[*BCM*] John Hays

[John Hays]

I apologize if my language was unclear - I didn't  mean to suggest that, 
as individuals, college students and 20 year olds are, generally 
thieves. I was expressing, in perhaps too colloquially a manner, 
generalizations about those groups across a large population. If you 
were to take a million people in their 50s, and a million people in 
their 20s, the odds are overwhelming that the group of 20 year olds 
would contain far, far more thieves than the group of 50 year olds. Of 
the data we have about criminal behavior, we are able to make a few 
highly supported generalizations, among them being that young people (as 
a group) commit more crime than older people, and men (as a group) 
commit more crime than women (as well as a few other, less fashionable 
generalizations that we don't necessarily have to get into).

I should point out that I am 24, and the overwhelming majority of my 
friends are obviously in their 20s.

And I rather think my position is far, far more defensible than the 
ludicrous notion that --drug addicts-- are responsible for most of the 
city's property theft.

- John



ian schwartz wrote:
> "College students, and young people in their 20s generally, are
> inveterate thieves"
>
> Is this really your viewpoint? That 20-somethings and college kids
> steal out of some long-ingrained habit? Or were you just making a
> broad sweeping generality for the sake of driving home your poorly
> thought out point?
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