Quote:Originally Posted by Sixtus
Tagging and curfew works extremely well. The tagged offender is essentially tied to their home, which means they cannot go out but they remain in the community and with their families.
What if they do not have a home, family or community?
It is a fact that 95% of offenders DO have a home, family and community, so you are arguing ‘WHAT IF’ for less than 5% of the offender population. What is your point exactly?
Quote:Unpaid Work also is a major disruption to the lives of offenders. They are able to remain in their normal occupations [when not performing unpaid work] and contribute through their taxes rather than being incarcerated financial liabilities to society.
What if they do not want to or can’t work?
45% of the offender popularion can and do work. 40% cannot find work because they have problems and learning difficulites with reading writing and number. We aim to address these needs by assessing literacy and numeracy skills of every offender placed on Community Sentences and bring in most appropriate support to meet their needs.
If they cannot work then alternate sentences are imposed whereby there is no physical demand.
I placed such a guy two years ago with a physical disability with a musium who were looking to undertake painstaking copying of achieves onto micro-fische. At the end of his sentence, they were so pleased with what he did, they gave him a paid job. He is now a wage earner ‘EARNING not stealing his way!’
Quote:Accreditted Programmes are also a very effective way of helping offenders deal with the problem areas of their lives which led to the offending behaviour. Treat the cause and avoid repetition of the consequences
In some cases that would work, but I’m not sure it would in most cases, but you might be right. I thought you meant community punishments like the scarlet letter, humiliating town center stocks…which I would approve of over jail in some cases though shame and humilation are now considered cruel and unusual therefore we (society) **go out of our way to make the criminal the ‘real’ victim **of an unjust and unfair world.
In SOME cases…it MIGHT work? Do I hear the voice of competent practice speaking? It DOES WORK in the vast majority of cases.
Prison is a training ground whereby good law-breakers train less competent one’s to become better, avoiding detection upon their release. Prison is really bad news trust me it really is.
Who has the right to ‘name and shame’. We all have sins in our past we do not want the world to know about. How come my sins are ok because I did not get caught, but one who did get caught, it is ok to ‘name and shame’.
What you are saying is ‘it is ok to sin but it is wrong to get caught sinning’ That is not what Christ taught
A lot of offenders come from dysfuntional families where everyone is an offender. They have never been properly taught right from wrong. All they know is ‘how to survive’. In that sense, they ARE victims too!
We as a society have a right to protect ourselves by teaching proper ways to behave. That involves 'pro-social modelling and teaching problem-solving skills, empathy and perspective taking skills to enable them to see things through the eyes of their victims. It does not nor should it involve public humiliation. That is cruel perverse and unnecessary. The courts give out the sentences prescribed by the law. To publically humiliate further is both unjust and un-Christian.
Most offenders have a very low and fragile self-esteem. Nothing is achieved by demolishing it further. We as Christians have a duty to ‘forgive as we have been forgiven’ and help our errant brothers and sisters re-integrate back into society.
