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Solitary Confinement Is Cruel and All Too Common
- ianstallings 11y agoAnother thing not mentioned in the article is the fact that a lot of small jails in the US have instituted a 23-hour lockdown policy, similar to super max prisons. So now socializing and free time out of your cell is rare, and lockup is the norm. I don't think they truly care too much about rehabilitation, so much as they care about control. Just my humble opinion.
- Loughla 11y agoWhen you have a building designed for 500 people, and hold 750 every day, you do what you have to to avoid large-scale violence. I'm not saying I agree with it, I'm just saying why it exists. Prison overcrowding is a thing across the US.
- minthd 11y agoEven with such limitations to prevent violence, it's extremely easy and cheap, today, in the digital age, to enable communication between prisoners.
- ianstallings 11y agoYes that's exactly why, and I do have empathy for the situation. That's why I mentioned the control part. I don't mean that they would rather be oppressive than help. What I really mean is they simply don't have time or money to worry about what happens to these people, because just maintaining control is hard enough. Just keeping the prisoners safe, while keeping yourself, and society safe also, is a very tough job.
- esturk 11y ago"California will end indefinite solitary sentences. In all, the reforms are expected to reduce the state’s solitary population, which is now over 2,800, by more than half." So they only ended indefinite solitary sentences. The definite sentences will stay. The main issue this opinion column raises is that it took several hundreds of inmates to form a class action for the change to take effective. The settlement will mean that the issue isn't being ruled as 'cruel or unusual punishment' so there's very little change that is making through the court system in the country.
- baldfat 11y agoWhat do they do with the supermax prisons where all the inmates are in solitary confinement. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermax_prison https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermax_prison Just to be blown away read the population in one supermax in Colorado. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADX_Florence#Notable_current_inmates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADX_Florence#Notable_current_i... Scary.
- robwilliams 11y agoWhat's scarier is who's inside the prison.
- baldfat 11y agoThat was my point sorry :)
- GordonS 11y ago> When the suit was filed in 2012, 500 of these inmates had been held for more than 10 years in tiny, windowless cells with virtually no human contact That is just... horrifying... evil even. 10 years in solitary confinement... it's just unthinkable what that would do to someone
- awicklander 11y agoAnd just won the appeal in 2015. So 13 years. Alone.
- mason240 11y agoIf they are not in solitary confinement, they are being confined with other people. Would you want to be the confined with someone who has a history of being violent with his cell mates?
- GordonS 11y agoThe only 2 choices shouldn't be solitary confinement or being beaten/raped/murdered by fellow inmates. I would have thought that surely most inmates would just want to get their head down and serve out their sentence?
- mason240 11y agoAnd that's why most inmates are not in solitary confinement. You are not understanding my comment. If the violent inmates are not solitary, they are in a cell with YOU. Do you want them in a cell with you, or in solitary?
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- knodi123 11y agoExtreme false dichotomy. Most people in prison are not violent psychopaths eager to murder anyone they can get their fingers on.
- AndrewKemendo 11y agoI wonder if I am an outlier in that I have a massive paranoia about being thrown into jail randomly because of being in the wrong place at the wrong time or cops executing a warrant on the wrong house. Maybe it's because I am mixed race and grew up in a poor minority neighborhood but it seems like the system is just eager and waiting to put everyone in it. Kind of like a low grade terror all the time.
- theseatoms 11y agoHave you read 'The Trial' by Kafka? Maybe you shouldn't, but it's a good read.
- cven714 11y agoReminds me of the intro to Brazil: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSQ5EsbT4cE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSQ5EsbT4cE
- jonlucc 11y agoI started thinking about this a lot while listening to the last season of Serial. At times, there is enough doubt in the case to think that he might have been just a high school boy who's girlfriend was heinously murdered. Then, next thing you know, he's being arrested and the state is demanding that he account for his whereabouts 6 weeks ago.
- astazangasta 11y agoI recently went to traffic court where i watched a young central American man get funneled into providing the state with free labor, merely because he was vulnerable and the opportunity was there. Our judicial system is for chewing up poor people. But it was ever thus; high-minded notions of justice cannot be carried by bureaucrats.
- thesagan 11y agoI noticed the same thing one time in a very similar circumstance. One guy after another being assigned to state work that very day.
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- azraomega 11y agoWhy am I hearing different stories? Some feel like prisoners are being treated too well, some feel like they are being mistreated... and isn't the fact being in a prison with all your freedom being taken away is cruel and all too usual, too? I'm so confused about this discussion.
- happyscrappy 11y agoThere is a common trope on HN that the cop is the perp and the perp is the victim. I am not sure where that leaves the actual victim.
- rmxt 11y agoIt takes but a minimal grasp of nuance to see that someone forced to have no human contact for 10 years can be both a victim and a convicted criminal at the same time.
- happyscrappy 11y agoSure, the murdered and the murderer are both victims but there is the question of degree.
- venomsnake 11y agoWhy prison then. If we go cruel - at least make it short? 50 hits with a whip and let him go if he is mentally fine.
- Brian-Puccio 11y agoMy theory is that if I see someone's arm being broken as a form of punishment, the pain and suffering is readily visible, which triggers a sort of empathetic reaction. But if I see someone in a windowless room by themselves, it's easy to dismiss that as "not so bad". I could even rationalize is and say "I'm an introvert and like quiet" or "general population is probably less safe, this would be better for me". There is no understanding of what it is like to spend weeks (which would do me in, let alone months or years) locked in a cage with no natural light, no calendar, a light that is never turned off and no conversation with anyone else. Similarly, I've heard and read many people claim waterboarding isn't torture because "all they need to do is hold their breath, they should rationalize to themselves that the captors aren't actually trying to drown them". I believe solitary confinement is cruel because of the psychological effect and shouldn't be used as it is today for the same reasons I think mock executions shouldn't be either. (Sure, you don't kill the person, but you're still psychologically torturing them.) If you don't believe that humans are social animals and need to interact with other humans on a regular basis, read about feral children [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feral_child https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feral_child
- pluma 11y agoSolitary confinement is a form of torture. But of course there is no torture in the US. If the US does it, it can't be torture.
- jes 11y agoNot saying you are wrong, but here's a different perspective: http://www.hermitary.com/solitude/nietzsche.html http://www.hermitary.com/solitude/nietzsche.html
- steve-howard 11y agoFrom the conclusion: >Nietzsche is a complex and provocative thinker, but he is a clear advocate of the role of solitude in every level of human activity, from philosophical and psychological to creative and societal. Can't do any of those in solitary confinement. Solitude you choose is quite different than being locked in a small room indefinitely.
- sumitviii 11y agoNietzsche's concept of solitude has freedom. If you feel like you are going insane, you can talk to real people. You can read books.
- nnq 11y agoAm I in minority to be the kind of person that would prefer serving something like a 1-5 years sentence in solitary instead of a regular american prison (Yeah, probably at a 5 years limit or something like that it would be too much and it be psychologically impossible for you to come back to society...)
- s_kilk 11y agoI take it you've never been to solitary then? There's a reason even the most hardened criminals quake with fear at the notion of being put in "The Hole". Isolation grinds away at your mind until you fall apart. At least in gen-pop you can find someone to talk to, even if they may try to kill you when you turn away.
- omginternets 11y agoRespectfully, this is spoken like someone who doesn't realize what solitary confinement actually entails, nor is familiar with the rich body of literature on the subject. Suggested reading: [1] http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/abs/10.1176/ajp.140.11.1450 http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/abs/10.1176/ajp.140.11.1... [2] http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/016025278690083X/pdf?md5=90c889c6110e1d47abf870989df10e82&pid=1-s2.0-016025278690083X-main.pdf http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/01602527869... [3] http://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1362&context=law_journal_law_policy http://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article... [4] http://www.jaapl.org/content/38/1/104.short http://www.jaapl.org/content/38/1/104.short
- dec0dedab0de 11y agoI new someone who was in jail for a short period, and they put him in solitary solely for his protection. He was grateful for it, but I don't think it was the same kind of solitary.
- forgetsusername 11y ago>I'm so confused about this discussion. Frontline has a great documentary about solitary confinement: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/locked-up-in-america/ http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/locked-up-in-america... Without giving too much away: watch as the criminals they feature walk into solitary confinement with sentences of weeks or months with the attitude of, "This is nothing. I'd prefer it here". Witness what it does to them.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- morisy 11y agoFor those looking for more, there's a lot of data and reporting on prison privatization, and its impact on policies like solitary confinement, up here: https://www.muckrock.com/project/the-private-prison-project-8/ https://www.muckrock.com/project/the-private-prison-project-...
- a3voices 11y agoI don't think solitary would be that bad with Internet access and TV. Maybe the problem isn't solitary but that they don't get these things. Also I would prefer not to have a cellmate in prison.
- gadrfgaesgysd 11y agoInternet gives you a way to communicate. For some it is the main way of doing so, they function normally( more or less ), and they aren't even in prison. It would go against their "policy" of isolating prisoners, however unsuccessful it is at rehabilitation.
- tired_man 11y agoWithout any agenda, I suggest you research why some prisoners are in permanent isolation. A large percentage of them are there because they assault/murder other inmates or guards.
- aw3c2 11y agoA cage with bars would be better than isolation.
- tveita 11y agohttp://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/10/solitary-confinement-shane-bauer http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/10/solitary-confine... "four years ago Pennington was "validated" by prison staff as an associate of a prison gang (one formed on the inside, as opposed to a street gang). That's the reason he and thousands of others are in the SHU with no exit date." "Gang evidence comes in countless forms. Possession of Machiavelli's The Prince, Robert Greene's The 48 Laws of Power, or Sun Tzu's The Art of War has been invoked as evidence. One inmate's validation includes a Christmas card with stars drawn on it—alleged gang symbols—among Hershey's Kisses and a candy cane. Another included a poetry booklet the inmate had coauthored with a validated BGF member. One poem reflected on what it was like to feel human touch after 14 years and another warned against spreading HIV. The only reference to violence was the line, "this senseless dying gotta end."" "THE DECISION to put a man in solitary indefinitely is made at internal hearings that last, prisoners say, about 20 minutes. They are closed-door affairs. CDCR told me I couldn't witness one. No one can." "At one point he initiated a hunger strike that involved 120 inmates. Two days later, he was put in ad-seg for "conspiracy to assault staff." The claim was based on confidential information that the person in charge of reviewing ad-seg assignments later found did not exist; it couldn't be found anywhere in his file. He spent a year in isolation." e: to state the point explicitly, few conclusions can be drawn from the official records because the standard of evidence is near zero, the guards can write anything they like, and they do.
- imauld 11y agoThe US is a country in which there are people and companies profiting off of the imprisonment of human beings. So I wouldn't expect this to change completely for the better for quite some time.
- Lawtonfogle 11y agoThe 13th amendment allows for slavery if a person has been convicted of a crime. It makes a lot of sense when you consider prison, especially America's take on it, just a continuation of slavery.
- necessity 11y agoWho do you consider should pay for the food and shelter of criminals? Their victims - society? IMO themselves, through labor, forced if necessary. If that's what you're talking about.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoSociety should pay. Society has a responsibility to treat everyone - even the lowest of the low - with basic dignity. Society has a responsibility to reintegrate and readjust those it has failed.
- ManFromUranus 11y agoPeople also have a responsibility to Society, they should not steal murder, or any number of other criminal actions. >Society has a responsibility to reintegrate and readjust those it has failed Where is the accountability in your world? If I pistol whip somebody in the face and take their wallet, then it sounds like (by your logic) that society has failed that person, rather than that person failed to abide by the shared social contract (to not engage in criminal behavior).
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoCreating people who are willing to perform such actions would suggest society has failed, yes.
- Lawtonfogle 11y ago>People also have a responsibility to Society, they should not steal murder, or any number of other criminal actions. How many are in prison for non-violent actions that harm none but themselves?
- m0v_eax 11y agoSolitary confinement is a violation of international human rights and should be treated accordingly.
- dharmach 11y agoMay be solitary confinement should replace capital punishment.
- hwstar 11y agoThis is what probably will happen in the southern states if capital punishment is found to be unconstitutional again. The people in power in the south believe that prison time never rehabilitates, and prison's sole purpose is to punish. If the death penalty option is taken away, they'll try to make prison life as difficult as possible for people convicted of capital murder.
- wfo 11y agoThis isn't people in the south who believe this, it's most people across the US who are involved in the non-defense side of the CJ system. And they believe it doesn't rehabilitate because it's a fact that it doesn't, the only fault we can find with them is that they believe it shouldn't.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoIf prison is for punishment, then this makes sense: solitary confinement is a punishment worse than death.
- csn 11y agoDeath sentence is considered harsher than imprisonment for life, right? It includes paying for your crimes with all your time and your existance. What if, in the future, it becomes possible to serve a x year sentence in a chemically induced coma or such, in a way taking away your existance too temporarily? Wouldn't that be a milder punishment because the element of "serving time" is no longer there?
- davelnewton 11y agoTime still passes when you're in a coma, you're just not aware of it.
- csn 11y agoOf course time passes. My point was that in a way, in that situation you are paying with your time and your existance, as opposed to a "normal" imprisonment where you only pay with your time. I also meant to raise the question whether the loss of your existance holds a higher value than your awareness of time served as a crime-paying currency.
- davelnewton 11y agoI'd rather be in solitary than suddenly wake up and find that the world, and I, had aged 40 years. IMO that's more cruel, but obviously that's an opinion.
- user_unknown 11y agoLike in 'Demolition man', only that there it also have its drawbacks.
- monochromatic 11y agoIt seems like that would take away any rehabilitative effect prison might have. Convicted of a crime, go to sleep, wake up ready to continue committing crimes.
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- shawn-butler 11y agoI don't often make these comments and trust the filtering to work but I really fail to understand why this is on HN front page. It has no technology or startup confluences or flavor. It is not even a factual story but an "editorial" opinion piece with zero information content.
- wpietri 11y ago"On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity." -- https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- sixothree 11y agoI think this community has a particular eye for injustice and depravity of accepted norms.
- musername 11y agoThe spread of this opinion has an upstart attitude to it. There might be a profit to be made in raising donations, or otherwise awareness, for the cause.
- mc32 11y agoI'm glad as a society we're starting to look at how we deter crime and how we manage convicted criminals. I hope we learn to not only take people who are danger to society out of circulation, but once incarcerated work to have them become useful when they reenter the general population. For too long it has resembled third world punishment models. The objective should be mainly to improve safety and to that end reeducate, reform, inculcate, etc. in order to make reentry viable. That said, if it's useful to monitor electronically to ensure compliance, I'm okay since breaking social norms come with consequences like incarceration, and reform, etc then electronic monitoring during the probatory period. But we should put great effort into making those people useful, rather than the traditional outcasts we've made them to be post release.
- jordanpg 11y agoDoes anyone seriously doubt that the use of prolonged solitary confinement will be listed in the history books alongside other examples of state-sponsored torture, slavery, and terrorism? I'm not going to make any cliched remarks about karma here, but the United States will have to deal with the consequences of its actions eventually. Ironically, our own history books are filled with such redemption stories, which forms the basis of the ludicrous exceptionalism that so infects rational discourse about most anything these days.
- vinceguidry 11y agoI would be interested in seeing the Supreme Court's rationale that solitary confinement constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. The four principles guiding the court are as follows from Wikipedia: The "essential predicate" is "that a punishment must not by its severity be degrading to human dignity," especially torture. "A severe punishment that is obviously inflicted in wholly arbitrary fashion." "A severe punishment that is clearly and totally rejected throughout society." "A severe punishment that is patently unnecessary." The Eighth Amendment was copied virtually verbatim from the English Bill of Rights and wasn't actually used to proclaim a particular punishment was unconstitutional until 1910, 119 years after the American Bill of Rights was ratified. Since then, the principles of "proportionality" and "evolving standards of decency" are evolving to ascertain constitutionality questions. Neither principle appears to do the trick. Of the four principles above, only the first seems to apply. So the Court will have to declare that solitary confinement is torture in order to stop its widespread use. As seen, the Court has historically been cautious in declaring punishments unconstitutional, waiting until the battle has already been mostly fought in the sphere of public opinion. Given the stances the Court has taken concerning the death penalty, I predict that no sweeping, immediate prohibitions will take place, rather the Court will apply largely ineffectual provisions to the imposition of solitary confinement. For example, the Court has ruled in 2002 that capital punishment is constitutionally cruel and unusual when applied to inmates with intellectual disabilities. Georgia promptly responded by making it virtually impossible to obtain a judgment.