• optional@feddit.org
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    3 days ago

    As a Non-American I seriously wonder which one is which. I don’t have the feeling that either of them is treated with any seriousness in the US.

    • Showroom7561@lemmy.ca
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      2 days ago

      Just looked up some “penalties” in Canada for murdering people with your car.

      If you use a car to drive aggressively and cause death, you only get a maximum of 2 years in jail. That’s it. Take a life for maybe up to 2 years in jail.

      It’s not taken seriously at all.

      • Jerkface (any/all)@lemmy.ca
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        12 hours ago

        You are using loaded language here. The penalties for provable murder with a car are the same as for murder by any other method. Murder and homicide are not synonyms. Aggressive driving that results in death is not murder, which is an intentional, pre-planned action, not something that happens incidentally or even negligently.

        • Showroom7561@lemmy.ca
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          10 hours ago

          I understand the differences in language, but none of that matters at all to the victim or their family.

          The fact is, you can kill someone with a car while being reckless, and it’s a very minor offence.

          It’s only under the most extreme circumstances that someone killing a person by car is taken seriously.

          • Jerkface (any/all)@lemmy.ca
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            3 hours ago

            I understand the differences in language, but none of that matters at all to the victim or their family.

            Okay? Not to take the bait, but so? Whether or not it is murder is a legal matter, which would be completely unchanged if there was no grieving family.

            If you accidentally lock your coworker in the walk-in oven at work and they die, you probably never see the inside of a prison. (A jail, maybe.) What is your basis for comparison? Oh, right, “murder.”

            It’s only under the most extreme circumstances that someone killing a person by car is taken seriously.

            Right, and actual murder is always one of those.

            You can’t use loaded language and then be all, “well I don’t want to get into a semantic argument.” Your argument would be meaningful if it wasn’t hyperbolic. Drivers do get breaks and you don’t have to exaggerate.

            • Showroom7561@lemmy.ca
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              3 hours ago

              Fair points, for sure.

              Whether or not it is murder is a legal matter, which would be completely unchanged if there was no grieving family.

              The only major difference between manslaughter, 1st degree or 2nd degree murder is intent.

              I would argue that if you are driving recklessly or dangerously (two different legal definitions), especially at high speed or while drunk/high, there’s a reasonable expectation that your actions can and will kill someone.

              Manslaughter isn’t good enough. To me, it’s as equal to murder as firing a gun into a crowd (even if you claim you didn’t intend to kill people).

              If you accidentally lock your coworker in the walk-in oven at work and they die, you probably never see the inside of a prison.

              Completely different from being reckless and/or dangerous in a vehicle.

              Dangerous driving causing death would not, and should not, ever be considered an “accident”.

              If you dropped bricks from a building, anyone would agree that those actions will probably kill someone. It’s not good enough to say “three people died because you decided to throw bricks off a building, we’ll give you six months probation for being reckless.”. That’s not justice for anyone.

              If “murder” doesn’t fit in the context of death by car, let’s come up with another legal charge that’s more appropriate than manslaughter.

              We constantly read stories like this one, where three people were killed by a DUI driver who was also speeding, yet served no time and only 1 year driving suspension.

              Or a trucker who killed four and was only given six years in prison, despite being given the “harsher” charge of dangerous driving.

              Or this guy, who was racing and killed a woman in a hit-and-run, only got two years. And the only reason why he got a slap on the wrist, is because it wasn’t proven that he wanted to kill the cyclist.

              The moment your actions behind the wheel are deliberately dangerous, the context changes, IMO.

      • optional@feddit.org
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        1 day ago

        I don’t doubt that deaths by cars aren’t taken seriously. I doubt that deaths by guns are.

        Btw. if you’re willing to prevent deaths in either of these cases, you should actually work on preventive measures instead of penalizing after the killing. As the diagram above clearly shows, even harsh punishments don’t prevent gun crimes, so what makes you think it would work for car crimes?

        What you could do instead is:

        • Separate gun owners/drivers from other people (don’t allow carrying guns through the town/protected bike lanes)
        • Reduce the number of people who feel the need to own a gun/car (build strong and safe communities/build fast and safe public transit)
        • Disallow owning extremely dangerous weapons (automatic rifles/pickup trucks)
        • Require intensive training and background checks before allowing people to own a gun/car
        • Take away the gun license/drivers license from offenders
        • If you really have to put people in prison make sure they’ll get re-socialized in prison instead of breeding even worse criminals
        • Showroom7561@lemmy.ca
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          1 day ago

          you should actually work on preventive measures instead of penalizing after the killing.

          100% prevention is the best way to do things. But you also have to make sure that you don’t devalue a victim’s life by giving their killer “up to 2 years” in prison. I don’t know how I’d react if a loved one were killed by a reckless driver, only to get 4 months in jail (or none, as is usually the case).