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Culture War Roundup for the week of May 15, 2023

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Nice policy. I'll tell you the three things this will achieve:

(1) Sweet

(2) Fuck

(3) All

Such policies achieving sweet fuck all is the feature, not a bug.

"So where's the part where we start catching criminals and punishing them?"

"That's the neat part, we don't."

As @CriticalDuty mentions above, any sort of effective policy would mean more blacks in jails and prisons, which is unacceptable to those who consider black lives to matter more.

The laundry list of soft-hearted, impotent plans-for-action that excuses the agency and accountability of criminals sounds like right-wing parody, complete with forced acronyms for do-nothing programs and task (lack of) forces.

Re: security guards - now that anyone can walk into a store, grab something off the racks or the shelves, and walk right back out while telling you to fuck yourself, because any attempt to even lay a hand on them is ASSAULT, THAT'S ASSAULT, I'M SUING YOU AND THE STORE, there's not much they can do in reality

Pretty typical anarcho-tyranny, when shoplifters have greater protections than the employees or good Samaritans who try to stop them.

As for "train employees in de-escalation tactics", oh yeah that's gonna work. "Oh please, Ms. Shoplifter, I know systemic racism and poverty have impacted you which is why you're grabbing a carefully calculated amount under what would get you done for a felony, but if I just ask you nicely you'll hand everything back".

At this point we might as well just drop the act and have third base coaches stationed at store exits, to enthusiastically wave shoplifters out the store.