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1 in 100 Americans in prison?

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posted on Feb, 9 2010 @ 04:13 PM
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reply to post by Koyaanisqatsi
 


Something rotten is then somewhere. I'm from Czech Republic, we have experience with cruel conditions for political inmates - but what I see now in US is probably worse than Michel Foucault's night mares. Combination of panopticon and ancient slave regime. Kafka would be satisfied ... (BTW he spent one winter because of his TB in nearby village where I live know)
What is quite compelling: most of (IMO) US posters even on ATS defend US prison industry. I never though brainwashing could be so powerful. I was trained in "reading between the lines" from my childhood, I knew that I need to think freely but I have not to spoke freely - I'll never ever believe that any administration have "good intentions" with "we the people". I was born to cruel and absurd world and I know it - call me paranoid if you want. The term "prison industry" is self explaining.
I'm not disputing your view Koyaanisqatsi, I'm using your post as starting ground. The question is: why in "democratic" country with 300M inhabitants are more people in jail then in "communists" Chine with 1.000M+ inhabitants?

EDIT to add:
I almost sleep know, but I'll return to your link tomorrow. This area is quite important for me because lot of "right wing" politicians here in CZ push things to US model - being it jails or health care. There is no more "American dream" for me, it is American nightmare.

[edit on 9-2-2010 by zeddissad]



posted on Feb, 9 2010 @ 04:25 PM
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As for the numbers in prison it is way higher than it should be .

We should incarcerate mainly violent criminals. And there should be time involved for other crimes which involve fraud or embezzlement . As for victimless crimes prison sentences are not what prisons were made for in first place . In my honest belief this never ending adding of what is illegal is a detriment to our social structure .

Many crimes are simple a morality issue of one group forcing it on all others . Prostitution is one , our drug laws are another and of course we have consensual sex crimes . Sodomy oral gratification are governed by laws . If the sex worker isnt hurt and the John is happy whats the crime there . Or if my partner and i engage in oral gratification and its consensual what business is it of the government of what I do behind closed doors. Or if I partake from a left-handed rollie what business is it of theirs if no one was hurt . Will beat some one to the punch you are hurting your self by indulging in it . SO WHAT you have beer wine cigarettes chemicals in our food and drinking water .

Even the statutory rape laws are subjective 150 years ago it was quite common for 14 yo to be married many cultures that is a common age . And also do we as tax payers feel good about paying for incarcerating Genarlow Wilson ? And how many more of Genarlow Wilson are out there ? But I am quite happy paying to keep the likes of Charles Manson behind bars and the like of him.

abcnews.go.com...

He has since been released with alot of publicity and political pressure . How many are rotting in jail now for the same things as Genarlow Wilson or being forced to re registered as a sex offender ?

And one of the best examples of a laws and law enforcement thats gone way over the edge how about throw a snowball at some cars and get 5 years in the pen . I laughed about this and thought yea right what a bunch of BS .

Till I saw this

www.thesmokinggun.com...

Theres a newspaper link about it also but you have to register and I left it out .

Just think people in Virginia Might end up paying for 2 snowballers room and board for 5 years plus the court cost to keep these hardened criminals off the street . Boy thats is why we elect people to make laws and pay law enforcement to protect us from the dreaded evil snowballers .

When you look at what you can go to prison for is it any wonder our prisons are full ? And we keep electing these people to create more ways to get money out of you or throw you in jail .



posted on Feb, 9 2010 @ 04:40 PM
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reply to post by 1SawSomeThings
 


No, I'm not familiar with the inside of a prison, except for what I see in the media, and we all know how reliable that source can be.

Again, it depends on what you want prison to do. Punish? Rehabilitate? I believe the current problem with American prison systems is that they are located somewhere between these two ideas.

If you want to punish for crimes, consider the Sharia law in Muslim countries. Note, I'm not condoning Sharia law or stating that the US prison system should be punishment-based. But its food for thought.

If you want rehabilitation, then bring in more doctors and psychiatrists and therapists. Just be aware that it will be manipulated by some who like to play the blame game. It's everyone's fault I committed a crime except mine.



posted on Feb, 9 2010 @ 05:00 PM
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reply to post by smyleegrl
 




No, I'm not familiar with the inside of a prison, except for what I see in the media, and we all know how reliable that source can be.


Thanks for acknowledging that the whole picture of the inside of a prison is not available through the media. Many of the people in prison are those who are like people you and I may have known, who had difficulties with substances for whatever reason (as an example). But they are incarcerated due to the mandatory sentencing guidelines introduced during the "contract with America" days.



If you want rehabilitation, then bring in more doctors and psychiatrists and therapists. Just be aware that it will be manipulated by some who like to play the blame game. It's everyone's fault I committed a crime except mine.


In my opinion, every dollar spent on real rehab, i.e. competent medical teams/counselors, and family counseling, would reduce by 4x what we spend incarcerating people. There are figures to this effect, I will find them if anyone follows this thread. There are other major costs to society like recitivism, family support, welfare etc included. We should be able to do better than communist China .......



posted on Feb, 28 2010 @ 09:23 PM
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three strikes is to many if you ask me.

speaking as an american what we need to do is weed out the weaker ones from society and utilize them as a tool rather then a hindrance or a burden. Currently jails are nothing more then warehouses where adults sit in time out like children and learn to kill eachother through brutal jailhouse murders.

One strike should result in immediate sterilization especially people who get DUI's. People who are guilty of that crime hate children and only want to destroy the lives of their loved ones with their problems.

Second strike should be forced labor camp work. This solves the problem of overpopulated jails. While at the same time it makes them useful. For instance inmates could be used for massive urban development projects. It allows them to give something back to the community.

Third strike results in instant death or execution on the streets. Figure by the third time guilty or not it doesnt matter. The person has bad luck and if they do then your doing them a favor by putting them out of their misery.

May sound harsh or cold but all I am doing is typing what everyone else knows is true so dont kill the messenger.

[edit on 28-2-2010 by tigpoppa]



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 04:11 AM
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I believe the OP was from the UK where there are 2,000 violent crimes per 100,000 residents. In the US there are 466 violent crimes per 100,000 residents.

The UK has made a political choice that they would rather subject the citizenry to endemic violent assault than burden themselves with a large prison population. The US has made a political choice that they would rather burden themselves with a large prison population than subject the citizenry to endemic violent assault. Both decisions are perfectly legitimate and simply reflect different national priorities.

It's common knowledge that the streets of British battleground cities like Manchester and Birmingham are virtual war zones. There's no chance you'll get shot - because the population is disarmed, docile and neutered - but you may get stabbed to within an inch of your life (you're twice as likely to be slashed in the UK as you are to be shot in the US). But, they don't have a large prison population!



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 04:28 AM
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The first state in the United States to enact a "three strikes" law was Washington (the state, not the city) in 1993. This was not passed by the legislature but by public referendum initiated by petition, a method of popular legislating not enjoyed by Britons.

Under Washington's law you have to commit three specific crimes from a list of 40* "violent felonies" at which time you're automatically sentenced to life imprisonment. Since the law was enacted in 1993, the violent crime rate droppedfrom 27,040 per year to 21,546 per year. New Zealand is ratifying a variation of this law.

Further, Washington has a "2 strikes" law in which - if you're convicted of 2 felony sexual assaults and are determined by a court-appointed psychologist to be a likely habitual sexual predator, you're confined "indefinitely" to McNeil Island, a prison island in a remote part of Puget Sound. Washington probably doesn't have the rampant pedophilia common to the Windsor inbreds and HMG.

Washington is also the only state left in the US with a working gallows. The current hangman was hired in 1991 but hasn't hanged anyone since 1994. Here's a nice image of the gallows at the state prison in Walla Walla:




[edit on 1-3-2010 by zenser]



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 04:34 AM
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Well I spent a couple of weeks as an inmate at a high security prison, in remand. But I plead guilty and did not receive a prison sentence, so two weeks was all the prison I served.

So I have seen it, been a part of it, and it was not nice.

Hope you can fight, because you are going to get into lots of fights.
No heating in winter, no air conditioning in summer.
The food is crap.
The clothing and bedding is crap.
You mind your own business in prison.
If the guy right next to you gets pack raped by ten other guys, you just ignore it.
Boredom is the problem. Every day is exactly the same.
You don't need to think in prison, you just follow the routine.
You sleep, eat, crap, and shower at the same times.
Everything is provided, you need no motivation to do anything.

After a few years of that, they turn you out back among the public.
Suddenly you need to look after yourself, find a job, make friends, find a place to live. But you have forgotten how.

Easier to just rob someone, get caught, then you go back to the life you know inside.

Not me THANK GOD. But I have seen it, and it ain't pretty.



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 04:40 AM
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If the guy right next to you gets pack raped by ten other guys, you just ignore it.


They don't have to worry about that in British prisons. After all, it's not rape if you enjoy it ...


[edit on 1-3-2010 by zenser]



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 04:54 AM
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Well, where I was the rape occurred before I arrived.

They lined us all up, and about twenty huge screws with truncheons and prison dogs brought out this poor little whimpering rape victim.

Thy marched him along the line and he stopped and pointed out each of the guys that raped him.

Never saw any of them again, they were moved to solitary.

You can laugh, but I can assure you it was really grim awful stuff.



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:06 AM
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reply to post by Silver Shadow
 


I don't doubt it. Humans are, generally but especially more so the peasant classes, sickly oversexed.

I don't believe in capital punishment for murder but rape is a different story. It is the debasement of human spiritual superiority to the level of animals. Rape is the only cataloged crime that is replicated in the animal kingdom. No other crime committed by humans has a parallel in the animal world.

At the pinnacle of this carnival of disgust is anal intercourse. There is no human spiritual tradition that views the penetration of the rectal cavity as anything in the realm of normality. In Buddhism, in fact, the Satya Yuga ended once the proto-humans began sodomizing each other.*

The fact that it occurs within prison walls and - more often than taboos would lend us to believe - beyond those walls among persons otherwise identifying themselves as heterosexual, is evidence of the need for a great cleansing mechanism to descend upon humanity. No such mechanism is forthcoming unless a sufficiently enlightened mortal leader takes power to impose it himself.

Bantu peoples of sub-Saharan Africa - most notably Kenya - are one of the few cultural traditions on this planet that don't embrace anal intercourse in contemporary popular sexual life, even in urban society. Even in the privacy of the bedroom it is most generally looked on with revulsion greater than that in the west. This is probably indicative of the moral superiority of the Bantu people. The recent bill put forth in the Ugandan parliament by MP David Bahati, introducing death as a punishment for anal intercourse in certain circumstances, is probably more evidence of this.

* "The Story of Buddhism", Donald Lopez, p. 19


[edit on 1-3-2010 by zenser]



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:16 AM
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reply to post by zenser
 


In prison at least, it seems to have less to do with sex than just plain violence, viciousness, and domination against the victim.
Rats and packs of dogs are well known to suddenly turn on one of their own group in a sudden violent frenzy.

I agree with you, sodomy is an unnatural act, an abomination.

Sadly many misguided people seem very proud of the gay "alternative" lifestyle.



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:20 AM
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reply to post by Silver Shadow
 


That seems to be the line fronted by psychology. It's not one with which I'd agree.

Sadly many misguided people seem very proud of the gay "alternative" lifestyle.

It would be shortsighted and unfair to blame only the gay community. Anal sex is the taboo to which everyone, heterosexuals included, flock for the fulfillment of untapped sensory desires. The commonality of homosexual intercourse among practicing heterosexuals of Athens, or the increasing popularity of self-penetration today among heterosexual males, I think shows this. It's the sacrifice of the spiritual realm in fulfillment of the physical realm; it leads to a creeping social obsessiveness that stymies general progress among the species as a collective organism.

[edit on 1-3-2010 by zenser]



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:31 AM
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The prison system is broken, has been for decades now, there is no debating that. If it worked, there would be no need for "3 strikes and you're out". Think about it.

So until the time that it gets fixed, assuming that it ever does, here's a novel idea......... STOP BREAKING THE LAW!!!!!!


Kieth Richards said it best- "If there's one thing I hate more than a thief, it's a thief who gets caught".



Peace



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:41 AM
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reply to post by zenser
 


We are straying far off topic Zenser.
So I won't comment further except to say that many mainstream religions make chastity a requirement for true ultimate spiritual enlightenment.



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:44 AM
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reply to post by Silver Shadow
 


That's true and I'm okay with exceptions. For instance, I think the rape of prisoners of war is a justifiable expression of the will of conquest. But, that is a very limited aberration.



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:52 AM
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reply to post by zeddissad
 


I'm from Czech Republic, we have experience with cruel conditions for political inmates

Who cares about that? Česko has fine handguns and finer beer, that's all that matters. Give us your land for our ABM radars and don't worry your pretty little head over anything else.

[edit on 1-3-2010 by zenser]



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 05:57 AM
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The U.S. doesn't just want to tell the rest of the world how to live. We have an pseudo behavior modification or enslavement industry known as the Prison Industrial Complex.

It was rightly setup for the purposes of dealing with & housing serious criminals, & mentally ill but has mutated by including non conformist behaviors that have become labeled as criminal in order to hide the true nature of it and at the same time justify the industry growth.

The prison industrial complex begins to indoctrinate people in school. The smart ones become lawyers & judges, the bullies & smart ex-soldiers become cops, the otherwise nobody's & dumb bottom grade soldiers become jail & prison guards with a few exceptions. All in all they are the easily molded ones who have no clue that they are brainwashed cogs in the wheel of the slave corporation that makes sure there will be a revolving door so their industry can continue to grow while bankrupting most state budgets.

Everything you do in the U.S. has a law attached to it these days. Smoking, talking on the phone while driving, not wearing a seat belt, speeding, recreation drugs are all illegal, not having insurance, not wearing a helmet and on on can all result in fines. You can't in many places drink a beer on the beach, build a fire at the beach, play music on the beach, smoke cigarettes at the beach. Forget about smoking a joint, drinking a bottle of wine or sex on the beach, hell just being at the beach after curfew can get you arrested.

The fines have become in a sense extra taxes, that not only compound if not paid immediately, but can result in the loss of freedom. If you decide to contest a infraction or fine you must check box that obliges you to show up to the hearing. If you should miss that hearing - they will put out a bench warrant that now makes you a pseudo criminal for the action of contesting a fine, but not showing up to contest it.

That results in arrest by cops who actually call themselves good guys while pointing guns at you, bruising your wrists, beating you if necessary and dehumanizing you while just doing their job and don't care whether it's for spiting on the sidewalk or murder - it's all the same to them. They will process you whether you're cooperate or not and they will kill you if you resist the enslavement process.

It is America's little secret slavery, yet even most the people in the courts and prisons don't even realize what they're part of. They call it corrections, but half the prisoners don't even need correcting - it's the system that needs it.

The 3 strikes law is just another overlapping tool to give people longer sentences. While their is a list of supposed more serious crimes - they can manipulate something as simple as shoplifting (not a 3rd strike offense) a carton cigarettes into a robbery (a 3rd strike offense) if a store employee attempts to physically stop the shoplifter and the shoplifter resist.

So, yes it is possible to go to prison for life for stealing a loaf of bread and a pack of cigarettes if you have two strikes.

[edit on 1-3-2010 by verylowfrequency]



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 06:06 AM
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Originally posted by zeddissad
reply to post by Koyaanisqatsi
 


Something rotten is then somewhere. I'm from Czech Republic, we have experience with cruel conditions for political inmates - but what I see now in US is probably worse than Michel Foucault's night mares. Combination of panopticon and ancient slave regime. Kafka would be satisfied ... (BTW he spent one winter because of his TB in nearby village where I live know)
What is quite compelling: most of (IMO) US posters even on ATS defend US prison industry. I never though brainwashing could be so powerful. I was trained in "reading between the lines" from my childhood, I knew that I need to think freely but I have not to spoke freely - I'll never ever believe that any administration have "good intentions" with "we the people". I was born to cruel and absurd world and I know it - call me paranoid if you want. The term "prison industry" is self explaining.
I'm not disputing your view Koyaanisqatsi, I'm using your post as starting ground. The question is: why in "democratic" country with 300M inhabitants are more people in jail then in "communists" Chine with 1.000M+ inhabitants?

EDIT to add:
I almost sleep know, but I'll return to your link tomorrow. This area is quite important for me because lot of "right wing" politicians here in CZ push things to US model - being it jails or health care. There is no more "American dream" for me, it is American nightmare.

[edit on 9-2-2010 by zeddissad]


WOW - how many people on ATS could reference Benthams Panopticon and Kafka - nice. Impressed. Then again you're a European.........

Michels thesis on Punishment is indeed interesting relative to America - So is Dostoyivski.

The issues regarding America are truly depressing - here are my thoughts.

The US declared almost 20 years ago (in fact right around Fukiyamas famous quote - regarding history - zeddisad ?!!) - Dick Cheney declared that the US's number one threat was China - and in many ways it has been sine the end of the Tea Wars - history eh.

The gaol has been to set up a system which will be able to compete with China - and that is simply a level playing field in the western labor market - make no mistake thats what it is about. It is the ultimate class war for western citizens as we are forced to compete with china - we will all be driven into the ground in a race to the bottom - while a new super elite transnational globalists will rule over a new transnational feudal system.

The prison population is definitely part of this agenda.

I can see some very serious class wars in the next decade - oil is going to strike a particularly bad tone - we need a clean energy break asap.



posted on Mar, 1 2010 @ 06:08 AM
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reply to post by audas
 


I can see some very serious class wars in the next decade

Since you like literature ...

"When you reach up with your strong hands to seizes our palaces and our purpled ease, we will show you what true strength is ... in the roar of shell and shrapnel and the whine of machine guns will our answer be couched. We will crush you down under our heel and we will walk over your faces." (Jack London didn't just write nature books!)



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