Not too surprised. Living in the US, giving a shit about the safety of owned property is pretty much the only thing you can count on.
Property is more important than lives. Where else would people literally say theyād shoot someone for going on ātheirā land.
In the US, we have a phrase for the mindset youāre describing:
āFuck you, I got mine.ā
That phrase is absolutely not said about self defenseā¦
Classic American, extending their personhood to the items they own. Get a grip, your wallet is not you and youāre not defending yourself if itās stolen.
Your inability to grasp that people value the product of their time as much as their time itself shows you are pathetically disconnected from reality yourself. Grow up and stop relying on mommy and daddyās allowance they give you for doing nothing with your sad life.
In another comment you talk about fascists taking over the world, yet here you are, spouting what a fascist would say in regards to private property, while a socialist would understand the difference between personal property and private property and understands the dangers of the latter. Get educated, schlub. Youāre spouting the kind of idiocy that enabled the fascists to take over.
Also Iām in my forties living with cancer in the USA where the treatments cost $18k a month without insurance. Dear god I only wish I had mommy and daddy taking care of me.
I donāt know about you, but my wallet only holds plastic cardsā¦ All of which can be cancelled, replaced, and any money spent by the thief returned and restored. The only thing it takes up is a small amount of my personal time. So I really havenāt lost anything at all. I donāt know why youāre so geared up to fuck someone up over such a small inconvenience.
Your semmantic games are not appreciated. Fuck off dummy.
Not necessarily, but itās an easy way to describe our view of others in our society in general. Not much faith in our fellow humans.
Because replacing said property costs money, money they generally donāt have. Being poor in the US is a cruel hell and they donāt seem to plan on fixing it any time soon so violence it is.
Yep. Donāt ever bother with de-escalation when you know no safety net will save you. You have to go all in, or you are left behind, or dead.
Not the world I like living in, but thatās the world Iām currently living in. Hell, my father was robbed several times growing up, so he made sure to teach my sibling and I how to be wary and catch people in the act.
Yep. Donāt ever bother with de-escalation when you know no safety net will save you. You have to go all in, or you are left behind, or dead.
I love love love how everyone just assumes they will win these fights and they wonāt end up dead anyway trying to protect their pittance of property. What a fucking unhinged way to live.
Guess what, you donāt always win just because youāre in the right.
I certainly donāt like the situation, but the amount of people who are chomping at the bit to attack others are far greater than those who donāt want to. I would likely have to hand over everything if I had a gun pointed at me, but usually the best way to avoid that risk is to avoid being there. Staying away from crowds, either trying to bluff/strike/capitulate with those who try to attack you, or just not trusting anyone.
This is why bystander effect is a real issue when it comes to situations in the US where people are injured or need help - the risk of being robbed, defrauded, or sued means itās a far easier choice to keep moving and not think about those around you.
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When US Americans get painted this way, it feels like a āHumans- Fuck Yeahā story. Like Iām just so used to us having our downsides highlighted that it feels special to be seen for a positive attribute
Itās a bit like learning that Russian cargo ships donāt get boarded by pirates because theyāll just start fucking shooting.
Say what you want about Russians, but that kind of rules.
Russians are the scariest white people.
Finland slaughtered them something like with a ver lopsided ratio in the winter war. The Finns are pretty white.
Yeah, but Finns are pretty nice (if socially awkward) when you donāt fuck with them. Wouldnāt count on that with Russians.
Russians can be nice too, itās just that mostly, not unlike the Finnish, they donāt give a fuck about you in general.
Only if youāre their wives after a few bottles.
Russians are pathetic malnourished drunkards, not scary.
Hey, nothing scarier than a drunk dumbass with little to lose. Same reason crossing the wrong Americans is trouble, too.
TIL Ukrainians arenāt white
/S
Ukrainians arenāt as scary as Russians, they donāt go invading other countries.
Yeah if I shared a border with Ukraine I wouldnāt be the least bit scared of them. If I shared a border with Russia Iād have a nuclear program.
I feel like these stories provide second-hand catharsis, but I donāt know if itās necessarily a positive light.
Yeah seems like committing a violent crime in response to a petty crime to me.
Yes, but in America it is acceptable to shoot an unarmed teenager running away for stealing a candy bar, so not exactly preaching to the choir here
Hell, thereās at least one story of a black teenager being shot because he rang someoneās doorbell to ask for help.
I donāt agree with characterizing being robbed from as not a big deal, especially when itās as physically intimate as pickpocketing.
Maybe itās no big deal to lose a bit of money if youāre rich, but I would be truly fucked to lose my phone or wallet, and more than inconvenienced to lose money or objects which would need to be replaced with money.
But more than that is the sense of violation. What gives someone the right to come into my home or put hands on my body and take my personal things? Itās dehumanizing. It feels disgusting to be treated that way. Of course Iām going to defend myself.
Pickpocketing is non violent. It is theft.
Robbery involves the use or threat of violence. It is a violent crime.
The two should not be conflated in either direction. Also pickpocketing does not happen at peoples homes, but in public spaces. This is different from break-ins which are a more serious crime as they violate the private living spaces of people on top of violating their property rights.
My reponse would be extremely violent if I were to be pick pocketed thatās for sure. I would not even feel bad at their injuries.
And no one would feel bad when the police in a country with reasonable laws takes you to jail for assaulting someone because of petty theft.
What is this Judge Dredd garbage people from the US often seem so proud of? That stand your ground thinking is only accepted in the violent bubble you guys seem to live in and accept as normal. Itās not normal anywhere else. This is why your police can kill unarmed people on video every week with zero consequences, and with no one batting an eye. Even in the most repressive societies, the security forces have the good sense of killing people in secret, not on video every week. This level of violence is not normal, and you as a regular person donāt benefit by internalizing it as your personal life philosophy.
You werenāt raised by wolves. You wouldnāt get it.
Edit* Found and read the article, it never said the Americans beating up the pickpockets got charged with anything. Shit one had fake elctric wallets to shock the shit out of thieves and only got em confiscated. Seems to me more beat downs would be welcome by the French police of pick pockets. Unless theyāre on the take.
Your attempt at the high road is hilariously pathetic and ignorant to the world.
Pickpocketing is robbery, my guy.
Just because it is done stealthily doesnāt mean i wasnāt robbed of my goods
Pickpocketing is a form of larceny that involves the stealing of money or other valuables from the person or a victimās pocket without them noticing the theft at the time.
Robbery[a] is the crime of taking or attempting to take anything of value by force, threat of force, or use of fear. According to common law, robbery is defined as taking the property of another, with the intent to permanently deprive the person of that property, by means of force or fear; that is, it is a larceny or theft accomplished by an assault.[2] Precise definitions of the offence may vary between jurisdictions. Robbery is differentiated from other forms of theft (such as burglary, shoplifting, pickpocketing, or car theft) by its inherently violent nature (a violent crime); whereas many lesser forms of theft are punished as misdemeanors, robbery is always a felony in jurisdictions that distinguish between the two.
Yeah letās get dragged into semantics.
Does violence only happen in physical form? Because the time I was pickpocketed left me paranoid for years. The violence inflicted upon me didnāt leave me physically hurting, youāre definitely correct there.
It left me emotionally fucked for years.
I think youāre mixing up the words ātheftā and ārobberyā. Robbery always specifically indicates violence.
I donāt think whether an attack is physically violent should play a role in whether someone is allowed to use violence to defend themselves. Plenty of forms of sexual assault are non-violent in the sense that they donāt cause bodily harm to the victim, but I still think you should be allowed to resort to violent methods of stopping/preventing them. Things like gropings, upskirt photography, etc are a form of psychological violence in my opinion.
This is different from break-ins which are a more serious crime as they violate the private living spaces of people on top of violating their property rights.
What is the reasoning behind this distinction? Are you suggesting itās okay to defend your home with violence?
To come at this from another angle, do you think theft should be legal? If not, why is it okay for the state to enact violence on perpetrators, but not victims?
Dude, i didnt make any remark on what forms of self defense are appropriate. I merely pointed out that robbery is a violent crime, wheras theft is not.
Subsequently robbery is facing harsher sentences than simple theft and it is important to distinguish the two, or any other forms of crime for that matter. There is a reason why all sorts of crime have been defined specifically and differently from each other.
So they make the internet worse for poor people? I could get through 20k in a second, but someone with just an old laptop would take a few minutes, no?
Couldnāt give less of a fuck, if someone steals from me theyāre gonna face the consequences
Humans work off of incentives and risk. If thereās essentially no consequences for pickpocketting and the incentive is quite high with expensive phones and cash potential, the balance is way out of proportion. A good chance of getting your shit rocked brings it a bit more in line.
The possibility of getting shot or stabbed is way out of proportion the other way. Thatās the problem with America. You canāt even give someone the bird when they nearly crash into you without fear of getting shot.
I interpreted it as a negative, like āAmericans are violent,ā heh.
Is it?
I sympathize with the complex though.
We have a hyper sense of justice instilled in us from a young age. Itās like the basis of our country (or so weāre taught).
Iād say itās more about retribution. Thereās a craving for punishment against perceived wrongs.
I donāt disagree. Basically what weāre told justice is.
Thereās nothing perceived about someone snatching my wallet. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
I get it, but it has to be obvious how quickly this logic can spiral, though.
If I come around a corner and find you putting the boots to someone begging you to stop, youāre getting smoked by the biggest thing I can find. I donāt know the context. Violence to stop violence is measured.
Being wronged isnāt a carte blanche. As soon as you introduce violence, suddenly violence actually becomes the measured response against YOU.
Live by the sword, die by the sword, somehow still relevant.
Being wronged isnāt a carte blanche. As soon as you introduce violence, suddenly violence actually becomes the measured response against YOU.
am i supposed to ask the robber nicely to give me my stuff back?
I mean, itās a reasonable place to start at the very least?
Weāre talking about pickpockets, right?
Someone tried to pickpocket me in Europe on the train. I blocked the door and, despite having no common language, I left them know I was aware they had taken my stuff. Iām pretty sure they understood it was my intention to get it back and that was going to be a hassle for everyone.
They just handed it back and left.
Should I have just started swinging?
So committing a crime yourself, assault (and/or assault with a deadly weapon), in response to the first crime, pickpocketing, is suddenly totes okay then? I donāt get it. Seems like retributive extrajudicial punishment to me. Just because itās a real thing that happened and not just perceived doesnāt suddenly absolve you of committing violent crime in return. If you hospitalize the pickpocket and give them a lifelong limp, youāve given them far more severe and retributive punishment than just taking their wallet in return.
I mean, who knew, maybe this is why we have laws and shit.
Yes it is totes ok. Encouraged even. Fuck a thief.
Itās not a crime. You can use force to reclaim stolen property. Legally, it gets āinterestingā when you involve a weapon in your use of force, because some areas allow the threat of deadly force far before it can actually be used and youāre probably going to expose yourself to legal avenues if the police donāt like you when they show up. But simply kicking someoneās ass after they stole from you? Perfectly permissible.
If you want to talk about the morality of it, thatās a different conversation.
If I beat the shit out of a pickpocket and give them a lifelong limp too bad so sad, they have a permanent reminder of the principle of fuck around find out or FAFO. I was minding my own business right until they decided to make themselves my business.
Legality is stupid and does factor into 99% of my actions so I will disregard it as a decision making factor.
I was minding my own business right until they decided to make themselves my business.
Poetry
Lmao youāre unhinged dude. Get a grip and maybe realize the shit in your wallet isnāt more valuable than a human life.
Especially considering its probably all credit and debit cards that you can cancel almost immediately and get any money spent by a thief returned to your accounts. But yeah, someone deserves a lifelong limp because they inconvenienced you. Get the fuck outta here lmao.
You might not support someone like Trump politically but youāre no better than those who voted for him. These attitudes are 100% why US society is deeply fucked, the politics are just a symptom of this violent brainrot.
why are we defending thieves?
You realise beating up a pickpocket is itself a stupid game that will get you in jail, right?
If the idea is that I canāt defend my own property then I understand why pickpocketing is so rampant elsewhere.
I donāt want to kill anybody, but Iām not gonna just hand it over with a smile on my face.
Yeah I feel like I am in crazy town. If you donāt want your ass kicked keep your hands out of my pocket. There will be consequences and they will be lopsided.
You donāt have to want to kill anybody, but itās still a crime to violently assault someone. Further, you can still kill someone without trying, say you punch him once and he goes lights out and his head hits the concrete so hard it kills him. Doesnāt matter that you didnāt want to, you just killed someone.
Now if you used something defensive like pepper spray so you can escape with your wallet? Thatās a different story. Thereās a wide gap between protecting your property and assaulting someone.
So like ā¦ where is that righteous violence right now? Whatās currently happening in the US is way worse than pickpocketing.
These are all the fantasies of people who think theyāre the winner in every single outcome.
Thereās a significant percentage of Americans that wouldnāt take that as a negative. As in, arenāt just violent, but are proud of being violent and consider it to be a positive quality. Not all of us, but a fair few. Hence you get things like some gun people fantasizing about having someone break in to their house so that they have a justification to shoot someone and feel righteous about it.
I think thatās a positive. Americans, in the absence of law enforcement, will fight to defend themselves and their property (and vicariously, the property of others).
Stopping thievery, is, unto itself, a just cause.
Thieves in the US will just pull a gun on you and turn it into a robbery. Itās simply safer for them to come out of the gate with you at an obvious disadvantage.
Can you draw your weapon before they can pull their trigger? Go ahead, punk. Make my day.
Yeah, this seems to be the most plausible answer here, assuming the baseline claim is true.
It tooke me years to understand that in the US apparently instead of burglars just breaking in, stealing stuff and leaving, āhome invasionsā are a thing, where people are facing armed robbery in their houses, often including rape. It seems that in the US crime often has a much more violent and hateful component to it than in other western countries.
Around 5 years ago, still in reddit I did a comparison between US and EU crime rates. Despite my prejudice against the US most crimes were fairly similar (robberies, burglaries, assault), it was homicides where the US goes batshit insane.
I believe it must be the availability of guns (even on the defending side, making the criminals more aggressive) that makes a homicide happen alongside a robbery where it does not in EU.
I think it also helps to imagine the irresponsible, aggressive, jackass. A common enough fellow amongst many cultures in their own variety. In most of europe this individual is restricted to bar fights and other less lethal means of conflict. In Switzerland, most folks have a gun but also have military training with it and are less likely to have the issues that cause American veterans to be more likely to be violent.
Meanwhile here in America this jackass can buy a gun after jumping through a few hoops depending on what state. Not only can they own a gun, they may be culturally encouraged to whether itās because of macho posturing, rural lifestyle, or because of any other number of reasons such as being a minority in the Midwest. Once armed the jackass has the means to engage in high emotional violence. Every āIāll fucking kill youā that is normally accompanied with a fist may come with lead instead.
Eh our burglaries sometimes turn into sexual violence too even without guns involved. And it should be unferstoo that āhome invasionā means everything from a quick burglary while youāre out of town to an armed robbery with rape. But yeah itās important to understand that we do overly focus on the latter and ignore that the former is far more likely even here, but thieves in America often have guns. Crime is disproportionately violent here, but we also are really focused on the most violent crime because itās sensational and serves as common excuses for bigotry and for gun ownership.
Like when I suffered a home invasion I became acutely aware of how few people I knew had experienced such a thing (and were willing to volunteer that information). So many people own a gun to deal with a violent robbery with rape, yet few know anyone whoās experienced that, a gun kept safely is unlikely to help, and theyāre significantly more likely to be harmed by their own gun than someone elseās.
I call it colonial trauma. Our forefathers would rape the help and the worse that would happen is getting berated by the judge.
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My wife and I were Honeymooning in Paris, purchasing subway passes from an automated kiosk, when a guy who was pretending to be really interested in his phone started getting uncomfortably close to her. She felt him touch her, so she elbowed him real hard, knocking the phone out of his hand, and yelling, āOh no, are you OK, Iām so sorry, I broke your phone!ā real loud (which was true, she cracked his screen). I donāt think he was expecting a 5ā2" woman to assault him, because he grabbed his broken phone and started booking it before I could react.
A very nice Parisian came over and told us we needed to be more careful and watch ouf for thieves. We thanked him, but my wife was laughing a few moments later because she just assumed he was a pervert. I thought maybe the phone screen had already been broken, and he was trying to run some sort of, āHey, you broke my phone, give me money!ā scam but chickened out when he saw how aggressively my wife reacted. We live in a major American city, so weāve experienced crime before, but it never occurred to us that he was trying to pick her pocket. Felt almost quaint, like a Dickens novel.
I live in a tourist trap area of the US and got pick pocketed once shortly after moving here. So I am real cautious of strangers getting close. After doing the Pokemon go rounds one night some dude started following me, and the girl I was dating at the time, from the gas station. I come from a much more densely populated area of the US so I immediately recognized it as a threat, and told her to keep walking and I would catch up. Iāll admit I was a little too aggressive given the situation, cause I saw a ācome to jesusā moment in homieās eyes when he realized how big the dude he was stalking was(Iām easily two standard deviations to the right of bell curve in terms of largeness, but Iām also proportional so most donāt realize it on sight).
I would say I felt bad, but after getting my walker taken and having to go through the bullshit involved, I wasnāt about to take a chance. Funny thing is, the girl actually broke up with me cause of that incident and immediately got with a meth head who took her and her family for what they could.
This story, much like life, has no point other than keep your wallet in a very noticable area.
Edit: Walker=wallet, though iām not far from a reliance on either.
Itās weird moving to places where the relative danger of different crimes vary.
I grew up in a place where I was mugged at knife point a couple of times. It was a pretty socioeconomically deprived area where this wasnāt normal, but it wasnāt super abnormal either. One of the times I was mugged, I was in a pretty bad place with my mental health, and I said āif you want my phone, then just fucking stab me for it, because I donāt give a fuck anymoreā. The guy mugging me seemed to recognise me as someone going through some shit, and became super sympathetic. He even asked me if there was anything he could do to help. A friend who was mugged (at knifepoint) in the same rough area one responded by saying āoh come off it, mateā and continuing walking. Itās like there was a weird sense of solidarity, because we all knew we lived in a shit hole place with no prospects.
I later moved to a much safer city, where being out at night felt tremendously safe. Now, I live in a larger city, and none of my previously cultivated instincts for safety are the right fit. I know that I must be more cautious here than I was in the small, posh city I lived in, but also I feel that the kind of caution I need here is quite different to what was necessary in my home town. Without a calibrated sense of risk in this new city, I often find myself being overly cautious. I suppose thatās a safer side of caution to err on.
You know whatās funny? I got robbed at gunpoint in front of my house. I was wearing a knock off Ulysse Nardin watch, and they didnāt even touch it. They got about $30 from the wallet before being arrested. And no, the cops never gave me my $30.
If I had my wallet stolen, the worst part of it would be having to renew id and stuff. Itās a lot of faff
Real talk. I wouldāve gladly given up the money for an easier time getting everything back together.
As we say in the USA:
āThe police donāt protect us, we protect usā
There are 7 police officers in my town of 13k. We say āSometimes thereās justice and sometimes thereās just usā
Whole lee shit this is good! Iāve always heard the adage āwhen seconds count, the police are only minutes away.ā
And thatās true for both where Iām from(Miami) and where I moved to(the corner of bum fucked & nowhere)
I mean sure, it do be like that but also my old roommate, who never locked his car and kept weed and his work tools in it overnight, every night, walked around our neighborhood with a pistol ālookingā for the guys who stole the aforementioned tools and weed.
It happened 3 timesā¦thereās something wrong with alot of us
Did he think that gave him a legal precedent? Like isnāt owning weed and a gun a felony in and of itself?
Edit: currently depends which federal court circuitās jurisdiction you fall under. Might get brought to the supreme court at some point? Either way thereās legal precedent that makes that iffy. Which is fair. Weed should be legal, and despite this asshole, I trust stoners more than habitual drinkers or the GOP and their constituents.
Either way the guy was obviously a fuckinā issue, and was committing several other federal offenses lol.
In my jurisdiction, yes. Any drug offense combined with possessing a firearm is an automatic felony. Even if the drug offense by itself would have been a misdemeanor. It is a very bad idea, legally speaking.
Owning the gun is not a felony weed yes
Lol no he was just mad. And weed is legal in Cali. Guns are too but Iād be willing to be that one was street bought
Thatās kinda cool seeing how apparently you guys do put your money where your mouth is š I wish we talked about that kinda stuff more and not just about the bad. I feel like remembering that not every aspect of being American sucks might give people a better reason to resist too.
Americans are naturally anarchist, we just have a shitload of bootlicker propaganda shoved on us at all times and too many people buy it
I often find Americans abroad to be quite charming in how American they are. Certainly, there are some that are obnoxious (and even their friendliness can be obnoxiousness in a way), but it can be quite endearing; Americans (especially the ones you meet while travelling) are so outgoing, and theyāre so keen to make connections with people. Like, is it cringe when an American says āoh my great great grandfather was Scottishā, as if makes any difference at all that they are 1/16 Scottish? Yeah, somewhat. But after a friend explained to me that she sees it as coming from a deep desire to connect with other people, I began to see it as quite sweet.
Itās part of why I grieve for whatās going on in America right now. āAmerican-nessā is a messy, mixed concept, and it would be unreasonable to ignore how much of that concept is deeply problematic. However, I feel that there is goodness within that concept, and the people in power at the moment seem hell bent on destroying or undermining what goodness exists there.
How do Europeans react to pickpockets?
I caught a pickpocket in Madrid with his hand in my girlfriendās purse. He was directly behind us on the escalator. We just kind of were like āhey not cool,ā then had an awkward escalator ride. We were late for a flight, so didnāt really have time to do much anyway.
I have had stuff stolen in Paris. Mostly, you have no idea it happened until theyāre long gone.
You caught a man with his hand in your girlfriendās purse, and his punishment was a āhey, not coolā and 15 seconds of awkward escalator?
No fucking wonder that happens CONSTANTLY when an awkward 15 second escalator ride is the punishment for getting caught.
What do you suggest they shouldāve done instead in that situation? Assault him and get arrested? Report him to the police or airport security and miss the flight while getting the bureaucratic run-around?
Cause a scene. Be obnoxious and in their face. You donāt have to throw a punch to be scary.
Sounds like your police protect criminals and not the victims if what youāre describing is true.
To be fair ours in the US mostly do this, too.
Nah, I suggest they should try aggressively shitting their pants, synchronized with their girlfriend.
Surely the sound + smell will attract the authority figure they so need, and the situation will resolve itself quickly. Much more effective than a stern look!
God what a bunch of pussies.
Correct me if I am wrong but isnāt average American scared to walk to church without a gun of there are 80 year old homeless people on the way?
Nah. Thereās a subset sure but not really. I donāt carry anything and I feel no fear. I even lived in Detroit and walked around at night. It was fine.
Stand corrected, as you are quite wrong.
I havenāt even seen a gun in years. Youāre out of touch with reality.
Iām an American and I see guns literally every day. Are you not counting cops, security guards, and soldiers?
I have no reason to come into contact with cops, security guards, or soldiers on a regular basis. I can only assume your āliterallyā is facetious as well because literally every day is absurd.
And in the context of replying to someone making claims against the āaverage Americanā carrying guns, I think itās appropriate to omit people carrying for work, yes.
Iāve been in a situation like that. Street perfomance, many a people. Some guy bumped behind me. I somehow quickly noticed a lack of phone. I told my dad, soon as I realised. He went up to the guy, the guy was all like āeh, he dropped itā or whatever. Feels like they just be awkward
It usually isnāt worth the time to call the police and wait for them while trying to retain the person(s). If the stolen value is under 400 euros they can only get a fine.
So no one calls the police and no one beats the shit out of them? No wonder you have a problem with pickpockets. You want to be robbed as a society.
I have never been robbed. I have only seen it a couple of times in the metro, so it isnāt really a problem here.
Yeah when I was robbed in Paris, the police did nothing.
I think you destroyed him emotionally.
warn other people of their presence, publicly shame them
Has public shame worked so far?
Evidently not
Sounds like they just shrug it off like wusses. āOpe donāt get to own that anymore ā
Why is pickpocketing and related just like, not a thing in the US?
I call bullshit. This is the country where everybody says, donāt confront or theyāll shoot/stab you. I bet many other countries have more vigilantism. This is the country, where everybody has guns āto rise against tyrannyā and lets a tyranny roam free. This is the country where school shootings are almost a daily event. Majority of these people wonāt even confront people that litter.
We donāt have pickpocketing in America, we have robbery.
I had two incidents in my life where someone attempted to rob me. Like specifically requested I give them something. Both times ended with nothing, because they backed off when they realized I donāt have anything worth it.
Ah ha ! As a kid I was stunned by how violente the death of Bruce Wayne parents were. All this for jewelery? I get it now. Thatās just cultural chock. Less pickpocketing more robbery.
We do have organized pickpockets in the US, just not as many and they are mostly concentrated in specific parts of the country where there are dense tourist areas. New Orleans and Las Vegas for example are both pretty well known for having pickpockets.
Why is pickpocketing and related just like, not a thing in the US?
I call bullshit. This is the country where everybody says, donāt confront or theyāll shoot/stab you.
Well, you might have your answer right there. Pickpockets risk getting shot or stabbed, so the risk/reward maths out poorly for them
Three American cities are in the top ten worldwide in fear of getting pickpocketed.
Source: https://matadornetwork.com/read/worst-us-cities-for-pickpockets/
Pickpocketing is happening in every major US city with numbers rising from year to year:
So US citizens thinking theyāre superior when they arent.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/05/pickpocket-smartphones/585997/
https://havengear.com/blog/pickpocketing/
But in the end, I believe itās the car centered cities that keep numbers relatively low. No puclic transport and less people at one place= less pickpockets.
Three American cities are in the top ten worldwide in fear of getting pickpocketed.
this is an opinion poll of tourists, not a statistic on crime data.
Pickpocketing is happening in every major US city with numbers rising from year to year: So US citizens thinking theyāre superior when they arent.
Thank you for your screenshot of a study about āconcern over pickpocketingā. Europe still proceeds to take more of the top 10 spots.
alright, so itās one in east asia, one in turkey, five in europe, and three in the usa. the europe/usa ratio roughly matches the population ratio. the point stands that itās still very comparable by population (which a top ten cities list is not suited to describing)
USA has more land mass by leagues, soā¦ Europe is still kicking ass based on area and probably on population, too. Three big US cities almost certainly doesnpt equal up to many Euro citiesā¦
Your attempts to twist this narrative are hilarious, but itās also so, so sadā¦
Ok but the US points in the pickpocket column are pretty low compared to Europeās. Other forms of stealing are plenty common in America, itās just that weāre a lot more likely to get shown a gun and asked to empty our pockets ourselves than have the thief covertly do it for us.
That 0.0 stat is really helping your argument
In the unlisted cities, pickpockets will leave cash, weed, and Kinder Surprises in your pockets.
less people at one place= less pickpockets.
Checks out. Las Vegas, Orlando, and NYC are all huge tourist destinations. Thatās where youāll find the most pickpockets.
Every last thing on that list is a major tourist destination.
Maybe weāre looking at this wrong. Maybe itās not that the US is less likely to be pickpocketed, just for size youāre less likely to be in a pickpocketable area.
The other part of the comment was that Americans drive everywhere, thus there are less opportunities to pickpocket. Tourists walk around a lot.
Also Vegas doesnt surprise me in the least. Itās utterly unwalkable except in the hospitality areas where a lot of people are drunk and headed to or from casinos.
If I were to choose one place in the world to be a pickpocket, Vegas would be very high on the list. Itās a perfect combination.
Thereās ways to mug and rob tourists in cars. You flag them down like youāre asking for help (I was taught to not stop as a teenager because of how common this was), or you cause a minor fender bender in a beater although thatās more commonly an insurance scam method. Growing up, rental cars in Florida had special ārentalā plates, until the government changed the law to make rental cars have the same plates because criminals had been using them to target tourists (cops did too, and they werenāt that thrilled by the change).
TLDR: Orlando is one of the worst car dependent hell holes and it still made the list because Florida Man can be clever when it comes to stealing from tourists.
See, they think that pickpocketing isnāt an issue in the US because they have far more pressing issues.
Over here we talk about pickpocketing, because itās pretty much the worst crime anyone ever encounters in their real life. You probably wouldnāt care much about that if thereās multiple school shootings a day and people can just stage insurrections and nobody cares.
Ask the women about that take
Crime perception is derived mostly via news reports. Most people are affected by crime maybe 1-2 times in their lives (of course, this number differs greatly with some people being affected by crime all the time, but the median is very low).
That means, your perception what kinds of crimes are how prevalent is mostly shaped by media.
Media has a very limited bandwidth, so of course only the most sensationalist kinds of crimes are reported on. If thereās a school shooting almost every day with 31000 victims in total per year, the likelihood of something as petty as pickpocketing making the news is very low.
Density and cultural norms in general are definitely a factor.
If I was out and about in my normal area where I live in the US and someone got close enough to pick my pocket Iād be on high alert because they are way inside the normal personal space bubble here.
I must not have made that comment clear. That is what americans often have told me when talking about vigilantism. āDonāt resist because they might be armed.ā
Thank you for clarifying my foreign friend! āDonāt resist because they might be armedā cuts both criminal and civilian.
In America, having a gun is part of the cat and mouse! I am one of two in my x100+extended family to ever get mugged, and implying a gun by asking āis the $13 in my wallet worth the leadā made me the only mugging 'winner".
Yeah, in the instance crime happens, they might have a gun, but lucid criminals understand you might have one as well.
And the mentally unstable is taken really good care of over there I hear.
I have never even met anyone who has gotten mugged or pickpocketed. Not family, not friends, not even my students. Have some been assaulted in some way, yes.
Here is a discussion from the other day about Danes leaving their stuff in public, because anything rarely happens. Americans were also shocked that babies are left outside to sleep in the fresh air, in that same thread. https://lemmy.world/post/32576945
Maybe our lived experiences are anecdotal, different. Your stance seems very generalized, though, if you donāt mind me saying so.
The type of shit the average Joe/Jill deals with depends on their location, situation, and reaction cannot be wrapped up so simply. Mass shootings and politics are just more issues youāre lumping together in a way I feel just isnāt so beautifully packaged as you wrapped it up to be.
Our society is fucked. Donāt get me wrong. But Iām smart/dumb enough not to call you on it outright while I still understand that everything you encompassed here is far more nuanced than a simple, regurgitated hot take.
Many of the people that have helped me escape muggings are the same people our society would accuse of mugging me. 100% of the time they were more helpful than law enforcement.
I think that speaks more to the topic at hand than your comment. We only have each other, sometimes just ourselves, and we cannot look to those that are suppose to uphold the law so we take care of ourselves to a passionate degree and learn fast that itās better to ask forgiveness than it is permission. The court system is a joke, too. So again. Too many topics, ideals, and talking points to wrap up in a neat little package.
If it was as simple as all of that, why not run for office with this as your platform? Do the work. We all know those actually in office arenāt doing it, so prove them wrong. Otherwise, and Iām sorry, but I take what you say just as seriously as the pontificating drunks I served all night.
Iāve never been pickpocketed here. It really is in my experience such an elsewhere and old timey crime that Iād be shocked to see it here outside of somewhere like times square.
Itās a skilled crime with high risk of physical violence that thrives when people with enough money to rob are walking with enough frequency as to make it worth robbing folks. Car culture probably plays more of a role than risk of being beaten up, but the potential violence of victims may contribute to would be pickpockets just being muggers.
Thievery here is more con artists, threatening crime, and burglary. Itās a smash and grab on your car, a mugging (though thatās also not super common since the cities were cleaned up), or a armed robbery of a store rather than a pickpocket
Iāve confronted some litterbugs in the past. Sometimes they get indignant and try to talk shit, but since I usually start my picking up the trash and then saying something, the usual responses are, I didnāt mean to do that, or, I was going to get that. To which I usually just say, yeah, sure you were buddy, and walk away. One time it was pretty sketch, big ass dude got real aggro, but fuck him, donāt litter.
Omg, this turned out to be a thread with plenty explanations to USians that societies have laws, police, judgesā¦
You can blame the orange guy all you want, but your culture is completely derailed. Murder (under whatever āreasonsā) canāt be a national sport.
Weapon manufacturers really did a good job in the land of the freeā¦
I mean obviously the gun laws are insane but the act of collectively beating the shit out of pickpockets has my respect.
Violent retribution as a core principle might contribute to your completely insane murder rates.
Man, people should have a right to defend their shit. The idea that someone should be allowed to take your things in front of you and you should be charged if you beat them up is pretty unhinged tbh
I fully disagree and enjoy living in a society free of such barbaric tendencies.
Make your people happy and maybe theyāll stop stealing your shit.
There are people who steal no matter how wealthy or comfortable they are. Theft is not stopped by making people happy. Reduced significantly, yes. But absolutely not stopped. Wage theft is the largest form of theft in the world, done exclusively by the better off and rich. Never forget that
(And yes, Iām saying that people should have the right to beat up their employers to get back their stolen money)
Also not really a thing here, and thatās fucking insane
It is a thing there, in fact.
Not sure whether to downvote because of the shitty human nature argument, or upvote because youāre right about wage theft.
Where do you live? I want your shit
Not rhetorical, I personally want your shit
I bet you would, but assuming youāre American, youāll never get anywhere close to it
Where is that? Turkmenistan? Russia? Bhutan?
Man, itās just shit. Life should be of higher value than an object, even if itās a really cool object or useful. You beating someone for taking something is a bigger problem then things being taken. You canāt commit a crime because someone else also committed a crime first. Get it?
Quite simply, that should be the thiefās decision to make. Itās their risk to undertake, it was their decision to make that choice to rob and steal.
You canāt commit a crime because someone else also committed a crime first. Get it?
Legality is not morality.
Just like it is your decision to make too? Do you not see how that applies right back to you as the victim that then perpetrates a crime? It is in no way moral to gun some one down because they stole your chocolate bar, or your daughters virginity for that matter. It is your decision to act in retaliation, howsoever you do, and yes you should be held accountable for how YOU handle a situation, any situation.
Whatās really lost in this whole conversation is how itsā¦ 2025 and almost nobody walks around with cash anymore?
You can literally call your bank and credit card companies and have all your cards cancelled and locked within minutes? Any money spent by the thief will be returned to your accounts?
If itās your phone stolen instead of your walletā¦ You didnāt have it set to be locked or auto-lock when theft is detected? You didnāt have find your device set up? You donāt have it set to be able to be remotely wiped? Pretty sure you can also get your phone insured for theft.
One of the few valuable things Tyler Durden said in Fight Club was āYou are not the contents of your wallet. You are not the car you drive. You are not your fucking khakis.ā Yet Americans still love to extend the concept of who they are to the things they own.
People are fucking unhinged, man.
Pretty sure you can also get your phone insured for theft.
No individual should be expected to use insurance to protect themselves from theft as a solution to it. Thatās a crazy take.
Thatās literally why insurance exists and is a foundational principle in most modern societies, but uhm, go ahead and keep living in the stone age.
Here here! Itās what they are indoctrinated to do in their defense. You make a good point that decades and decades of effort has gone into making things more secure has reduced the risk/reward for stuff like pickpocketing. I would bet they mostly target things like travel documentation now for identity theft, something more varied and readily available in multi country Europe than North America.
What about a pickpocket that stole a stupid iPhone from a rich teen who would get a new one the very next day? And, in some less frequent cases, the pickpocket may have had actual needs like buying medicineā¦
Thatās the reason we have a judicial system. Not even police are supposed to do harm, only prevent harm and bring into justice system.
I know the system has many flaws. Thatās beyond the point. Those who prefer to go vigilante are calling for making it worse. Specially if we take into account the effects of inequality on a hands-on self-service judicial approachā¦
But the judicial system famously doesnāt differentiate between people doing what they need to for good reasons and those doing it for bad reasonsā¦
Wouldnāt that be factoring in motive and mitigating circumstances during sentencing?
Are you actually defending thieves?
Why canāt the pickpocket go get a job and buy his own damn iPhone. My stuff is mine, you try to take it and Iāll hit you. This is like basic human behavior.
And, in some less frequent cases, the pickpocket may have had actual needs like buying medicineā¦
Likewise, a pickpocketing victim may also need to buy medicine.
Fair point. Thanks for providing it with assertiveness.
I know the system has many flaws. Thatās beyond the point.
That isnāt beyond the point. That is the point.
Also you can make up sob stories about those people all day if you want to. Got nothing to do with reality but if you like to feel sad for them knock yourself out.
Howās the pickpocket to know the person in questionās situation? Thatās one of the top justifications scammers in india use as to why they pretend what they do is reasonable. But reality is they donāt know, and they donāt care. Theyāll steal from anyone.
What about a pickpocket that stole a stupid iPhone from a rich teen who would get a new one the very next day? And, in some less frequent cases, the pickpocket may have had actual needs like buying medicineā¦
Fuck Em.
My most American belief is that society fell apart when we got rid of dueling. Assholes need the threat of violent retribution to contain their assholery, and without that, they just shit everywhere.
Of course, that belief falls apart the minute that you realize that assholes can be good at dueling, tooā¦
It also falls apart when dueling did not generally cross classes. If you were a rich guy your ādefense of your honorā was either petty or eliminating competition, sometimes both. No poor person was going to take out a ārich assholeā by any other means than being charged with murder. The only violent retribution available to the masses is revolt accompanied by a guillotine.
Very true.
The public largely supported the abolition of duelling. The reason it disappeared was because it was largely associated with slave owners in the south and it disappeared after they lost the Civil War.
Watching 60 days in is an absolutely insane thing to watch as a non american. People living like cockroaches in moldy shit stained rooms. People just sleep on the floor because they are over capacity, violence, food that looks just downright like a hazard to eat. And people in there are like: yeah, iāve been here 10 times. I canāt get a job so i do crime and then i land here again. Or guys like: i grew some weed, so obviously iām in this slave hole for 10 years.
What I find worse is how many Americans refuse to accept that our society can and should treat prisoners better. Like Iām not advocating for luxury hotels or unrestricted freedoms for them, just humane conditions, reasonable sentence lengths, and a focus on rehabilitation. What weāre doing isnāt working and is a stain on our collective soul.
Though I will say most Americans have odd understandings of quality of life. Owning a car is seen as so fundamental that people feel attacked at the idea of building cities where itās not a necessity, while the idea that we should provide free meals to schoolchildren or providing medicine to prisoners is seen by many as government waste. Even our fundamental and foundational rights such as state appointed lawyers for the indigent accused of crimes are nickel and dimed to uselessness, and the idea of providing these lawyers for all accused who want them is seen as radical.
This is hardly a bright side to the fucked up cloud that is the modern prison system, but something I have found notable is that some of the most interesting stuff about restorative justice has come from American scholars and activists. Itās notable to me because whilst America seems to distill all the things I hate most about how society treats crime and prisoners, I recognise a heckton of these things in the justice systems of other countries too ā including my own. However, there does not seem to be as much appetite for digging into these problematic aspects in countries where things are perceived to be on the more moderate side.
Like I say, itās hardly a ābright sideā, but I think there isnāt an easy answer to āhow do we respond to people who transgress against society?ā. Even if we agree that we should focus on rehabilitation, the question of how to do that is a pretty complex one. It would be wrong to say that Iām hopeful when thereās so much fucked up stuff deeply entrenched in modern justice systems (especially the American one), but I do feel bolstered by how much I have personally had my perspectives challenged by the aforementioned scholars and activists resisting unjust ājusticeā in the US.
Yeah Iāve been seeing a lot of folks act like all Americans are absolute barbarians who revel in our nationās cruelty, but prison abolitionists still operate here and plenty of communities here are actually putting rubber to road for rehabilitative justice.
And as you say, itās fucking hard. You want to give people chances but you need to prioritize victims safety and rights, and the fact is there are bad actors in every group. And thatās not even getting into situations where life is a hell of a lot easier when you keep giving one person more and more chances.
Iāve been fortunate enough to know some folks in the prison ab scene and theyāre good folks trying to do right by the sorts of folks nobody else is gonna. And Iāve come to the conclusion that you can judge a society by how it treats its criminals. Who will defend the unsympathetic? Someoneās gotta, otherwise youāre a hop skip and a jump away from having a role where the worst people can get official sanction to be their worst selves. Round here the prison guards are often just as bad of people as the prisoner.
have they tried not doing crime?
USian checking in, and youāre absolutely right. We somehow have the biggest police budget, while simultaneously having the most violent crimes & incarceration rates of all the developed nations.
thereās no āsomehowā about it. police donāt stop crime.
Right, they punish ex post facto & not judicially
The other day, I was learning about the private prison system in the UK. It was grim seeing how that whole process leads to the proliferation of crime. Things are a damn sight better here than in the US, but itās clear that our current trajectory is taking us closer to the US on that front.
Itās a self reinforcing cycle, because the rhetoric of crime leads to the proliferation of prisons, and a system that finds it profitable to criminalise people. Iām not even talking about prisons in terms of rehabilitation Vs punitive justice here, but almost the stage before that ā people who probably shouldnāt be considered criminals at all. I suppose what I am positing is that we should be applying preventative medicine" lens towards crime and criminals. But of course, whereās the profit in actually addressing socioeconomic inequities?
The saddest/funniest thing to me about this whole bit is how every. single. US. person defending their right to righteously beat the shit out of someone for picking their pocket never, ever, even considers the idea that they might lose.
Itās just like gun owners in general. They all think theyāre a perfect shot and the other guy must be like a Storm Trooper in Star Wars and canāt hit the broad side of a barn.
Everyone thinks theyāre the hero and that they donāt need cops and laws until theyāre the one bleeding out in an alleyway on the verge of death because they were stupid enough to āfight back.ā
US Americans are completely fucking unhinged and live in a fantasy land where somehow every single one of them is the biggest and strongest with the biggest dick and will always win because their cause is righteous. What a crock of shit.
Willingness to stand up for oneself is not necessarily the same as one overestimating their ability to fight.
I was bullied regularly as a kid. I was no match at all for most of the bullies, they easily had strength, size, numbers, and fighting experience over me, but since the schools wouldnāt or couldnāt do a damn thing to protect me, especially when the bullies followed me well away from school grounds, the only choices I had were to either endure it, or to try to change the situation by standing up for myself. Even if I got my ass beat even worse just for standing up for myself, at the very least it made it clear to them that I was no longer guaranteed to be a frictionless target and that sometimes changes things for the better.
Itās not about winning. Itās about putting up the fight, because the potential outcomes of not fighting back arenāt always much better than standing up for oneself.
That said, I personally wouldnāt want to put a foreign trip in jeopardy by assaulting anyone if it wasnāt an actual self defense situation, much like back at home. Iām just responding to this idea that willingness to fight is not the same thing as being overly confident that one will come out on top.
and that sometimes changes things for the better.
And a lot of times it changes it for the worse, too. What even is this argument?
I donāt think you understand what itās like to be constantly bullied and constantly on guard. At some point there is no concept of āworseā. At some point there is only the sense of āliterally anything in the world except this.ā
And I think youād be shocked to find out how wrong you are. Youāre describing my high school years. Guess what? Fighting back made it worse.
Iām genuinely sorry to hear that and Iām glad you made it out of there. But I stand by my point.
As do I. Sometimes the bullies genuinely have the upper hand. Like the Nazis versus the people in their concentration camps. Fighting back just lead to more violent retribution against those who were already being mistreated. You canāt magic your way into suddenly winning a losing battle. Itās absurdity after absurdity in here.
I think itās actually a symptom of a small penis. Huge truck, big gun, itty bitty peepee.
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People!! Ugh. Downvoting me is letting your internalized opression taking over your moral!
I donāt downvote much. I logged in today just so I could downvote you.
Not sure why other folks did it, but for me, you seemed to like the attention.
In 1992, I caught an eight year old pickpocketing my friend. We were 4 18yo males from Texas. So I am holding this kid a couple feet off the ground trying to decide what the hell to do with him. My friends didnāt really know what to do either. He was struggling pretty good, but not enough to get free. His mom came rushing over yelling something unintelligible, so I just threw him at her, and they took off running.
glad people are finally noticing this aspect of 2a. maybe the conversation can eventually start to touch on things like how it works for unions, reproductive rights, preventing cop fuckery, resisting environmental exploration. long story short, how the perpetrators of systemic and corporeal violence almost exclusively only target the vulnerable and unarmed.
I think the biggest factor here is the immediate and tangible aspect of this type of theft.
Wage theft and systemic things are larger and conceptual until it hits, and more often than not because itās so vague and not ājust one personā it doesnāt evoke the same visceral response in a lot of people.
Not sure how we can start reframing to do so but getting on these conversations is a good idea for sure.
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sidenote, the reading of a thread on twitter is hellish. Top to bottom be damned, itās like 3 different UIs in one.
Especially if thereās a little addon from Tumblr at the end of something.
why isnt the reddit type formatting good enough?!What reaction were the French pickpockets expecting? Ope, lemme get that for ya?
I think itās harder to die from poor in France.
Oh. That makes sense
Certainly not assault. Most (french) people catching a thief inside their pocket have a bad enough day to not risk getting injured while winning a prison ticket.
I live in Canada, thereās surprisingly little pickpocketing here too, and we donāt have the same gun/weapon laws.
Like the Americans, weāll straight up beat you to a pulp if you try some shit, and weāre very sorry about thatā¦ You motherfucker.
If you want to steal shit, at least be moral about it and go to a walmart or something. Iām sorry but Iām not even going to pretend to be sorry about a pickpocket targeting normal people getting his (or her) ass beaten.
Though, on that note, is it harder or riskier to shoplift in Europe? Maybe thatās why we have fewer pickpockets because stores are much easier and safer targets. Unless you get a particularly enthusiastic mall cop after you, even if you get caught, itāll probably be a fairly polite interaction involving more disappointment than rage, all the way from capture to sentencing, at least in Canada.
Plus these days the odds of getting cash is low and the expensive device everyone carries has gps tracking built in, so the reward might be too low for the risk.
If you see someone shoplifting, no you didnāt.
Edit: to clarify, I agree with you, and thatās part of the intention of leaving this quip here
This is my viewpoint too.
If Iām a witness to shoplifting, Iām not a witness to shoplifting.
Unless youāre a kleptomaniac, youāre probably not stealing because you want to. Youāre stealing because you have to.
Corporations have insurance, and theyāre not people; so if they lose some money in the transaction, I am unbothered.
The majority of shoplifting is organized effort to sell shit online or to fund a drug habit. Why because only a drug addict will spend more hours stealing than you do working and he will by himself steal more than 40 casual thieves because heās motivated
Seems pessimistic.
What about the people who canāt afford to live and need to steal to eat? Those downtrodden because some rich CEO asshole decided to try to replace them with AI, and they lost everything being unemployed and having the price of everything shoot through the roof for no goddamned reason?
What about those people?
Iām not saying that there arenāt people who steal to fund their addiction, but thatās not the only motivator.
Weāre all humans.
Iām sorry but Iām not even going to pretend to be sorry about a pickpocket targeting normal people getting his (or her) ass beaten.
What about American tourists in a foreign nation that has been historically violently repressed via the American Military and economic shock treatment by American institutions? Those American tourists enabled their government and businesses to do that, via their votes and their labor for said businesses. In this respect they are not just āregular peopleā in a place like Mexico, Chile, Iran, Iraq, and so on.
You know rich people have rigged our gov for ages. Those wars we fought were highly unpopular and nobody wanted them. Rich people made lots of money as a result. Believe it or not, āno more stupid warsā was part of Trumpās campaign platform. Itās about the only part that dems liked too. You canāt run for office here without being super rich unless itās local or an anomaly.
Bernie Sanders, David Hogg, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Jasmine Crockett.
Stop this defeatist attitude bullshit. The real problem is people donāt vote in the fucking primaries.
Zohran Mamdani is an example of what happens when people turn out for the primary.
Upvote for being right.
This is bullshit logic. In the last 40 years the government has served the interests of the few and half the time is literally elected by the minority that would have lost the election in most democracies.
Also actions are a moral reflection on you alone not the victims
I wonāt try to argue about the morality of it, though I canāt agree that pickpocketing any random American does anything to fight the military industry or their imperialism, though I will grant that culpability for it is complex. But when you play with fire, you should expect to get burned occasionally.
This is definitely a win for the Americans, beating the shit out of pickpockets is awesome.
