Privately run prisons

Your thoughts? I'd question the cost effectiveness of such a thing. The easiest way to save money is cutting corners and you really, really don't want to cut corners with murderers and rapists.

Does it really matter? Most convicted murderers and rapists aren't given many future opportunities to murder and rape.

Well, the most cost effective way to do it is to use them for labor.

I'm curious as to "cut corners" in this instance. Most prisons, when cutting corners, aren't likely to fall apart and let people out, they're more likely to treat them like shit because the piping broke down.

The arguments I've seen against them take a pro-prisoner view. I remember one book called Citizen You! that talked about the "convicted marijuana users getting raped and murdered."

That's seems more of an argument against marijuana criminalization.

It doesn't necessarily need to be pro-prisoner. If a private prison doesn't run any more efficiently/cost effectively then a regular one why bother?

Perverse incentives continue to be perverse.

Does it really matter? Most convicted murderers and rapists aren't given many future opportunities to murder and rape.

...Nnnnnno. Not really the case, if you look at prisons. Plenty of murder and rape going on there.

Anyways, the real issue here is a discussion of "proportionate justice" and the rehab vs. punishment debate. To encapsulate the argument in a nutshell, what good is deciding on a proportionate 5 year sentencing when prison turns you into a hardened criminal, or kills you entirely?

Another huge problem is that the prison lobby continually pushes tougher sentencing laws to fill their coffers at the expense of state budgets and ordinary citizens. And they get away with it too because every politician wants to be perceived as "tough on crime". It's appalling.

That's seems more of an argument against marijuana criminalization.

Well what you going to do, only have two crimes? Rape and murder?

And as storyyeller says, it leads to mass criminalisation of petty things. Just look at Alcatraz, in order to turn a profit, they kept throwing in less and less worthy criminals. It finally had to be closed down due to mass abuse that was highlighted (and turned into a movie) about a young white guy who basically got life imprisonment, tortured (a lot by solitary confinement, thus disproving anybody who says that is not torture) and went insane. His crime? Stealing a few dollars.

This is a terrible idea.

1) It's only more expensive, because you're paying a private company to do the exact same job, only you're paying them. It'd only be more expensive, no matter how much they can try to 'eliminate waste from the system' I've seen a prison, I leave near one, they look pretty damn effecient. Invariably, companies will try to cut corners and the results will be disasterous.

Remember that oil spill in the gulf? And the mine that collapsed in WV? Those happened because companies cut corners.

2) It'll create a lobby of people trying to make every damn thing illegal, crime would probably go up on the virtue of more criminalization. I can imagine there'd be a push to make sentances harsher. And damn hell, it's already bad enough with police departments doing that.

No. No. No. BAD IDEA.

The three strikes law was largely brought in by the prison lobby, if wiki is to be believed. So yes, they push for everything to be illegal and keep people in jail longer.

And now we've got a two strikes law.

To hell with that, haven't you heard of the zero tolerance policy?

I suppose now's a good time to rant about sex offender registries? Although it would probably be preaching to the choir.

You guys have already pointed out what I was going to say: If people make money off the prison industry, then you get a lobby that wants more people in prison longer, which is bad.

Same problem with private defense contractors. The last thing we need is people with a vested interest in there being more wars.

You are welcome to rant about sex offender registries so long as you make a new thread for it. I think it could actually turn out to be fairly interesting.

Does it really matter? Most convicted murderers and rapists aren't given many future opportunities to murder and rape.

This is disturbing on multiple levels. First, you are denying the humanity of prisoners, turning them into a separate group of lebensunwertes leben whose lives and feelings mean little or nothing and allowing one to easily ignore the fact that by doing the same atrocities to them as they did to others (abuse, torture, rape, and murder are rampant at all levels of the American prison system, by inmates and guards), you are essentially sinking to their level and validating violence and depravity. Second, you are assuming that they all got in on violent, life-destroying offenses like murder and rape, and not because they, say, robbed diamonds too many times (an especially dangerous assumption in our era of stupid "tough on crime" horseshit). Third, a prison system that exists only to punish and contain offenders turns the segments of society that produce the most offenders (impoverished underclasses) into societal enemies, which means that there is no logical reason for people in those segments to cooperate or submit to the state's authority, resulting in yet more crime and social unrest. If the Man doesn't give a shit about you, why give a shit about the Man? This is where "fuck the police" comes from.

edited 17th Jan '11 11:18:49 PM by WoolieWool

"First, you are denying the humanity of prisoners, turning them into a separate group of lebensunwertes leben whose lives and feelings mean little or nothing and allowing one to easily ignore the fact that by doing the same atrocities to them as they did to others (abuse, torture, rape, and murder are rampant at all levels of the American prison system, by inmates and guards), you are essentially sinking to their level and validating violence and depravity." - Woolie

That's not quite true. Hurting a criminal isn't on the same moral level as hurting an innocent.

Then again, since this is Tsukubus we're talking about here I'd say a warped perception of morality is something to be expected.

This goes beyond "hurting a criminal" and into "treating criminals as second-class humans". And furthermore, what is the point of "hurting criminals"? Do you want to dissuade them from reoffending, or just torment them out of a sense of vengeance? One is a worthwhile goal, even if often approached in inappropriate ways, the other is just senseless cruelty. Cruelty is something we do not need more of in this world.

But cruelty towards the deserving makes some people feel better about themselves! Why would you deprive them of their punching bags?

^ You can do that without hurting any actual people, by writing fiction about CompleteMonsters getting Laser-Guided Karma.

edited 24th Jan '11 8:30:58 AM by Ettina

Cruelty, in many parts of the world, is an accepted part of life.

That said, most reform programs do poorly but they continue on the virtue that a 1-10 percent success rate is good for business.

Sorry if I'm late to this party, but I think the prison system isn't all about throwing people into a cell and promptly forgetting about them.

It's supposed to be about rehabilitating them back into society, if it can be done. If my kid grows up and does something to put her behidn bars, I want the system to do what it's supposed to do - remove her from the general population and rehabilitate her so that she can re-enter that population and become a productive member of society again.

In this regard, our prison system needs a BIG overhaul, for reasons mentioned already. But, not by being privately run, for reasons mentioned already.

...eh, its not like it will be any worse than the public prison system. The goverment is supposed to oversee that there isnt any abuse going on there either, and that... well, theyre not good at that. Or they just dont care. There seems to be this culture that anyone, ANYONE, who ends up in jail, deserves the constant beatings and rape heaped upon them.