Is it normal that i feel empathy for criminals?

How I feel about a criminal depends on what crime he, or she committed.

Nothing is more easily ruined than perfection.
Once someone has a felony, there just isn't as much motivation to stay on the straight path. Kind of for the same reason that people with bad credit just do not care if it gets worse.

That aside, yes, criminals got into crime for some kind of desperate reason. People do not typically risk a criminal record and possibly prison for fun.

I think somewhere in-between yours and your moms view is where I sit with how i feel about these sorts of things.

The only criminals I sympathize with are tax-dodgers, scammers and such. If one is stupid enough to fall for a scam, or trick, it's their own fault. Scamming and ripping people off is a bit like going to a casino. You're gonna lose and it's your fault for losing. It's called capitalism...

As for tax evaders, I don't know what's going on in your countries, but in Bulgaria, corrupt politicians spend tax payer money only for themselves. So I would gladly get someone to cook books for me, offshore, bribe people and do everything I can to make as much money as possible and pay the politicians as little as possible. So I support them.

Those politician bastards make old folks live with just 100 Euros a month, while they drive Bentleys and buy "company" luxury apartments and go on "team building" sessions on Bora Bora... Fuck them!
Bulgaria is a small country with a total population of roughly 7 million, yet we have more than 250 legislators.
Not to mention the tens of thousands of government payroll turds that do nothing all day, but somehow get paid.

But scum like thieves, vandals and such deserve pain and lots of it. Violent criminals and rapists deserve death.

I agree. I just watched The Assassination of Gianni Versace on Netflix and this question made me think of it. Basically, Versace had a great childhood and was supported even though he was gay and he liked fashion (this was when times were different of course). On the other hand, his killer Andrew Cunanan, who was a serial killer, had a super rough childhood. His father treated him as “special” his whole life (and later completely shattered his self image) and physically abused his mother in front of him. His father also stole money from his company and was caught so he flew back to the Philippines and left his family with no money. Ive also read somewhere that most serial killers suffered from an abusive childhood. I think that physical or mental abuse can really mess a person up, especially during childhood.

What I find so interesting about this argument is that I work in childcare and when a child misbehaves you’re supposed to praise instead of punish them. You would think the same thing goes for adults (like counseling, support groups, etc) but if you think about it, adults are more than fully capable of making their own decisions. Also, tons of people have mental conditions. More than are diagnosed. But that doesn’t vindicate somebody that commits horrible crimes. Like I could have depression and be responsible about it (trying to go to therapy, taking meds...) or I could victimize myself & deal with it by murdering all my bullies.

The way life works is there is consequences to all actions. No one cares why you did something they just know what you did.

Example: a dude at work fell asleep and got caught. He says he fell asleep because he's working so much harder and morr hours than everyone else there. The boss says "You're fired". The boss does not care about the excuse. He caught the man sleeping and thats it period.

My opinion is that prison shouldn't be used as a punishment, but only as a way of keeping people who demonstrate that they're unable to behave in a socially positive way (or at least a socially neutral way) apart from the rest of us.

There's solid research that shows that locking people up alone doesn't make them less likely to commit further crimes when they're released, but rather increases the likelihood of that. There are individual exceptions, of course, and some do people see the light and alter their approach to life after a spell behind bars. For the majority, though, prison allows convicted prisoners to improve their criminal skills, widens their criminal networks, and sucks them deeper into the underbelly of society.

Unfortunately, positive interventions in the lives of those who have either been convicted of a crime or are heading that way are challenging, expensive, and don't always succeed. They also don't gratify people's need to see wrongdoers punished, so funding such programmes is a hard-sell for politicians.

I know right... jeffrey dahmer needs a great big hug, not his fault! Tis societies fault

It's good and normal to feel empathy for criminals. I can assure you they've been hurt 100x worse than anyone they ever hurt and they're just turning a little bit of that pain outwards.

You are a soft hearted man . Dude