A problem with crime.

The general consensus definition of crime is an illegal act committed against an individual or the state, or some such vernacular which says something similar. If you ask any average person on the street as to what makes a criminal a ‘criminal’ more often than not the word violence comes out as a part of the criminal’s actions. For hundreds of years, when it came to defining a criminal or felon, violence seemed to be a prerequisite, with more so called “petty” crimes thought of as civil infractions or public nuisances punishable by a fine or maybe a night in the local jail, but with no permanence of a record attached or negative label to be lived with. As a result, those who were caught on things such as public drunkenness or disorderly conduct of some kind were never branded as being a “criminal” or felon; they were a public nuisance on the level of the stray dog who refused to leave the public square, but they never had to be worried about being thought of in the same light as murders and rapists. Today, in 21^st century America, with all of its liberal socialistic laws, everything short of speeding infractions is considered a “crime”, making it very easy to be branded a “criminal”-at least in the eyes of the states and their laws.

Get arrested for a suspended driver’s license-you are a criminal.

Get caught using a bush to relieve yourself because you couldn’t hold it any longer while waiting in line at the Porta Potty-you’re a criminal.

Get a little loud, but not physical, with your significant other after a bad week, leading to a neighbor calling the police and whomever they determine to arrest becomes, you guessed it, a criminal.

Needless to say, just about anything today that is deemed “punishable” by law or which is considered an “arrestable” offense, makes it all to easy for you, or anyone you know, to become a criminal. There are 10’s of thousands of laws in America which cover every possible “out of the norm” act imaginable, to the point that it is nearly impossible for anyone to not become a criminal. In fact, I’d be willing to bet, that not one American has not committed a “crime” at some point in their life, and the only difference between them and those with a record is that they never got caught.

Compounding matters for people just trying to get by and stay out of legal trouble is the ease with which it now is to become a Felon-if being a criminal wasn’t bad enough, becoming a “felon” is something no one wants to be called.

Felons are considered to be the most heinous of all people in our society. They are the worst of the worst. To be a felon used to mean that you had committed crimes so atrocious, so violent against society, that many of the rights guaranteed to you by our Constitution were stripped from you-leaving you barely half a citizen in the legal sense. Today, however, state and local laws have made it much easier to become a felon. Many states have what are called “habitual” statutes for so call repeat offenders of non violent, lesser crimes (misdemeanors) which, once you are classified as a habitual offender, you become a felon. The problem with many of these laws that you can be habitualized for is the ease with which a person can be arrested for the original offense-particularly as it relates to traffic laws, most commonly driving under a suspended license.

In many states, as here in the state of Florida, once you get 3 arrests for driving with a suspended license, you become a felon-a ridiculous notion given the ease at which states can suspend and keep your license suspended relative to a mode of transit that is unquestionably a necessity in today’s society. In fact, if ever given the opportunity, take a look at the reasons for which your state can suspend a persons license and it will shock you. So vast and varied are the laws for which states can take your license-pretty much for every and anything-that having a valid drivers license is almost entrapment, and its no wonder that very few people ever get only one violation for driving on a suspended license and why so many eventually become a felon over a relatively victimless crime.

Of course state lawmakers would have you think otherwise. They would tell you of the epidemic like proportions as to the number of people driving on a suspended license and the cost that these drivers pass along to everyone else via increases in car insurance rates, all the while ignoring the fact that they have made it many times easier to lose your driving privileges than it is to keep them.

Pointing out the idiocy of license laws is all too easy, but in the state of Florida you can be habitualized for such petty crimes as simple battery (giving someone a black eye) and petty theft (stealing a candy bar) thereby allowing for a whole new genre of felon’s that essentially become wards of the state-dependant on government programs such as welfare, social security and food stamps for survival, which could very well be what our politicians want-a class of people, which they create, dependent on them for survival.

Of course, if you are willing to do the crime you have to be willing to do the time, but there is a rational and logical line that I believe has been crossed by our laws when it becomes easier to become a criminal than to be a productive citizen, and this, I believe, is one of the biggest problems with “crime” in America today-not necessarily the people committing them, but the laws through which you can be made a “criminal”.