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You’re Wrong, and I’ll Tell You Why You’re Wrong Read Apathy Jack’s The Face of Jesus in my Soup? If not, go away and read it now. Go on. I’ll still be here when you get back. Right, back to business. Jack, I disagree with pretty much everything you said there. As I said, you’re wrong, and I’ll tell you why you’re wrong. First, the idea that prison is about punishment, and not about rehabilitation. The fundamental problem is that this completely misses the point of punishment itself. Punishment is never for its own sake, but always for a purpose. The purpose of punishment always fits into one of two categories - either deterrent punishment or rehabilitative punishment. Those who favour harsher penalties invariably support the idea of punishment as a deterrent. It’s a very logically appealing idea. Everyone’s wanted to do something but chosen not to because of the consequences, whether these consequences were legal or more personal. So obviously a harsher penalty for a given act will discourage more people from performing that act. The only problem with this line of thought is that it doesn’t work. The majority of studies done on this show no reduction in crime rates when longer prison sentences are introduced. Although the jury’s still out on the question, the answer they’re going to come back with is clear to all but the most blinkered. After all, do you really think the pervert down the road performs a risk/benefit analysis before he goes out and rapes young girls? Fuck off. That isn’t to say that prison sentences have no deterrent effect, only that longer prison sentences seem to have little effect on the strength of this deterrent effect. Given the rate of recidivism, it’s pretty clear that prison isn’t really serving much of a rehabilitative function, either. The difference is, though, that rehabilitation just isn’t as simple as deterrence. With deterrence, you can try harsher or more lenient sentences. Neither seems to have much of an impact. If our rehabilitative techniques are failing, however, it’s still not obvious that rehabilitation in and of itself is a failure, only the particular methods that we are using. And considering that all our talk of rehabilitation has amounted to little more than just that - talk - it’s hardly surprising that it’s failed. Despite a century of talk, there has been very little change in the day-to-day life of the average prison inmate (although I read in the Herald the other week that prisoners are no longer served fish and chips because they want to teach them healthier eating habits. Progress of sorts, I suppose). If you lock a person up for several years, and treat them like an animal, you can hardly be surprised when upon release they act like an animal. Which brings me to your claim that by committing these serious crimes the perpetrators have given up all their rights. This is nothing short of nonsense. The fundamental flaw with this argument lies in most people’s understanding of rights, which seems to come almost exclusively from what they’ve heard of the US constitution. “We hold these truths to be self-evident...” Well, that’s nice and all, but it really does betray its Christian origins. These truths are self-evident because they were given to us by a higher power. Let’s make this clear: your rights have no meaningful existence outside of that given to them by the law. There may be rights that you believe you’re entitled to which you do not have, and there may be rights that you do have that you think you shouldn’t. Nonetheless, the rights you actually have are those defined by legislation. So I have a certain set of rights, bestowed upon me by no greater power than the law. Once convicted of a crime, I would have a lesser set of rights. I don’t seriously believe that you would actually want to take away all of those rights - are you seriously suggesting that it would be okay to treat prisoners differently based on their race or gender? What about their rights to consult with legal counsel? Do you want to take that one away? I also question the value of castrating rapists. Partially because it’s been shown not to eliminate recidivism (there’s a discussion I don’t want to have to go into detail on...), but mostly because of your suggestion that we’d only do it if we were absolutely sure that they were guilty. This is one of the major problems I have with those who support the death penalty - “Oh, we’ll only kill them if we’re sure they’re guilty.” I surely can’t be the only one that’s noticed that this means you want to decide the severity of the punishment based not on the severity of the crime, but instead on the quality of the evidence. In one fell swoop, this not only strikes a massive blow to the philosophical foundations of our legal system, but also rewards people for being better criminals. Yeah, you heard me. Make it too obvious you were the one who raped that women and we’ll hack your bollocks off, cover it up and we’ll let you get away with a prison sentence. Oh well, at least we’d probably see more rapists using condoms. I suppose that can’t be all bad. And while I’m at it, where the hell did this idea that eight or ten years in prison is like a week at Butlins come from? Five years in High School seemed like an eternity in hell to me, and I’m pretty sure that high school is quite significantly less unpleasant than prison. I just don’t see how eight years in prison could possibly be getting off lightly for anything. I agree that if you make a choice in full knowledge of the consequences, you deserve them, however I would hasten to add that these consequences should have more thought put into them than that they might help the National Party win an election. --Hewligan |
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