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I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either. Is it punishment? If so, then there are much more e

I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either. Is it punishment? If so, then there are much more effective and cheaper ways we could punish people. Is it rehabilitation? If so, how does being locked into a room with a bunch of other criminals rehabilitate someone? Is it removing criminals from society altogether? In that case, there's a far more efficient way to do that. Because prisons don't have a clear role, they end up being a weird and ineffective mix that achieves virtually nothing.

Volatile-Rig 4y ago
We know the purpose of prisons; very cheap labor without oversight.
- worik 4y ago
  An exemption to the prohibition of slavery.
- alex_sf 4y ago
  UNICOR makes 61 million a year. Not exactly big business.
avalys 4y ago
> achieves virtually nothing. The purpose of prisons is to remove people from society altogether, yes. They do accomplish this. Your complaint on that point is that they don't do this efficiently (compared to what, killing the prisoners instead?)
- arcticbull 4y ago
  The penal system generally solves along three axes, whose distribution varies based on the society in which they exist. 1) Segregation. Taking dangerous individuals and putting them in a separate area away from society. 2) Rehabilitation. Changing the behavior of these individuals to avoid recidivism. 3) Retribution. Just making these people miserable because it people outside prison feel good knowing the people in prison are having a bad time. The US penal system is designed principally around (1) and (3) and pays lip service to (2).
  - tyingq 4y ago
    I wouldn't overlook the money angle either. Privatization, either outright, or in part via service fees for phones, books, commissary, etc, has changed the system.
    - TheOtherHobbes 4y ago
      It's mostly money. The penal system is extremely profitable. Slave labour redefined.
      - gruez 4y ago
        >It's mostly money. The penal system is extremely profitable. source? Specifically, the claim that it's "mostly" money.
        formerkrogemp 4y ago
        CoreCivic and Geo both own and operate the majority of prisons in the US.
        hirvi74 4y ago
        Only ~8% of prisoners are incarcerated in private facilities. https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-prisons-in-the-united-states/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-priso...
        formerkrogemp 4y ago
        "Companies own or manage 75% of U.S. detention facilities. Two of the biggest companies, CoreCivic and The GEO Group, are publicly traded. In the correctional system, however, less than 10% of state and federal inmates are in the care of private prisons." https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/02/why-private-prisons-geo-group-and-corecivic-are-struggling-under-trump.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/02/why-private-prisons-geo-grou... Well, it seems I need to brush up on some reading then.
- bnralt 4y ago
  Indeed. Here's a case I happened across recently that go almost no media attention[1]. Got almost no media attention. Guy that stalked and assaulted a woman was released early on parole. Proceeds to stalk woman again, is arrested, prosecutors don't press charges. Assaults the woman again, is arrested again, prosecutors don't press charges. Eventually, the man kills the woman. There are dangerous individuals that need to be removed from society, and when they're not, they hurt and kill those around them. If there is a more efficient and effective way to do this, that would be great. But it's hard to have this discussion when people pretend these things aren't important functions that need to be addressed in some way. [1] https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/local/dc/stalking-murder-dc-sylvia-matthews-southwest-michael-garrett-alleged-homicide/65-4dfabc18-d683-4d67-ba30-12755d65b115 https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/local/dc/stalking-murder-...
  - amanaplanacanal 4y ago
    Yes, that happens. But what percent of folks in the criminal Justice system are that guy? 5%? 95%? And what do we do to try to change those people so that they don’t do it again when they are released?
    - jvanderbot 4y ago
      The false positive vs false negative discussion in criminal justice is the whole problem. You cannot come up with a number that is satisfactory to everyone, and for every person you lock away forever because they will surely reoffend, how many should legitimately be over-punished for their actions? I personally think we should provide more productive activities for prisoners, so that it is not necessarily the end of their lives or contributions to society. But that is so ripe for abuse that it's useless to even start the discussion.
    - alex_sf 4y ago
      76.6% of US prisoners are 'that guy'. [1] [1] https://harvardpolitics.com/recidivism-american-progress/ https://harvardpolitics.com/recidivism-american-progress/
- WalterBright 4y ago
  You could do this more efficiently by putting the nonviolent ones in a separate facility that is far less secure, more like army barracks. The incentive would be if they become violent, or escape, they go to the violent prison.
  - ajb 4y ago
    This is exactly the system in the UK, low security prisons for fraudsters and the like. Usually convicts do a stint in a high security prison at the start, to see if they are going to be a good boy, and to give them a taste of what it's like if they aren't.
  - khazhoux 4y ago
    I think you're describing the current system. There are multiple prison levels. https://www.rasmussen.edu/degrees/justice-studies/blog/different-types-of-prisons/ https://www.rasmussen.edu/degrees/justice-studies/blog/diffe...
dxhdr 4y ago
> I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either. Some people can't function in society. What do you do with them?
- pessimizer 4y ago
  Lock them up with other maladjusted people for years, then let them loose on society with a hardened attitude, extensive criminal connections, and no ability to find employment?
  - Ekaros 4y ago
    The last part really leads to to question, what do people expect to happen? Them willingly starve or freeze to death?
  - thefounder 4y ago
    The main issue is that we have time based sentences only for most crimes. Criminals should never be left back in society unless they prove themselves fit/worthy to come back. Of course I don't mind a minumum time based sentences as punishment on top of that requirement either. However betrayed trust cannot be repaid in full just serving time locked-up.
    - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
      >The main issue is that we have time based sentences only for most crimes. Criminals should never be left back in society unless they prove themselves fit/worthy to come back. So if this was the strategy of the U.S until about 2010 I suppose it would have been morally justifiable as an act of self-preservation to kill anyone that saw you smoking pot - assuming of course that there is such a thing as personal rights and people had the right to smoke pot, but the government prevented them from doing so. on edit: perhaps I'm in a bad mood but I do find it astounding how often when one of these articles comes out about how inhumane the American prison system is, whole branches of the discussion devolve into conflicting ideas on how one can make it more inhumane.
ransom1538 4y ago
[deleted]
- rjbwork 4y ago
  That's right. And that's why we put people who do things like smoke the devils lettuce or sniff a little columbian snow in there. To keep these menaces away from the rest of us. I mean, can you imagine? People just walking around doing what they please to their own bodies and not providing slave labor to the state or private prison corporations? The absolute horror!
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- jjeaff 4y ago
  Around 40% of the prison population is there for violent crime. And for most, it's probably a very loose definition of "violent". Few would argue that you shouldn't put violent offenders in prison, but that's not the reason the majority of people are there.
- JW_00000 4y ago
  Does this mean you think any criminal (that committed a violent crime) should be locked up for life? Or how does the length of prison sentences factor into this?
  - ransom1538 4y ago
    "Does this mean you think any criminal (that committed a violent crime) should be locked up for life?" Lol what? No.
cmh89 4y ago
>Because prisons don't have a clear role, they end up being a weird and ineffective mix that achieves virtually nothing. I think the role of prisons is really clear, we just have a common social lie we tell ourselves because the truth is really ugly. The prison system exists to provide slave labor to those willing to use it and as a tool to hurt marginalized communities.
- hjgjhyuhy 4y ago
- sacrosancty 4y ago
bergenty 4y ago
The point of prison to me seems like a place you can put people that are dangerous and take them out of the equation for society.
- amanaplanacanal 4y ago
  But then how do you decide when to let people out again? Why do we have time limits on sentences?
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
JackFr 4y ago
The purpose of prisons is threefold: First incapacitation - that is at a minimum preventing incarcerated people from continuing their criminal behavior; Second, rehabilitation; Third, punishment. Those are legitimate and valid goals. However it seems in many cases we only succeed in the third. Criminal activity in prisons is rampant and rehabilitation more often than not fails.
- qznc 4y ago
  If rehabilitation were a goal, the US could learn a lot from other countries how to do that. I don’t see that happening though. So I conclude the system has other more important goals. The usual complaint about rehabilitation methods seems to be that they compromise the deterrence or retribution aspects.
  - HWR_14 4y ago
    > So I conclude the system has other more important goals. I think you are confusing "this system is bad at achieving its goals" and "this system has other goals". The goals of the prison system are really hard. Rehabilitating people is really hard.
- ROTMetro 4y ago
  No, rehabilitiation is explicitly NOT part of prison. Stop spreading that myth. From Federal Title 18 §3582. Imposition of a sentence of imprisonment: "recognizing that imprisonment is not an appropriate means of promoting correction and rehabilitation"
  - JackFr 4y ago
    And yet 18 U.S. Code § 3553 - Imposition of a sentence (referenced by 3582) says: the need for the sentence imposed— (A) to reflect the seriousness of the offense, to promote respect for the law, and to provide just punishment for the offense; (B) to afford adequate deterrence to criminal conduct; (C) to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant; and (D) to provide the defendant with needed educational or vocational training, medical care, or other correctional treatment in the most effective manner; D sounds a lot like rehabilitation to me.
jessaustin 4y ago
The purpose of prisons is the same as that of any other large expenditure that doesn't go directly to the poor, in an inverted totalitarian state like USA. The purpose is to transfer public resources to private hands. That process is what drives every decision in a simulated democracy like the one to which we are subject.
- worik 4y ago
  An effect, but not the purpose.
  - jessaustin 4y ago
    At this time, such naïveté is understandable only in the very young.
dahfizz 4y ago
> Is it removing criminals from society altogether? In that case, there's a far more efficient way to do that. Such as?
bowsamic 4y ago
You should definitely read “Discipline and Punish” by Foucault. Probably the most famous philosophical text about prison
rebuilder 4y ago
If prisons send a message, who is that message directed at? IMO prisons serve the functions of deterrence and rehabilitation - although not well - but they also serve to keep the public happy. We put criminals in prison to sate the public’s need to see justice done. Even if we had the perfect rehabilitation regime that would just “cure” criminals, I think putting it into practice would be an uphill battle if it didn’t entail doing some kind of serious harm to the convicted. People want revenge. Prison is a controlled method of providing that.
CommieBobDole 4y ago
I think you may be confusing "this thing doesn't work for its intended purpose" with "nobody knows what this thing is for". Prison would ideally do three things: 1. Act as a punishment and by extension as a deterrent to people who have functioning impulse control, but might otherwise choose to commit crimes, and to deter people who have committed crimes from committing more crimes after their sentence. 2. Segregate from the rest of society people who have harmed others through criminal acts so they can't continue to harm the public during their incarceration. 3. Rehabilitate people by addressing mental illness and unhealthy modes of thinking to reduce the chance that they will re-offend after their period of incarceration is over. In the US, at least, I think the system does a decent job of the first one, to the point that prisons are full of people who are mentally ill, drug-addicted, or just have such terrible impulse control that the idea of avoiding punishment never figures into their actions. I don't think prisons need to be horrible or sentences long in order to serve as a a deterrent, the idea of loss of freedom is enough to deter anyone who can reasonably be deterred. The second one is working OK, too, but it's terrible; people who are locked up somewhere are not out committing crimes, so crime goes down. So we give longer and longer sentences for smaller and smaller crimes, and it 'works', in the same sense that letting people starve to death reduces hunger. Finally, there's rehabilitation; on a scale of 0 to 100, we rate a -100. We could not reasonably get any worse at this. As you mentioned, spending years locked in a cage with other criminals just makes people better criminals. If you wanted to design a system that maximized recidivism, you could do little better than the US prison system. Prison makes people harder, more violent and more ruthless, and/or breaks them psychologically. People join criminal gangs, which they remain in after they leave prison, and beyond that it provides an opportunity to make contacts and generally 'network' to further a criminal career. Little to no attempt is made to identify or treat existing mental illness, which is of course exacerbated by the conditions in prison. So we eventually let these people go, and they re-offend, which takes us back to the second purpose, in a feedback loop. It's a huge mess. And the sad thing is, it's a problem that could be solved, but it would be expensive and politicians don't want to be seen as 'soft on criminals, so we just keep doing more and more of the same thing and it keeps costing us money and lives.
- a1369209993 4y ago
  > We could not reasonably get any worse at [rehabilitation]. Sure you could! Would you like some suggestions? Try adding classes on topics like lockpicking and marksmanship to the prison vocational programs. Make it illegal for any business to hire ex-convicts for any position whatsoever. Provide inmates with easy access to regulated amounts of prescription painkillers and other addictive drugs. Make it illegal for pharmacies to sell these to ex-cons. Formalize the prison gang system, and make regular calls to one's gang leader a condition of parole. I can probably come up with more if you'd like; once you give up on pretending it's not intentional, there's a lot that can be 'improved' here.
uptheroots 4y ago
I believe prisons in part serve the purpose to keep us in check. With the threat of prison, society is encouraged to police itself. As another comment in this thread mentioned, Foucault helped to develop these sort of ideas and describes the motivations and development of the prison system in his work.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- Tao3300 4y ago
  It keeps us in check but not like you think. At least for crimes with direct victims, prisons keep us out of blood feuds by letting the state monopolize retribution while keeping the object of it out of reach.
rgrieselhuber 4y ago
My conclusion is that they are designed to bring maximum psychological trauma to individuals who have not learned to protect themselves from amygdala hijacking.
ge96 4y ago
For me it's fear, I don't want to be bad, because I don't want to be locked up. Anyway I've never really had the desire to act badly towards others eg. despite being into technology, not a hacker/scammer.
deleted 4y ago
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deleted 4y ago
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deleted 4y ago
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alex_sf 4y ago
> I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either. It's to remove known criminals and violent offenders from society. > Is it removing criminals from society altogether? In that case, there's a far more efficient way to do that. It's also irreversible.
IAmGraydon 4y ago
I think the primary purpose is to act as a deterrent. You do bad things, you lose the most precious thing a person can lose...their power.
AnonCoward42 4y ago
It's manyfold. The reasons I can come up with are * Punishment * Retribution (yeah, it's different thing) * Protection (of society) * Time to think about your crime There are probably more.
valdiorn 4y ago
1. Protect the public. 2. Deter crime. 3. Rehabilitate. 4. Punish. These are the four pillars of incarceration. How different countries weigh the different elements varies greatly between cultures. Us system is basically 90 percent punishment, 10 percent protecting the public, and nothing else.
NoPicklez 4y ago
Depending on the crime it's neither of those things. First and foremost it's simply segregation from the rest of society. If you go around killing people, then segregated stops you from continuing to do so (in theory). As for smaller crimes which carry time, then that begs the question of whether its for punishment or rehabilitation. Perhaps it's both, being stripped of your freedom to participate in society for years is a form of punishment. There is likely an outdated precedent that if you have those freedoms taken away for considerable time, people will not look to break the law again. The problem is that there are systems in society which people are brought into which perpetuate crime.
RickJWagner 4y ago
Prisons also keep convicts locked up, where they can't kill/injure/steal any longer. That's an important one.
cratermoon 4y ago
> I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either The Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution says most of what's important to know about the carceral state of the US today: "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States"

Volatile-Rig 4y ago

We know the purpose of prisons; very cheap labor without oversight.

worik 4y ago
An exemption to the prohibition of slavery.
alex_sf 4y ago
UNICOR makes 61 million a year. Not exactly big business.

avalys 4y ago

> achieves virtually nothing. The purpose of prisons is to remove people from society altogether, yes. They do accomplish this. Your complaint on that point is that they don't do this efficiently (compared to what, killing the prisoners instead?)

arcticbull 4y ago
The penal system generally solves along three axes, whose distribution varies based on the society in which they exist. 1) Segregation. Taking dangerous individuals and putting them in a separate area away from society. 2) Rehabilitation. Changing the behavior of these individuals to avoid recidivism. 3) Retribution. Just making these people miserable because it people outside prison feel good knowing the people in prison are having a bad time. The US penal system is designed principally around (1) and (3) and pays lip service to (2).
- tyingq 4y ago
  I wouldn't overlook the money angle either. Privatization, either outright, or in part via service fees for phones, books, commissary, etc, has changed the system.
  - TheOtherHobbes 4y ago
    It's mostly money. The penal system is extremely profitable. Slave labour redefined.
    - gruez 4y ago
      >It's mostly money. The penal system is extremely profitable. source? Specifically, the claim that it's "mostly" money.
      - formerkrogemp 4y ago
        CoreCivic and Geo both own and operate the majority of prisons in the US.
        hirvi74 4y ago
        Only ~8% of prisoners are incarcerated in private facilities. https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-prisons-in-the-united-states/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-priso...
        formerkrogemp 4y ago
        "Companies own or manage 75% of U.S. detention facilities. Two of the biggest companies, CoreCivic and The GEO Group, are publicly traded. In the correctional system, however, less than 10% of state and federal inmates are in the care of private prisons." https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/02/why-private-prisons-geo-group-and-corecivic-are-struggling-under-trump.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/02/why-private-prisons-geo-grou... Well, it seems I need to brush up on some reading then.
bnralt 4y ago
Indeed. Here's a case I happened across recently that go almost no media attention[1]. Got almost no media attention. Guy that stalked and assaulted a woman was released early on parole. Proceeds to stalk woman again, is arrested, prosecutors don't press charges. Assaults the woman again, is arrested again, prosecutors don't press charges. Eventually, the man kills the woman. There are dangerous individuals that need to be removed from society, and when they're not, they hurt and kill those around them. If there is a more efficient and effective way to do this, that would be great. But it's hard to have this discussion when people pretend these things aren't important functions that need to be addressed in some way. [1] https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/local/dc/stalking-murder-dc-sylvia-matthews-southwest-michael-garrett-alleged-homicide/65-4dfabc18-d683-4d67-ba30-12755d65b115 https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/local/dc/stalking-murder-...
- amanaplanacanal 4y ago
  Yes, that happens. But what percent of folks in the criminal Justice system are that guy? 5%? 95%? And what do we do to try to change those people so that they don’t do it again when they are released?
  - jvanderbot 4y ago
    The false positive vs false negative discussion in criminal justice is the whole problem. You cannot come up with a number that is satisfactory to everyone, and for every person you lock away forever because they will surely reoffend, how many should legitimately be over-punished for their actions? I personally think we should provide more productive activities for prisoners, so that it is not necessarily the end of their lives or contributions to society. But that is so ripe for abuse that it's useless to even start the discussion.
  - alex_sf 4y ago
    76.6% of US prisoners are 'that guy'. [1] [1] https://harvardpolitics.com/recidivism-american-progress/ https://harvardpolitics.com/recidivism-american-progress/
WalterBright 4y ago
You could do this more efficiently by putting the nonviolent ones in a separate facility that is far less secure, more like army barracks. The incentive would be if they become violent, or escape, they go to the violent prison.
- ajb 4y ago
  This is exactly the system in the UK, low security prisons for fraudsters and the like. Usually convicts do a stint in a high security prison at the start, to see if they are going to be a good boy, and to give them a taste of what it's like if they aren't.
- khazhoux 4y ago
  I think you're describing the current system. There are multiple prison levels. https://www.rasmussen.edu/degrees/justice-studies/blog/different-types-of-prisons/ https://www.rasmussen.edu/degrees/justice-studies/blog/diffe...

dxhdr 4y ago

> I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either. Some people can't function in society. What do you do with them?

pessimizer 4y ago
Lock them up with other maladjusted people for years, then let them loose on society with a hardened attitude, extensive criminal connections, and no ability to find employment?
- Ekaros 4y ago
  The last part really leads to to question, what do people expect to happen? Them willingly starve or freeze to death?
- thefounder 4y ago
  The main issue is that we have time based sentences only for most crimes. Criminals should never be left back in society unless they prove themselves fit/worthy to come back. Of course I don't mind a minumum time based sentences as punishment on top of that requirement either. However betrayed trust cannot be repaid in full just serving time locked-up.
  - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
    >The main issue is that we have time based sentences only for most crimes. Criminals should never be left back in society unless they prove themselves fit/worthy to come back. So if this was the strategy of the U.S until about 2010 I suppose it would have been morally justifiable as an act of self-preservation to kill anyone that saw you smoking pot - assuming of course that there is such a thing as personal rights and people had the right to smoke pot, but the government prevented them from doing so. on edit: perhaps I'm in a bad mood but I do find it astounding how often when one of these articles comes out about how inhumane the American prison system is, whole branches of the discussion devolve into conflicting ideas on how one can make it more inhumane.

ransom1538 4y ago

[deleted]

rjbwork 4y ago
That's right. And that's why we put people who do things like smoke the devils lettuce or sniff a little columbian snow in there. To keep these menaces away from the rest of us. I mean, can you imagine? People just walking around doing what they please to their own bodies and not providing slave labor to the state or private prison corporations? The absolute horror!
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
jjeaff 4y ago
Around 40% of the prison population is there for violent crime. And for most, it's probably a very loose definition of "violent". Few would argue that you shouldn't put violent offenders in prison, but that's not the reason the majority of people are there.
JW_00000 4y ago
Does this mean you think any criminal (that committed a violent crime) should be locked up for life? Or how does the length of prison sentences factor into this?
- ransom1538 4y ago
  "Does this mean you think any criminal (that committed a violent crime) should be locked up for life?" Lol what? No.

cmh89 4y ago

>Because prisons don't have a clear role, they end up being a weird and ineffective mix that achieves virtually nothing. I think the role of prisons is really clear, we just have a common social lie we tell ourselves because the truth is really ugly. The prison system exists to provide slave labor to those willing to use it and as a tool to hurt marginalized communities.

hjgjhyuhy 4y ago
sacrosancty 4y ago

bergenty 4y ago

The point of prison to me seems like a place you can put people that are dangerous and take them out of the equation for society.

amanaplanacanal 4y ago
But then how do you decide when to let people out again? Why do we have time limits on sentences?

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

JackFr 4y ago

The purpose of prisons is threefold: First incapacitation - that is at a minimum preventing incarcerated people from continuing their criminal behavior; Second, rehabilitation; Third, punishment. Those are legitimate and valid goals. However it seems in many cases we only succeed in the third. Criminal activity in prisons is rampant and rehabilitation more often than not fails.

qznc 4y ago
If rehabilitation were a goal, the US could learn a lot from other countries how to do that. I don’t see that happening though. So I conclude the system has other more important goals. The usual complaint about rehabilitation methods seems to be that they compromise the deterrence or retribution aspects.
- HWR_14 4y ago
  > So I conclude the system has other more important goals. I think you are confusing "this system is bad at achieving its goals" and "this system has other goals". The goals of the prison system are really hard. Rehabilitating people is really hard.
ROTMetro 4y ago
No, rehabilitiation is explicitly NOT part of prison. Stop spreading that myth. From Federal Title 18 §3582. Imposition of a sentence of imprisonment: "recognizing that imprisonment is not an appropriate means of promoting correction and rehabilitation"
- JackFr 4y ago
  And yet 18 U.S. Code § 3553 - Imposition of a sentence (referenced by 3582) says: the need for the sentence imposed— (A) to reflect the seriousness of the offense, to promote respect for the law, and to provide just punishment for the offense; (B) to afford adequate deterrence to criminal conduct; (C) to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant; and (D) to provide the defendant with needed educational or vocational training, medical care, or other correctional treatment in the most effective manner; D sounds a lot like rehabilitation to me.

jessaustin 4y ago

The purpose of prisons is the same as that of any other large expenditure that doesn't go directly to the poor, in an inverted totalitarian state like USA. The purpose is to transfer public resources to private hands. That process is what drives every decision in a simulated democracy like the one to which we are subject.

worik 4y ago
An effect, but not the purpose.
- jessaustin 4y ago
  At this time, such naïveté is understandable only in the very young.

dahfizz 4y ago

> Is it removing criminals from society altogether? In that case, there's a far more efficient way to do that. Such as?

bowsamic 4y ago

You should definitely read “Discipline and Punish” by Foucault. Probably the most famous philosophical text about prison

rebuilder 4y ago

If prisons send a message, who is that message directed at? IMO prisons serve the functions of deterrence and rehabilitation - although not well - but they also serve to keep the public happy. We put criminals in prison to sate the public’s need to see justice done. Even if we had the perfect rehabilitation regime that would just “cure” criminals, I think putting it into practice would be an uphill battle if it didn’t entail doing some kind of serious harm to the convicted. People want revenge. Prison is a controlled method of providing that.

CommieBobDole 4y ago

I think you may be confusing "this thing doesn't work for its intended purpose" with "nobody knows what this thing is for". Prison would ideally do three things: 1. Act as a punishment and by extension as a deterrent to people who have functioning impulse control, but might otherwise choose to commit crimes, and to deter people who have committed crimes from committing more crimes after their sentence. 2. Segregate from the rest of society people who have harmed others through criminal acts so they can't continue to harm the public during their incarceration. 3. Rehabilitate people by addressing mental illness and unhealthy modes of thinking to reduce the chance that they will re-offend after their period of incarceration is over. In the US, at least, I think the system does a decent job of the first one, to the point that prisons are full of people who are mentally ill, drug-addicted, or just have such terrible impulse control that the idea of avoiding punishment never figures into their actions. I don't think prisons need to be horrible or sentences long in order to serve as a a deterrent, the idea of loss of freedom is enough to deter anyone who can reasonably be deterred. The second one is working OK, too, but it's terrible; people who are locked up somewhere are not out committing crimes, so crime goes down. So we give longer and longer sentences for smaller and smaller crimes, and it 'works', in the same sense that letting people starve to death reduces hunger. Finally, there's rehabilitation; on a scale of 0 to 100, we rate a -100. We could not reasonably get any worse at this. As you mentioned, spending years locked in a cage with other criminals just makes people better criminals. If you wanted to design a system that maximized recidivism, you could do little better than the US prison system. Prison makes people harder, more violent and more ruthless, and/or breaks them psychologically. People join criminal gangs, which they remain in after they leave prison, and beyond that it provides an opportunity to make contacts and generally 'network' to further a criminal career. Little to no attempt is made to identify or treat existing mental illness, which is of course exacerbated by the conditions in prison. So we eventually let these people go, and they re-offend, which takes us back to the second purpose, in a feedback loop. It's a huge mess. And the sad thing is, it's a problem that could be solved, but it would be expensive and politicians don't want to be seen as 'soft on criminals, so we just keep doing more and more of the same thing and it keeps costing us money and lives.

a1369209993 4y ago
> We could not reasonably get any worse at [rehabilitation]. Sure you could! Would you like some suggestions? Try adding classes on topics like lockpicking and marksmanship to the prison vocational programs. Make it illegal for any business to hire ex-convicts for any position whatsoever. Provide inmates with easy access to regulated amounts of prescription painkillers and other addictive drugs. Make it illegal for pharmacies to sell these to ex-cons. Formalize the prison gang system, and make regular calls to one's gang leader a condition of parole. I can probably come up with more if you'd like; once you give up on pretending it's not intentional, there's a lot that can be 'improved' here.

uptheroots 4y ago

I believe prisons in part serve the purpose to keep us in check. With the threat of prison, society is encouraged to police itself. As another comment in this thread mentioned, Foucault helped to develop these sort of ideas and describes the motivations and development of the prison system in his work.

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Tao3300 4y ago
It keeps us in check but not like you think. At least for crimes with direct victims, prisons keep us out of blood feuds by letting the state monopolize retribution while keeping the object of it out of reach.

rgrieselhuber 4y ago

My conclusion is that they are designed to bring maximum psychological trauma to individuals who have not learned to protect themselves from amygdala hijacking.

ge96 4y ago

For me it's fear, I don't want to be bad, because I don't want to be locked up. Anyway I've never really had the desire to act badly towards others eg. despite being into technology, not a hacker/scammer.

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alex_sf 4y ago

> I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either. It's to remove known criminals and violent offenders from society. > Is it removing criminals from society altogether? In that case, there's a far more efficient way to do that. It's also irreversible.

IAmGraydon 4y ago

I think the primary purpose is to act as a deterrent. You do bad things, you lose the most precious thing a person can lose...their power.

AnonCoward42 4y ago

It's manyfold. The reasons I can come up with are * Punishment * Retribution (yeah, it's different thing) * Protection (of society) * Time to think about your crime There are probably more.

valdiorn 4y ago

1. Protect the public. 2. Deter crime. 3. Rehabilitate. 4. Punish. These are the four pillars of incarceration. How different countries weigh the different elements varies greatly between cultures. Us system is basically 90 percent punishment, 10 percent protecting the public, and nothing else.

NoPicklez 4y ago

Depending on the crime it's neither of those things. First and foremost it's simply segregation from the rest of society. If you go around killing people, then segregated stops you from continuing to do so (in theory). As for smaller crimes which carry time, then that begs the question of whether its for punishment or rehabilitation. Perhaps it's both, being stripped of your freedom to participate in society for years is a form of punishment. There is likely an outdated precedent that if you have those freedoms taken away for considerable time, people will not look to break the law again. The problem is that there are systems in society which people are brought into which perpetuate crime.

RickJWagner 4y ago

Prisons also keep convicts locked up, where they can't kill/injure/steal any longer. That's an important one.

cratermoon 4y ago

> I don't really understand what the purpose of prisons is, and I don't think anyone else really does either The Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution says most of what's important to know about the carceral state of the US today: "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States"