[BrokenDreams]

The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world, with 4 times the world average. I don't think many Americans realize this. Land of the free? :no

http://www.nccd-crc.org/nccd/pubs/2006nov_factsheet_incarceration.pdf

I have my own ideas why this is so, but would like to hear other peoples thoughts and explanations?

 

[leomouse]

-it's a business, gives people jobs - security guards, police, courts, parole officers etc.... -also sometimes prisoners are used for cheap labour
-removes responsibility from the government to actually help these people, such as investing in poor neighborhoods, soo we can blame social problems on these "criminals"
-removes those from society who are not willing to lead a "normal" life

 

[UltraShy]

It's largely a result of our idiotic drug laws that fill prisons to the brim with non-violent drug offenders, who are disproportionately poor minorities. I find it most interesting that the Democratic Party that is now in power and claims to care so deeply about the poor & minorities continues with the same old drug laws that keep harming so many poor minorities.

Libertarians are the only ones who dare to openly discuss the issue while being ignored by the rest of the nation that is happy to continue down a path of Prohibition that failed 80 years ago with booze and has been failing for so long with other drugs as well. The DEA was created about 35 years ago to win the war on drugs. Clearly, they're not winning. Is 35 years not enough to recognize that it doesn't work and never will?

Or do we move to even more draconian measure like Singapore where drug dealers are simply hanged?

Neither major party will even dare to discuss the issue of drugs to any serious degree and generally won't discuss it at all. The only thing Obama has dared to say about drugs is that he did inhale when asked about his past drug use and he did order the DEA to stop raiding medical marijuana clinics where they are legal under state law (a change from the Bush administration that ignored states rights on this issue). And I applaud Obama for making this common sense change that was long overdue.

The US ranks #1 in the entire world when it comes to prison population and it doesn't matter how you measure it. We're #1 in raw numbers, managing to even top China that has four times the population! We're also #1 on a per-capita basis. This is definitely not an area where one can be proud about coming in first.

As I've pointed out before, the issue of drugs naturally leads to the issue of guns & gun rights. Late Nobel laureate economist, Milton Friedman, estimated that half of all US homicides are the result of drug prohibition in a paper he wrote back in 1991. How many more must die? How much more must be spent to support the world's largest prison population? The War On Drugs takes our money, our lives, and our liberties.

 

[BrokenDreams]

Well, leomouse and UltraShy have expressed the main 2 reasons that I believe have caused this sad situation. I didn't want to influence anyone's opinion which is why I hadn't expressed mine initially. Now that they have both been expressed I will say I agree with both of them completely.

During alcohol prohibition in the 1920's and early 1930's gangs and criminals increased dramatically, resulting in gangs, drive by shootings and government corruption because of the large sums of money involved, just like we are seeing today. That's where Al Capone and his gang got their start along with many others. Besides this, people were medically harmed more from drinking the illegal alcohol as it was unregulated and had many impurities. Within 13 years the people of the US realized that prohibition was a failure and ended it, after which crime and corruption diminished again. How long will it take for us to wake up and learn this valuable lesson over again.

The other factor is the privatization of our prisons. As long as prisons are run by private companies whose success is based on how many people they hold behind bars, there will be little effort to actually rehabilitate people and incorporate them back into society. Additionally their lobbyists will continue to influence officials to extend sentences, make mandatory minimum sentences and make more and more laws to lock people up for.

It's time for a change!

 

[nubly]

i dont know but if you break the law then you should be ready to do your time. if you dont agree with certain things then breaking the law isnt the way to change things.

 

[UltraShy]

i dont know but if you break the law then you should be ready to do your time. if you dont agree with certain things then breaking the law isnt the way to change things.

I guess that means Rosa Parks should have taken a seat at the back of the bus as the law of that time told her to. As you just said, breaking the law isn't the way to change things.

Back during prohibition many people did break liquor laws and one of the reasons Prohibition was repealed was because prosecutors often got juries to come back with not guilty verdicts even when the facts of the case clearly showed the defendant to be in violation of Prohibition.

It was also repealed for economic reasons. The Great Depression destroyed the revenue from personal and corporate income taxes, so they legalized booze simply to tax it.

 

[UltraShy]

mandatory minimum sentences

This in many cases simply results in one being charged with a lesser crime that carries a lower minimum or it ends up with clearly unjust results such as a boy who's 16 years & 1 month old being listed for LIFE as a sexual predator for having sex with his girlfriend who was 15 years & 11 months old.

 

[LoneLioness]

We need more social programs to keep people off drugs and from having to steal and stuff.

 

[Mr. Frostie]

I blame it on the hip hop/youth culture that glorifies violence, drugs, lack of respect for other people's rights and property, abuse of women and all sorts of anti-social behavior.

 

[MissMay1977]

It is because a large portion of the people in prison have a mental illness but don't get proper treatment so they self medicate and it leads to crime.

 

[nubly]

I guess that means Rosa Parks should have taken a seat at the back of the bus as the law of that time told her to. As you just said, breaking the law isn't the way to change things.

its not. parks wasnt the first person to do that. hers is the most known because of the actions she took after this indicident. refusing her seat may have given her the motivation to fight but it was her latter actions that help civil rights movements

i dont know much about prohibtion america

 

[BeNice]

Because our society sucks.

 

[TheRob]

If the government felt they could legalize drugs and tax them, they would've done it by now. It's either more profitable to maintain the status quo or the governments/judicial systems of the world are well paid to keep their silence.

Something like 85% of homicides around here are drug related.

 

[continued hope]

How to get him to stop

I have a 24 year old son, he was an honor student untill the 12th grade when I finnally noticed there was a problem. I did not know the extent at the time but know 7 years later and after trying everything I could to help him, he is back in jail for breaking the frontglass of a skateboard shop to try and steal whatever he could to buy drugs. this will be his 5th or sixth arrest and he has spent around 3-4 years incarserated for drugs and theft.
This time he lasted only 6 months on probartion and I thought he was doing good, he held down a job, his employer loves him because he does have a great personallity when he is clean. Everyone who knows him triedto help him do good this time and he failed us all. It's almost like he cannot break the behavoir cycle. As soon as we all start to give him privilages in our life, he does something wacked out like this that makes me question, Does he have a mental problem? or do the drugs just make you stupid.
Well, I quess he will get another 2-5 years this time and then another chance to redeem himself. He will fail again unless I can somehow get thru that he needs God in his life. It doesn't hurt as much this time, I quess we eventually become numb in the heart, but I still belive he can change and I'm glad he is where he can't get heroin and hurt himself more with his addition. I don't even know if when he goes back to Jessup MD prision if they even have programs to help him. I really feel like I lost.

 

[UltraShy]

We need more social programs to keep people off drugs and from having to steal and stuff.

How much criminal acts does one need to engage in to get the money to buy a $10 jug of generic vodka? Not much; begging could likely bring in enough income.

The DEA effectively puts a target on your back, your home, your car and any other property when they squeeze drug supplies and push prices sky high. A junkie steals your car to pay for his habit. A junkie steals your laptop to pay for his habit. Some crack w*ore works the corner in front of your house which really destroys property values to pay for her habit. They rob you at gunpoint demanding your cash, watch, jewelry and any other valuables to pay for their habit. They break into your home and steal anything of value that isn't bolted down to finance a fix. How the hell is this system making you safer?

I'd prefer not to have somebody pull a weapon on me. I'd prefer not to have hookers on my street. I'd prefer not to have burglars in my home. I'd prefer my car still be where I parked it when I come back the next day. And the policies of the DEA do not help at all in encouraging the peaceful world that I would prefer.

How are we supposed to keep people off drugs? You went to school -- didn't they give you the same "drugs are real bad; don't do them" lecture that we got at my school? That lecture seems to fail miserably in the inner cities of America.

 

[BrokenDreams]

Continued hope, I'm really sorry to hear your sad story. Your son initially had a drug addiction which is a medical problem, not a criminal one. He probably only turned to crime to support the high cost of his habit. Putting someone with a medical problem in jail does little to resolve the root cause of the problem and only puts him in contact with a lot of bad people who are negative rather than positive influences. Most prisons have little in the way of actual rehabilitation. Many are privately run and don't mind the repeat business at all.

My only recommendation is to try to get him some professional therapy when he gets out to try to discover and resolve the root cause of his drug addiction. Many peolple do drugs in an effort to escape deeper issues.

I wish you luck in your future efforts to help him.

 

[justpassinby]

I'm assuming by social problems you mean poverty, abuse, dysfunction, etc. Just because you grow up in this environment doesn't mean you have to be a criminal.

 

[UltraShy]

Something like 85% of homicides around here are drug related.

I hope you are not implying there is a causal effect here as in heroin causes murder.

From 1920-33 there was a great deal of alcohol related murder, though it wasn't booze causing it. It was organized crime who had taken over the production & distribution of illegal booze who were on a killing spree, no different than the gang bangers of today that are in charge of the drug trade where the rules of the game are kill or be killed and be ready to defend yourself, your turf and, your product with deadly force.

 

[bezoomny]

its not. parks wasnt the first person to do that. hers is the most known because of the actions she took after this indicident. refusing her seat may have given her the motivation to fight but it was her latter actions that help civil rights movements

i dont know much about prohibtion america

Rosa Parks is well-known because her arrest was the main event that caused the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which brought Martin Luther King, Jr. into the national spotlight. The Montgomery Bus Boycott ended the Alabama bus segregation law. Civil disobedience worked very well there.

The Greensboro sit-ins are another example, where black students sat at the "whites-only" lunch counter and other areas designated "whites-only." They technically broke the law, but even when threatened with violence or physically injured, they never fought back. They broke a law they deemed unjust and oppressive.

Civil disobedience can and does work, not only in the civil rights movement but also in the Indian independence movement, the anti-Vietnam movement, and many others.

 

[Amocholes]

There is a difference between breaking the law and civil disobedience.

Smoking a joint behind a bar is breaking the law. Smoking a joint on the courthouse steps with a group of like minded people is civil disobedience.