I think the men should have the same opportunity as the women to play with their kids. This tugs at my heart strings a little bit, as a man that has recently divorced with two young children. It truly kills me inside that I don’t get to see them every day anymore, I do get them as much as I can but my ex has not let me get them at times when she was angry at me. The maternal bond is possibly the strongest bond, but I think children’s bond with their father can be just as important even if the relationship dynamic isn’t exactly the same.
I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that lack of playgrounds is not high on the list of male inmates’ complaints, and it’s much lower on the list of what ails society.
This is one of those things that sounds good in theory but is probably extremely difficult and very expensive to implement in reality.
Also, I agree with fjs1fs. It seems unlikely that this is what male inmates would choose to spend money on. Qadgop, can you take an informal survey at work?
Another thought I had was that the state (or feds or private prison company) may also be worried about liability; having kids around other inmates in a playground may prove dangerous and costly.
OP you mentioned one men’s prison that had a playground. Are the men allowed to use it for family visits?
I get propositioned by the ladies far more often than I get derision. Frankly I’d prefer the latter.
Dads get to visit with their kids, if mom brings them (and they’re approved to see them). The visiting rooms in our prisons do have a collection of kids’ toys to provide distraction and interactive play. Some prisons have better-stocked kid toy supplies, some have worse. The playgrounds are not the primary visiting site. They’re an added feature at a very few institutions, and seemingly aimed at female inmates.
Now they may well have been donated by some outside agency who wanted them at that particular prison; they may have been an added benefit based on just having the resources to build it at the time of construction; I’m really not sure. But save for the access to playgrounds at a couple of sites, I am not aware of differences in visitation policies between male and female institutions.
There’s a lot that’s been written on the effects of having a parent in jail or prison, and support groups/resource networks set up for such families. More could be done, to be sure.
I’m really not convinced that a playground is a great way to deepen father/child bonds in a prison. I don’t really play with my son at the playground: it’s a place for kids to play and adults to rest or talk. For the same money, you could have a cheerful rec room with games and toys meant to be used together: board games, ping-pong, legos, puzzles, dolls and stuffed animals. Even, honestly, gaming consoles with 2-player games.
I will explain my reasoning.
Anything that builds family bonds is going to help everyone in the family. The chance for dad to take his child to the playground is a chance to build such a bond. Won’t work all the time and won’t be a complete solution, heck it might hurt on occasion, but in general it will help. A stronger family helps the mom. A stronger family helps society later when dad gets out. win win win win. I don’t see a downside.
Will it be a big deal? That varies. Sometimes it won’t make any longterm difference, sometimes it will be the push that keeps the family together.
I think those are “playgrounds” too in the most general sense. It is the general idea that is important, not whether we are talking about see-saws versus Playstations. That depends on the facility and the resources available.
Incarceration strikes me as a rash approach to poor parenting. Only a small fraction of dead-beat dads are incarcerated, and to have the desired social effect, about a hundred million parents would need to be sent to prison to stop them from reproducing. Don’t forget their counterpart, dead-beat moms, that the children do remain exposed to daily.
To each his own, I guess: when the Firebug was younger (he’s 10 now), sometimes he’d be playing with the other kids on the playground, but just as often, it would be him and me.