California prisons are pure hell. Listen to a few min of this interview; it's eye opening (warning: prison language)...
California bans private prisons
571–580 of 646 posts
Re: California bans private prisons
#572Earlier quoted context omitted.
why does the healthcare discussion always regress to capitalism vs socialism? everyone cites canada as the ideal model of social healthcare but forget to mention the long wait times and the fact that their population is only a fraction of the US. i think our system could use some tweaks but throwing it out altogether for a socialist program is not it.
Tell me what is the wait time when you can never get treatment?
That’s just propagandist garbage. I’m alive because the Canadian system works, a few times over.
Re: California bans private prisons
#573Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I'm also in favor of socialized medicine for basically exactly these reasons. Shocker, I know. The system works! I grew up in socialized medicine, and you get sick, you go to the hospital, they treat you and you leave. There's no step 4. Why Americans continue to willingly subject themselves to these torturous systems is beyond me. It's all in y'alls control.
Because when people talk about how terrible healthcare is here, it's usually people who don't have or can't afford good insurance. And by good, I mean covers most everything and doesn't have a huge out of pocket. If you have good health insurance, the healthcare in the US is absolutely top tier. Many people that complain are getting a plan with a huge deductible either because they are being cheap or can't afford bet…
“I’d rather 10 guilty men go free than 1 innocent man behind bars” -some American dude
Re: California bans private prisons
#574Earlier quoted context omitted.
Denmark comes very close per capita, while still having shockingly lower prices. Edit: found a good source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2866602/ Note, per capita it looks like most of the countries studied are discovering new drugs (in the study's terminology "new molecular entity") at much faster rate than the United States when adjusted for population. The money quote: " Our data suggest that the U…
Denmark is so tiny compared to the US, it hardly makes sense to compare drug discovery per cápita. If Denmark happens to release just a single extra drug one year, it totally shifts their ratio.
Exactly. Denmark has little bargaining power compared to what a larger US state would have. But they do bulk purchases and get prices thereafter.
Re: California bans private prisons
#575Earlier quoted context omitted.
Don't forget that the US's rapid access to all the healthcare the patient wants leads to huge amounts of harm in the form of over-testing, over-diagnosis, and over-treatment.
Are you actually arguing that people wanting too much healthcare is a bad thing?
It absolutely can be. The reason you don’t get colonoscopies until you’re in you’re 40s isn’t because they’re not fun. It’s because the risk of a false positive times the negative consequences thereof outweighs the benefit of you finding something early. People are wierd gooey lumps of random stuff. Scan anyone and you’ll find something out of place. The vast majority is irrelevant until some break even point where it’s not. Hence the recommendations and guidelines.
Re: California bans private prisons
#576Earlier quoted context omitted.
The union in question is a public sector union, though, so it's not obvious how to apply your (correct, at least to my eyes) analysis.
I think for public sector, we have to look at it on the state level. Using the same analysis, in a democratic society, one vote has in theory more power than membership in a public sector unions, because with that vote you can decide more things than just wages of public employees. I suspect the American culture of "being tough on crime" isn't really about prison-employee unions, but has historical roots in the colon…
I think the American culture of "being tough on crime" was a reaction to the insanity of the 70s counter-revolutionary movements. In 1972 there were over 1900 domestic bombings in the US alone (https://status451.com/2017/01/20/days-of-rage/).
Re: California bans private prisons
#577Earlier quoted context omitted.
"The American culture is very antagonistic. In democratic societies, which are less antagonistic, this would become a matter of new public consensus much sooner before they would go on actual strike" Like France?
I think France is kind of odd because yes, they do strike a lot, but usually the public approval of the striking is quite high. So it is less antagonistic in this sense. I live in Europan country with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tripartism , and that's one option how to make things less antagonistic. There is lot of negotiations going on before the strike happens, and it mostly gets averted.
In France most of the strikes come from the public sector. And I'm pretty sure the public approval for the strikes depends if it affects them: if you'd poll people living in Paris about the current public transportation strike, I don't think you'd see a lot of support.
Re: California bans private prisons
#578Earlier quoted context omitted.
Did you see this post as a good opportunity to just divert attention to anti-union ideology with your comment?
A union doing a shitty thing can be pointed out without it being anti-union.
Sure, but that's not what happened here ... the comment you responded to accurately described what did happen.
Re: California bans private prisons
#579Wondering from where it comes the optimism in this thread for this ban. Ive traveled to more than 40 countries, and lived for some time in 5, all of them with public prison monopolies. In all of them the prison systems turn to be terrible. And by terrible, I mean that the US prisons look like 5 stars hotels compared to them. For reference, I was in most south american and caribbean countries, Spain, Portugal among ot…
What is it with Spanish prisons? I live here and have heard about the problem of foreigners from UK and US not wanting to serve time in their owne country. They prefer here, but overpopulation is a problem, hence the articles about the cases.
Re: California bans private prisons
#580Earlier quoted context omitted.
The purpose of imprisonment is to punish criminals by depriving them of their liberty. As a side-effect, society benefits because a criminal has been forcibly removed from visiting further misery on law-abiding people. Imprisonment is and should be a deterrent punishment - it is not a support group. One can both be in favor of abolishing for-profit prisons and also in favor of severe deterrent sentences for law-break…
Exactly. Statements like the commenter above are not universal truths. Certainly, some people believe the purpose of prison is rehabilitation. That is neither a universal belief however, nor the focus of our legal system. Many people believe the point of prison is punishment, just as the point of fines (like a speeding ticket, for example) are to make someone hurt financially, not to recoup costs (one person speeding…
It can be both at the same time. A step of the reformation process is for the inmate to understand the need for the punishment. It doesn't mean that there is no punishment, just that blind retribution is insufficient to form a perspective for the inmate and society. Most inmates are not going to stay in prison for their whole life, so of obviously you try to maximize rehabilitation.
I do believe it to be a universal truth that a reformist approach is superior. Treating it as opposed solution is certainly short sighted.