I propose we bring back corporal punishment

Great Debates
1

How about it?

This is not some “those criminals deserve to be beaten to within an inch of their lives” thread - I actually think prison is far, far crueler than corporal punishment, and has several really bad downsides.

6 months is generally considered a pretty short prison sentence. I would take a few hours of really bad pain over 6 months in jail in a heartbeat. Even if it was some holiday-home style prison, the sort that white collar criminals end up in. For me, this loss of liberty is far worse than a bit of pain. You lose six months of earnings, for a start. You probably lose your job.

Then you have the bad prisons. In 6 months, it is extremely possible that you would suffer far more pain and humiliation than a few lashes - you could end up raped, beaten, living in fear for months. Bad prisons seem to be run by hardened criminals - it’s not so bad if you’re a real scumbag, but if you’re a regular guy who is in prison for drugs / non-payment of fines / some other non-violent crime, it’s hell.

There is also the idea that young “at-risk” kids go to jail as wayward kids, and come out as proper criminals. According to this, in the UK

Doesn’t sound like too many are being rehabilitated.

There’s also the issue of cost. In Ireland, each prisoner costs €100k per year. Of course, when you take into account the loss of economic activity from those locked up, the figure would be higher still.

Added to this is the stigma of being an ex-convict. Jobs are hard to come by, etc.

Of course, you need prisons for the small number who actually need to be locked up for the good of society, but I imagine that number is far, far less than the amount of people in jail currently, particularly in the US. You could operate on a loose three strikes rule, with exceptions for murderers/rapists/violent crimes (excluding punchups).

Of course there would be downsides to a society with CP - one possible one is that because punishment would be so cheap and quickly administered, it could become far more common and you could have people being whipped for being cheeky to an officer / some other non-crime. There is a lot of room for abuse by those in power. Another downside is that it would institutionalise violence in our society, potentially making citizens more prone to violence.
Alternatively, you could force people to do community service. This is a much more humane idea, but not sure how much of an actual deterrent it would be.
So what do you Dopers think? Anyone else prefer 20 lashes to a few months (or years) in the slammer? Are there any other alternatives to prison?

2

I’m okay with it for vandalism, burglary and drunk driving, for starters.

3

I’m OK with forced labour. Would prisoners in giant hamster wheels hooked up to turbines be considered a "green” energy source? If you kept “Old Sparky” you might need a few extra people running at that time. :wink:

4

Yeah, the Rodney King beating really increased domestic tranquility in the LA area, right?

5

Seeing as how criminals are the lowest scum there is, I really don’t care what you do to them. Sure. Whip them. It saves me money. Sherriff Joe is highly regarded in my office. One coworker calls him his hero. We even have a theme song for him. He’s got the right idea on how to treat criminals in this country.

Now surely there have to be some regulations, but I’m fine with your idea in principle.

6

What makes you think that a beating has any more of a rehabilitative function than incarceration?

7

And Sgt. Slaughter, for good measure.

8

Until the “criminals” burn down your city in riots due to your brutality. Or kill you. Or until you end up having your bones broken over a traffic ticket.

9

Prevention is better than punishment.

Encourage parents of children between 5 to 14 to interact more with their child’s education and leisure activities. Provide more affordable youth friendly organisations and outlets for kids who are otherwise going to be roaming the streets causing mischief. During these years, kids should be put in varying situations to see how they react. If little Timmy starts jabbing his pencil in the hamster, that is a sign. Note it down, create other situations, look for more signs. Seek out the underlying causes for this flag-raising behaviour; try to assist the parents to correct them. Be prepared for parents to protest that “their little precious does not have behavioural problems, it’s the fault of x, y and z”.

Those that are seemingly destined to be scumbags and are unresponsive to all incentives, should be kicked to within an inch of their life*, the first time they are caught using violence on another individual.

A bit radical, I know, but Vote For Ivan anyway. Someone has to try something different.

  • Or at least into a hospital bed, so they can reflect on where they went wrong.
10

The rehab part of corrections is probably overstated in any case.

Corporal punishment may actually be preferable for certain crimes (I’m thinking property crimes would be the best candidate). If you buy the notion that the likelihood of getting caught is the biggest deterrent to criminal activity, and that long prison sentences don’t really deter all that much, why not just cane their asses? Society gets some level of retribution without the expense of housing these criminals in jails and prisons.

11

If you are talking about Rodney King, please either stop talking about him, or get your facts right.

Unless by “traffic ticket” you mean “drunk driving, attempting to avoid arrest by driving 100 mph, and violently resisting arrest while out on parole for robbery”.

Regards,
Shodan

12

Beating people has zero rehabilitative function and it’s inhumane. If that’s also true of prison, that’s a failure of the prison and justice systems. (It’s also a reflection of people’s totally inconsistent priorities when it comes to prison. Do we want people to come out prison and contribute to society if possible, or do we just want them to suffer? Those goals conflict.) And I agree with ivan astikov. The causes of crime might be a separate debate from this one, but if the issues that cause crime go unaddressed it doesn’t matter how you punish people because you’re not going to deter a significant amount of crime. You’re just going to make cosmetic changes to the prison system.

13

That was not a court sanctioned beating, apples and oranges.

If Rodney King had gone before a judge, and was judged properly guilty and then caned it would have been quite different. The opinion probably would have been you did it, got caught, now take your licks and shut up.

14

The only way to stop crime is to stop young men. I don’t see that working.

Perhaps national service for all 20-30 year olds is an idea worth exploring. If you really care about crime that much.

15

No, I loathe the idea of corporal punishment.

Except the sexual kind.

16

Criminals are the lowest scum there is? Evil politicians and military leaders are far far worse. Mao, Hitler, Stalin, Pol pot, Kim Il Sung are far worse than some wanna be gang banger arrested for stealing a television.

17

Yeah, suuuuure. Black guys being whipped by racists isn’t going to have any political or historical resonance in people’s minds.

18

I was reading a book called ‘do or die’ about LA gang members and the author was talking to an ex gang member and gang counselor at a youth authority camp. The counselor told her to try to find a truly violent, dangerous gang member who hadn’t been abused (physically or sexually), because those are the ones who end up truly hardcore. There may be a few sociopaths who were truly dangerous, but his point was that all the truly dangerous ones had been abused in one way or another.

So you treat people with violence, cruelty and derision, then end up shocked when they become inhumane.

19

And the OP is proposing we could beat that out of them. :wink: You’re absolutely correct.

Right. That would have outraged people, too. And even if you leave Rodney King out of it, there are so many valid reasons to be worried about racism in the justice system that it would be a horrible idea to bring back anything that echoes slavery. Maybe that’s less of a big deal for the OP in Britain, where it would still be a bad idea for all the other reasons.

20

Great. So those of us who didn’t spend their youth as juvenile delinquents get to serve as slaves for the state. :rolleyes: