Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

prisonism.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 119 posts

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#51

Post by merpnderp »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #47
hnaccy wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's only counting federal prisoners. When you include state prisoners you get Violent: 47% Property: 17% Weapons: 5% It's not obvious to me that the "vast majority" of prisoners are not dangerous.

I question the reliability of the metrics, especially at the state-level where records keeping, analysis, and justice procedures are disjoint. I would find it hard to believe that we have both the highest prisoners per capita and the highest violent people per capita.

Why is this hard to believe? Even with more ready access to guns, Americans stab, beat, and bludgeon more people to death that most countries entire murder rate. The US is a violent country even without counting the guns.

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#52

Post by geofft »

panic wrote: post #7

For more cheery prison reading, here's an article from a reporter who worked undercover as a guard at a private US prison: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/06/cca-private-pris... . IMO, the whole idea of prisons is inherently inhumane. We've really got to do better.

> IMO, the whole idea of prisons is inherently inhumane. We've really got to do better.

At some point I reread Isaiah 61:1, "...to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound...," and it's been bugging me ever since that prison is, as far as I know, not a concept in the Judeo-Christian worldview. Isaiah doesn't want to proclaim liberty to the unjustly captive and release to the unjustly imprisoned; he's proclaiming release to everyone.

All the examples of people going to prison in the Bible that I can think of - Joseph in Egypt, Daniel in Babylon, John the Baptist in Judea, Paul and Silas in Philippi, etc. - are of "good guys" being thrown in prison by "bad guy" governments. I can't think of an example where God says to build a prison, or where a follower of God puts someone in prison, and the Bible says they did a good thing. (Maybe I'm forgetting something, though; I'd appreciate correction here.)

For all that Western culture seems to be proud of our Judeo-Christian morality, did we inherit this one keystone of our whole thing from pagan concepts of how to run a justice system?

And is it my religious duty as a Christian to fight for release for all the prisoners?

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#53

Post by geofft »

Koshkin wrote: post #24
gcb0 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how to solve prisons in America: go full Liberal. states want private prisons. prisons should be to rehabilitate. so pay the prison business only if it delivers. i.e. pay private prisons on a rehabilitation rate instead of simply the number of inmates. it's not like you're expected to pay for damaged goods in a regular business transaction, so simply stop doing so with private prisons.

> prisons should be to rehabilitate What I personally appreciate the most is the simple fact of having dangerous people confined so that the danger to others (including myself) is no longer there.

Why do we think that "dangerous people" is a coherent concept? Are there actually two million people in the US who are inherently dangerous and will commit crimes no matter what?

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#54

Post by daxorid »

pc86 wrote: post #19
gcb0 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how to solve prisons in America: go full Liberal. states want private prisons. prisons should be to rehabilitate. so pay the prison business only if it delivers. i.e. pay private prisons on a rehabilitation rate instead of simply the number of inmates. it's not like you're expected to pay for damaged goods in a regular business transaction, so simply stop doing so with private prisons.

> prisons should be to rehabilitate A lot of people, regardless of political persuasion, believe that the purpose of prisons is to punish those inside. No more, no less, and any "rehabilitation" is just something that happens alongside (and often in spite of) the real purpose.

Even if the purpose was punishment, I wonder why we harbor such a deep aversion to corporal punishment.

The (US) Constitution prohibits "cruel and unusual" punishments in sentencing, but in my mind, losing years of one's life, which one will never get back, is significantly more cruel than, say, fifty lashes.

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#55

Post by _jal »

Koshkin wrote: post #20
keiferski wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always held to the "Sin City"[1] philosophy: society's needs change over time, while people fundamentally don't. The existence of prison is just a failure of society to accommodate the wide variety of human natures. Obviously this brings up questions of the "dangerous to society" variety, but a minuscule percentage of prisoners are dangerous psycho killers. [1] Most people think Marv is crazy, but I don't believ…

> a failure of society to accommodate the wide variety of human natures The raison d'être of the society (and the state) is not to "accommodate" anything, especially not some particular aspects of human nature, but rather to suppress them, limit the "natural" freedoms -- in order to create a semblance of order and harmony among humans, which, in particular, makes it easier to control (and protect) them.

Oof. That is one view. There are others, that tend to note that society exists without state institutions - in fact, society is a necessary precondition to a state.

Some of these other views don't credit 'society' as something with a will or a reason, simply as an emergent property. That's not to say 'society' doesn't cause things to happen, but it does imply disagreement with the parent comment.

I absolutely agree that states are primarily instruments of suppression and coercion. I just think that equating state and society is not only incorrect, but also heads down a potentially dangerous path. Societies emerge from being social animals in proximity, states emerge from negotiations, coercion, or some combination thereof.

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#56

Post by spacelizard »

pc86 wrote: post #19
gcb0 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how to solve prisons in America: go full Liberal. states want private prisons. prisons should be to rehabilitate. so pay the prison business only if it delivers. i.e. pay private prisons on a rehabilitation rate instead of simply the number of inmates. it's not like you're expected to pay for damaged goods in a regular business transaction, so simply stop doing so with private prisons.

> prisons should be to rehabilitate A lot of people, regardless of political persuasion, believe that the purpose of prisons is to punish those inside. No more, no less, and any "rehabilitation" is just something that happens alongside (and often in spite of) the real purpose.

If we believe prisons are to act as a sort of operant conditioning for the inmates, then the punishment IS supposed the rehabilitation. However, as you probably know, many folks do not respond to this type of conditioning.

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#57

Post by Boothroid »

celticninja wrote: post #30
vixen99 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Archer has sold 330 million copies of his books and thus has no pressing need for money. That however is no excuse for encouraging someone to steal from a writer however successful. What else would you encourage people to thieve and from whom? Anyone who's been to prison?

I didn't say that you should steak from someone just because they had been to prison. I suggested stealing from Jeffrey Archer because he is a bit of a cunt who has a very chequered history with the truth and is as dodgy now as he was in the past. Most recently he was likely involved in financing an attempted coup in Equitorial Guinea. Sometimes stealing is ok, in a world where not everything is black and white an in…

Relevant: https://hooktube.com/watch?v=pssI1ZwzcmQ

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#58

Post by Sir_Cmpwn »

merpnderp wrote: post #51
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I question the reliability of the metrics, especially at the state-level where records keeping, analysis, and justice procedures are disjoint. I would find it hard to believe that we have both the highest prisoners per capita and the highest violent people per capita.

Why is this hard to believe? Even with more ready access to guns, Americans stab, beat, and bludgeon more people to death that most countries entire murder rate. The US is a violent country even without counting the guns.

Don't take this to absurdisms. I take it you're not American? The stereotypes about us are no more true than the stereotypes about your country.

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#59

Post by RobertoG »

_jal wrote: post #55
Koshkin wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a failure of society to accommodate the wide variety of human natures The raison d'être of the society (and the state) is not to "accommodate" anything, especially not some particular aspects of human nature, but rather to suppress them, limit the "natural" freedoms -- in order to create a semblance of order and harmony among humans, which, in particular, makes it easier to control (and protect) them.

Oof. That is one view. There are others, that tend to note that society exists without state institutions - in fact, society is a necessary precondition to a state. Some of these other views don't credit 'society' as something with a will or a reason, simply as an emergent property. That's not to say 'society' doesn't cause things to happen, but it does imply disagreement with the parent comment. I absolutely agree t…

Are you sure that states don't emerge automatically too?

We are hierarchical creatures, even in a small group of friends hierarchy appears on its own. If you have a hierarchy the rest is just organizational details.

Re: HM Prison – A Survival Guide (2015)

#60

Post by throwawayfdf »

ghostbrainalpha wrote: post #48
throwawayxbe8 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about one that accommodates people who possess marijuana? What about a society that accommodates people who have opioid addictions and need medical help? I think you have a rather skewed idea of the majority of our prison population. I'll give you a hint, though: most of them aren't rapists, murderers, and child molesters.

> I'll give you a hint, though: most of them aren't rapists, murderers, and child molesters. HINT = 15% of the prison population in California are sex offenders.

Which bass-ackwards definition of "most" are you using, friend?
Post reply on HN