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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

#21

Post by Houshalter »

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.

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.

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

#22

Post by nraynaud »

peteretep wrote: post #6
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?

> 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)

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

#23

Post by cmdkeen »

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…

Ironically medieval prisons were only for those awaiting trial - prison wasn't seen as a punishment only an administrative means of keeping hold of people.

Given what they'd do if you were found guilty...

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

#24

Post by denzil_correa »

The "Department of Corrections and Rehabilitations" of the State of California tweeted [0] a related article [1] titled Why the Producer of "The Hangover Part III" Spends So Much Time in Prison.

[0] https://twitter.com/CACorrections/status/340220581972692992

[1] http://www.motherjones.com/media/2013/05/hangover-part-iii-e...

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

#25

Post by EliRivers »

Houshalter wrote: post #21
philwelch wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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.

The evidence appears to indicate that it's far less effective as a disincentive than people hope.

For prison to work as a disincentive, people need to be capable of making sensible decisions about what to do NOW in order to create a better distant future. They often aren't. Criminals are often people who do very badly at this. They don't want to be in prison twenty years from now, but it's not going to affect how they live their life now.

If prisons as thought of as primarily a disincentive, it's a very expensive way of getting not much back. I expect it's a cultural thing.

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

#26

Post by simonbarker87 »

Houshalter wrote: post #21
philwelch wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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.

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

#27

Post by simonbarker87 »

psionski wrote: post #17
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'…

This is not punishment, this is revenge. Punishment is a corrective action, this breaks them even more. By the way, this is extremely dangerous - to paraphrase Nietzsche: in solitude, whatever you bring with you grows. Do we really want whatever they're bringing to grow?

Good point, I wasn't thinking of the revenge aspect. I guess the system in this case feels like it's purpose is to exact revenge on behalf of society

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

#28

Post by [deleted] »

Houshalter wrote: post #21
philwelch wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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.

[deleted]

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

#30

Post by guard-of-terra »

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.

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