by Deborah Lawwill

Created on: August 01, 2009

Crime is an unfortunate part of every society and thus must be dealt with in an efficient and humane manner. It is as much a social problem as it is individual responsibility as both the person who commits the crime and other people in society are effected. Violent crimes are the worst and yet most common crimes that we see today.

There are many reasons why individuals may choose to commit crimes, though I am not advocating in the least bit that such behavior is acceptable. A bad economy is a major contributor to crime. People worry about security. Someone who may have never stolen anything before might be found shoplifting. People are stressed so naturally violent crimes increase. Aside from just economic circumstances criminal behavior can come from an abusive childhood or relationship, severe poverty, lack of parental discipline or presence as a child, or mental illness.

It harms the individual because it causes them to be institutionalized, which does not seem to do much, especially for people who are trapped with drug addictions. They just get out and use again. Our judicial system is very flawed. A large percentage of people with severe mental health issues are placed in jail or if they are fortunate enough to get a correct diagnosis they are placed in state mental institutions which are exactly the same, if not worse than jail; because state psychiatrists are biased and usually just pass everyone off as sane to avoid the actual effort of checking out every claim thoroughly. Those institutions are underfunded, understaffed, and don't seem to do any good for anyone. Because it's exactly like jail, just with the possibility of receiving a shot in your rear end, many mental health patients are afraid and pretend to be fine just to escape from those awful places.

It harms society because the judicial system is extremely flawed. Police officers are incredibly lazy, often harassing innocent people while failing to notice people who are actually committing serious crimes. A lot of the people in the judicial system are just there for job security and are absolutely terrible at their jobs, often resulting in even more problems because situations are not handled correctly. Because of the economy, police officers are being laid off as well and thus, crime rates increase because government jobs seem to be underfunded and understaffed.

Crime is a terrible thing. Despite outside circumstances, in the end we must all be responsible for our actions. Our actions affect not only ourselves, but they affect others around us as well.

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