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The dominant mindset these days is that prison should be about rehabilitation, not punishment. It sounds wonderful and unobjectionable on its surface. But it is

The dominant mindset these days is that prison should be about rehabilitation, not punishment. It sounds wonderful and unobjectionable on its surface. But it is wrong. Not entirely wrong, but wrong nonetheless. Because prison also serves as a risk reduction measure for the general public. While I do want our justice system to try its hardest to rehabilitate people, I hold the abhorrently unpopular opinion that some portion of the population just needs to be kept away from the rest. I hear plenty of local news stories about a suspect who has 20+ prior offenses being let go from custody awaiting trial. Why in the world do we let people with such a track record out of jail, much less with no cash bail?

joshuamorton 5y ago
You're simplifying the opposing position in a way that isn't fully honest. There are at least four purposes incarceration can serve: rehabilitation, retribution, dissuasion, and separation. Rehabilitation meaning, giving people the tools and resources to avoid recidivism. Retribution being, punishment or justice for the benefit of the victim. Separation being physical removal of people incompatible or dangerous to society. Dissuasion being what you describe, punishment that rational actors will take into account when deciding to take an action. Pro-rehabilitation people argue that rehabilitation should be the first priority, and retribution the last, with separation there when necessary (think: life sentences for people who murder without remorse) and dissuasion somewhere in the middle. Compare prison to something like an inpatient addiction recovery center, which aims to rehabilitate and separate (although sort of in the reverse way) and how much more constructive that is. I don't think there's very many people at all (even among like hardcore prison abolitionists) who believe that it's possible to entirely do away with some form of separation of people who are dangerously incompatible with the norms of society. If nothing else, mentally ill people who can exhibit violent behaviors will continue to exist. All that said, your comment also has very little to do with murder rates. Those don't really correlate a lot with petty crime or even petty violent crime. Someone who makes a living breaking into cars doesn't suddenly jump to murder.
maxmcd 5y ago
The United States has the largest prison population in the world and the highest incarceration rate. Every time there is a crime thread on HN it is full of anecdotal stories about how we can be tougher on crime. It boggles my mind that this is the accepted framing. You're not going to "see" the lives that wasted in prisons that would have been reasonably rehabilitated in other countries. You would have to think the criminal justice system in the united states is extremely fair and that we have a dramatically different population to place such a high priority on the people that are possibly victims of crimes over people that are inappropriately incarcerated.
- darawk 5y ago
  It's almost as though the framing of "tougher" vs "softer" is a ridiculous over-simplification of the matter. We should be tougher on violent crime and softer on non-violent crime. EDIT: I want to amend this to say that even the increase in nuance that I just suggested is probably not nuanced enough. Some kinds of violent crime we are probably too harsh on, and some kinds of non-violent crime (e.g. serious white collar financial crime, or certain types of safety/environmental violations at scale) we could probably stand to be a bit harsher on.
  - scarmig 5y ago
    Severity of punishment isn't the best way to disincentivize crime. If you have two justice regimes, one where 50% is caught and punished and the other where 25% is but punishment is twice as harsh, the former will be far more effective at decreasing crime. (Mostly) abolish prisons, and put tons of police officers into the community.
    - darawk 5y ago
      You're absolutely right. But deterrence isn't the only issue of importance. We do want to select punishments that deter. But we also simply want to separate incorrigible offenders from society. Every year a murderer is locked up is a year they aren't killing anyone (except maybe other prisoners). I agree that increasing the probability of getting caught is good too, though.
koboll 5y ago
>prison should be about rehabilitation, not punishment It should. But simply letting people out is neither.
iknowstuff 5y ago
1. The US has the most incarcerated people per capita in OECD 2. US prisons seem to be awful. They should be about rehabilitation, but they are focused on punishment. 3. Because of point 2, we are reluctant to imprison some offenders, in fear of destroying their lives and chances of rehabilitation. 4. The cash bail system is not the norm across the world. It is weird to only jail people who can't afford to pay. Are there any attempts to copy Norway's Halden prison in the US?
- xtracto 5y ago
  > 2. US prisons seem to be awful. They should be about rehabilitation, but they are focused on punishment. Just the other day I watched a video of an interview of an American person who spent time in a prison here in Mexico. He described American prison as "a hotel" when compared to Mexican prisons. There is a really good documentary about a prison in Tijuana [1] showing an example of that. My point being that prisons in the USA are actually quite good, compared to most prisons in the world. That doesn't make them acceptable. The problem is that the general idea of the prison system in the world just doesn't seem to be working. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqi4ZpR2OWI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqi4ZpR2OWI
- baybal2 5y ago
  > 1. The US has the most incarcerated people per capita in OECD But Russia (a suspended OECD member) beats it for a total number of people who been through the prison system. 10%+ of men to be exact.
valdiorn 5y ago
Prisons serve 4 roles; rehabilitation, punishment, deterrent and public safety. How you balance these is done differently in many countries. The US seems to historically have focused on the punishment aspect most of all. I'd say deterrent and then rehabilitation are the main ones in the UK. In Scandinavia it's mostly about rehabilitation and public safety, with punishment being almost non-existent.
- ericmcer 5y ago
  Do they have any kind of therapeutic role for the victims of violent crime? I know revenge is petty but if someone hurt me badly or killed a member of my family it would be a bit of a kick in the teeth for our societies main concern to be how best to rehabilitate them.
aaomidi 5y ago
It's wrong when you focus ONLY on prisons. That's the thing people miss from the conversations. Those who want to abolish police and prisons aren't just saying shut them down and we're all good. They're saying shut them down and spend money in directly increasing the quality of life for people. Crimes increase as poverty and class divide increases. Decrease those and you've actually managed to solve the source of the problem, rather than trying to find a solution for the consequence (increase in violent crimes).
- AuryGlenz 5y ago
  Alternatively, people that aren’t intelligent and/or have impulsivity issues have a hard time holding down jobs - and those people very well might still commit crimes even after throwing money at them. A classmate of mine had a successful tile laying business. He got on meth. He put cameras in people’s homes. He stole things. He then tied up a girl and raped her all night.
  - aaomidi 5y ago
    "people that aren’t intelligent and/or have impulsivity issues have a hard time holding down jobs" So why does the US have more of this? All of these descriptions ignore that America is seemingly the worst place out of everywhere for this? Why?
    - s1artibartfast 5y ago
      Poor broken families & communities with low education and few options generate large numbers of such people. A simple look at the background of violent offenders shows this. This is partially an economic problem, but also has social roots with multigenerational feedback loops. >50% of violent offenders were physically abused, raped, or neglected by parents. Many were unwanted or abandoned by one or more parents.
    - Zababa 5y ago
      I would guess it's the long-term consequences of the slave trade/labor and the inequalities that stems from it. America isn't the worst place, but it's the worst "first world country", and first world countries usually don't have that history.
AuryGlenz 5y ago
I’ll back up your unpopular opinion and say we should have a new Australia. Some people are never going to rehabilitate, keeping them in prison costs a ton of money, and they’d probably enjoy being on an island somewhere better anyways…even if it would be a ridiculously lawless place. The only problem is I think we’re all out of inhabitable places.
- reducesuffering 5y ago
  Problem is the same with the death penalty, sentencing some innocent people, because that's essentially what you'd be sentencing them to. Some innocent people (tried guilty) will be sent there and immediately become slaves or killed. Have a minimal force to enforce basic rights? Well to actually configure that safely, you're back at a prison.
oehtXRwMkIs 5y ago
What you replied to was describing a failure of the jail system, not prison system.

joshuamorton 5y ago

You're simplifying the opposing position in a way that isn't fully honest. There are at least four purposes incarceration can serve: rehabilitation, retribution, dissuasion, and separation. Rehabilitation meaning, giving people the tools and resources to avoid recidivism. Retribution being, punishment or justice for the benefit of the victim. Separation being physical removal of people incompatible or dangerous to society. Dissuasion being what you describe, punishment that rational actors will take into account when deciding to take an action. Pro-rehabilitation people argue that rehabilitation should be the first priority, and retribution the last, with separation there when necessary (think: life sentences for people who murder without remorse) and dissuasion somewhere in the middle. Compare prison to something like an inpatient addiction recovery center, which aims to rehabilitate and separate (although sort of in the reverse way) and how much more constructive that is. I don't think there's very many people at all (even among like hardcore prison abolitionists) who believe that it's possible to entirely do away with some form of separation of people who are dangerously incompatible with the norms of society. If nothing else, mentally ill people who can exhibit violent behaviors will continue to exist. All that said, your comment also has very little to do with murder rates. Those don't really correlate a lot with petty crime or even petty violent crime. Someone who makes a living breaking into cars doesn't suddenly jump to murder.

maxmcd 5y ago

The United States has the largest prison population in the world and the highest incarceration rate. Every time there is a crime thread on HN it is full of anecdotal stories about how we can be tougher on crime. It boggles my mind that this is the accepted framing. You're not going to "see" the lives that wasted in prisons that would have been reasonably rehabilitated in other countries. You would have to think the criminal justice system in the united states is extremely fair and that we have a dramatically different population to place such a high priority on the people that are possibly victims of crimes over people that are inappropriately incarcerated.

darawk 5y ago
It's almost as though the framing of "tougher" vs "softer" is a ridiculous over-simplification of the matter. We should be tougher on violent crime and softer on non-violent crime. EDIT: I want to amend this to say that even the increase in nuance that I just suggested is probably not nuanced enough. Some kinds of violent crime we are probably too harsh on, and some kinds of non-violent crime (e.g. serious white collar financial crime, or certain types of safety/environmental violations at scale) we could probably stand to be a bit harsher on.
- scarmig 5y ago
  Severity of punishment isn't the best way to disincentivize crime. If you have two justice regimes, one where 50% is caught and punished and the other where 25% is but punishment is twice as harsh, the former will be far more effective at decreasing crime. (Mostly) abolish prisons, and put tons of police officers into the community.
  - darawk 5y ago
    You're absolutely right. But deterrence isn't the only issue of importance. We do want to select punishments that deter. But we also simply want to separate incorrigible offenders from society. Every year a murderer is locked up is a year they aren't killing anyone (except maybe other prisoners). I agree that increasing the probability of getting caught is good too, though.

koboll 5y ago

>prison should be about rehabilitation, not punishment It should. But simply letting people out is neither.

iknowstuff 5y ago

1. The US has the most incarcerated people per capita in OECD 2. US prisons seem to be awful. They should be about rehabilitation, but they are focused on punishment. 3. Because of point 2, we are reluctant to imprison some offenders, in fear of destroying their lives and chances of rehabilitation. 4. The cash bail system is not the norm across the world. It is weird to only jail people who can't afford to pay. Are there any attempts to copy Norway's Halden prison in the US?

xtracto 5y ago
> 2. US prisons seem to be awful. They should be about rehabilitation, but they are focused on punishment. Just the other day I watched a video of an interview of an American person who spent time in a prison here in Mexico. He described American prison as "a hotel" when compared to Mexican prisons. There is a really good documentary about a prison in Tijuana [1] showing an example of that. My point being that prisons in the USA are actually quite good, compared to most prisons in the world. That doesn't make them acceptable. The problem is that the general idea of the prison system in the world just doesn't seem to be working. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqi4ZpR2OWI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqi4ZpR2OWI
baybal2 5y ago
> 1. The US has the most incarcerated people per capita in OECD But Russia (a suspended OECD member) beats it for a total number of people who been through the prison system. 10%+ of men to be exact.

valdiorn 5y ago

Prisons serve 4 roles; rehabilitation, punishment, deterrent and public safety. How you balance these is done differently in many countries. The US seems to historically have focused on the punishment aspect most of all. I'd say deterrent and then rehabilitation are the main ones in the UK. In Scandinavia it's mostly about rehabilitation and public safety, with punishment being almost non-existent.

ericmcer 5y ago
Do they have any kind of therapeutic role for the victims of violent crime? I know revenge is petty but if someone hurt me badly or killed a member of my family it would be a bit of a kick in the teeth for our societies main concern to be how best to rehabilitate them.

aaomidi 5y ago

It's wrong when you focus ONLY on prisons. That's the thing people miss from the conversations. Those who want to abolish police and prisons aren't just saying shut them down and we're all good. They're saying shut them down and spend money in directly increasing the quality of life for people. Crimes increase as poverty and class divide increases. Decrease those and you've actually managed to solve the source of the problem, rather than trying to find a solution for the consequence (increase in violent crimes).

AuryGlenz 5y ago
Alternatively, people that aren’t intelligent and/or have impulsivity issues have a hard time holding down jobs - and those people very well might still commit crimes even after throwing money at them. A classmate of mine had a successful tile laying business. He got on meth. He put cameras in people’s homes. He stole things. He then tied up a girl and raped her all night.
- aaomidi 5y ago
  "people that aren’t intelligent and/or have impulsivity issues have a hard time holding down jobs" So why does the US have more of this? All of these descriptions ignore that America is seemingly the worst place out of everywhere for this? Why?
  - s1artibartfast 5y ago
    Poor broken families & communities with low education and few options generate large numbers of such people. A simple look at the background of violent offenders shows this. This is partially an economic problem, but also has social roots with multigenerational feedback loops. >50% of violent offenders were physically abused, raped, or neglected by parents. Many were unwanted or abandoned by one or more parents.
  - Zababa 5y ago
    I would guess it's the long-term consequences of the slave trade/labor and the inequalities that stems from it. America isn't the worst place, but it's the worst "first world country", and first world countries usually don't have that history.

AuryGlenz 5y ago

I’ll back up your unpopular opinion and say we should have a new Australia. Some people are never going to rehabilitate, keeping them in prison costs a ton of money, and they’d probably enjoy being on an island somewhere better anyways…even if it would be a ridiculously lawless place. The only problem is I think we’re all out of inhabitable places.

reducesuffering 5y ago
Problem is the same with the death penalty, sentencing some innocent people, because that's essentially what you'd be sentencing them to. Some innocent people (tried guilty) will be sent there and immediately become slaves or killed. Have a minimal force to enforce basic rights? Well to actually configure that safely, you're back at a prison.

oehtXRwMkIs 5y ago

What you replied to was describing a failure of the jail system, not prison system.