ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Another fatality stealing wire

Mark, this is not a copper problem, it is a theft problem. If the market for stolen coppper dried up tomorrow they would steal something else ... and probably get away with it.
As long as people make excuses for these people it promotes the idea that stealing is a reasonable way to feed your family ... or your drug habit ... or whatever.
BTW I hear he had 9 kids ... was he actually paying to support them?

I agree it is a theft problem - but if stealing copper (or anything else) paid less than the jobs available to a major portion of the population. Whens the last time you saw a headline reading: "PHD in physics explodes in white hot ball of plasma while stealing copper to sell as scrap." ??? I'm not going to speculate on this persons education level - but if you have 9 kids, you're either rich enough or dumb enough... One is a Rockefeller the other is Cletus (from the Simpsons) IMO. We're the one of the richest nations on earth right now - but have people out there doing things common in 3rd & 4th world countries. Something is wrong....

e57, I think you hit the core of the disagreement here.

You say "poverty causes crime."

I submit that has the situation exactly reversed. I say Crime causes poverty.
An 'ethic' that considers crime to be OK is pretty good at making sure no one will ever improve, invest, build, or seek to improve themselves.

There are solid reasons why some communities have essentially no crime, drug abuse, or any of the other 'social ills.' There are also solid reasons that other communities are 'stuck' in an endless cycle of depravity.

You're right ... such a discussion is way beyond the scope of this forum. I made my first post as a response to what seemed to be a 'cry-a-long' for the deceased. As far as I'm concerned ... such sympathy is misplaced. I'm not about to let us become a society of professional victims, where everyone tries to top the other guys' sob story.

Outstanding post John, I can't say much else without drifting into politics so I won't.

Having grown up poor, and immersed in a culture of crime, I'm going to stick to my guns on crime and poverty, and the chicken/egg dicussion on that. I sought improve, invest, build, and seek to improve myself. I moved out of my neighborhood, got a real job....

I will also add to that something that I heard recently. Wealth as the cause of crime... This persons reasoning was that crime is pretty low where everyone is poor. Nothing to steal for one. But the idea of amomosity created across the class divides made a lot of sense to me.

Back on topic though... Can you imagine going to steal copper from a transformer vault? (Yes YOU and I CAN... We are electricians!) It is not as if there has not been no publicity about this type of thing. People are warned since they were children not to mess with electricity, or to mess with fallen powerlines. They have heard about the deaths, and the third degree burns - there are constant news stories about it lately, and they do not live in caves... For us, as electricians, the next equal I could think about would be recycling explosives...

"Ya know Johnny, you should quit that job at McD's... Big money in recycling explosives. Yesirrie, you could make in ONE night what you do in a whole month of 32 hour weeks that they let you have without offering you any befefits that are required for 40 hour weeks in most States...."

"Yeah Bob, but dont explosives have a tendancy to - you know - Explode????"

"Well yeah... But looky here - I bought that boat with recycled explosives - and there aint a red blooded American who don't want a luxury item like a BOAT."

I don't know--- I'm ranting now. But somehow there are people who think that their time is more profitable recycling installed live copper than doing some other job. And I'm talking to people who have demo'ed out panels and all kinds of electrical wiring before. And even slap-dash that takes time, not to mention hauling it down to the scrap yard. To sell a couple hundred in copper probably took them 6~8 hours work. $25 an hour, and risk of death or jail or both.

I didn't notice a big drop in crime around here when anyone who showed up at a job site could work, for pretty good pay. There were still guys sitting on the curb in front of my wife's place with "will work for food" signs but you couldn't actually get them to come and do some work.
The problem is bums are bums, thieves are thieves. I spent a good part of my life is SE DC (Anacostia). I have been around my share of poor people and we didn't have much money ourselves but my family worked, we didn't steal. We finally got out of there but it was from my parents saving and working hard to get us out.

Well I removed one entire post and if you really take the time to look there are still comments directed at the person.

Steeling is a crime..nuf said.

I tell you I am getting fed up with where this site has been heading.

Lets stick with the electrical trade and leave the political rants out of here.

Gentlemen,

Let's agree for the moment that however bad or desparate the man, it was a tragedy for his family.

On that note I think it's time to let this thread cool off.