Subject:
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Re: What about all the prisoners?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Thu, 16 Nov 2000 14:29:23 GMT
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Viewed:
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1202 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Christopher L. Weeks writes:
> > And what if he still refuses to work it off? I'm not trying to sound
> > nitpicky, but this seems fundamental to your stance on rehabilitation.
>
> I agree that it is fundamental. I think that most of the people are not
> broken, but have lost their way. Society (their schools, their parents,
> whatever) did not show them how to find peace in our system.
I'm still not comfortable with this, since it suggests "choose to conform
or we'll make you choose to conform to society's ideals" in a way every bit
as totalitarian as the Big Brother states of which Libertopia is the
antithesis. (I know you haven't specifically been arguing for Libertopia
here, but many of your proposed prison reforms appear to be in step with
that sort of thinking.)
> One element of showing the way is to enable them with profitable skills.
> Prisons barely do this now, but they fail to provide all kinds of important
> corrollary skills such as providing a free-like atmosphere in which the
> prisoners also learn things like the importance of being on time to work.
The classic and continuing problem is that Johnny in one week can make
more money selling stolen goods than he can earn through legal work in a
year. Until this very real monetary factor is changed, the lure of illicit
skills will outweigh the nebulous sense of pride one might derive from legal
employment.
> I think that prisoners can be taught, like school children, to value
> their empathy **snip** But those people would already be willing to work off
> their debt.
Ultimately my concern here is that some debts will never be worked off,
and treating a murderer with compassion can be a slap in the face to the
family of the victim. If, for example, a murderer is rehabilitated and
deployed into the workforce, is his entire paycheck for the rest of his life
going to compensate the victim's family? What if the murder victim had been
making 80K/year? How will the criminal repay that debt?
While today's system obviously makes no real provision for such monetary
payback, incarcerating the murderer for life weighs in as something of a
tradeoff.
> And generally, a nurturing atmosphere is needed. Not bootcamp. Kindness
> begets kindness. You will never fix people by abusing them. Never. I don't
> and can't know that my system (with lots more details worked out, obviously)
> will work, but I know for sure that the current paradigm sucks.
Heh. I'm certainly not in favor of free cable TV and weightrooms to build
bigger criminals, and you're correct that something fundamental has to
change before rehabilitation has any meaningful effect.
Kindness can indeed beget kindness, but kindness can also beget abuses and
efforts to take advantage of that kindness.
Dave!
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