San Francisco Neighbor Says Don’t Call Thieves ‘Criminals’
2nd November 2015
So what if he stole your stuff? Doesn’t make him a bad person, does it?
In the site’s Crime and Safety area, where residents share strategies for fighting crime, Malkia Cyril of S.F. suggests that her neighbors stop using the label because it shows lack of empathy and understanding.
Cyril pointed out that instead of calling the thief who took the bicycle from your garage a criminal, you could be more respectful and call him or her “the person who stole my bicycle.”
“I [suggest] that people who commit property crimes are human and deserved to be referred to in terms that acknowledge that,” Cyril, who’s the executive director of the Center for Media Justice in Oakland, writes in the thread.
I am not making this up.