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Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

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Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#221

Post by danharaj »

danielam wrote: post #197
lovich wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So other than the progeny part, how is prison labor not exactly what you said? People are literally captured, and based on overturned convictions at least some percentage are innocent. These people are then forced to work and can have their sentence extended arbitrarily by bureaucrats and not the court system. Based on the California example the system even tries to keep people working when given a court order to rel…

You're confusing things. There is a difference between forced hard labor as just (and thus commensurate) punishment for a crime and actual, particular abuses committed by the justice system. There is nothing wrong with forced hard labor as a punishment for a crime to the degree required by justice (and frankly, many crimes deserve far worse). There IS something wrong with inflicting pain on someone who is innocent, e…

In other words, you think there exist situations in which it is just to enslave people. You're trying to make a distinction that literally no one else makes because you want to separate forced labor as punishment for a crime from the connotations attached to the word slavery. It's just a sleight of hand.

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#222

Post by thriftwy »

narrator wrote: post #195
usmeteora wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back to the topic, prisons are just another haven for contract robbing. The prison contracts everything from security to mopping. Everything is 3x more expensive. Prison costs are a sink to our society. Except taxpayers foot the bill. Theres an economic incentive to keeping crime low and right now were all being robbed blind, in this area as well (because yes there are too many to count) The amount who are released w…

I had a friend who lived in Bisbee, Arizona, which is a small town next to the border that has a big border patrol station in the city. He said that because of the border patrol presence there aren't any illegal aliens around to do construction. He could only get cheap labor from ex-convicts. It made me think that typically ex-cons have formed the lowest rung in the economic ladder that illegal aliens now fulfill.

How about paying what it's worth for labor instead of expecting to get 'cheap' labor?

Yesterday people expected cheap construction labor, today they complain there's not enough cheap home nurses around. I wonder if they'll aim for cheap software development labor tomorrow.

I wonder why I don't feel entitled to cheap caviar and cheap yachts?

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#223

Post by sp332 »

yjgyhj wrote: post #162
cubano wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the risk of being boorish about the subject... I was recently released from Las Vegas County Jail (CCDC) where all sentenced inmates, myself included, are forced , by state law, to "work" in some manner in the jail. In this case, work consisted of 11-hour shifts, 6 days a week, of ultra back-breaking kitchen work. We were not even allowed to have water cups anywhere outside the break room. They actually yelled fas…

That is indeed totally crazy. I wish I had some way to verify your story, as I as a reader can't know who sits behind the keyboard on the other side.

Other stories: http://amp.nola.com/v1/articles/20683759/what_state_prisoner... and https://news.vice.com/article/hard-labor-heres-the-weird-shi...

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#224

Post by emodendroket »

narag wrote: post #191
emodendroket wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What "religious doctrine" would that be?

A clue: there are a number of religions that include the concept of hell. Hell is the ultimate retribution, in case society wasn't able to apply it in this world. The underlying idea is that justice is a balance. If someone commits a crime, the reality is unbalanced and equilibrium must be restored punishing the culprit. This idea has been developed by some philosophers, Kant IIRC (but a lot of Kant's work is mostly…

The idea that some people are irredeemable seems to be rather against the current of most Christian thought.

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#225

Post by cubano »

pixl97 wrote: post #183
77pt77 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you refused to work, you were put in the box and 5 days were added to your sentence. Don't you need a judge to determine that?

That depends on what 'added' means. The sentence you receive from a judge is probably not anywhere close to what you will actually sit in jail for. Probation, parole, double time, triple time, good behavior, trustee status, all affect the outcome. For example, you are sentenced to 3 years of jail for a non-violent drug offense. How long do you serve in jail? Very commonly 366 days, though it may be as much as a year…

> For example, you are sentenced to 3 years of jail for a non-violent drug offense. How long do you serve in jail?

You don't get 3 years in jail, you get 3 years in prison. The only jail time you do waiting to be sentenced to prison is the time you wait to go to court.

You get no gain time for time spent in jail for your prison sentence, so its often called dead time or day-for-day or something.

>An ironic application of the prisoners delma. If none of the prisoners would be willing to be a slave, the state could not hold them all, or 'extend' their sentences because of overcrowding.

This is an interesting observation, but here is how thats dealt with; anyone whom discusses a general purpose strike against working is charged with a serious felony "inciting to riot" and is given an "outside charge" and is probably spending years more in prison.

That's how they do that.

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#226

Post by orasis »

lowpro wrote: post #190
soup10 wrote: post #146

giving criminals rights is a politically toxic because of religious doctrine: the point of jail is not to learn, but to suffer. the idea is if you flagrantly disrespect god(aka the power structure of the society you live in), you must suffer as an example to others. Its not an ideal system, but there's a certain sensibility to it that stabilizes society. If people saw those that go to jail, come out better persons. T…

What a silly argument. (Disclaimer: atheist) Your argument doesn't understand what god(s) mean. In what world does anyone use society as an understanding or proxy of god? This argument makes a fallacious assumption as its primary argument then goes on to make other points based off of that incorrect assumption by definition. And besides that, I think you grossly underestimate the stubbornness of many who go to jail i…

How is their argument silly? For many, God is an archetypical metaphor for a Daddy that must be feared and obeyed. Trump's election showed that a huge percentage of religious Americans have an authoritarian bent.

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#227

Post by shagie »

jondubois wrote: post #204
usmeteora wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back to the topic, prisons are just another haven for contract robbing. The prison contracts everything from security to mopping. Everything is 3x more expensive. Prison costs are a sink to our society. Except taxpayers foot the bill. Theres an economic incentive to keeping crime low and right now were all being robbed blind, in this area as well (because yes there are too many to count) The amount who are released w…

Yes the idea of having a criminal record is silly - It's a self-fulfilling label. Once you are labeled a criminal, it only makes it harder to get a job and give up crime. Besides, crime has become such an arbitrary thing. A corporation is allowed to quietly syphon away billions of dollars from society using clever government lobbying and tax avoidance schemes but if a member of society physically steals something fro…

For a Spider-Man approach- https://imgur.com/gallery/gcrPf

There are a number of companies that exist with the intended purpose of providing jobs to ex convicts.

The risk that a regular company takes, however, is one of "this individual has done XYZ when times were hard in the past. How can we be sure they won't again?" This is combined with that for many good paying jobs there are more applications than positions allowing for the "filter by felon" to be a not unreasonable first level filter for HR to apply.

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#229

Post by xor1 »

thriftwy wrote: post #222
narrator wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a friend who lived in Bisbee, Arizona, which is a small town next to the border that has a big border patrol station in the city. He said that because of the border patrol presence there aren't any illegal aliens around to do construction. He could only get cheap labor from ex-convicts. It made me think that typically ex-cons have formed the lowest rung in the economic ladder that illegal aliens now fulfill.

How about paying what it's worth for labor instead of expecting to get 'cheap' labor? Yesterday people expected cheap construction labor, today they complain there's not enough cheap home nurses around. I wonder if they'll aim for cheap software development labor tomorrow. I wonder why I don't feel entitled to cheap caviar and cheap yachts?

>How about paying what it's worth for labor instead of expecting to get 'cheap' labor?

Tell that to all of the companies that outsource manufacturing.

Re: Housing a prisoner in California costs more than a year at Harvard

#230

Post by orasis »

emodendroket wrote: post #224
narag wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A clue: there are a number of religions that include the concept of hell. Hell is the ultimate retribution, in case society wasn't able to apply it in this world. The underlying idea is that justice is a balance. If someone commits a crime, the reality is unbalanced and equilibrium must be restored punishing the culprit. This idea has been developed by some philosophers, Kant IIRC (but a lot of Kant's work is mostly…

The idea that some people are irredeemable seems to be rather against the current of most Christian thought.

Christians overwhelmingly elected Trump. Perhaps Christian != a follower of the teachings of Christ.
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