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For an article about "lateral thinking" and "going back to first principles", the basic tenet of locking people in a room hasn't really been questioned - this w

For an article about "lateral thinking" and "going back to first principles", the basic tenet of locking people in a room hasn't really been questioned - this whole thing is thinking within the box, almost literally. Geofencing, tagging and monitoring all play a role today in people serving time in the community: the only reason we don't go further is society's need for safety. If behaviour analysis could reliably predict someone going off the rails, if biochemical analysis could measure an addict's ability to kick their drug of choice, etc. etc. then you don't need the box in the first place.

bluejekyll 11y ago
Agree. And there's lots of research to show this: https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=122570 https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=1225... I have an idea, maybe totally crazy, but what if we forced the communities that sentence someone to bear the entire cost for incarcerating the individuals. This would force those communities to rethink where they are allocating money because they would not be able to afford to imprison so many people. Basically, lock 'em up and throw away the key wouldn't be an option. On top of that, it might encourage pushing money to the deeper root issues which is fair education opportunities for everyon, and sustainable living situations that allow children to thrive. Back to this article, no matter how awesome, I don't think VR can out perform real human interaction, but it might actually be better than the current situation. Edit: agree with the problem that this would punish the very community that needs more help. But, what I want to figure out is, what should be the method to discourage prison and encourage in-community rehabilitation? (Under the assumption that this is both more cost and rehab effective, and less disruptive to already stressed families)
- bfstein 11y ago
  So poor communities--where crime is naturally higher in the first place--should be less well-equipped to incarcerate their own bad actors? I don't think that logic holds.
  - bluejekyll 11y ago
    Perhaps it would look that way initially, but wouldn't we then be forced to really confront the issue? I'm open to other ideas, but right now the way I see it is there is no negative impact on the courts today when they sentence people. There is nothing for one the judge to think about the total cost to the community when putting people in jail for 20 years.
- shiftpgdn 11y ago
  You would be punishing communities that need help the most. Crime is usually (but not always) a result of poor broken communities, schools, etc.

bluejekyll 11y ago

Agree. And there's lots of research to show this: https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=122570 https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=1225... I have an idea, maybe totally crazy, but what if we forced the communities that sentence someone to bear the entire cost for incarcerating the individuals. This would force those communities to rethink where they are allocating money because they would not be able to afford to imprison so many people. Basically, lock 'em up and throw away the key wouldn't be an option. On top of that, it might encourage pushing money to the deeper root issues which is fair education opportunities for everyon, and sustainable living situations that allow children to thrive. Back to this article, no matter how awesome, I don't think VR can out perform real human interaction, but it might actually be better than the current situation. Edit: agree with the problem that this would punish the very community that needs more help. But, what I want to figure out is, what should be the method to discourage prison and encourage in-community rehabilitation? (Under the assumption that this is both more cost and rehab effective, and less disruptive to already stressed families)

bfstein 11y ago
So poor communities--where crime is naturally higher in the first place--should be less well-equipped to incarcerate their own bad actors? I don't think that logic holds.
- bluejekyll 11y ago
  Perhaps it would look that way initially, but wouldn't we then be forced to really confront the issue? I'm open to other ideas, but right now the way I see it is there is no negative impact on the courts today when they sentence people. There is nothing for one the judge to think about the total cost to the community when putting people in jail for 20 years.
shiftpgdn 11y ago
You would be punishing communities that need help the most. Crime is usually (but not always) a result of poor broken communities, schools, etc.