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Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

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Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#41

Post by tokenadult »

barrkel wrote: post #29
yummyfajitas wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You realize that the number of people in jail and prison labor are orthogonal issues, right? One can both oppose our war on drug users (near as I can tell, the main source of our excess prisoners) and China's war on the Falun Gong, but also have no objection to forcing robbers/rapists/murderers to work for their keep.

They are most certainly not. Presumably the base rate of bad people in the human population does not vary greatly from country to country, yet the rate of jailed people does. It follows that many people in jail in countries with a high rate of incarceration arguably ought not be there; and making life harder for them is wrong. Or to put it another way, arguing from justice, along the lines of Rawls' original position…

Presumably the base rate of bad people in the human population does not vary greatly from country to country,

That's an empirical question. I wouldn't presume one way or the other on that issue until I had some data. (I would, of course, have to define "bad people" in some reasonable way that would work cross-culturally to gather my data.)

Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#42

Post by barrkel »

tokenadult wrote: post #41
barrkel wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are most certainly not. Presumably the base rate of bad people in the human population does not vary greatly from country to country, yet the rate of jailed people does. It follows that many people in jail in countries with a high rate of incarceration arguably ought not be there; and making life harder for them is wrong. Or to put it another way, arguing from justice, along the lines of Rawls' original position…

Presumably the base rate of bad people in the human population does not vary greatly from country to country, That's an empirical question. I wouldn't presume one way or the other on that issue until I had some data. (I would, of course, have to define "bad people" in some reasonable way that would work cross-culturally to gather my data.)

Well, if it is true that the rate of "bad people" does vary greatly from country to country, it justifies xenophobia, racism and a lot of other nasty things, potentially even genocide on a utilitarian basis. I take it as a given that it doesn't vary much primarily because the alternative is too horrible to contemplate. It would imply that people are not created equal (in a human rights context) and in particular do not deserve equal treatment. It really opens up a whole can of worms.

Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#45

Post by tokenadult »

barrkel wrote: post #42
tokenadult wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably the base rate of bad people in the human population does not vary greatly from country to country, That's an empirical question. I wouldn't presume one way or the other on that issue until I had some data. (I would, of course, have to define "bad people" in some reasonable way that would work cross-culturally to gather my data.)

Well, if it is true that the rate of "bad people" does vary greatly from country to country, it justifies xenophobia, racism and a lot of other nasty things, potentially even genocide on a utilitarian basis. I take it as a given that it doesn't vary much primarily because the alternative is too horrible to contemplate. It would imply that people are not created equal (in a human rights context) and in particular do n…

Oh, I see your concern, but I was thinking of cases in which, for example, one country rather than another has much higher rates of some kind of overt behavior that societies around the world generally agree is criminal (rape comes to mind) although the causation of the different rates is something that is malleable (e.g., attitudes toward women). I probably agree with you as to starting assumption about human nature in an idealized condition before societal influences start their work on individuals, but perhaps think (having lived in more than one country) that countries just might differ in social conditions that make criminal behavior more or less likely for otherwise indistinguishable individuals. This all gets back to the issue of what the definition of "bad people" is, as I noted in my first post to which you have kindly replied.

Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#46

Post by ez77 »

hugh3 wrote: post #34
ck2 wrote: post #3

How about the hundreds of thousands of prisoners in the US forced to work for pennies per hour? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison%E2%80%93industrial_compl... If they refuse, they are written up as uncooperative and it could affect privileges, parole, etc. Makes many millions in profit for the states and federal government, even some judges own stock. Ironically it's the only labor in the US that can compete with of…

Is anyone else tired of the fact that on the internet you can't say "Hey, look at this sucky thing in Random Country X" without having someone pipe up and say "Yeah, but what about this vaguely-similar thing in the USA? Huh? Huh?"

How are the Chinese and American situations vaguely similar? Just because one involves computers and the other doesn't? If these counterexamples are not made up, what would it take for you to go from being tired to seriously revising your beliefs on the US system?

Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#47

Post by ez77 »

Mz wrote: post #37
hugh3 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is anyone else tired of the fact that on the internet you can't say "Hey, look at this sucky thing in Random Country X" without having someone pipe up and say "Yeah, but what about this vaguely-similar thing in the USA? Huh? Huh?"

An online friendship of mine ended in part because of the other person's habit of pouncing on any excuse to bad-mouth the US and it's government and culture like it is The Evil Empire. So count me among the tired.

As a foreigner who studied in the US, I used to find myself attacking some US actions with some American friends, while attacking senseless knee-jerk anti-Americanism back in my country... A sad, and also tiring state of affairs, without much (even partial) support on either place.

Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#48

Post by [deleted] »

hugh3 wrote: post #34
ck2 wrote: post #3

How about the hundreds of thousands of prisoners in the US forced to work for pennies per hour? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison%E2%80%93industrial_compl... If they refuse, they are written up as uncooperative and it could affect privileges, parole, etc. Makes many millions in profit for the states and federal government, even some judges own stock. Ironically it's the only labor in the US that can compete with of…

Is anyone else tired of the fact that on the internet you can't say "Hey, look at this sucky thing in Random Country X" without having someone pipe up and say "Yeah, but what about this vaguely-similar thing in the USA? Huh? Huh?"

[deleted]

Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#49

Post by yummyfajitas »

barrkel wrote: post #42
tokenadult wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably the base rate of bad people in the human population does not vary greatly from country to country, That's an empirical question. I wouldn't presume one way or the other on that issue until I had some data. (I would, of course, have to define "bad people" in some reasonable way that would work cross-culturally to gather my data.)

Well, if it is true that the rate of "bad people" does vary greatly from country to country, it justifies xenophobia, racism and a lot of other nasty things, potentially even genocide on a utilitarian basis. I take it as a given that it doesn't vary much primarily because the alternative is too horrible to contemplate. It would imply that people are not created equal (in a human rights context) and in particular do n…

It would only justify genocide if the foreign population were expected to commit a much larger genocide.

It would imply that people are not created equal (in a human rights context) and in particular do not deserve equal treatment.

Nonsense. It would imply that equal treatment would not result in equal outcomes.

Equal treatment: rapists go to jail, regardless of their country of origin.

Unequal outcomes: 10 in 100 people in Rapistan are in jail, whereas only 1 in 100 people in the Withpermissiononlyville are in jail.

Re: Inmates forced to farm gold online in Chinese prisons

#50

Post by crystalis »

Mz wrote: post #37
hugh3 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is anyone else tired of the fact that on the internet you can't say "Hey, look at this sucky thing in Random Country X" without having someone pipe up and say "Yeah, but what about this vaguely-similar thing in the USA? Huh? Huh?"

An online friendship of mine ended in part because of the other person's habit of pouncing on any excuse to bad-mouth the US and it's government and culture like it is The Evil Empire. So count me among the tired.

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