You can see this effect on school playgrounds and twitter.
Speaking of which, what can we do to bring up the mean IQ of Twitter to the level of school playgrounds?
People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
11–20 of 165 posts
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#12If 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.
So put them to work and pay them the going rate [in the normal economy] and use that toward victim restitution? If you pay them the market rate and this activity improves their well-being compared to being sedentary, I think it’s a win for all involved.
I’d pass on the forced labor part, but make work at a going rate optional. Bring separated from everyone and everything you love is punishment enough in many cases.
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#13Perhaps this is why there is all the anecdotal evidence of people being asses to one another, and especially to “low status” retail workers and clerks over the last 2 years.
(economic/influence based status here, of course all people should be given the same amount of default respect regardless of occupation or income level, but real life seldom plays out that way)
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#14If 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.
So put them to work and pay them the going rate [in the normal economy] and use that toward victim restitution? If you pay them the market rate and this activity improves their well-being compared to being sedentary, I think it’s a win for all involved.
“The going rate” will be low, because of market dynamics. Either you need a prisoners' minimum wage, or you need to not do that; people do still have rights even if they've committed crimes.
Put them in education, give them food and shelter, and they'll be better able to contribute to society when they get out.
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#15Pleasure is fleeting. It must be or else you'd still be glowing from your first orgasm. Inevitably the search for pleasure will require variety and inevitably that variety brings you to inflicting pain on others. We do it publicly. The romans fed people to the lions. We have lots of violent sports. Nascar isn't about driving left. It's about the crashes. Hockey is about the fights and checking. Lets not even evaluate…
NASCAR and hockey are about a whole lot more than the things you mentioned, as any fan of either will tell you.
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#16If 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.
So put them to work and pay them the going rate [in the normal economy] and use that toward victim restitution? If you pay them the market rate and this activity improves their well-being compared to being sedentary, I think it’s a win for all involved.
Forced labor is an incentive to incarcerate more people. Incarceration should not be profitable.
It would be better to give them daily education, therapy, recreation, etc. They have piloted such programs in the US with a lot of success at preventing recidivism.
All of this can save costs in the long run. Paying for prison security, medical costs, maintenance, turnover, and recidivism is extremely expensive.
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#17Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#18If 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.
So put them to work and pay them the going rate [in the normal economy] and use that toward victim restitution? If you pay them the market rate and this activity improves their well-being compared to being sedentary, I think it’s a win for all involved.
Forced labor in a fixed geographic region with strict security requirements is fundamentally incongruent with pricing power.
I think prisoners should have the option to work and that they should be subject to all of the normal worker protection laws. Wages can go toward some combination of restitution and improving quality of life in prisons: food, lodging, entertainment in off hours, etc.
Restitution should be limited to a fixed percentage of monthly income (as it is in the civilian world). Why? Because removing positive reinforcement from the act of labor has perverse psychological effects. These effects persist after incarceration and contribute to recidivism.
This sort of system is insufficiently punitive for some, so the politics of these reforms are tricky.
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
So put them to work and pay them the going rate [in the normal economy] and use that toward victim restitution? If you pay them the market rate and this activity improves their well-being compared to being sedentary, I think it’s a win for all involved.
“The going rate” will be low, because of market dynamics. Either you need a prisoners' minimum wage, or you need to not do that; people do still have rights even if they've committed crimes. Put them in education, give them food and shelter, and they'll be better able to contribute to society when they get out.
They should have the option of school or work, with a minimum GPA required to stay in school. The biggest issue will be supervision of the grading to ensure it's not being abused either to punish people who are doing well or to let people off who aren't actually doing their work.
Re: People behave more sadistically when they’re bored
#20Pleasure is fleeting. It must be or else you'd still be glowing from your first orgasm. Inevitably the search for pleasure will require variety and inevitably that variety brings you to inflicting pain on others. We do it publicly. The romans fed people to the lions. We have lots of violent sports. Nascar isn't about driving left. It's about the crashes. Hockey is about the fights and checking. Lets not even evaluate…
NASCAR and hockey are about a whole lot more than the things you mentioned, as any fan of either will tell you.
There’s a lot of different nuances to all sports. I used to find baseball boring. But after coaching little league and watching and help players grow, I’ve developed a an appreciation for the nuances of both the games and the plays by themselves.
Hockey is similar. The fights are the surface.