this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2024
39 points (86.8% liked)
Asklemmy
43890 readers
766 users here now
A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions
Search asklemmy π
If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!
- Open-ended question
- Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
- Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
- Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
- An actual topic of discussion
Looking for support?
Looking for a community?
- Lemmyverse: community search
- sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
- [email protected]: a community for finding communities
~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_[email protected]~
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Id say: prisons dont work, cost a lot and does huge damage. They also often work as a gateway to heavier crime. I dont need a replacement for that. "Nothing" would still be an improvement. This is the short answer
When that is said, what do we do about crime? Id say that depends, what kind of crime? There are so many different motivations for doing crime, there should be just as many solutions: removing poverty, proper sex education, confiscating the money from the rich, remove the reasons people are doing crime in the first place
We also do a lot of alternatives today: fines, mental hospitals, community service, guidance, conflict counseling, anger management courses, sometimes a serious conversation with the police, childcare help, detox institutions, and a lot more
They have three things in common: they work, they are a lot cheaper and they dont for the same mental damage as torture/prison
And then there are those under 1% og criminals that is totally lost, that need to be locked up. But only until we get a society where they dont get lost..
If those are valid substitutes for prison and they do exist, then why does prison still get the bulk of the offenders? Iβm all for your idea but reality seems to be proving those solutions do not apply to most cases of criminal justice
What reality? Prisons doesnt work. Even just abolishing them without alternatives would be better for solving crime Why prisons get the bulk of the offenders? Light be something wrong with the system then. Just like how tons of people starve to death each day while EU and USA burns food to keep high prices Something happening of not a good reason to continue doing it
I his whole idea is awfully reminiscent of a certain political party insisting ACA is bad and needs to be repealed? Why? Itβs bad? What are you going to do instead? We have a concept.
Iβm not necessarily disagreeing with the idea but yes there needs to be something do do with criminal offenders as either punishment or protecting civilization from repeat offenders. There needs to be some way for offenders to regret their actions or some opportunity to re-think their choices. Reforming civilization to address those who are in actual need is the first step, as is redirecting away from prison where you can, but itβs nowhere near sufficient. Way too many criminals are actual criminals
I almost feel like I'm being contrarian by asking this, though it isn't my intent: your alternatives sound great at first blush, but how do you intend that those alternatives are enforced? Does that lead into your estimated >1% of offenders?
These are not really my alternatives, but common solutions where I live. They are usually enforced through the police or in a court system where they base it on stuff like what you have done, what your intensions are, where you are in life, and what you yourself think will help you to not repeat your crimes It is not perfect, parties that pretend to be tuff on criminals are undermining it for cheap votes, and way too many still go to prison. But it is an alternative that works and that rehabilitate people without hurting them I wish we could go the opposite way