[tolbish]

> to say this isn’t working and needs radical correction to enforce some social norms and define acceptable behavior under penalty of imprisonment, labor, or some undesirable consequence for the offender

We should really be focusing on the underlying mental health issues rather than resorting to a base desire to crack skulls. One such example is opening up (humane) mental health institutions. For people who are out of their gourd but aren't your typical criminal case, these mental health institutions would exist for these people to go if they consistently prove to be a danger to themselves and/or others.

[aksss]

Who said anything about cracking skulls? Institutionalization is simply a manner of imprisonment, but it is still in that column. State-run institutions were shut down, but interestingly the amount of "institutionalized" people in the population remained much the same, they basically just moved into the prison system, which I think is arguably worse. But yeah, I'm all for addressing mental health and being more "liberal" with institutionalization. It's better than having crazy people cursing at kids on the street, threatening violence and creating public health hazards.

[silexia]

Cracking skulls is actually the more humane solution. If a city makes harsh examples of a few criminals, it dissuades many more potential criminals from ever getting started.

Allowing criminals and homeless to run rampant will lead to the rapid increases in both we have seen in SF. Then there still will be an inevitable backlash, and that will involve the cracking of far more skulls than would have happened by doing it early. If a city never enforces its laws, the criminals will crack far more innocent skulls.

You can't escape the cracking of skulls, you just choose who does the cracking and how many get hurt.