5 ms·

they shouldnt be paid at all. they're in prison for a reason. they have a debt to society. a great many of those people didnt do 'one bad thing' then got cau

they shouldnt be paid at all. they're in prison for a reason. they have a debt to society. a great many of those people didnt do 'one bad thing' then got caught. it was just the last bad thing they were caught for. any many of them did 'the bad thing', then continued doing other bad things up until the point they were put in prison.

pavel_lishin 10mo ago
I don't agree with your "slave labor is ok if the slave committed a crime" position, and find it morally indefensible.
- antonymoose 10mo ago
  Stepping aside the fact that I think most everyone here is playing fast-and-loose with the “slave” terminology here… Why do you feel prisoners doing low wage labor to be wrong? Practically everyone in human history since the dawn of time has had to go out and produce something of value. Why, all of a sudden, should a murderer or rapist get to sit on their ass and consume what we all produce? I find nothing questionable about a humble job for them at all.
  - pavel_lishin 10mo ago
    Two answers: 1. Why should they be restricted to ludicrously low wages? If they're producing something of value, they should be compensated. Not only is it morally wrong to, you know, enslave people, on a more practical level it would be very helpful for people who are leaving prison after serving their sentence to actually have some money saved up, so they have better opportunities, to avoid recidivism. 2. The reason they can sit on their ass and consume what they produce is that they effectively become wards of the state. They're still human beings, and if we have decided to incarcerate them, we become responsible for them, and they still have rights as human beings. A humble job is fine; I'm not saying they should be sitting in an aeron chair bullshitting on Slack for 8 hours a day. But slavery for pennies on the hour is wrong.
  - 7bit 10mo ago
    I don't think you know what humble job means, and meant to say humiliating pay.
  - Wilder7977 10mo ago
    Working should be a free choice (we can discuss about how much freedom exists for many people), and should always be paid. There is nothing wrong if a prisoner chooses to enagage in (fairly paid) labor. But if they are not free to do so, then they are slaves, not workers. Prisoners already lack freedom in many aspects. "Sitting on their asses" like if they were sipping cocktails on a beach is a bit a misrepresentation don't you think? I wouldn't exchange the possibility to move and do what I want for possibly any amount of money, nor for being able to "sit on my ass" in that sense. Would you? Besides the moral arguments - which I will say, they are so obvious that it feels incredible even having to discuss why enslaving prisoners is wrong - you can make economic arguments. For example, that having cheap or borderline unpaid labor compresses the salary in that market, or that this system creates a dysfunctional incentive to increase prison population for private profits. Maybe that's why the US is one of the countries with the highest incarcerated population in the world. The highest among western and larger countries. I understand though there is a cultural barrier. I am from Europe and in most countries here prison has a rehabilitation purpose, which is what most benefits society, and prisons are not private entities.
  - nozzlegear 10mo ago
    You're instantly jumping to the worst of the worst types of prisoners: murderers and rapists. Prisons also include people who commit non-violent crimes like drug possession, burglary, cybercrime, etc. Why should those people be forced to work the same "humble jobs" in prison? I do find that questionable.
jollyllama 10mo ago
In many cases, their earnings are confiscated as part of restitution.
macintux 10mo ago
> they're in prison for a reason. Often that reason is "too poor to afford proper representation" or "looked vaguely like the actual criminal" or "took a plea bargain because the justice system was threatening them with an immorally-long wait for a trial and a likely worse outcome".
- ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago
  Often that reason is "committed a horrific violent crime"
  - lanyard-textile 10mo ago
    Often it is. Often it is not. Often, they too are a victim of our judicial system, and we can't just ignore them due to the peers we locked them in with.
  - kelnos 10mo ago
    Not really? I mean, when you compare the number of people who have committed a "horrific violent" crime to the total number of people caught up in the US prison system, I expect it's not "often".
    - ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago
      The numbers are fuzzy but they indicate that at least a simple majority of (and possibly up to an extreme majority) of prisoners have committed violent crimes.
      - everforward 10mo ago
        That really depends on what you classify as “violent”. There are a lot of crimes labeled “violent” that don’t include direct physical harm to another person. Eg burglary is labeled as “violent” many places when the actual act was “smashed a window, grabbed a TV and ran away”. Drug manufacturing is also typically considered “violent” even without any kind of assault/murder/turf war/etc. The numbers I saw said 47% of inmates had a violent crime under federal or state classifications.
aacid 10mo ago
Punishment is only one reason of inprisonment, another is correction. Majority of prisoners do not serve lifetime sentence, at some point they wikl return to society and ideally you don't want them to get right back to what they have been doing before because they have no other options or they don't know nothing better.
7bit 10mo ago
Ah yes. American Prisons prioritizing punishment over resocialising is the reason why criminals so often continue to hurt society after they have been released. Then we have people who demand to double down on the punishment and wonder why these people never stop breaking the law. Americans are a marvelous bunch. Thanks Dog I live in a first world country.

pavel_lishin 10mo ago

I don't agree with your "slave labor is ok if the slave committed a crime" position, and find it morally indefensible.

antonymoose 10mo ago
Stepping aside the fact that I think most everyone here is playing fast-and-loose with the “slave” terminology here… Why do you feel prisoners doing low wage labor to be wrong? Practically everyone in human history since the dawn of time has had to go out and produce something of value. Why, all of a sudden, should a murderer or rapist get to sit on their ass and consume what we all produce? I find nothing questionable about a humble job for them at all.
- pavel_lishin 10mo ago
  Two answers: 1. Why should they be restricted to ludicrously low wages? If they're producing something of value, they should be compensated. Not only is it morally wrong to, you know, enslave people, on a more practical level it would be very helpful for people who are leaving prison after serving their sentence to actually have some money saved up, so they have better opportunities, to avoid recidivism. 2. The reason they can sit on their ass and consume what they produce is that they effectively become wards of the state. They're still human beings, and if we have decided to incarcerate them, we become responsible for them, and they still have rights as human beings. A humble job is fine; I'm not saying they should be sitting in an aeron chair bullshitting on Slack for 8 hours a day. But slavery for pennies on the hour is wrong.
- 7bit 10mo ago
  I don't think you know what humble job means, and meant to say humiliating pay.
- Wilder7977 10mo ago
  Working should be a free choice (we can discuss about how much freedom exists for many people), and should always be paid. There is nothing wrong if a prisoner chooses to enagage in (fairly paid) labor. But if they are not free to do so, then they are slaves, not workers. Prisoners already lack freedom in many aspects. "Sitting on their asses" like if they were sipping cocktails on a beach is a bit a misrepresentation don't you think? I wouldn't exchange the possibility to move and do what I want for possibly any amount of money, nor for being able to "sit on my ass" in that sense. Would you? Besides the moral arguments - which I will say, they are so obvious that it feels incredible even having to discuss why enslaving prisoners is wrong - you can make economic arguments. For example, that having cheap or borderline unpaid labor compresses the salary in that market, or that this system creates a dysfunctional incentive to increase prison population for private profits. Maybe that's why the US is one of the countries with the highest incarcerated population in the world. The highest among western and larger countries. I understand though there is a cultural barrier. I am from Europe and in most countries here prison has a rehabilitation purpose, which is what most benefits society, and prisons are not private entities.
- nozzlegear 10mo ago
  You're instantly jumping to the worst of the worst types of prisoners: murderers and rapists. Prisons also include people who commit non-violent crimes like drug possession, burglary, cybercrime, etc. Why should those people be forced to work the same "humble jobs" in prison? I do find that questionable.

jollyllama 10mo ago

In many cases, their earnings are confiscated as part of restitution.

macintux 10mo ago

> they're in prison for a reason. Often that reason is "too poor to afford proper representation" or "looked vaguely like the actual criminal" or "took a plea bargain because the justice system was threatening them with an immorally-long wait for a trial and a likely worse outcome".

ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago
Often that reason is "committed a horrific violent crime"
- lanyard-textile 10mo ago
  Often it is. Often it is not. Often, they too are a victim of our judicial system, and we can't just ignore them due to the peers we locked them in with.
- kelnos 10mo ago
  Not really? I mean, when you compare the number of people who have committed a "horrific violent" crime to the total number of people caught up in the US prison system, I expect it's not "often".
  - ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago
    The numbers are fuzzy but they indicate that at least a simple majority of (and possibly up to an extreme majority) of prisoners have committed violent crimes.
    - everforward 10mo ago
      That really depends on what you classify as “violent”. There are a lot of crimes labeled “violent” that don’t include direct physical harm to another person. Eg burglary is labeled as “violent” many places when the actual act was “smashed a window, grabbed a TV and ran away”. Drug manufacturing is also typically considered “violent” even without any kind of assault/murder/turf war/etc. The numbers I saw said 47% of inmates had a violent crime under federal or state classifications.

aacid 10mo ago

Punishment is only one reason of inprisonment, another is correction. Majority of prisoners do not serve lifetime sentence, at some point they wikl return to society and ideally you don't want them to get right back to what they have been doing before because they have no other options or they don't know nothing better.

7bit 10mo ago

Ah yes. American Prisons prioritizing punishment over resocialising is the reason why criminals so often continue to hurt society after they have been released. Then we have people who demand to double down on the punishment and wonder why these people never stop breaking the law. Americans are a marvelous bunch. Thanks Dog I live in a first world country.