>The reason I raised this issue is that solitary confinement in this circumstance, for a kid who clearly has shown some remorse and insight, and is a product of

>The reason I raised this issue is that solitary confinement in this circumstance, for a kid who clearly has shown some remorse and insight, and is a product of bad circumstances, doesn't seem very advanced. True: it's _barbaric_, the complete opposite of advanced. However, this also highlights that a nation can be advanced in some areas, yet backward in others - and in fact I would argue this is necessarily the case for all countries, all the time, because the standard of being advanced in all areas all the time is an impossibly high bar. Is the US an advanced nation? It's hard to argue against that: it has put people on the moon, invented the microchip, etc. And apart from technological advancement it has championed social ideas that are (or were) very different from much of the rest of the world, yet are arguably for the best: a government without a king, uncompromising free speech, etc. But it's also a hard, harsh, uncaring country, inhabited by people that seem to have forgotten the word 'compromise', where a minor medical problem can cripple you for life (medically and financially), where a minor misdemeanor can mean life in prison. Its prison system is indeed a great example of that. I can only hope that it isn't 'advanced' in these areas; that the rest of the world will not eventually grow into the same state. Ultimately, the two of us are having a completely different discussion. I'm simply pointing out that the author of the article is simply lying for dramatic effect when he says no other advanced nations use solitary confinement as a punishment; that he uses the word 'advanced' to hide behind in case someone looks on wikipedia for five seconds and finds out he is wrong. I don't really care about the word 'advanced', or what it means: he could have said "no other countries that have the color blue in their flag use solitary confinement as a punishment", as (to me) it would have had the exact same meaning. You, OTOH, see an opportunity to advance the general state of affairs in the US. I agree that ending some of its more barbaric practices would be a good idea, but I'm not in a position to help, seeing as how I'm a citizen of another country, located on another continent. I don't have a congressman that I can write to, nor the ability to cast any vote in a relevant election. So I can only root for you, and hope you succeed in reforming the US prison system.