So what would you say to someone in this situation, who had been arrested, housed in one of these facilities for a few weeks, and then found innocent in a fair trial?
More to the point, what would you say if it were you? I think I can, without impugning anyone’s character, postulate a hypothetical situation where one were arrested, didn’t have any kind of good alibi, and was charged with a crime they ultimately didn’t do. After spending two weeks in this kind of establishment and being found innocent, what would you say to Arpaio afterwards? “Don’t bother apologizing, I know this is just how it works. Brutal and dehumanizing treatment of suspected criminals is part and parcel of the defense of a free society, keep up the good work?”
The key thing, and the thing that I admittedly had not been aware of, is that this is not a prison, it’s a jail. Many of the people there haven’t been convicted of a crime yet. Why should people be treated badly if they haven’t been found guilty?
Look, there’s an old joke about a nun who goes to the construction foreman next door to her girls’ school to complain about the language of his workers. He tells her he’s sorry but his guys are just rough and tumble construction workers and inclined to call a spade a spade. She replies “That’s just the problem, sir. They don’t call it a spade, they call it a fucking shovel.”
Well, I’m gonna call a spade a fucking shovel here and accuse you people of not giving a shit about the pain and suffering you allege these inmates are being subjected to. In almost every prison in this country inmates are bullied and robbed and beaten and their lives made miserable by 6’5" 320 lb. weightlifting gangbanger assholes and their hangers-on, or by gangs of inmates who’ve banded together, or by prison guards and employees themselves, and you don’t utter a word of protest.
No, what you’re all het up about is the fact that a right wing lawman, someone in a position of official authority (one of your longtime and well-known boogeymen) is taking concrete steps to try to make going to his jail as objectionable as possible. And you’re using the fact that blacks and Hispanics are prominent among his population there to claim that he’s acting out of racial bias when the reality is that he’s trying to do all he can to make being sent to his jail unpleasant enough for anyone sent there so that when they get out they will behave well enough not to get sent back.
I happen to think his approach is a great idea and it should be instituted in all jails and prisons. And I don’t care whose skin is what color. You can pink up and Strangers In The Night all them white boys in Minnesota and Wyoming too for all I care!
We’re complaining that a sadist does everything he can to flout constitutional protections for all kinds of Americans, and some dumbshits actually think that’s a good thing.
I just answered this. They are already being treated far worse simply by virtue of being put in jail. They’ve been taken from their families, their jobs, they’ve lost their income and their freedom. They’re put in cells with scary assholes. It sucks to be arrested wrongfully but it happens, and everyone seems to accept all the consequences I’ve just mentioned without complaint. It’s only when Joe Arpaio and pink underwear enter the picture that an innocent arrestee’s plight suddenly becomes cause for concern, and compared with the other consequences of having been arrested and put in jail in the first place I find the unpleasantries of Arpaio’s jails to be minor indeed.
The Constitution says convicts can’t be made to listen to Frank Sinatra, eat baloney sandwiches or wear pink underwear?
And that they have to be given porn and weightlifting equipment?
Not while the Supreme Court is still blessedly free of a liberal majority it doesn’t.
I swear, the things you whingebags define as torture and sadism! (“Oh, noes! They have to watch the Disney channel and wear pink underwear!!!”)
I mean, I’m with you on disembowling and burning at the stake, but really, isn’t this a bit much? How do you people get through your days without collapsing from the stress?
Sinatra falls under “cruel and unusual punishment”, already brought up in this thread.
Do you have anything to offer us about how those who have not been convicted of any crime deserve that? Would you *really *still be able to simply shrug if off if it were you?
We are deeply privileged to have an actual, living onion-belted cloud-yeller right here on the Dope for us to mock.
There’s a difference between not convicted and wrongfully accused. If I were simply not yet convicted of a crime I’d committed, I’d be thinking “Fuck, I wonder if I’m gonna be able to get off on this. I hope the libbies have got things to the point now where I’ll just get a slap on the wrist or kicked loose because it’s ‘cwowded.’”
If I was arrested because I’d been wrongfully accused, I’d be pissed off and worried just like I would in any other jail.
I nominate that accusation for deportation to IMHO.
Cause ain’t no court substantiated it, and even the Obama justice department has demurred on trying to bring similar charges against him. So I’m afraid I’ll have to consider your accusations as little more than partisan whingeing.
Frankly, I think I’d much rather spend time in Arpaio’s jail than some of the other ones I’ve seen video of. It seems fairly safe and orderly, everybody has floor to ceiling window views, plenty of ventilation, and as you might figure I like Frank Sinatra and at least some Disney. I wouldn’t be too crazy about the heat but that isn’t Arpaio’s fault.
And now, as always happens when life intrudes on our happy little contests, I’m afraid I’m going to have to take my leave for a while. Or maybe permanently as I’ve pretty well said my piece…several times!
Are you aware of the multiple court cases which showed that Arpaio and his deputies had violated fundamental constitutional rights by not providing basic health care services to inmates?
This isn’t about pink underwear. It’s about not beating mentally ill veterans who happen to be inmates and then just happen to turn up dead later. It’s about the millions of dollars that Arizona taxpayers are liable for because you think it’s just hinky that a sadist gets to run a prison in ways that are actually inhumane.
If you’re anxious for a taste of prison life, I’d be more than happy to send you a fresh-baked nutraloaf to munch on. Nobody else’s is quite like mine.
I say that if SA breaches his promise and comes back to answer, we just all make a pact to ignore him since he’s already said his piece, and has now vowed to hold his peace. So let’s just talk about what he would say.
Would you, Simulacrum of SA, support a program to put people in jail - not prison, but jail - as a preventative measure? Finish high school, spend a summer in jail to make sure you never want to come back?
Proviso being that you would have to participate in it.
