Crime and Pointless Punishment

written 31 Aug 2007 over dinner

Every parent knows that when two young brothers are fighting, you don’t send them both to their shared bedroom in punishment. That would only result in them continuing to bicker at each other over who’s fault it was that they’re in there, or worse, lead them to conspire against the parental system that doled out the punishment. No, you stick one kid in the kitchen and one in the basement, leave them stew in their own thoughts for awhile, and when it’s over they’re usually pretty happy to just have that be over, which keeps them from fighting again for awhile, at least.

So why does our judicial system keep sticking the same types of criminals in the same prisons together? Once they’re in there, they have very little to do other than to sit and discuss what they’ve done and how they might do it better next time. Sure, not many people want to return to prison, but the very institution itself encourages a return visit.

How are we, as a society, so fucking stupid?

Filed Under: issues confronting us all

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I’ve been watching Lockup lately, and seriously, alot of those people should not be released into the public. On the other hand, imprisoning so many seems a waste of resources and federal funds. So I’ve had the sick fantasy of being an anti-hero vigilante, breaking into prisons Terminator style, and ending theirs, and our, miseries. Seems to me that would deter alot of crime, you get offed real violent like while in lockup.

- bsti | 08:40pm 1 Sep 07
Seems fair to me…

Alternatively, I’d be pretty happy if we reverted to a gladiator-style society where all prisoners, whether in there for mass murder or parking violations, were forced to do battle with each other, tormented wild life, maybe some sexy robots, and if you win for a set amount of time (your sentence), or at least don’t get killed, you’re free to go back into society and teach them not to try and teach you a lesson again.

- nathan | 06:42pm 4 Sep 07