91–100 of 165 posts
I have a similar thought about flamewars on the internet, or rather about why generic discussions so often turn into flamewars: the mind resorts to indignation to amuse itself in the absence of anything more interesting. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...
I have a similar thought about flamewars on the internet, or rather about why generic discussions so often turn into flamewars: the mind resorts to indignation to amuse itself in the absence of anything more interesting. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...
Being bored seems like one of the factors, but I also wonder if it is additionally caused by being unhappy or angry or [some other emotion] in other parts of our lives.
The first one will go nuts and scream his head off all night and has been arrested so many times they know him by name. The next just bought a rolling chair and likes to roll around his apartment, the next wakes up all hours during the night and is constantly moving his milk crates and lawn furniture and dropping things that roll (these two live above me) and the last stomps around the building and can be heard at 0400 in the morning whining about her life and talking $#!t about everything and everyone.
Fracking Miserable people who spread misery.
I mentioned to the people above me and the one denies he rides the chair and then uses his medical condition as an excuse. The other said flatly, “too bad”.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Out of the hockey fans I know, only the really casual watchers are interested in fights and checking at all. The big fans are way more interested in the strategy and statistics and many of them are annoyed when a big fight breaks out and wastes time in the game. If what you were saying was true, way more people would just be watching videos on the internet of people getting into street fights than professional sports…
>Out of the hockey fans I know, only the really casual watchers are interested in fights and checking at all. The big fans are way more interested in the strategy and statistics and many of them are annoyed when a big fight breaks out and wastes time in the game. If what you were saying was true, way more people would just be watching videos on the internet of people getting into street fights than professional sport…
> Every highlight reel is about the crashes. So it is about nascar. Nascar highlights are all about crashes.
Looking up "Nascar highlights" on YouTube, I can see that it's not all about crashes, it seems to be all about turnarounds, where somebody suddenly overtakes somebody else, or somebody loses their position quickly, so crashes are a part of that, but it doesn't seem to be "about crashes", but rather about changes in the standings of a race in progress.
If this is indeed true, it is yet another piece of evidence in the case for prison reform. Prisoners are universally bored, yet in many cases insufficiently protected from one another. Read accounts of any long-time convict's time in prison and you'll hear about excruciating boredom punctuated by acts of outrageous sadism.
Lets take for an example a semi successful drug dealer. Odds are the drug dealer choose that profession because the rewards were higher than the risks. So to discourage that you can 1) make prison so terrible he fears it more than the rewards from dealing 2) teach him something that is of comparable economic utility so he no longer wants to deal drugs.
The problem is that option 2 is arguably a reward. If you create incentives to break rules ("I break the law and sell drugs, my punishment is that i get locked away from X years and be forced to learn a trade or get a degree") then why wouldnt you break rules? We seem to pretend we dont want 1. But I've seen plenty of comments from conservatives about how the criminals deserve what they get, and oddly enough I also hear "dont drop the soap" jokes from liberals when its people they dont like....
Then you have for example murderers. Quite a few murderers will probably never murder again. The man who kills his wife and her lover after catching them in bed, is probably not going to be killing anyone again. It was that set of situations that drove them to that. What more can the person do than classes on impulse control? And your going to get them to learn that by putting them in the place where the impulse stimulus is completely different than the regular world? What does life or a lengthy prison accomplish if punishment/deterrence is not the goal?
Thats not even getting into the fact that prison is the main mental health provider for anyone with serious issues who cant get family to take care of them. (and even people who have family might not be able to afford their particular issues). A person with severe schizophrenia who attacks others can't really be reformed
The only real fix is to be honest about what the goal of "prison" is. And break the concept out into reform, containment, and punishment. At least then you can optimize towards those goals.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I believe we should focus on separating criminals from non-criminals instead of punishing and torturing them. Give them an environment where they can thrive without being harmful to themselves and others. Let them re-join the society ONLY when they pose acceptable risk. This means violent criminals may never get to re-join the society, but that's okay given that they are still given a humane environment where they ca…
Penal colonies and other forms of exile are cruel and unusual. It's hard to conceive because this form of punishment has been disused in the west for nearly as long as drawing and quartering, but historical use of exile gives a sense for how extreme permanent exile is as a punishment. Even in the age of drawing and quartering, penal colonies were used primarily as an alternative to capital punishment. In the age of g…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd be happy if we'd just get over this vindictive need to deprive prisoners of basic pleasures. I've seen outrage over the idea that prisoners have access to TVs, or gaming consoles, or similar, stories of wardens confiscating books and pen and paper and such. I understand there are some other concerns that may warrant keeping usage of some of those under surveillance or similar (keep a pencil from being used as a s…
> I'd be happy if we'd just get over this vindictive need to deprive prisoners of basic pleasures. I won't argue that there aren't some people who have such a vindictive need, but in most cases where I've had conversations with folks about things like this, it's more that they oppose someone having a similar (or maybe "better") quality of life to what they have, without working to pay for it, and rather being paid fo…
That's even worse. But maybe the term should be different; maybe it isn't vindictiveness.
The US is the most incarcerated country in the world. We have the most prisoners, the most prisoners per capita, the highest spending on prisoners, and one of the worst recidivism rates (76% after 5 years).
What we're doing is -clearly- not working. The idea that we'd rather spend -more- than other countries, on a system that works worse, begs the question of 'why'. Why would we want to keep doing the same thing, that isn't working, -and- costs us more? Because we think prisoners don't deserve better.
Maybe that isn't "vindictiveness", but it's damned close.
It certainly isn't "I want to make sure my tax dollars being used effectively", or "I want the best outcomes from prisons", or even "I want to make sure they're only getting what they need to serve their time and then be able to come out and rejoin society".
It very much is "Damn the consequences, and how much it costs, I want them to have the worst possible experience".
I'm burned by social sciences so I'll wait for a replication study. But as an aside, grinding maggots is not exactly my idea of sadism. I prefer when they feel physical pain. Or at least think they look like they do. Although, mental atrocities are actually my specialty. They must excite my empathy, I'm more the sensitive type. The icing on the cake is, when they like it. Confiscating one of their most important hold…
Experience with maggots is an important control variable, especially given the tiny sample size (13 people ground maggots). I suspect that people who have experience dealing with a maggot infestation -- or any infestation -- will have a very different relationship to grinding maggots. I wouldn't think twice about grinding maggots, but to do so voluntarily I'd have to have nothing better to do because it's not pleasan…
I do, albeit just a small one.
My wife used to feed our American Staffordshire with raw offal, especially beef stomach, tripe, whatever. Absolutely disgusting. But he loved it.He seemed to inhale about two pounds of it in what I perceived as nanoseconds. He was such a charming beast, absolutely adorable. But disgusting nontheless. May he rest in peace.
Anyway, one friday morning we forgot to take out the trash with a handfull of leftovers from that stuff before setting off for a little trip over the weekend.
I tell you, sunday evening was hell on earth. The lord of the flies himself had infested our kitchen. Thankfully its door was closed during the infestation and they weren't fully awake and they all sat sluggish and fat on the windows. I annihilated most of them with the vacuum cleaner and started a search and destroy mission that lasted half of the night. A few hundred sleepy flies and some leftover maggots had to die. No remorse. Thought about nuking the place from orbit.
I don't have to mention, we never ever feed our AmStaff with offal again.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I believe we should focus on separating criminals from non-criminals instead of punishing and torturing them. Give them an environment where they can thrive without being harmful to themselves and others. Let them re-join the society ONLY when they pose acceptable risk. This means violent criminals may never get to re-join the society, but that's okay given that they are still given a humane environment where they ca…
Isn't that basically how Australia was populated?