# The American prison system makes no sense **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 7, 2011, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917 "2011-10-07T17:19:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/21 "2011-10-07T20:35:14Z")
> [@Mach Tuck](#): > > The experience of being in prison already sucks. But does it suck all that much more than the person’s average life outside of prison? ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/22 "2011-10-07T20:40:19Z")
> [@rogerbox](#): > > I don’t have a cite but I don’t think there is any correllation with how much the prison sucks and recidivism rates. Whereas, I do have cites (and don’t care about recidivism): > **[Study: Potential criminals deterred by longer sentences](https://phys.org/news/2009-05-potential-criminals-deterred-longer-sentences.html)** > > Deterrence is often a stated goal of criminal sentencing guidelines, but there is debate about whether the threat of punishment actually discourages people from committing crimes. A new study published in the Journal of Political Economy sheds some... [http://members.multimania.co.uk/lawnet/SENTENCE.PDF](http://members.multimania.co.uk/lawnet/SENTENCE.PDF) ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/23 "2011-10-07T20:59:29Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > Hear, hear! > > And I would add that we need reforms that will end the destruction of the family. You mean like some kind of act or amendment defending marriage as an institution? Or perhaps a prohibition on divorce or moratoriam on people who die before their children reach the age of majority? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/24 "2011-10-07T21:11:26Z")
> [@rogerbox](#): > > If you are talking about me, I never once said anything about giving the inmates more control, in fact on Lockdown at one prison in Wyoming the staff do an average of 26 hours overtime a month because they are staffed at 50%. I think that is unsafe for both staff and inmates, and with full staff they would have MORE control over inmates. No, I wasn’t directing my remarks at anyone in particular. It’s just that most ideas for making prisons better involve giving prisoners more freedom. And the unfortunate fact is that when criminals are given more freedom, one of the things they use it for is to commit some crimes. Here’s a true story. I was involved in the opening of a new prison. We had telephones on the units that prioners could use to call home. We were going to enact a policy limiting phone calls to fifteen minutes. But the prioners weren’t happy with that - they didn’t want us controlling their phone calls. It wasn’t a major issue so we gave them that one - there would be no rules limiting hos long people could stay on the phone. You can probably guess what happened. We started getting complaints all the time from people that wanted to make a phone call but couldn’t because the guy using the phone had been on it for over an hour. We say, “What do you us to do about it? He’s allowed to stay on the phone as long as he wants.” And the guy who was waiting would say, “Yeah, I know. But I want to use the phone now.” And that was the problem in a nutshell. No prisoner wants us to enforce the rules on him. But they all want us to enforce the rules on all the other prisoners. They don’t want us telling them to turn off their radio - but they don’t want the guy living ten feet away to be playing his radio when they’re trying to sleep. ---
**Author:** ![rogerbox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/76d3ee/32.png) [@rogerbox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rogerbox)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/25 "2011-10-07T21:20:50Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > (and don’t care about recidivism): Can you explain to me what could possibly be going through your mind that you don’t care about people being in your community re-offending? That is like saying you don’t care about your house being broken into or your kids getting beat up by gang members, I didn’t think such a viewpoint was possible. ---
**Author:** ![Llama\_Llogophile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@Llama\_Llogophile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Llama_Llogophile)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/26 "2011-10-07T21:24:39Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > But does it suck all that much more than the person’s average life outside of prison? Is this a serious question? Do you really think there are many people who prefer to be incarcerated? Not that this really matters to my point. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/27 "2011-10-07T21:49:51Z")
Forget retribution, forget rehabilitation, forget deterrence. The important purpose of incarceration is incarceration. It takes criminally-inclined persons out of circulation for a few years, puts them where they can commit no crimes but against each other. Going by crime stats falling over the past couple decades as incarceration has risen, that **works,** if we care to spend the money. That said, I see no reason why they should do their time any more miserably than is inevitably necessary in a prison. Let 'em at least have air-conditioning! ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/28 "2011-10-07T22:30:37Z")
> [@](#): > > Forget retribution, forget rehabilitation, forget deterrence. Because thinking and doing things constructively is so _hard_ Lets just keep to simplistic stuff and instant solutions to complex problems, it saves us using our intellect to think about the sort of society these individuals came from, and it saves us taking a more critical look at ourselves. Lock them up for good, much easier than thinking, personally I believe that thinking is quite important. ---
**Author:** ![rogerbox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/76d3ee/32.png) [@rogerbox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rogerbox)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2011, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/29 "2011-10-07T23:18:18Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Forget retribution, forget rehabilitation, forget deterrence. The important purpose of incarceration is incarceration. So rather than make sure inmates learn skills so they don’t break into your house, you’re comfortable with the fact that prison is criminal-college? This seems…“short sighted” is being generous. > [@](#): > > It takes criminally-inclined persons out of circulation for a few years, puts them where they can commit no crimes but against each other. You do realize crimes against other criminals are still crimes just as much against you and me and actually matter, right? Let me remind you that those people are human beings. Someone who goes to jail for stealing a car doesn’t deserve to be raped any more than you do. ---
**Author:** ![thelabdude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@thelabdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelabdude)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/30 "2011-10-08T02:12:42Z")
I note nobody has posted a cite to a successful program that could be expanded. I agree our prisons make our failed schools look good in comparison, but the bottom line is we don’t have a proven system for reforming prisoners. My wife taught GED preparation in a prison for a while. She lost her job due to a cut back. Those getting their GED were a little less likely to come back. Of course, it may have been those less likely to come back that went ahead and got their GED. ---
**Author:** ![code\_grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@code\_grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/code_grey)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/31 "2011-10-08T04:24:26Z")
the prison system deescalates underclass criminality, tortures and terrorizes lower and middle class white people who get entangled in it and provides a feeding trough for lots of parasitic government employees and contractors. What’s not to like from the standpoint of the evil regime that runs the country? (Looking forward to your thread about TSA making no sense 🙂 ) WRT reform, it would seem that getting “reform” done anywhere is pretty hard nowadays. Activist parents are a lot more numerous than activist prison reformers and have more political clout, and look how well they have fared against the educrat bureaucracies and teacher unions. But I do agree that it is a shame that no politicians bother to make a big deal out of this. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/32 "2011-10-08T05:18:20Z")
> [@Sateryn76](#): > > Can I get a cite on the Head Start thing? I’m not saying you’re wrong, but I’ve heard differently, and that most gains even out by second or third grade. My comment was based on my pre-Web readings but Googling does term up, e.g. [this PDF file](http://www.nhsa.org/files/static_page_files/399E0881-1D09-3519-AD56452FC44941C3/BenefitsofHSandEHS.pdf): > [@](#): > > Research shows that HS is a wise investment for society. The preliminary results of a randomly selected longitudinal study of more than 600 HS graduates in San Bernardino County, California, showed that society receives nearly $9 in benefits for every $1 invested in these HS children. These benefits include increased earnings, employment, and family stability, and decreased welfare dependency, crime costs, grade repetition, and special education But the same Googling suggests some studies have reached different conclusions, and I’ll concede my claim about Head Start may have been badly phrased or controversy. I _won’t_ retract the political charge I made, of which Head Start cutting was an example. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/33 "2011-10-08T05:18:22Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > If you dump money into prisons and make it really **suck** for those who are incarcerated – one person per cell with no contact with anyone but visitors, or breaking rocks in a field every day – then it’s possible that you’d see a lot more push to stay out of prison, even if it meant going straight. What you are describing was what the United States tried in its earliest prisons back in the 1790s. It didn’t work then and it won’t work now. Individuals isolated from meaningful human contact will not be properly socialized when they are reintegrated in society. In fact, they’ll probably be worse off than they were before. ---
**Author:** ![rogerbox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/76d3ee/32.png) [@rogerbox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rogerbox)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/34 "2011-10-08T05:39:13Z")
> [@code\_grey](#): > > the prison system deescalates underclass criminality, tortures and terrorizes lower and middle class white people who get entangled in it and provides a feeding trough for lots of parasitic government employees and contractors. What’s not to like from the standpoint of the evil regime that runs the country? (Looking forward to your thread about TSA making no sense 🙂 ) I can’t tell if you’re being serious or not. How do you think prison treats whites differently from blacks? TSA doesn’t make sense either because airplane security is literally impossible (I have posted before that I used to work at an airport and I know exactly how much of a charade TSA security theatre is). But I don’t think anyone on the SDMB actually champions TSA, and I don’t make recreational outrage threads, I like to actually discuss and debate ideas. > [@](#): > > WRT reform, it would seem that getting “reform” done anywhere is pretty hard nowadays. Activist parents are a lot more numerous than activist prison reformers and have more political clout, and look how well they have fared against the educrat bureaucracies and teacher unions. But I do agree that it is a shame that no politicians bother to make a big deal out of this. If your post is serious I don’t think your “The gubmint is evil, privatize privatize, privatize!” reform is what I want anywhere near our prisons. ---
**Author:** ![code\_grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@code\_grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/code_grey)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2011, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/35 "2011-10-08T06:04:04Z")
> [@rogerbox](#): > > I can’t tell if you’re being serious or not. How do you think prison treats whites differently from blacks? I didn’t say anything like that. I said that from the standpoint of the powers that be prison serves a different purpose for different kinds of people. The underclass if left unchecked will create havoc through violent crime - hence they are imprisoned for real and for make-belief but easier to prove (drug possession) crimes. The thugs involved adapt themselves well to incarceration and are not really “terrorized” by prison environment (some of them allegedly are even on average healthier while incarcerated than on the street). Poorer whites constitute a potential political or even violent threat to the system if they get sufficiently pissed off at the world around them, hence keeping them scared of going to prison is convenient for social stability. > [@](#): > > If your post is serious I don’t think your “The gubmint is evil, privatize privatize, privatize!” reform is what I want anywhere near our prisons. I did not say anything about privatization, so no need for telepathy. I said that the government is stuck on “evil” and there seems to be little to be done about it, in many different areas. Prisons are just one such area among many. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2011, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/36 "2011-10-09T17:53:00Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Don’t blame prisons for the number of people who are incarcerated. Prisons don’t grab people off the streets to fill empty cells. If you think America has too high an incaceration rate, then look at the legislatures and court systems. > > Or if you want to look at the problem more broadly, look at the schools and community centers and libraries and day care centers. Prison is just the final symptom in a chain of social failure. If you want to reform society you’re better off putting your resources earlier in the chain. A million dollars spent on a school will do a lot more than a million dollars spent on a prison. They do. The 3 strikes rule puts some petty criminals in jail for life who would get short time sentences and be out. The judges in Pennsylvania were tossing lots of kids in jail for non-jailable offenses because they were bribed to do so. Once in jail, kids are often kept full term instead of getting out earlier like they should ,because there is profit in it for our prison industry. ---
**Author:** ![Indygrrl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@Indygrrl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indygrrl)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2011, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917/37 "2011-10-09T18:11:20Z")
The fact that we imprison so many nonviolent drug (or marijuana) offenders makes me sick. If we decriminalized drugs, and gave up the whole “war on drugs” that would go a long way towards prison reform. There’s no reason other than greed that we have so many of our citizens imprisoned for nonviolent offenses, especially when rich folks can buy their way out of prison time for the same offenses. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-prison-system-makes-no-sense/598917.md?page=1)