Do prisons really help?

[mafh]

My sister-in-law has been in prison twice – once for shoplifting, and once for battery. The first time she was in prison, she had a lot of time added to her sentence because she couldn’t behave herself even in prison. She spent most of this extra time in solitary confinement. She came out of prison much worse, with new drug addictions, and with new friends that were bad influences (other felons, drug dealers, gang members, etc.). She did very badly for a couple years, and then was arrested again. This time, she spent even more time in solitary confinement and really deteriorated. She got put on a wait list for mental health treatment, and after being in solitary confinement for 8 or 9 months, she finally made it to the top of the list for treatment. She was in treatment for some months before she was released. This time, she was released from prison into a group home for the mentally ill. She was still pretty bad when she got out, and her problems are far from over. But, she is a lot more stable now that she is in the group home, and at least she’s kept herself out of prison for 5 or 6 years now.

The thing that seems to have helped her the most are the group home and the psychological counseling. The prison experiences seemed to hurt more than help, and the solitary confinement almost completely destroyed her mental health. She is almost completely illiterate, but the primary recreation you are permitted in solitary confinement are books/magazines and writing paper (no TV, radio, socializing, etc). So, she was essentially locked in a cage for months with nothing to do. I have serious concerns about the practice of solitary confinement, especially if it is long term as hers was.

 

[The_Curt_Jester]

Too much prison time. Not enough executions.

 

[sw85]

What do you guys think? Norway and Sweden have EXTREMELY nice ‘prisons’ and their return rate is half of the U.S. How can the government imagine violent people living in a violent place becoming less violent?

There’s a lot of things going on in Norway and Sweden that aren’t going in here. For one thing they don’t share 3000 miles of border with a failed narco-state. For another they don’t have a sizable minority subculture that fetishizes violence.

I’m not saying you’re doing this, but I often hear people speak about how Norway must be doing something right and we should emulate them. This amuses me. Part of what Norway is “doing right” is exactly stuff we can’t emulate. It’s easy to keep your crime rate low and your prisons tidy when you’re a sparsely populated nation made up of 99% white Lutherans and oh yeah stepping outside after sunset (which starts at 6 PM tonight and ends in mid-March) will cause your eyes to freeze shut. It’s not so easy in a nation with a comparatively radically warm climate, forced integration of hostile and irreconcilable subcultures historically at war with one another, sprawling and badly managed cities rotting from the inside out, and the aforementioned problems with demographics and location.

Now granted I’m no expert on the prison situation. It seems to me that being in prison is a pretty terrible situation and ought to be one that a sane, normal person would desire to avoid. It also seems to me that most people who wind up in prison are neither perfectly sane nor perfectly normal. It also seems to me that to the extent prison is a bad, bad place to be, it’s because too much freedom is given to prisoners with too little supervision. Adopting the Norwegian model would make this problem worse, not better. It would seem the Norwegian model works only with a very specific population that we in the US do not have.

I don’t know what the immediate solution is. Taking away more of their freedom (i.e., basically round-the-clock solitary confinement) hardly seems fruitful, and probably prohibitively expensive.

A lot of people are suggesting that the kinds of people who wind up in prison are what Aristotle used to call “natural slaves,” i.e., people who are slaves to and by virtue of their own natures, rather than civil law. In other words, utterly inept idiots and cretins, the kinds of people who cannot possibly care for themselves. A sane and healthy and well-ordered society would have institutions to deal with these kinds of people (and I don’t mean “institution” in the narrow sense of a particular building or organization). I’m not saying they’d all be better off married and raising children (though many of them might be), but surely some of these otherwise insufferable creeps would thrive in, say, a cloistered monastery, under the supervision of a very strict abbot enforcing rigorous rules of silence.

It seems to me the closest we get to this in the United States is the Army, which in my experience working with them is made up largely of people from the same background as prison inmates but who had the sense not to get caught up in all that BS that landed others in prison. That’s a good example of the kind of institution I’m talking about, but the impetus can’t all be on the government to provide these sorts of avenues of escape. Society itself needs to step up. The best thing it can do right now is stop relentlessly destroying normative family structures, since as we all know, growing up in the same house as your biological parents is pretty much the best way to get a good start in life.

 

[Bill_7154]

What do you guys think? Norway and Sweden have EXTREMELY nice ‘prisons’ and their return rate is half of the U.S. How can the government imagine violent people living in a violent place becoming less violent?

Do prisons really help? IMO, it depends. In the USA I think the criminal justice system is extremely broken. There are for profit prisons, with people paid to lobby senators and representatives in government to make more laws and have mandatory minimum sentences, etc. What is the goal of businesses? To make money, right? Well, how can for profit prisons function any other way than to work to increase the ammt of people going to the prisons and to get incarcerated again and again after they are released?

Prison’s don’t rehabiliate in the USA. They scare some people straight, so to speak, but they are not set up to rehabilitate. The system in the USA is set up in such a way that people come out more violent and more educated as a criminal than when they went in (sure there are exceptions, I’m generalizing).

So, IMO, they ‘help’ by keeping very violent people locked up away from society in general. This is complictated though. Now, I’m against the death penalty. But in states where there is no death penalty (and in states where there is one) the people who ‘run’ the prisons are the people in there on life without parole. They have nothing to loose if there is no death penalty. They can do any crime in prison and their sentence stays the same. So what happens is that new people who come to prison must submit to their rule or be subject to be murdered. This means that people who are not hardened criminals, who get a sentence of a few years, are threatened and ordered to do things like hold drugs in their cells, weapons, do violent acts against other prisoners (and these prisoners may not even be violent or have violent crimes/pasts) because the prisons ‘shot callers’ (that is what the prisoner leaders are called) order them to do so with punnishment up to and including being murdered if they do not comply.

So there are plenty of people who are generally not hardened criminals who did something to get them sent to prison, and they can be committed to doing what it takes to make ammends for their past wrongs and doing the right things in prison so they can change for the better, etc but in order to survive must follow the orders of the ‘lifers’ who control all the inmates. The guys who have killed people inside and outside of prison and are never getting out. They control the rackets in prison, the drug sales, the gambling, extortion, etc, etc. So people committed to rehabilitating themselves, in order to survive inside prison, must do crimes that will, if caught, get them longer sentences.

For example, someone who ?.. robbed someone because they were desperate because they lost their job and their family was starving and about to loose their home… bad thing but overall a person not living a life of crime… lands in jail and now must hold drugs and weapons in their cell, or is told (because their cell mate is a child molester) “Kill your cell mate or we are going to kill you”. What does such a person do?

Prisons are gladiator schools. People who are sent there and want no part of that must be part of that.

So, overall, I definitely do NOT think that prisons help society at large. I think there are a lot of laws in the USA that send people to prison that should not be laws and should not send people to prison. Such as drug laws. I think that funds for the war on drugs should be diverted and sent to doctors and therapists and such in order to provide treatment to drug abusers. Prisons don’t cure drug addicts and despite the war on drugs the ‘drug warriers’ can not even keep drugs out of maximum security prisons after the war doing on for 40+ years, not even ONE of them in the entire country. So how are they ever going to be kept off the street? If you think about that, it is so far beyond ridiculous, I can’t even comprehend how ridiculous it is.

There are plenty of people who are ex convicts who have changed their lives. These poeple know what it takes to do so. Some work in the field of helping ex prisoners in one way or another, lots of ex drug addicts for example. I think people like that probably have good ideas as to how to change the current system to help more people so they are not a threat once released, get maximum rehabilitation, etc. I used to have a boss who was an ex convict. He was also an ex drug addict. A huge % of those who go to prison are drug addicts or involved in drugs in one way or another. If we want to reduce the % of people who go to prison, who do so repeatedly… if we want to make such people less of a threat to the population… treatment and not jail is the anwer IMO (I have worked as a drug and alcohol counselor).

Prison for the very violent and keep them segregated from everyone else. And think about being against drug and drug use as I am, but think about the harm that the war on drugs does to society. It put’s Al Capones in charge running murderous gangs. They are in charge of products that are in demand and this demand is not changing because of the drug war. There is a group of current and former law enforcement officers who are for ending the drug war. I think that their points of view and what they have to teach/explain to the rest of us is valuable and from a unique perspective. www.leap.cc I highly recommend watching the video on that site if you click ‘watch a video’ (or similar) near the top left of the front page of the website and then click the main video (on the left side) that comes up.

Maybe we, as a society, could reduce the crime and violence, and increase treatment and therefore lessen the ammt of people on drugs if we changed our current approach to dealing with drugs. Lets face it, the war on drugs is and has been a failure. And it’s consequences are very severe in $ and lives lost

 

[Bill_7154]

I can only speak of prisons in Illinois, but the prisons here have gyms, yards with exercise equipment, cable TV, academic and vocational schools, and a commissary where inmates can buy radios, TVs, blue jeans, sneakers, and all sorts of food. When I retired, inmates were paid 33 cents a day for just being there. Add to that the 3 hot meals a day and a warm bed to sleep in. For some of these guys life is much better on the inside than on the outside. I knew of a couple that had to be forced to leave.

I see all of these things as problems with the system. I think there should be incentives to get them to do good things (participate in rehab) and think basic necessities should be the order of the day for those who don’t want to get serious about being on the rehab track.

And sadly, your correct that some have better lives in prison than outside of prison. For those who grew up in foster homes, jails for kids, are chronic homelsss drug addicts, they live a cycle of going from prison to shelter to prison…many for their entire life. it is costing taxpayers lots of money and is not helping these people to change their ways.

I am sure there is a better way. A couple hundred (or more) years ago we used to keep mentally ill people in jail, in chains. Now they live in group homes and their own apartments. Chage is possible. Improvement on the status quo is possible.

 

[Bill_7154]

On the topic of prisons in Norway and Sweden, economic disparity is a big factor in crime in the US (in my opinion, at least). Countries that have more equality of income (and a good standard of living i.e. not communist or under a dictatorship) have less violent crime. I think an advantage of more capitalistic societies is that the standard of living is improved for all ( medicine, technology, cars etc) but the poor bear the weight of being the lowest in society in their soul which leads to many social ills.

I think the current “justice system” is harmful to society in many ways. It unnecessarily destroys families. Don’t get me wrong, I think violent criminals (especially murderers) should be locked up. However, I think the current system is too quick to cast away those who have made poor decisions (often because society left them few good choices). These are not excuses for sins, but just a way to say that I think the current system makes things worse in many ways.

I generally agree with everything your saying. I would point out that not only is it the poor, it is the war on drugs that feeds the prisons millions of prisoners. If the drug war reduced kids using drugs maybe I would consider that despite all the murders that happen because of it (just like in the Al Capone era) that it might be worth it. But the reality is that kids can get drugs easier than they can get alcohol because when a substance is illegal the people who sell it generally don’t discriminate against those who are not of adult age. This is something that saddens me greatly and I know that our society would be much better off if we made a transition towards treatment and away from punnishment for those who are addicted. I have worked as a drug and alcohol counselor. Many drug addicts eventually turn to crime to fuel their habits for drugs after they spend and borrow all they can. Women prostitute themselves. And it’s because drugs are prohibited, and therefore very costly (people are risking life in prison for being in that business, hence a huge premium on the cost of the product. Alcohol and cigarette addicts don’t do crimes to fuel their drug habits and women don’t prostitute to fuel those drug habits either. Why? They are legal, and therefore affordable.

Ending drug prohibition has nothing to do with addressing the drug problem in society. What it has to do with is addressing the CRIME and VIOLENCE problems. Then we could actually tackle the drug problem.

 

[Bill_7154]

Pete,
In all sincerity I don’t think they are making out on that deal. I’m sure that most would gladly pay the 33 cents a day for the longing of freedom in their souls. I am not saying that some people do not deserve to be there, but the same type of argument of good conditions is what allowed slave masters to condone ( in their minds atleast) holding slaves. I imagine if all people were set free from prison very few would ask to return.

Being made in God’s image we all deserve a measure of dignity. Material goods can help to contribute to dignity, but unless we absolutely have to imprison people, we are unnecessarily taking away possibly their highest form of dignity- their freedom.

Peace, Brother.

-Ryan

What do you think about the notion of a system where prisoners were given graduated levels of comforts based on their behavior in prison? I think this exists to some extent but I’m sure it could be expanded upon and made more universal across different states if the powers that be choose for it to be so?

My thinking is to incentivise good behavior (as in avoiding bad behavior and also engaging in rehab groups, etc) with more tv time, better cable tv access, better food/deserts, whatever to encourage rehabilitation and good socialization so the prisoners would be in a better position to adjust to society upon release, lessening the chance of re-offending.

 

[Bill_7154]

When I went to the Academy, there was an inmate cook in the cafeteria. I was told by some of the staff there that every time he got out, he robbed the same VFW. I can’t tell you how many fathers and sons and brothers I saw come through the system. It’s like it was a family business. Drugs are a lot of the problem. Quite a few would get out and get back into the drug culture they came out of. Get high and kill someone or steal to support their habit. To be honest, I don’t know how to stop recidivism, other than force them to get better educated. Most of them see education as a waste of time.

If it were legal to possess and use drugs, and they were dispensed at a pharmacy, and since legal would be a fraction of their current price, don’t you think that less people who were addicted would rob or kill to get them? Alcoholics can support their addiction on like 10 bucks a day, maybe less. Cigarette addicts too. Despite the huge problems that alcohol abuse causes society, it is not illegal to possess or use it. Police target certain behaviors that MAY result from it’s use, not it’s use itself.

If other drugs were handled the same way I’m pretty certain crime (theft, violence) would drop drastically. So are the law enfocement officers who are members of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. www.leap.cc Their numbers are growing each and every year. They include judges, former dea agents, etc, etc, etc. They have video’s and such at their site and they do talks internationally about the war on drugs being a problem and not a solution. Have you ever heard of them? Do you have an open mind when it comes to the notion of the best way to actuallly address societies problems with drugs? If so, I suggest you check out what they have to say. They are not some hippie drug users advocating for drugs to be legal. They are actual police/other law enforcement who have fought the drug war on the front lines for decades and actually have done research, etc regarding the issue.

I’m curious to hear what you have to say about them, assuming you have an open mind on the subject. (and I’m pretty sure they are against drug use, as am I).

 

[Bill_7154]

20% of state prison inmates are there because of drug convictions.
albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf/t600012004.pdf

While I don’t doubt what you linked to here (didn’t look) I ask you this:

Do you honestly believe that only 1 in 5 prisoners had a problem with drug use in their lives prior to going to prison?

And what % of people who do robberies do you think have drug problems? For example, do you think that 80% of people who do robberies do them so they can have money to pay their car note, take their girl out to dinner? Or do you think that maybe a fair to large % of those who do robberies do so because they have a drug problem?

My point: If someone is a drug addict, and robs a convience store and is convicted of armed robbery…the issue behind the crime is their drug addiction.

 

[Bill_7154]

Prison is no place for rehabilitation mainly because the majority of the people there see no problem with what they are doing and therefore cannot be rehablitated.

I think that part of the problem is that the inmates get to continue not taking responsibility for themselves once they are locked up. I don’t have all the answers but there definately needs to be a change. I believe that there is a way to help these people become productive citizens and just giving them everything they want and need because they committed a crime is not the way to do it.

I agree with the second paragraph I quoted from you. I would say that this is their problem and why they need rehabilitation. I’m no expert on prisons, but I’m wondering if any other countries have better success with rehab in prison. I also know that we have for profit private prisons in this country. In any of those prisons it would be absolutely 100% against their business model to have any kind of rehabilitation, they want repeat business.

People can get rehab even if in the beginning they blame others for their problems/don’t regognize they have a problem. It’s a process, it will never be perfect. But people’s hearts and minds can be opened/changed. I think that rehab should be the focus in prison. If it were the focus I believe that more rehab would happen over time.

Just because prisoners are the way they are today, does not mean that this is the way they will be forever. I worked for 10 years in a 3/4 way house for guys who had alcohol and drug problems and either came from prison or a homeless shelter. Now, we had the choice of picking who got accepted to the program and there were like 10 applicants for every bed, so we took people who needed help but they definitely needed to be assessed as being committed to doing what it takes to change. Some of the guys would go back and run AA meetings at one of the local jails when they were cleared to be allowed to go visit the jail. It’s a hard population to deal with but I think rehab, if seriously were slated as the primary focus of prison, could happen on a larger scale than it happens now. But it takes the attitudes of the people in charge to believe in rehab, and that needs to pass down through all the staff and they have to believe in it or it won’t work.

I’d rather have more rehabed ex prisoners released into society, I think it’s best for everyone.

 

[pnewton]

Yes, they really help isolate criminals from the rest of society.

This they do much better than probation. We have swung much more in the direction of probation and the result is a rise in crime and the number of victims. I do not have the answer, but shorter sentences will result in greater victimization of the innocent.

I think any hope to be found would have to involve a moral change in society as a whole, something which is unconstitutional in America according to current case law.

 

[Bill_7154]

I’ll tell you the inmates that got me. They’re the one’s that say if their neighbor has 2 TVs and they don’t have one they should legally be allowed to go into their neighbors house and take one,. I’ve heard that more than once. How do you rehabilitate someone with that attitude?

Prisons are filled with people who are essentially diagnosed (or not diagnosed but qualify as) or have traits of antisocial personality disorder:

It is characterized by at least 3 of the following:
1.Callous unconcern for the feelings of others.
2.Gross and persistent attitude of irresponsibility and disregard for social norms, rules, and obligations.
3.Incapacity to maintain enduring relationships, though having no difficulty in establishing them.
4.Very low tolerance to frustration and a low threshold for discharge of aggression, including violence.
5.Incapacity to experience guilt or to profit from experience, particularly punishment.
6.Markedly prone to blame others or to offer plausible rationalizations for the behavior that has brought the person into conflict with society.
There may be persistent irritability as an associated feature.

The diagnosis includes what may be referred to as amoral, antisocial, psychopathic, and sociopathic personality (disorder).

It is difficult to treat successfully, but since such a larger number of them are drug addicts/alcoholics this is an angle to treat them. I have met a therapist, former convicted felon who served prison time who specializes in treating ex convicts.

The social climate of prison works against any type of rehab. One can start by having a wing for those who show an interest in/are willing to try rehab/treatment. Throw in a couple of priveledges to incentivise them in participating, but not nearly enough to get people to go from general pop over to that wing for the extra perc’s.

Drug testing and walking them through the 12 steps. Having former convicts who have rehabilitated themselves come in a regular speakers. Treat them with dignity and respect. Tell them what they are doing right. They have been told what they are doing wrong/have done wrong their entire lives. Tell them what they are doing right, praise positive behavior…even if it is very small, a very simple thing that you and I take for granted as the way to behave. Help them learn to take compliments. Help them learn to drop the persona of tough guy while not offending them, show them that one can be a tough guy and also a rehab guy. Teach them that rehab takes strength. Reinforce their loyalty (even though to the wrong people) is a strenght they have that they can build upon. Find out their interests and work with those.

Read a book or 3 written by experts on this matter, get avice from experts. Not everyone will change, but some will. Keep your expectations realistic, small goals, expect ups and downs. Private counseling so they can let down the tough guy act to some degree where there is risk in doing so in groups.

 

[interestedman]

What do you guys think? Norway and Sweden have EXTREMELY nice ‘prisons’ and their return rate is half of the U.S. How can the government imagine violent people living in a violent place becoming less violent?

I think culture and homogeneous race could play a role.

 

[Dale_M]

While I don’t doubt what you linked to here (didn’t look) I ask you this:

Do you honestly believe that only 1 in 5 prisoners had a problem with drug use in their lives prior to going to prison?

And what % of people who do robberies do you think have drug problems? For example, do you think that 80% of people who do robberies do them so they can have money to pay their car note, take their girl out to dinner? Or do you think that maybe a fair to large % of those who do robberies do so because they have a drug problem?

My point: If someone is a drug addict, and robs a convience store and is convicted of armed robbery…the issue behind the crime is their drug addiction.

Okay, I agree with you. The same could be said about rehabilitating prisoners, in general.

It is unfortunate that the US has such a terrible record on supporting drug rehabilitation. Certainly we are better than some countries (e.g. Russia), but our societal indifference is counter productive.

 

[Bill_7154]

Okay, I agree with you. The same could be said about rehabilitating prisoners, in general.

It is unfortunate that the US has such a terrible record on supporting drug rehabilitation. Certainly we are better than some countries (e.g. Russia), but our societal indifference is counter productive.

The sad thing is that it’s an easy fix (if people were not brainwashed to think of drug addicts as criminals and bad people, but as sick people who need help).

I was a child when the drug war got up and running. So I remember what the police were like pre-drug war and know what they are like now.

I also remember the manipulation put on society to support laws that seemed to be drawn up to target drug kingpins and people who sell drugs to little kids…but are used against average citizens now (who may be casual drug users).

The asset forfeiture law: It was pitched to society as such: International drug lords are so powerful and so rich they can afford better counter survailance equipment than the government, etc… we need a special law to get them. We need to be able to seize their mansions, etc before convicting them of a crime, to hit them where it hurts, financially…to give us a fighting chance against them.

40 years later: The asset forfeiture law is used on everyone. I read a couple years ago that the average seizure is like $3,000 or something like that…in the form of some used car. I initially thought the law made sense the way it was pitched to society. But if I were told that my neighbors teenage son who gets caught with some marijuana will get their car seized from them I would have been against the law. If I were told that a man and woman’s house would be seized in the event that one of their teenage children were, unbeknownst to their parents, selling drugs out of the house I would have been against the law. But it has been used that way.

Selling in a school zone: Initially this was pitched to society with TV comercials showing some sleezy older guy reaching his hand through a fence to a school (an ELEMENTARY SCHOOL) and selling crack to a kid who was like 11 years old. And then they would show a bunch of crack vials on the playground. And then they say something like ‘shouldn’t people who sell to children receive a more harsh punnishment?’. And I think to myself, heck yes they should!

Fast forward to today: You can have one 50 yo man selling marijuana to another 50 year old man, within one of their houses or apartments or office and both individuals can believe that anyone who sells any drugs to any kids should get the death penalty…but…if the location they are at is within so many yards of a school they will be charged with ‘selling within a school zone’. If I knew the reality under which the law would actually be used, as opposed to the way I was manipulated to think it was targetting adults selling to children (at a school) I would not have been for that law. This law adds extra time to a person’s prison sentence. And I would venture to guess that the majority of people who are charged with this crime are not influencing children towards drugs. I would venture to guess that in most cases the kids at the school don’t know what’s going on. I would also venture to guess that even if it’s 2am and all the kiddies are in bed… 2 guys in a car a few blocks from a school doing a drug deal are going to be charged with this additional crime where they will get more time in prison.