| When the grandparent said "Kinda hard to feel sorry for a criminal being unable to report a crime....." The parent answered "You don’t feel sympathy for sex workers, who in many places are unable to report being assaulted?" -- as if that category was what the grantparent meant by "criminals". It was obvious to me that this was not what the grandparent meant, and I chimed in to say that one can still find it "hard to feel sorry for a criminal being unable to report a crime" while still feeling sorry for a prostitute that can't report a rape. It's easy to speak of "criminals" casually without including (into your concept of them) large categories of people that the law might still consider "criminals" (eg. prostitute, a teen that did some weed, a guy who hacked into a website for fun, somebody who gasp pirated some music, etc.). That's orthogonal to what protection criminals should get or not. I can support the rights of a criminal (to a fair trial etc) without feeling sorry for them. I don't find feeling "sorry" necessary to support people's rights. >You’re argument seems to be: people who commit crimes shouldn’t expect protection under the law from other crimes. No, my comment meant to convey (a) that the grandparent's point that "Kinda hard to feel sorry for a criminal being unable to report a crime" is not some bizarre cruel statement, and it doesn't necessarily have to do with some special cases of legally considered "criminals" that are more like victims themselves like a prostitute. What I didn't like was the uncharitable interpretation of the grandparent's comment. |