Crimes undermine human society. Reasons for committing a crime are varied andcomplex, so we could not say that violation of law is just human nature and that people'stendency to break the law could be stopped when they are young.
We are still not sure what causes people to commit a crime. The reason seems to be clearin cases in which a thief steals money to make a living or buy things normally unaffordable.
Many thieves, when caught and interviewed, reveal that they come from poor families andhave very little education. Therefore we could establish a relation between less privilegedfamily background and low level of education. Many people used to believe that parents couldteach their children the harms of wrongdoing by showing them the consequences of suchaction and the obligation of complying with social norms. Such method works for mostchildren who are aware of what they are doing and what would happen from their action. Butwe also learn from news or other sources that many high-level officials take bribes or abusepower for their own benefit. Such people with high income and good education clearly knowwhat they are doing and the possible consequences. Such crimes would not have happened iftendency to commit crimes could be stopped when people were young.
Moreover, we know that people tend to act for their own benefit, but we do not know ifthis is due to human nature or other causes such as ideas learned later in life. If it is humannature, people live in faraway places without much education would commit crimes at a higherrate than people with schooling in cities. By contrast, people in remote places are more honestand kind, and the crime rate is significantly lower than that in city. From such evidence, wecould not conclude that the above assertion is true.
While we continue to explore what causes crime and how to prevent it, we need to bear inmind that it is far more complex than we normally think. Accordingly, measures for crimeprevention should also be multidimensional.
To sum up, the conclusion that it is human nature to commit crime and that people'stendency to break the law could be stopped when they are young is not well supported.People become criminals for many reasons and we should adopt more effective methods forcrime prevention.