.

 

[McElroy]

You are ASSUMING for the purpose of this thought exercise that the thief will not steal the car if the door is locked. That was not a stated condition. And that is exactly where placing any blame on the owner in this thought exercise falls to pieces.

I'm just being cold and unempathetic with a bit of schadenfreude. If something is stolen the thief is to blame, that doesn't mean I always would - depending on given information and/or the concurrent angle of Saturn - have empathy for the victim. Like the Persian store-owner in Crash. He's a bit sympathetic but not much.

This train of thought is going in circles. I think most people have laid out their reasoning quite well and as is customary on the Internet, we do know where everyone stands on the matter but try anyway to somehow get them caught in a slightly different argument for some Imaginary Butt Clench Points. Anyway, that's not you (and I don't even mean most posters do that). You only wanted to say that the OP is asking the wrong questions. It's hard if not impossible to simply rearrange an ongoing discussion like that.

 

[cleric of the order]

there are places in this world where you don't have to lock your car.
my dad is from Jamaica and he talked about, it's great not having to put bars on your windows, arm yourself, have big dogs and lock everything behind a gate.
it's great not to be listening for the sound of a switchblade sliding open on the streets and it's great not to have police who are directly criminal
i like living in canada

 

[Sonmi]

Criminal responsibility is based in personal responsibility, but not every case of personal irresponsibility is criminally reprehensible.

What's the magic separating line then?

Malice, mostly the fact that you're affecting others in one case and mostly yourself in the other, and the criminal code.

By willingly leaving his car unlock, as is the case with the hypothetical OP, presumably because he thinks it's more convenient, he's willingly taking a risk for himself, perfectly legal, but still irresponsible.

Being stupid is not illegal, but it's still being stupid.

 

[Smithnikov_v1legacy]

Criminal responsibility is based in personal responsibility, but not every case of personal irresponsibility is criminally reprehensible.

What's the magic separating line then?

Malice, mostly the fact that you're affecting others in one case and mostly yourself in the other, and the criminal code.

By willingly leaving his car unlock, as is the case with the hypothetical OP, presumably because he thinks it's more convenient, he's willingly taking a risk for himself, perfectly legal, but still irresponsible.

Being stupid is not illegal, but it's still being stupid.

Then why assign him a percentage of responsibility in the crime? And if you believe that, why do you not advocate for a change in the criminal code to reflect that?

 

[Sonmi]

Criminal responsibility is based in personal responsibility, but not every case of personal irresponsibility is criminally reprehensible.

What's the magic separating line then?

Malice, mostly the fact that you're affecting others in one case and mostly yourself in the other, and the criminal code.

By willingly leaving his car unlock, as is the case with the hypothetical OP, presumably because he thinks it's more convenient, he's willingly taking a risk for himself, perfectly legal, but still irresponsible.

Being stupid is not illegal, but it's still being stupid.

Then why assign him a percentage of responsibility in the crime? And if you believe that, why do you not advocate for a change in the criminal code to reflect that?

Because he facilitated the crime in the same way that someone sending his credit card information to a Nigerian prince is facilitating his own identity theft, or that, in a more extreme example, someone who accepts to transport a package from a stranger across a border is facilitating being potentially turned into a drug mule.

EDIT: Or, if we were to use a more recent example, a certain neo-Nazi facilitated getting assaulted by an anti-fascist protester by spouting hateful rhetoric.

I do not believe in a change in the criminal code because these victims only really affect themselves, and are not acting immorally/maliciously in any case, simply irresponsibly.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

I don't believe anyone was talking about faulting for someone for experiencing a thought. Do you know why I don't act on my thoughts of hitting people or taking stuff? Because I don't want to. I wouldn't want to get punched in the face. So I don't punch people in the face. I wouldn't want to have my shit stolen. So I don't steal shit. It's not locks that keep people honest, it's empathy. If you think I'm the type of person who would shame people for having a shadow, you need to see my media collection.

First of all, I was making a general point, I never intended to imply you specifically would shame people or anything.


Now, with that out of the way. What you describe is the thing I mentioned. You act not because you don't have the desire to steal but because doing so has consequences, be it in that you may get punched or put to jail or your conduct may contribute to a society such that one day you may have something of yours stolen. This is what I was illustrating as well. The desire is there and if you knew that your stealing something would actually influence nothing negatively (for example, you stole a bike which would otherwise be forgotten where you found it until it rusted and was collected by the garbage collectors) then you'd be fine with it.

What we judge on is based on those who do vs those who do not steal. Honestly, whatever reasoning you use to not do something is insignificant for as long as it succeeds at preventing you from going with your desire.


The issue is that people who do not fail at not doing something tend to sometimes be treated as though they did do it, and the reasoning the people who shame them use is that "they shouldn't even have the desire to do that thing in the first place", that merely having the desire means they're bad people, which is basically shaming people for thought crimes. We see this all the time when racism is brought up for example, where people may not actually discriminate in their daily lives but as long as they have certain notions they're basically as good as a KKK member in the eyes of some people.


We have to avoid the trap of shaming people who have done nothing wrong, no matter what we feel about their thoughts.

 

[OldNewNewOld]

They owner might be an idiot, or just careless. Maybe they are sick and forgot to lock it? Maybe in a hurry? Depressing? An accident happened? A million reasons why they could have forgotten to lock the door.

There is no real reason to steal a car... permanently. I could see someone doing it temporarily for some reason that would make it kinda okay-ish in my eyes, but absolutely no blame lies on the owner.

Being stupid or careless or distracted does not mean it's okay to steal that person's belongings.

 

[Thurston]

Imagine a lone elderly man, nearly blind, mostly deaf, hobbling along with his walker, in a place with no witnesses, no cameras, and you with a perfect alibi. His wallet, hanging out of his pocket, has a sheaf of unmmarked, untraceable used bills almost falling out. You could, walk quietly up behind him, snatch the bills from him, and be far away before he realized anything had happened. He is incredibly wealthy, by ethical and legal means, so the theft of the money will have no significant effect on his life, but could not be used to right any wrong he has done. It is the opportunity for a perfect crime.

If you take the money, have you done something wrong?

YES. YOU ARE A THIEF! YOU STOLE SOMETHING! NO MATTER HOW EASY CIRCUMSTANCE MADE IT FOR YOU!

 

[The Lunatic]

The car manufactures, for not installing the car with automatic locks.

But, I guess it depends.

If you take your car to a place with a sign that says "Leave your car here, unlocked, and it'll be stolen" and you leave it there, unlock, and it gets stolen, then, well, I mean... Yeah.

Depends on the context of the surrounds.

 

[Thurston]

As my father taught, and later as I read in Machiavelli, "Virtue is no defense against lack of virtue."

The honest can be cheated. The peaceful can be assaulted. The faithful can be cuckolded.

Be nice. Also, don't be stupid. Lock your doors.

It's not a weak man's fault if he is robbed. The robber suffers from lack of virtue. But virtue will not defend you.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

I'm going to skip the part where you assume my motives and instead point out that you seem to be waffling with these two statements. First you say that my empathy is the exact same motive as being afraid of going to prison (it's not), then you say that any motive that prevents me from acting like a shithead is irrelevant because I didn't fuck with you either way. Have you ever met somebody who adheres to the letter of the law but not the spirit and seems to expect a reward for meeting this minimum standard of human behavior? Like the Christians who tell you that it's only fear of Hell preventing them from sinning? I've encountered people like this a lot, and while they may pass the criteria you have described here, I speak from experience that it is unwise to trust them.

Locks do not keep good people honest. Being human does. While we all may possess a stunning capacity for cruelty and negativity, we're also capable of the kind of compassion and solidarity that changes the world.

To put it another way, I assume that you're a nice guy to your friends. Do you do it because you're afraid of getting punched if you don't? Or do you do it because they're you're friends and you want them to be happy too? Not to say that those are mutually exclusive thoughts. But which one is more important to you?

Expecting a reward internally is fine, if you express that expectation then of course you're being rude and whatnot and that is an act that is worth judging but whatever hidden expectations people have in their hearts is their own business for as long as they act appropriately.

As someone who grew up in a super duper Christian country, I know the type of god fearing folk you mention. Thing is, as long as religion keeps em in check, it's better than the alternative of them going wild. Trust them or not, at least the harm they could be causing is minimized. This is the best we can hope for outside of mind-control and authoritarianism.

I do it because I find value in being nice, intrinsic value. It is basically a selfish act more so than one of empathy; I do not wish to lower myself and behaving according to every instinct one may have will inadvertently lower that person to that level. Of course I never even considered punching my friends, so it's easy for me to say since I had to expend no effort in being "not a shithead" but that doesn't make me any better of a person than someone who had the urge and suppressed it. Sometimes I also am annoying on purpose if it has more value, such as saying extremely bad puns and have people groan but then chuckle anyways. The value of comedy surpasses the "get out" response.

 

[sageoftruth]

I keep noticing a common misunderstanding that's causing a lot of tension here. Basically the idea that accusing someone of negligence somehow makes the perpetrator less guilty.

Well, when it's termed as blame being shared, then yes, it does.

It's okay to call the victim foolish, irresponsible, or downright idiotic (based on context). It's not excusing the thief or stating that it's sometimes okay to steal cars.

But if it's partially the victim fault for the crime, why isn't the victim then prosecuted?

Nice to see the impact this had after my hiatus from the forum.

Anyway, as mentioned earlier, the victim is not being prosecuted because the thief and the victim are not sharing the blame. If anything, the blame for each of them is two separate cases entirely. Case 1 is about how morally reprehensible the thief's crime is, and case 2 is about how much sympathy the victim should garner. Percentage has nothing to do with it.

 

[FalloutJack]

It is careless to leave a car unlocked...

[HEADING=1]BUT![/HEADING]

...stealing is illegal, full stop.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

Expecting a reward internally is fine, if you express that expectation then of course you're being rude and whatnot and that is an act that is worth judging but whatever hidden expectations people have in their hearts is their own business for as long as they act appropriately.

As someone who grew up in a super duper Christian country, I know the type of god fearing folk you mention. Thing is, as long as religion keeps em in check, it's better than the alternative of them going wild. Trust them or not, at least the harm they could be causing is minimized. This is the best we can hope for outside of mind-control and authoritarianism.

I do it because I find value in being nice, intrinsic value. It is basically a selfish act more so than one of empathy; I do not wish to lower myself and behaving according to every instinct one may have will inadvertently lower that person to that level. Of course I never even considered punching my friends, so it's easy for me to say since I had to expend no effort in being "not a shithead" but that doesn't make me any better of a person than someone who had the urge and suppressed it. Sometimes I also am annoying on purpose if it has more value, such as saying extremely bad puns and have people groan but then chuckle anyways. The value of comedy surpasses the "get out" response.

Classifying your better nature as inherently selfish motives rather than an empathetic, social drive strikes me as a very cynical, self-absorbed way of looking at human nature. Whatever happened to the sublime contentment of being a part of something bigger than yourself?

Besides, it still comes back to the fact that if you require a locked door to prevent you from coming in and stealing shit, if you will burglarize a house if the door is unlocked and you have a genuine shot at getting away with it, you're not a good or honest person. You're just a discreet breed of predator. Note, I'm using an impersonal form of "you" here.

What it comes down to is not whether or not you have a shadow. Everyone does and it's not a matter of suppressing it. By definition, that's what we do with our shadows. The question is why you choose not to act on it that says something about you. Your relationship with your shadow is based very much on how you feel about those dark thoughts swimming around in your imagination. The kind of person who only refrains from stealing a car because the door is locked still seems to think they're entitled to take somebody else's car and is thus the kind of person who is not to be trusted. Not saying it's easy to spot these people. But when you find you're dealing with one, get away while you have the chance.

My better nature really isn't either of those two things. It's just me being me. What is a selfish motive is behaving properly when my nature isn't to do so. It's a very logical way of reasoning out good behavior I think. You add up the selfish benefit of the act vs the selfish benefit of retaining your dignity and depending on how much you value your dignity you will be that much less likely to behave badly. Call it what you want but I see it as a much better method of procuring a good society than just relying on people being selflessly empathetic cause it feels good to do so.


No matter how safe it is to burglarize a house, you still know that you have fallen to the level of a common burglar, so the damage to your self-image is done even if you don't go to jail. Some people will gladly sell that for the contents of that house, especially if they're desperate, but still, I think most people would rather work and earn those objects in a dignified way, which is why no matter how little risk, you always will be forced to pay a big price for stealing. It might not be jail but rather anxiety about if you will get caught, guilt about being a thief, all that stuff. Of course, if we have some type of anarchist who doesn't believe in property rights, this all goes out of the window, so that is one weakness indeed.

Your shadow is you, if you accept it and don't treat it as some kind of outsider influence trying to make you go down the wrong path but rather as a natural aspect of you that you have to channel creatively and make use of it in good ways then it's gonna be fine. Issues arise when people are made to feel that their shadow shouldn't exist or it's something to be suppressed instead of understood, which was what my comments earlier regarding shaming folks were about.

 

[Jamcie Kerbizz]

Blaming the thief 100% completely negates any personal responsibility of the owner, which is a very dangerous line to toe.

Rephrase the situation like this: There was no thief, but an escaped zoo monkey got into the car, managed to start the ignition and drove into a river, drowning in the process. Or if that's too unlikely, let's just say he took a dump and smeared it on the wind shield. If you want to make it more gruesome though - let's say the owner left his dog in the car, said monkey opened the door and the dog ran under the bus.

In all of those you now have a 100% "the owner is at fault" scenario. The only difference is that in your hypothetical scenario the other party is presented as more negative than the first, which somehow absolves the first party of any guilt, which is simply not true.

The only truth of the matter is that crime will exist. It existed since the inception of humanity and might as well be the only constant until the heat-death of the universe. So yes, personal responsibility is a huge factor if you want to assign blame in these scenarios.

Thief is 100% to blame. That isn't question of morality just sheer logic. Now, if we ask if owner did everything in order to *prevent* the theft of car then 100% of blame falls on the owner. There's no blaming the thief here, his intent of stealing the car is unchanged but might have failed or retargeted some other car instead if owner was less careless. But it doesn't alleviate any of blame from thief for stealing the car. It's simple.

Monkey example doesn't apply. Animals aren't responsible for their actions. In such case their care taker would be blamed and needed to cover in full any damage monkey may do.

Going that route you could blame massacred people for not wearing kevlar vests or children to not build up sufficient upper body strength to prevent wrestling away candy or police for not shooting thief in bed first thing in the morning thus preventing any crimes being committed etc. Such reasoning would be just an attempt to whitewash perpetrator and cast some of the blame back to the victim. Nonsense.

That being said, if we discuss responsibilities for crime prevention / avoidance it opens up whole new topic. Lets say car owners starts of with 'oh there was nothing I could do' I shouldn't be in situation where my car is stolen in the first place!' then you could ask how about locking it and that has nothing to do with victim blaming.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

Call it what you want but I see it as a much better method of procuring a good society than just relying on people being selflessly empathetic cause it feels good to do so.

You and I just are not going to agree on this point. While I support the idea of being selfish to become selfless, the operative is that you at some point have to think of somebody other than yourself.

No matter how safe it is to burglarize a house, you still know that you have fallen to the level of a common burglar, so the damage to your self-image is done even if you don't go to jail.

And this I just see as naive. Everyone is the hero in the own narrative. As Akira Kurosawa said, the bad sleep well.

Table this for now?

My quote of choice would be something more like "there is no rest for the wicked" but yes, we can agree to disagree. Cheers.

 

[Reasonable Atheist]

I know of no concrete evidence that blame has anything to to with right or wrong, Blame is simply who you personally decide is wrong. Regardless of what the truth may be.

Therefor whomever you decide to blame, is to blame.

 

[Smithnikov_v1legacy]

Blame means that person should be held responsible for the consequences. Law enforcement's job is to go after the thief and recover the stolen vehicle. At no point are they required to say, "Fuck you, buddy, we're not going to look for your car. Don't leave the door unlocked next time." In fact, that sort of behavior is actively discouraged in favor of enforcing the law.

You would think that'd be a simple thing for most of us to grasp, but some of us can't it seems...

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

Making the mistake of allowing a car to be a greater opportune target by not locking a door is a mistake, not a crime, and still should not be a way to shame or blame the victim of the crime.
It is entirely impossible to say that said thief would have decided not to steal the car were it locked because a determined thief needs nothing to dissuade them from committing the crime intended, and a lock is just an obstacle in their path. Its dependent on the thief's mindset, true, but the idea of a locked car being a total barrier against thievery is not absolute.
But either way, the owner of said car is not responsible for a criminal's intention to steal. Period, regardless of whether they left the doors unlocked or not.
First, on your own property the crime of trespassing is committed, both in entering a property you don't own unbidden (to commit a crime) and then also entering a car you don't own. Even on public land, entering a car you don't own without the owner's permission is trespassing (and possibly with intent to burgle) regardless of a locked/unlocked state except perhaps in certain instances like a good Samaritan moment of turning off lights to save a battery or even to lock the car (things like that are actually protected by law but its a narrow field).
Crime is not ever the fault of the victim, even if the victim made a mistake that put them in the situation. In terms of personal responsibility, all it means is the victim has to deal with the consequences of their mistake, but it should never be a situation to place blame upon them.