Permanent Lockdown: Torture?

Antithesis · 02-01-2007, 04:44 PM

It's stuff like this that makes me wonder if life is crueller than death.

Are Prisons Driving Prisoners Mad? -- Friday, Jan. 26, 2007 -- Page 1 -- TIME

tristanrobin · 02-01-2007, 04:51 PM

I have always asserted that life in a maximum prison is far worse than the death penalty.

The one thing the article doesn't address is how many of these prisoners went INTO the system with serious mental afflictions. It's not as if super-max is driving ALL of them mad - some of them went IN that way.

chrisg967 · 02-01-2007, 06:18 PM

Hm... define mental affliction. One person in the article was quoted as saying,

Quote:

"We have to ask ourselves why we're doing this," says psychiatrist Stuart Grassian, a former faculty member at the Harvard Medical School and a consultant in criminal cases. "These aren't a bunch of cold, controlled James Cagneys. We're taking criminals who are already unstable and driving them crazy."

(emphasis mine)

And the last paragraph:

Quote:

Part of the reason we build prisons at all has always been the retributive urge. Those who do very bad things while they walk among us should lead very hard lives after they have been removed. That makes a lot of emotional sense. Whether it always makes practical sense is something else entirely.

So, if we follow the dictum of the Seven Habits of Effective People, and begin with the end in mind, what end do we have in mind???

sgtdmski · 11-11-2007, 04:29 AM

So, the Death Penalty is cruel and unusual, and now it seems that the next harshest penalty will soon be challenged as such, what's next? Is not all forms of confinement in some way cruel and unusual????

Get for real. We have as a society so bent over backwards to make confinement of criminals comfortable. We provide meals, healthcare, cable TV, education, workout equipment, and God forbid we overcrowd the system.

Before long the will be no prisons, let the criminals roam free.

dmk

pensacola_niceman · 11-11-2007, 07:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sgtdmski

So, the Death Penalty is cruel and unusual, and now it seems that the next harshest penalty will soon be challenged as such, what's next? Is not all forms of confinement in some way cruel and unusual????

Get for real. We have as a society so bent over backwards to make confinement of criminals comfortable. We provide meals, healthcare, cable TV, education, workout equipment, and God forbid we overcrowd the system.

Before long the will be no prisons, let the criminals roam free.

dmk

Just kill them - all violent offenders, rapists, and murders. And, don't take 20 fucking years of appeals and stays of execution to do it.

garysher · 11-11-2007, 04:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pensacola_niceman

Just kill them - all violent offenders, rapists, and murders. And, don't take 20 fucking years of appeals and stays of execution to do it.

See how the Iraq experience is affecting you already??

fxashun · 11-11-2007, 04:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by garysher

See how the Iraq experience is affecting you already??

I too have noticed a change. It's eerie.

pensacola_niceman · 11-12-2007, 08:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by garysher

See how the Iraq experience is affecting you already??

I felt that way before I came to Iraq. Maybe I'm just expressing it a bit more freely now.

waitingtables · 11-12-2007, 11:17 AM

There are plenty of people who are declared insane and not competent to stand trial, that are locked up forever in hospitals anyway. I honestly don't care if someone in jail for life goes crazy or not, as long as they can't get out. Maybe solitary lockdown seems cruel, but it is far less cruel than killing, raping or assaulting someone. I don't believe in the death penalty, period. But I have no problem with locking up killers and never letting them see the light of day again.

pensacola_niceman · 11-12-2007, 11:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by waitingtables

There are plenty of people who are declared insane and not competent to stand trial, that are locked up forever in hospitals anyway. I honestly don't care if someone in jail for life goes crazy or not, as long as they can't get out. Maybe solitary lockdown seems cruel, but it is far less cruel than killing, raping or assaulting someone. I don't believe in the death penalty, period. But I have no problem with locking up killers and never letting them see the light of day again.

Very nice. You don't believe in the death penalty, but you are in favor of giving criminals a fate worse than death. Your so-called compassion has clouded your judgement.