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Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

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Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#31

Post by babarock »

simonbarker87 wrote: post #26
Houshalter wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main purpose of prison is to act as a disincentive. A lot of people don't commit crimes in the first place because they are scared of going to prison.

I think that assumes that they are in the same state of mind of a well balanced person. If they are hungry, tired (of life), scared, have no other option then the risk reward may skew to them thinking that the risk of prison is worth it.

So unfair. Even a "well balanced person" can commit a cri me. Actually, human beings are notoriously bad at avoiding future harm. We're wired to survive immediate dangers, but it takes a lot of mental effort to realize long term dangers.

How else would you explain the widespread of tobacco smoking, over-eating, and other behaviors that are extremely dangerous but not immediately punishing?

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#32

Post by Mordor »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #30
gruseom wrote: post #2

Solitary confinement is now so obviously a form of torture that it's surprising this is still controversial. Future generations will surely look on it the way we look on past barbarities.

I don't see how, given that hell is other people, and other people in prison are quite infernal. If I ever get in prison (which I hope to avoid but nobody can be guaranteed) I hope to be in solitary.

Perhaps the real hell is being left alone.

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#33

Post by lovskogen »

kybernetyk wrote: post #18
Myrmornis wrote: post #4

Too depressing to read in its entirety. One straightforward way of evaluating whether there might be anything wrong with practices in American prisons is to compare with other countries -- do other nations with stable democracies use solitary confinement in a similar way?

A different view: In Germany you are usually locked up for 23 hours/day in your (1 or 2 man) cell when you're serving a prison sentence. There are some exceptions to this like being able to visit another prisoner for one hour every day or use the kitchen for one hour every few days, etc. (Or if you are really lucky you can get a job inside the prison.) I'd say being imprisoned is inhumane in every country on this pla…

I think imprisonment here in Norway actually is quite humane.

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#34

Post by guard-of-terra »

Mordor wrote: post #32
guard-of-terra wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how, given that hell is other people, and other people in prison are quite infernal. If I ever get in prison (which I hope to avoid but nobody can be guaranteed) I hope to be in solitary.

Perhaps the real hell is being left alone.

I tried both in my life and being left alone is so much better than forced to be with other random hostile people.

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#35

Post by peteretep »

nraynaud wrote: post #22
peteretep wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> do other nations with stable democracies use solitary confinement in a similar way Other countries with stable democracies have universal health care, don't incarcerate almost 1% of the population, have never landed people on the moon, don't spend 5% of their GDP on the military, aren't the home of Apple, Microsoft, and IBM, and so on. America has always been (and will probably always be) an edge case.

You know, being an edge case does not prevent from respecting the rules, and human rights rules are made so that "special cases" don't end up like the nazi Germany special case. (yeah, sorry, that's historically when and why it was decided to write the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

> being an edge case does not prevent from respecting the rules

Shouldn't or doesn't? Shouldn't, sure. Doesn't ... the evidence doesn't bear this out.

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#36

Post by leoh »

philwelch wrote: post #13
simonbarker87 wrote: post #10

A very sad read and the comments are even worse. This sort of thing so clearly crosses the line in to inhumanity. I appreciate that some/many of these inmates have committed awful crimes but it seems that this particular system offers no opportunity for rehabilitation and is focussed solely on punishment. I forget where I read it but I believe that there is a correlation between the severity of the punishment and it'…

It's not about rehabilitation or punishment. It's far more cynical than that. It's simply a matter of separating people from the population. Prisoners are separated from the free population; especially dangerous prisoners are separated even from the prison population.

True. But you can separate people in a manner that isn't cruel. In fact, if the American system wasn't so cruel, there would probably be a better chance that inmates would recover from antisocial behavior. Many of these prisoners have seen cruelty and haven't been raised properly from the day they were born. They don't need more cruelty. They need care. Some of them haven't had even decent health a single day I their lives—nutritionally, emotionally, etc. And it's not their fault. It's largely our society's fault.

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#37

Post by danielsamuels »

lovskogen wrote: post #33
kybernetyk wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A different view: In Germany you are usually locked up for 23 hours/day in your (1 or 2 man) cell when you're serving a prison sentence. There are some exceptions to this like being able to visit another prisoner for one hour every day or use the kitchen for one hour every few days, etc. (Or if you are really lucky you can get a job inside the prison.) I'd say being imprisoned is inhumane in every country on this pla…

I think imprisonment here in Norway actually is quite humane.

From what I've read[1], I would agree with you.

[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/feb/25/norwegian-pris...

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#38

Post by peterjancelis »

kybernetyk wrote: post #18
Myrmornis wrote: post #4

Too depressing to read in its entirety. One straightforward way of evaluating whether there might be anything wrong with practices in American prisons is to compare with other countries -- do other nations with stable democracies use solitary confinement in a similar way?

A different view: In Germany you are usually locked up for 23 hours/day in your (1 or 2 man) cell when you're serving a prison sentence. There are some exceptions to this like being able to visit another prisoner for one hour every day or use the kitchen for one hour every few days, etc. (Or if you are really lucky you can get a job inside the prison.) I'd say being imprisoned is inhumane in every country on this pla…

Prisoners in Monaco (there are only a few and mostly white collar criminals) receive a gourmet diet, medical checkups and daily exercise routine. It's a pet project of the local prison director to make it the best in the world - there is a documentary about it but can't find it back right now.

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#39

Post by nraynaud »

peteretep wrote: post #35
nraynaud wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know, being an edge case does not prevent from respecting the rules, and human rights rules are made so that "special cases" don't end up like the nazi Germany special case. (yeah, sorry, that's historically when and why it was decided to write the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

> being an edge case does not prevent from respecting the rules Shouldn't or doesn't? Shouldn't, sure. Doesn't ... the evidence doesn't bear this out.

Sorry, english is not my first language.

Re: Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons

#40

Post by yardie »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #30
gruseom wrote: post #2

Solitary confinement is now so obviously a form of torture that it's surprising this is still controversial. Future generations will surely look on it the way we look on past barbarities.

I don't see how, given that hell is other people, and other people in prison are quite infernal. If I ever get in prison (which I hope to avoid but nobody can be guaranteed) I hope to be in solitary.

I think you fail to grasp what solitary actually means in the prison tense. It's not a few hours of sitting on the floor meditating. It is 1 hour of sunlight, you don't go anywhere, there are no computers.

I used to think like that when I was younger, "going to prison getting raped?! I'll take solitary." Then someone that was released spoke at our college about what solitary really meant. I'll take my chances with the rapists.

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