[turtlecrxsi]

I agree with parenting as the building block for instilling non-violent values into an individual regardless of their culture or religious belief system. Crime takes place usually because somebody wants something badly enough that they view the person in which the crime is being committed as another object and not a person as themselves. I think this is significant. For example, when you've had a fight against an enemy as a child or as an adult when set off you just started wailing on the "enemy" and you no longer considered their feelings about the matter at that particular time. Granted, you probably ran out of breath or both got tired of fighting and if it was a friend may have even settled matters. Now we know that people can all go off the deep end at times and that is to be anticipated. However, crimes against others can be prevented by people remembering that they're human and the person they are acting upon is just as human as they are with emotions and feelings and thoughts of right and wrong. I've known good people and bad people and you really can't do anything to help the bad people because it seems that the damage is done. The good people sometimes get the shit end of the stick too. Accidental killings or self-defense is one example. But good people can also become bad simply by throwing drugs into the mix. I've known racy individuals that have teetered on the fence of good and bad and when on certain drugs they've just lost all reasoning for good. So even with the foundation of good parenting as I believe to be one of the fundamental building blocks of good behavior (or rather non-violent/criminal behavior) it really doesn't matter because people will end up doing something bad because of some foreign agent or influence. I wish I had the Modern Rhetoric text in front of me right now with the Kenneth Burke's essay about the pentad of human behavior with the fundamental terms: act, agent, agency, scene, purpose. These 5 terms can be used to analyze virtually all human behavior, whether it's right or wrong it can be analyzed to figure out why it happened.

EDIT:
Act: What happened? What is the action? What is going on? What action; what thoughts?
Scene: Where is the act happening? What is the background situation?
Agent: Who is involved in the action? What are their roles?
Agency: How do the agents act? By what means do they act?
Purpose: Why do the agents act? What do they want?
Of dramatism, Burke said: "If action, then drama; if drama, then conflict; if conflict, then victimage.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1: Burke, Kenneth. 1945. A Grammar of Motives. Berkeley: U of California P, 1969