Today we mainly punish criminals via prison, which is very expensive. I have previously favored torture (= corporal punishment) and fines paid by competitive debtor prisons. But today, I’d like to sing the praises of
I just found this blog, and generally like it, but this post does not reflect well on its author.Exile is actually a pretty good idea, since criminals are those who refuse to participate in society's laws, and what better way to get them to see the value of participation than to put them in a position without it?But torture is not a very good means of correcting behavior. I won't ask if this is how the author socialized his own children, but I will say that the reason why the incidence of violence in raising children has decreased is that more effective methods exist, for those who will look for them.
It already has been given up on. California used to have a model system to rehabilitate prisoners, one that actually worked. Now, since the largest PAC in California is the prison guards union, the "tough on crime" politicians have lots of political donations and there is "three strikes and you are out", criminalization of drug crimes, mandatory sentencing.
It is all about high wages for prison guards and large prisons.
Let's not give up on using prison to rehabilitate people. It might still work. Let's at least not develop prisons that deliberately make people worse than they were when they went in.
This is like asking why waste all that money on weapons contracts. It's not a waste - to the companies that get paid. Many prisons in the US are now for-profit enterprises. They lobby.
Libertarians (and I don't know what Robin thinks on this subject) have to either give up on the idea that we can save money by privatizing prison, give up on saving money by reducing the number of people we send to prison, or give up on our current implementation of representative democracy.
Yeah, imagine the guy that was psychologically capable of beating someone into hospital that now also has spend six month being chased by dogs without contact to other humans. *I* seriously don't want to live in the same region as him, even if he's tagged. I am afraid enough of all the other nutcases that don't care about punishment.
Exile would be an improvement. Better that each offender be made to work until restitution to the victim is made in full. What is cruel and unusual punishment. Slaves had to fear a masters whip. I submit we are now under much greater fears. Most would prefer forced labor than 1 month in jail. A whipping than 3 months in jail. A beating than 6 months in jail. To be tattooed branded and disfigured than 9 months in jail. To be hobbled than 1 year in jail. To be blinded in one eye than 2 years in jail. Where are the cutoffs for forced organ donation, medical experimentation, finger amputation, toe amputation, hand amputation, foot amputation, electroshock, lobotomy, castration, and countless other alternatives.All of the above are a state power inflation scheme that grossly multiply the original maleficence.
Anonymous, that is the definition of "bad people", people that the justice system has found guilty. That it happens to also correspond with conventional prejudices simply shows how well founded those conventional prejudices actually are.
If you replaced prison sentences with fines, maybe $100k per year of sentence, then people could really “pay” their debt to society and get back to being productive again. If you kept prison funding the same, then everyone is better off. The prisoners get better treatment through increased funding, the fines pay for some of the prison upkeep, and people who can pay the fines get out right away. Everybody wins.
I have always been attracted to the "let the punishment fit the crime" manner of punishment.Most of these would be administered in the afterlife and would be truly cruel and unusual. For example, the guy that invented the Phillip's screw driver would spend eternity trying to unscrew stripped out Philips's screws. The guy that made shirt labels scratchy on your neck would spend eternity removing them from shirts. The guy that made plastic containers you can't get into would have his radial artery slit open as he opened one thick plastic package after another, for ever and ever. Heh Heh!! You may have other examples.
The problem with productive punishment, as I repeat, is that society's laws are not at all just and rational, and the tendency to arbitrary and excessive criminalization must be countered by a cost on law enforcement's side.
You guys are so naive. You keep reasoning as though law-breakers were always bad people and law-abiding people were always good people. This is absurd.
Person A: "A bakery's function is to improve human welfare."Person B: "A bakery's function is to greate baked goods."Person A: "Well, what do you think baked goods are for?"
Good point about slavery. I would add that masochism just ruins the satisfaction of a good beating. Perhaps we should can them as a inexpensive peotein source.
Another way to save money is hard labor. Criminals can become productive, and pay their own keep.
The problem with corporeal punishment is that you lose one of the side effects of extended prison sentencing, namely, that the bad guys get removed from society for a time so the rest of us don't have to deal with them.
I just found this blog, and generally like it, but this post does not reflect well on its author.Exile is actually a pretty good idea, since criminals are those who refuse to participate in society's laws, and what better way to get them to see the value of participation than to put them in a position without it?But torture is not a very good means of correcting behavior. I won't ask if this is how the author socialized his own children, but I will say that the reason why the incidence of violence in raising children has decreased is that more effective methods exist, for those who will look for them.
It already has been given up on. California used to have a model system to rehabilitate prisoners, one that actually worked. Now, since the largest PAC in California is the prison guards union, the "tough on crime" politicians have lots of political donations and there is "three strikes and you are out", criminalization of drug crimes, mandatory sentencing.
It is all about high wages for prison guards and large prisons.
Let's not give up on using prison to rehabilitate people. It might still work. Let's at least not develop prisons that deliberately make people worse than they were when they went in.
"Why waste all that money?!"
This is like asking why waste all that money on weapons contracts. It's not a waste - to the companies that get paid. Many prisons in the US are now for-profit enterprises. They lobby.
Libertarians (and I don't know what Robin thinks on this subject) have to either give up on the idea that we can save money by privatizing prison, give up on saving money by reducing the number of people we send to prison, or give up on our current implementation of representative democracy.
Yeah, imagine the guy that was psychologically capable of beating someone into hospital that now also has spend six month being chased by dogs without contact to other humans. *I* seriously don't want to live in the same region as him, even if he's tagged. I am afraid enough of all the other nutcases that don't care about punishment.
Exile would be an improvement. Better that each offender be made to work until restitution to the victim is made in full. What is cruel and unusual punishment. Slaves had to fear a masters whip. I submit we are now under much greater fears. Most would prefer forced labor than 1 month in jail. A whipping than 3 months in jail. A beating than 6 months in jail. To be tattooed branded and disfigured than 9 months in jail. To be hobbled than 1 year in jail. To be blinded in one eye than 2 years in jail. Where are the cutoffs for forced organ donation, medical experimentation, finger amputation, toe amputation, hand amputation, foot amputation, electroshock, lobotomy, castration, and countless other alternatives.All of the above are a state power inflation scheme that grossly multiply the original maleficence.
Upvoted.
They called Australia, didn't they?
Anonymous, that is the definition of "bad people", people that the justice system has found guilty. That it happens to also correspond with conventional prejudices simply shows how well founded those conventional prejudices actually are.
If you replaced prison sentences with fines, maybe $100k per year of sentence, then people could really “pay” their debt to society and get back to being productive again. If you kept prison funding the same, then everyone is better off. The prisoners get better treatment through increased funding, the fines pay for some of the prison upkeep, and people who can pay the fines get out right away. Everybody wins.
I have always been attracted to the "let the punishment fit the crime" manner of punishment.Most of these would be administered in the afterlife and would be truly cruel and unusual. For example, the guy that invented the Phillip's screw driver would spend eternity trying to unscrew stripped out Philips's screws. The guy that made shirt labels scratchy on your neck would spend eternity removing them from shirts. The guy that made plastic containers you can't get into would have his radial artery slit open as he opened one thick plastic package after another, for ever and ever. Heh Heh!! You may have other examples.
>implying the rest of us aren't bad guys
The problem with productive punishment, as I repeat, is that society's laws are not at all just and rational, and the tendency to arbitrary and excessive criminalization must be countered by a cost on law enforcement's side.
You guys are so naive. You keep reasoning as though law-breakers were always bad people and law-abiding people were always good people. This is absurd.
create*
Person A: "A bakery's function is to improve human welfare."Person B: "A bakery's function is to greate baked goods."Person A: "Well, what do you think baked goods are for?"
Good point about slavery. I would add that masochism just ruins the satisfaction of a good beating. Perhaps we should can them as a inexpensive peotein source.
Somalia has a very low homicide rate, according to this:
http://www.economist.com/bl...
Another way to save money is hard labor. Criminals can become productive, and pay their own keep.
The problem with corporeal punishment is that you lose one of the side effects of extended prison sentencing, namely, that the bad guys get removed from society for a time so the rest of us don't have to deal with them.