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I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

theguardian.com

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Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#221

Post by wolfhumble »

jernfrost wrote: post #84
arcticbull wrote: post #7

Honestly, I find the US prison system absolutely horrifying in all respects. As satisfying as it may be for victims to feel the person that did something to them is 'gone' they will eventually be let out, and when they do I want them to be ready to integrate with society. Recidivism rates in the US show it is objectively not working, with state prisons leaving inmates to re-offend 76% of the time. [1] In Norway, much…

I am Norwegian, so I thought I'd add a few points, which I think greatly influence the difference. 1) Prison guard education is just a few weeks in the US to my knowledge. In Norway it is a 3 year college education, where you learn about mental illness, why people become criminals, how to rehabilitate people etc. The prison guard job in Norway, is by American standards more like a social worker. Guards spend a lot of…

> I don't know why it is like that, but perhaps a reason is that Viking culture was very revenge and honor based. But this mentality was destroying society so authorities worked hard for hundreds of years to change this mentality.

Or maybe it really sprung out of the Christian influence that came after the Viking culture, with teachings like: "Love your enemies" [Matthew 5:44 - https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5%3A44&...]?

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#222

Post by linkregister »

Maultasche wrote: post #181
irrational wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, didn't the US (not that the US existed yet) with the help of the French stand up to Great Britain at its peak?

It seems that way, but Britain was not all in on that war. The 1770s and 1780s was definitely not a peak time for Britain. The government was having financial problems and military spending was very low. The peak for Britain was later on in the 19th century. I think Britain could have won that war if they had really wanted to, given enough time and resources, but there was a great reluctance to spend the resources to…

I love reading about the War of 1812. I think it is easily the most avoidable of all U.S. wars.

The U.S. declared war on Great Britain as negotiations to roll back impressment and trade restrictions were finally progressing. Then, after some impressive U.S. victories repelling British invasions (following some impressive British victories), none of the original grievances were addressed in the treaty.

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#223

Post by linkregister »

sethrin wrote: post #196
irrational wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, didn't the US (not that the US existed yet) with the help of the French stand up to Great Britain at its peak?

"with the help of the French" is an understatement. It was better described as a proxy war between Britain and France.

The war was almost certainly unwinnable without French loans, arms, and naval support, but the bulk of the fighting was done by the Continentals.

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#224

Post by onion2k »

vivekd wrote: post #129
jernfrost wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am Norwegian, so I thought I'd add a few points, which I think greatly influence the difference. 1) Prison guard education is just a few weeks in the US to my knowledge. In Norway it is a 3 year college education, where you learn about mental illness, why people become criminals, how to rehabilitate people etc. The prison guard job in Norway, is by American standards more like a social worker. Guards spend a lot of…

>Christianity is quite focused on the idea of good and evil. Norse mythology was never like that. Norse mythology was never like that. There was no evil devil. The world was divided into order and chaos not good and evil. What? Why do people say stuff like this? The Norse myths were from a millennium ago, no one has believed in them for almost a thousand years. Maybe Norway is largely atheistic now but for the majori…

The Norse myths were from a millennium ago, no one has believed in them for almost a thousand years.

I can't quite see why Norse mythology wouldn't have had a direct impact on Norwegian culture that continues today. I don't know much about Norway but here in the UK we have laws that were passed 500 years ago that are still in use and that were strongly influenced by the church when they were enacted. You don't have to believe in something directly for it to influence your culture.

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#225

Post by copperkettle »

orf wrote: post #137
jernfrost wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I strongly disagree. The US is the most powerful country EVER in human history. It has the ability to invade and influence any country on the planet. No country in the past really had that ability. When Great Britain rules much of the world, they were no superpower like the US today. There were countless countries in Europe which could all challenge Britain militarily. Back then there was many great powers. Today the…

Your point about great Britian isn't completely correct, no power could have stood against the empire at its peak. France could have given it a go perhaps, and did around 1800 and where beaten (Waterloo! Waterloo! Waterloo!). The differences you talk about now are, in my opinion, down to advanced weaponry. Where before it was about manpower (and England's vast empire made procurement of such very easy) and sailing (a…

http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poems_arith.htm "ten rupee jezail" :) It's a very fine poem.

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#226

Post by metasean »

Noumenon72 wrote: post #61
CobrastanJorji wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Protecting inmates from a troublesome inmate can be accomplished without putting that inmate in a small, windowless room with no distractions by themselves for 24 hours a day.

But after you've tried environmental design, incentives, threats, guards, and surveillance, then can it be accomplished without the small, windowless room? I'd guess not at a reasonable cost.

In the first 14 years of Norway's Highest Security Department (SHS), their version of solitary confinement, they only had to put 11 prisoners there! [0]

The Wikipedia descriptions of Anders Breivik's confinement describe SHS [1]

According to a recent Business Insider video [2]:

- "With few exceptions, judges can only sentence criminals to a maximum of 21 years" which is less then these three men did in solitary!

- "In Norway, only 20% of prisoners return to jail. Compared to the US where 76.6% of prisoners are re-arrested within five years."

Which is even more impressive when you learn that as of August of 2014 Norway's incarceration rate was 75 per 100,000 people, in contrast to 707 per 100,000 in the U.S. [3]

So we Americans incarcerate almost 10 times as many people as Norway with a recidivism rate more than 3.8 times as high as Norway - clearly our focus on "reasonable cost" is justifiable!

[0]: https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&pr...

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anders_Behring_Breivik#Prison_...

[2]: http://www.businessinsider.com/inside-norways-luxurious-maxi...

[3]: http://www.businessinsider.com/why-norways-prison-system-is-...

--- edited to separate bullet points

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#228

Post by metasean »

jernfrost wrote: post #101
nether wrote: post #62

This is the worst of racism. The next time a white HNer tells PoC to just turn the other cheek toward racist words, point them to this. Racist attitudes are what enable horrific crimes against blacks, such as these.

But that is exactly what is needed, more enlightenment with real stories like this. People aren't going to realize racism is a real problem if you just scream racist to them. I am white and used to think anti-racists were a bunch of idiots. Only by seeing the prevalence of racism in social media did I start realizing racism was a bigger problem than I had imagined. Reading "Gang leader for a day", was a major eye ope…

I grew up with a sociologist as a mother, which means I grew up being taught a lot these systemic bias indicators. Having tried to explain the systemic nature of racism was certainly much more of a challenge before social media!

I'd also highly recommend everyone take an Implicit Bias test or two - https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/takeatest.html Your results might surprise you.

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#229

Post by BjoernKW »

onion2k wrote: post #224
vivekd wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Christianity is quite focused on the idea of good and evil. Norse mythology was never like that. Norse mythology was never like that. There was no evil devil. The world was divided into order and chaos not good and evil. What? Why do people say stuff like this? The Norse myths were from a millennium ago, no one has believed in them for almost a thousand years. Maybe Norway is largely atheistic now but for the majori…

The Norse myths were from a millennium ago, no one has believed in them for almost a thousand years. I can't quite see why Norse mythology wouldn't have had a direct impact on Norwegian culture that continues today. I don't know much about Norway but here in the UK we have laws that were passed 500 years ago that are still in use and that were strongly influenced by the church when they were enacted. You don't have t…

That's the common law system at work there. The Norwegian system by contrast is a civil law system.

Re: I spent 29 years in solitary confinement (2010)

#230

Post by coldtea »

ars wrote: post #122
TheCoelacanth wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would a small windowless room ever be necessary? How would an unarmed person harm someone from inside a normal prison cell?

You should look at photos. Most prisons don't have single cells, they have large rooms with bunks, or they have shared cells with 2 or more people in each one. They should make cells that are tiny and fit one person - but have lots of opening and permission to talk to anyone around them. That way there is physical isolation, but not mental isolation.

>They should make cells that are tiny and fit one person - but have lots of opening and permission to talk to anyone around them.

Actually there's no need for the cells to be tiny -- even if they are meant for just one person.

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