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Rob
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1 year ago
in Tags and Categories, Oh My! on Climb to the StarsUpdate: Rob Miller has a Batch Categories plugin which should do the trick. I can’t remember if he used any of my work or started from scratch, but in any case, it looks very much like what I had dreamed up for it ;-)
I mentioned in #wordpress that I was in need of something to do; you said, tongue-in-cheek I believe, "rewrite my Batch Categories plugin for WP 2.0+"; I actually did, heh.
It doesn't actually use any of your original code, but obviously owes a lot in spirit and UI to your original.
2 years ago
in Aw, poor widdle terrorist! on Enemy of Entropy
There is absolutely no reason to keep him locked in a tiny cell for 23 hours a day; it's just restriction for restriction's sake. He would have also lost his freedom if you'd have locked him up in a well-secured prison but still given him adequate exercise time, space, contact with other human beings, etc. He'd still be just as much of a danger to society (i.e. none at all) and it would cost just as little to house him.
As for the death penalty, it costs more than imprisoning someone for life, FYI, and comes with a plethora of additional problems—the fallibility of prosecutors being one major one, the hypocrisy of decrying murder while murdering criminals being another.
Detection rates are the proportion of crimes committed that are actually detected and the perpetrators prosecuted. Harsher punishments do not deter people (and this has been shown time and time again), since criminals know that—in the vast majority of cases—they simply won't be caught; they balance risk and punishment and no matter how harsh the punishment, low detection rates balance it out. You could have 100% detection rates and absolutely no punishment aspect to prison, and all crimes would be deterred; this doesn't work the other way.
In this case the perpetrator has been caught, but that the prospect of life in a supermax prison ipso facto did absolutely nothing to deter him.
In conclusion, I reiterate what I said before: harsh punishments solve absolutely nothing except satiating the general public's lust for revenge. Whether or not that's a good thing depends on whether you enjoy that revenge, I guess.
As for the death penalty, it costs more than imprisoning someone for life, FYI, and comes with a plethora of additional problems—the fallibility of prosecutors being one major one, the hypocrisy of decrying murder while murdering criminals being another.
Detection rates are the proportion of crimes committed that are actually detected and the perpetrators prosecuted. Harsher punishments do not deter people (and this has been shown time and time again), since criminals know that—in the vast majority of cases—they simply won't be caught; they balance risk and punishment and no matter how harsh the punishment, low detection rates balance it out. You could have 100% detection rates and absolutely no punishment aspect to prison, and all crimes would be deterred; this doesn't work the other way.
In this case the perpetrator has been caught, but that the prospect of life in a supermax prison ipso facto did absolutely nothing to deter him.
In conclusion, I reiterate what I said before: harsh punishments solve absolutely nothing except satiating the general public's lust for revenge. Whether or not that's a good thing depends on whether you enjoy that revenge, I guess.
2 years ago
in Aw, poor widdle terrorist! on Enemy of Entropy
This would be all well and good, it's just that harsher punishments demonstrably have no effect whatsoever on deterrence rates. Improving detection rates do increase deterrence, however, and also have the added bonus of not torturing or otherwise mistreating people.
Of course, for most crimes you simply can't deter people; crimes of passion, crimes of compulsion, crimes resulting from a rational cost-benefit analysis (murdering someone for their life insurance, for example).
Either way, mistreating prisoners solves nothing except satisfying those who crave to mistreat others. We lock up people because they commit crimes against other human beings; that does not give us the right to commit crimes against them. Criminals are human, and what separates us from criminals is that we respect other human beings. Throwing that out of the window simply lowers us to their level.
I find it quite horrifying that someone living in the supposed land of the free—who presumably opposes the tyrannous government of the world's dictatorships—endorses the government's mistreatment of those it opposes.
Of course, for most crimes you simply can't deter people; crimes of passion, crimes of compulsion, crimes resulting from a rational cost-benefit analysis (murdering someone for their life insurance, for example).
Either way, mistreating prisoners solves nothing except satisfying those who crave to mistreat others. We lock up people because they commit crimes against other human beings; that does not give us the right to commit crimes against them. Criminals are human, and what separates us from criminals is that we respect other human beings. Throwing that out of the window simply lowers us to their level.
I find it quite horrifying that someone living in the supposed land of the free—who presumably opposes the tyrannous government of the world's dictatorships—endorses the government's mistreatment of those it opposes.
