B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery • Hacker News Board

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#71

Post by AnimalMuppet » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 12:30 AM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #68

tjalfi wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Proposition 47[0] in 2014 substantially reduced the penalties for shoplifting, grand theft, forgery, fraud, and other crimes. Stealing It would be surprising if this didn't lead to a substantial increase in the crime rate. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_California_Proposition_47

Since when is even stealing anything excusable? Stealing $300 purse or $30000 car is exactly the same thing morally. The value of the item is in some ways orthogonal. Theft should be punished in the strongest forms possible so no one even thinks about doing it. Minimum 1 year in prison for stealing anything . Convince me otherwise.

I mostly agree with you. But...

Let's say someone steals a $300 purse or a $30000 car. Nobody needs either a $300 purse or a $30000 car. But let's say someone steals $10 of food from a grocery store. They may legitimately need that. (Or they may just have poor self-control.) If someone legitimately needs food, I could bend my mind far enough to call that "excusable".

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#72

Post by systemvoltage » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 12:33 AM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #71

systemvoltage wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since when is even stealing anything excusable? Stealing $300 purse or $30000 car is exactly the same thing morally. The value of the item is in some ways orthogonal. Theft should be punished in the strongest forms possible so no one even thinks about doing it. Minimum 1 year in prison for stealing anything . Convince me otherwise.

I mostly agree with you. But... Let's say someone steals a $300 purse or a $30000 car. Nobody needs either a $300 purse or a $30000 car. But let's say someone steals $10 of food from a grocery store. They may legitimately need that. (Or they may just have poor self-control.) If someone legitimately needs food, I could bend my mind far enough to call that "excusable".

Then the society should make provisions to directly provide food for the needy.

Allowing stealing is not tackling the problem head-on and instead squirming on a morally questionable line and thereby breeding crime and ill in the society.

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#73

Post by tropdrop » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 12:34 AM UTC

cecida wrote: post #35

hindsightbias wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SF leads in all areas of innovation, including crime. In the Covid era, tourists are not present in the quantities required to sustain various career populations, including criminals. Guns aren’t really necessary in SF, so there may be some gang initiation threshold.

I traveled to SF a number of times with work 2 years ago. I'm not trying to sound like a smug social democratic European, but I couldn't get over the homelessness, the petty vandalism, the rubbish, and the overall air of menace in the place.

On an episode of 99pi, I heard even visiting New Yorkers are shocked.

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#74

Post by AnimalMuppet » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 12:41 AM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #72

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mostly agree with you. But... Let's say someone steals a $300 purse or a $30000 car. Nobody needs either a $300 purse or a $30000 car. But let's say someone steals $10 of food from a grocery store. They may legitimately need that. (Or they may just have poor self-control.) If someone legitimately needs food, I could bend my mind far enough to call that "excusable".

Then the society should make provisions to directly provide food for the needy. Allowing stealing is not tackling the problem head-on and instead squirming on a morally questionable line and thereby breeding crime and ill in the society.

That's perfectly reasonable to say that society should do that.

In the meantime, though, society doesn't do that, at least not consistently enough. So in the current circumstances, I still have some compassion for someone in genuine need who steals food.

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#75

Post by systemvoltage » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 12:56 AM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #74

systemvoltage wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then the society should make provisions to directly provide food for the needy. Allowing stealing is not tackling the problem head-on and instead squirming on a morally questionable line and thereby breeding crime and ill in the society.

That's perfectly reasonable to say that society should do that. In the meantime, though, society doesn't do that, at least not consistently enough. So in the current circumstances, I still have some compassion for someone in genuine need who steals food.

From this thread, it seems like the society itself has voted to allow crime.

So, let me get this straight and state curtly - A city allows crime, then complains about rising crime!?

May be people of this city should question their understanding of how to run a good society.

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#76

Post by conanbatt » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 1:18 AM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #71

systemvoltage wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since when is even stealing anything excusable? Stealing $300 purse or $30000 car is exactly the same thing morally. The value of the item is in some ways orthogonal. Theft should be punished in the strongest forms possible so no one even thinks about doing it. Minimum 1 year in prison for stealing anything . Convince me otherwise.

I mostly agree with you. But... Let's say someone steals a $300 purse or a $30000 car. Nobody needs either a $300 purse or a $30000 car. But let's say someone steals $10 of food from a grocery store. They may legitimately need that. (Or they may just have poor self-control.) If someone legitimately needs food, I could bend my mind far enough to call that "excusable".

I think so too, and it is also defensible for the store owner to protect his 10$ with 0.50 cent shotgun shells.

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#77

Post by officialchicken » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 1:26 AM UTC

ilaksh wrote: post #65

tristanb wrote: post #45

In the last month in San Francisco. - Someone was shot on my doorstep at 6am. Survived. - My friend was woken up on the couch when a bullet landed at his feet. (Was fired up in the air and came down through a skylight). - My wife found a homeless person so dead they had rigor mortis - We tried to buy a house and failed when it had 37 other offers I still love this place, and its been my home for 15 years but it ain't…

Check out Playas de Tijuana, Mexico. Occasionally it smells bad, but not usually, and in my neighborhood we have a strong police presence. Also living a block from the beach only costs $500. And on Mondays there is a market on the street right in front of the apartment. I rarely see any homeless people. The dogs and barbed wire are usually enough to prevent most robberies as long as you don't park a really nice car o…

There are so many of these kinds of locations in Spain, it's hard to list. For $600/mo (2 BR apt/condo), sandwiched between Playa de Las Canteras and Playa de Alcavaneras. And several orders of magnitude safer than US/MX, in terms of crimes per capita.

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#78

Post by kevrc » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 1:30 AM UTC

ALittleLight wrote: post #55

fortran77 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you saying? These people are stealing and pointing guns at people only because they feel it's "unfair" that other people have more money than they do?

I think that's part of it. Imagine doing demanding or demeaning labor all day and making a tenth of what the guy spending 7-8 hours a day typing on a computer and playing Ping Pong makes. That would certainly seem unfair to me. Can't afford nice stuff, but you could take it... On top of that, SF refuses to punish crimes like theft, so...

I can assure you, the people who are robbing electronics stores are not the ones serving lattes or driving ubers. SF has a huge issue with career criminals. And it’s easy to be one. I have never seen such blatant drug dealing and robbery in my life, and I have lived in supposedly “dangerous” cities outside of the US.

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#79

Post by notyourday » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 1:32 AM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #67

tjalfi wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Proposition 47[0] in 2014 substantially reduced the penalties for shoplifting, grand theft, forgery, fraud, and other crimes. Stealing It would be surprising if this didn't lead to a substantial increase in the crime rate. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_California_Proposition_47

It’s also the way SF deals with crime. Daly City borders SF and they don’t suffer these crimes at the same rate. Their prosecutors prosecute. They don’t play the restorative justice game —which SF pushes on victims.

"If we could just teach prisoners to code and stop with this retribution nonsense" as so many HNers pontificated a few hours ago...

Re: B8ta closing another San Francisco store after armed robbery

#80

Post by kevrc » Sat, Feb 06, 2021, 1:34 AM UTC

scelerat wrote: post #52

ilamont wrote: post #2

Good for him, standing up for his employees who clearly must be very alarmed. B8ta has stores around the globe, and Norby told SFGATE last month that the crime in San Francisco is unlike anything the company experiences elsewhere. “This actually doesn’t happen anywhere else in the country,” he said. “We have 17 other stores, including three internationally. This just doesn’t happen anywhere else. It’s only here.” Why…

> Why do the stores in SF attract violent crime compared to, say, a store in another West Coast city? Vast wealth right next to abject poverty and hopelessness. Like a spark that, with sufficient potential, jumps a gap.

I don’t think this is the full explanation (or even the biggest factor). I have lived in foreign cities with FAR more income inequality than sf, and I never saw the blatant crime I see in sf. It’s to the point where seeing live shoplifting or robbery isn’t even a surprising or notable occurrence for most people. There is simply no will to enforce the law.