Talk:Punishment
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On deterrence: If deterrence worked then the societies with most the most aggressive sentencing policies would have less crime - this is not the case.
On rehabilitation: The plain fact is that most people come out of prison brutalise and worse people than when they went in.
On causes of crime: We need to understand what makes people criminals. Genetics? Environment? If people are genetically criminal is it fair to punish them?
On private jails: In the us In the US corrupt judges sent children to jail for cash! An indictment of the system if ever I saw one.--Bobbing up 07:16, 8 March 2009 (EDT)
- If criminality is genetic then we've opened up and entirely different can of worms.... But yeah, that last one is pretty shocking. If you want something similar, see the Bullshit! episode on capital punishment where they had a guy who was on death row despite being undeniably innocent; he was in prison at the time of the murder and this infomation was available to the prosecution. I've never quite been okay with the legal system as it is as a whole. Courts and judges should be there to determine the truth; punish the guilty and defend the innocent. But instead, you get two sides trying to "win" at all costs. Though I've had a conversation with a friend who's a trainee lawyer and although he agrees with me in principle that we could replace the entire system with the scientific method, it really wouldn't work in practice. ArmondikoVgnostic 07:30, 8 March 2009 (EDT)
- Actually there is another problem with prison. Young men not infrequently get up to mischief in their late teens early twenties. I read somewhere that statistics show that, if they are caught and "helped" by the prison system then they have a good chance of becoming lifelong criminals. If they are lucky and avoid being "helped" by the system they they have a good chance of becoming law abiding citizens. It seems to me that there is something wrong somewhere - how to fix it is the problem.--Bobbing up 07:58, 8 March 2009 (EDT)
- Indeed. The whole prison thing needs a rethink - it puts criminals in an environment where their only peers are other criminals, & where falling in with a gang is often the only way to survive (especially in US prisons), & keeps them in this environment for long enough to completely adjust to prison life, before releasing them back into the outside world. Wěǎšěǐǒǐď
Methinks it is a Weasel 08:08, 8 March 2009 (EDT)
- Indeed. The whole prison thing needs a rethink - it puts criminals in an environment where their only peers are other criminals, & where falling in with a gang is often the only way to survive (especially in US prisons), & keeps them in this environment for long enough to completely adjust to prison life, before releasing them back into the outside world. Wěǎšěǐǒǐď
- Actually there is another problem with prison. Young men not infrequently get up to mischief in their late teens early twenties. I read somewhere that statistics show that, if they are caught and "helped" by the prison system then they have a good chance of becoming lifelong criminals. If they are lucky and avoid being "helped" by the system they they have a good chance of becoming law abiding citizens. It seems to me that there is something wrong somewhere - how to fix it is the problem.--Bobbing up 07:58, 8 March 2009 (EDT)
