Philosophy Discussion Forums

Hi, @Grotto19

Thank you for your reply. You make some good points about positive reinforcement and the studies regarding it

Grotto19 in post #117 wrote:Criminals who defy the law today do so because they are quite likely not like the majority.

I doubt the accuracy of that. In the United States, things like marijuana and prostitution are illegal. In fact, the vast majority of those incarcerated in the USA are only charged with nonviolent 'crimes'. Worse yet, about half of the people incarcerated have not been convicted. The people who end up in prison aren't the criminals, but just poor people who cannot afford bail. The laws are so removed from defined by violence that everyone is a criminal.

Grotto19 in post #117 wrote:I feel that those currently in the norm of being lawful would more often stray without the threat of prison.

There is a lot of evidence in psychology and behavioral economics that suggests that is not the case. People are not rational agents and their behavior isn't explained by the cost benefit analysis that guides rational agents. Dan Ariely has lead several experiments on the matter, in which people in studies were given the opportunity to cheat. The rate at which they cheated was not affected when, through controlled comparison, the payout for cheating was increased. However, cheating rates could be affected by other factors that experimenters could control, namely whether or not other people cheated and whether or not those other people were part of the in group or out group.

Grotto19 in post #117 wrote:I feel reform to the prison system and more effort for reform of inmates is actually needed despite the expense.

I agree, which is key since this seemed to more of the conclusion.

Grotto19 in post #117 wrote:I think the only realistic results will come from an effort to change societies view of crime, an effort to educate and display positive reinforcement of right behavior in high crime areas. Media spends so much time displaying the crime and so little on people rising above it. I know the project of altering societal views is daunting, but I think our lack of this effort is the key contributor to current and future crime.

I don't agree that crime is "wrong behavior" and that not committing crime is right behavior. Martin Luther King was a criminal, for example. So was Henry David Thoreau. So was that elderly man arrested earlier this year for feeding the homeless.

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@Beyondthecave

Thank you for your reply.

Beyondthecave in post #118 wrote:Calling the facility a mental health hospital rather than a prison does not make things better unless their are genuine differences that make the hospital more humane.

I agree. A rose by any other name smells just as sweet.

You also mention make arguments that drug use and prostitution are not victimless. In short, I think these arguments fail because they show that those behaviors can sometimes entail victimization (e.g. when a sex partner happens to have an STD) or tend to lead to victimization (e.g. when a drug user steals to fund his addiction. However, there is difference between something sometimes entailing or leading to victimization and it being victimization. Those parenthetical examples are indeed victimization, and someone engaging in such victimization cannot be said to be committing only victimless behaviors. If you wish to discuss whether particular allegedly victimless crimes like drug use or prostitution are in fact victimless, or wish to debate their legal status, let's do that in a different topic; Consider all these threads each about allegedly victimless/consensual activity that is or has been illegal in many places: prostitution, homosexual civil unions, marijuana, alcohol, all drugs, paying employees poorly or choosing to work for low pay, and gambling.

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@Bezelbub

Thank you for your reply.

Bezelbub in post #119 wrote:We need prisons as a way to get rid of those which are harmful to our society.

Ipse dixit. Even worse, your post does not address the points in the original post.

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@Celtick

Thank you for your reply.

Celtick in post #120 wrote:After reading all of your replies to the question, I can safely assume that not one of you has experienced a crime committed against you or your family by a criminal.

Ad hominem fallacy.

Celtick in post #120 wrote:Does Society Need Prisons? The answer is no. Execute the bastards on the spot. Your instinctual reaction is to eliminate the threat to you and your family. If you hesitate or feel compassion towards the criminal, you put your family at risk. NO QUESTIONS ASKED.

Ipse dixit. Saying something is our "instinctual reaction" doesn't mean it is smart to do. The instinctive, fearful behavior your describe is primitive and animalistic and thus itself dangerous.

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@Wilson

Thank you for your reply.

Wilson in post #121 wrote:The objective of our legal system should be primarily to protect the law-abiding members of our society.

Why? What do you mean by the word "should"? Does "should" refer to some kind of religious or metaphysically moralistic belief held without evidence?

Why "protect" law-abiding members of a society--such as law-abiding Nazis in historical Germany--from criminals--such as Martin Luther King, Henry David Thoreau, and the man who just this year was arrested for feeding the homeless? Even calling it protection seems inaccurate. People need to be protected from non-defensive violence (e.g. murder, rape, etc.) not crime (e.g. marijuana, prostitution, etc.). Right?

The very reference to some need to protect suggests agreement with my ideas including the underlying sympathy towards victims of violence, right?

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@JOGeran

Thank you for your reply.

JOGeran in post #122 wrote:If the crime directly deals harm to someone because of the act for example Murder, Stealing, Rape, then it would make sense that there should be a prison sentence for it otherwise people would have little reason not to

That's not true. Dan Ariely's aforementioned experiments in cheating show that risks and benefits of cheating do not determine that rates at which people engage in the behavior. It's important to not just make claims without evidence. We need to check the large body of research in psychology and behavior economics before making strong claims about what leads to people committing actions like violent crime or not.

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@Hosshere

Thank you for your reply, post #123.

You make a great point about the lack of fathers or even both parents in many families. Interestingly, this is one of the worst effects of the mass incarceration problem. So many of these millions of nonviolent people locked up for things like marijuana are parents who have been stolen from their families. This has devastating effects not only directly on the family but rippling out on the rest of us.

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@Wilson

Wilson wrote:Anyone who thinks a society can function without prisons is not in touch with reality.

The above quote is a quote of the entire post. That is an absurdly weak argument that has no place on a philosophy forum. It's structure is clearly shown as absurd since everything before the last 6 words can be changed to any proposition and placed a reply to any argument.

The post in no way responds to or rebuts the points from the OP.

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@Logic_ill

Thank you for your reply.

Logic_ill in post #129 wrote:Society may need prisons for now because incarceration is a form of punishment and sometimes "rehabilitation". Maybe we can come up with some other way of dealing with criminals. I cannot think of many right now...

I'm sorry; I don't understand this post in the context of this topic. How is it response to the proposals for dealing with criminals in the OP? Can you elaborate on how this related to that?

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@Supine

Thank you for your reply. You make a great point about gang members not being bothered by going to prison and about prisons help fueling the problems outside of them. Another terrible aspect of mass-imprisonment is this: Nonviolent people who are sent to prison are much more likely to join a gang in prison. That's especially scary in a country like the USA where the vast majority of people in prison are only charged with nonviolent crimes.

In the OP, I propose rehabilitating crazy violent people in humane mental health institutions. What we have now is not just the lack of that but the opposite: Prisons filled with sane nonviolent people being turned crazy violent by the hell of prison.

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@Belinda

Thank you for your numerous replies. Sorry, I don't have much to say because I agree with most of what you have written.

Belinda wrote:As I was trying to say our gut reactions of anger and fear are human and to be expected. But we need to be rational even in cases of gross cruelty and criminality. I don't know what caused those criminals you mentioned to do what they did. But don't you think it is better for all our futures when we can rationally seek for causes of gross criminality instead of simply blaming?

Very well stated!

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@Grecorivera5150

Thank you for your reply.

Grecorivera5150 in post #135 wrote:Yes , we need a prison system. It is were people are sent who make it unbearable to exist in the greater prison.

How do marijuana smokers and prostitutes make it unbearable to exist in society? Even if that's true, how does the rebut the reasons I gave in the OP for why we don't need prison. Keep in mind, I never suggested setting everyone in prison free.

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@Felix

Thank you for your comments. Great points about the prison industrial complex.

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@Lucylu

Thank you for your reply.

I am intrigued by your ideas of non-military conscription. However, if it is to be used on anything but the small minority of inmates actually convicted of a violent crime, then I cannot support it.

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@Theophane

Thank you for your reply.

Theophane wrote:Their primary function is to punish criminals and to protect the public from such criminals.

Why do we need to punish criminals? It doesn't make sense to say we need A because of B unless it can be shown we need B.

I don't understand the "protect the public from such criminals". What does it mean to protect the public from pacifist marijuana smokers, to reiterate just one example from the OP?

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@Algol291

Thank you for your reply. You make a great point about how the role of money and profit. Indeed, there's billions of dollars in the prison industry. That's a lot of money to wealthy special interests to push destructive policy through lobbying and campaign contributions.

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@Roel

Thank you for your reply. You are unfortunately absolutely right in the example about prisons teaching people to commit crime. Prisons do the opposite of rehabilitation, which is doubly sad since most of the people going in our nonviolent.

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@ScottieX

Thank you for your reply.

ScottieX wrote:I think the decision faced by society is never "is X necessary or not necessary." It is Is X better than the available alternatives. So We have for example the non violent offender who could be in prison or could be outside facing some other restrictions.

This is a false dichotomy, and I'm a little confused by it considering the OP specifically makes a proposal that is not either of the two options.

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ABreedApart wrote:[...] what about the violence and injustice created by the production, transportation and distribution of these drugs? As a society, are we not allowed to legislate morality to some degree?

There is no science to backup the "morality"; it's basically religion. So I would say no. We can debate each of the specific allegedly victimless crimes in the respective topics: prostitution, homosexual civil unions, marijuana, alcohol, all drugs, paying employees poorly or choosing to work for low pay, and gambling. For each of those you want to be illegal, I invite you to discuss it with me in the respective topic.

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@Whitedragon

Thank you for your reply.

Whitedragon wrote:Police long discovered that if petty crimes are more strictly punished more serious crimes decline as well.

Ipse dixit. Please provide credible sources with evidence for that statistical claim.

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@Simply Wee

Thank you for your reply.

Simply Wee wrote:For the sake of the innocent we need prisons

This statement makes no sense to me in the context of the OP. Why wouldn't the alternative solution in the OP work? Why do we need to imprison pacifist marijuana users "for the sake of the innocent"?

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@Integrity

Thank you for your reply. You make great points about violent behavior being the result of environmental factors. We can much more effectively protect ourselves from violence by addressing those factors and thus preventing violent crime.


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Thanks again everyone!

"Need" is a word with different meanings to different people. But yes, society is better off with prisons than without. I will agree there is a lot of room for improvement in the system but that is true of every system.

A couple of things: "victimless crimes" commonly have victims. Prostitution can be associated with what used to be called "white slavery" and child prostitution is also not uncommon. Marijuana is legal where I live, but we are all familiar with drug gang violence, so drug sales are not victimless.

As to offenders who are unlikely to reoffend , I agree they exist. A lot of them are murderers of their spouses. They aren't going to kill anyone else, why not let them out of prison (when we close them), what's the harm? Not on my watch.

Change the bail system? Sure. De criminalize weed in all 50 states? Fine. Close all the prisons? Not if I have a say in it.

Hi, @LuckyR

You make a great point about the word 'need' having different meanings. Thank you for reply.

LuckyR wrote:But yes, society is better off with prisons than without.

Ipse dixit.

Why is society "better off" with prisons than doing what I proposed in the OP? What does "better off" mean?

LuckyR wrote:A couple of things: "victimless crimes" commonly have victims.

That's a contradiction.

LuckyR wrote:Prostitution can be associated with what used to be called "white slavery" and child prostitution is also not uncommon.

That's an association fallacy.

Further, it's a strawman. I'm not proposing legalizing child prostitution, and I doubt any significant number of people are. (If you want to discuss the legalization of prostitution specifically, I invite you to respond to my topic Legalizing Prostitution.) For the purposes of this topic, I am proposing only that we do not imprison people who's only 'crime' is engaging in prostitution between consenting sober STD-free adults--with all the typical common sense limitations of legitimate consent understood across many different jurisdictions and countries in all aspects of voluntaryism and contracts not just sex-related transactions.

LuckyR wrote:Marijuana is legal where I live, but we are all familiar with drug gang violence, so drug sales are not victimless.

Again, this is an association fallacy. It's an especially ironic one. Are you suggesting CVS and Walgreens shall be criminalized? Or is the this association fallacy ironically only making the fallacious inference of criminally associating associated behaviors when it comes to criminals (e.g. 'when criminals do the thing they are associated with illegally doing the criminal thing in an illegal way so it should be criminal to do it at all ever').

LuckyR wrote:As to offenders who are unlikely to reoffend , I agree they exist. A lot of them are murderers of their spouses.

Source please.

LuckyR wrote:Close all the prisons? Not if I have a say in it.

Ipse dixit. Why?

I get that you are seeking to focus on a specific aspect of a topic. So let me answer your take on this issue specifically (instead of the broader answer I originally directed at the Forum at large).

I put my conclusion at the beginning of my post so I understand you hadn't seen any reasoning at that point, but stick with me.

"Better off " meaning the benefit of incarcerating violent criminals away from folks is a value to the society.

Perhaps you didn't see the quotation marks around victimless crimes since I am calling that label as a misnomer, so I guess in a way you are correct, it's a contradiction, but one that goes against your premise.

Maybe I can cut to the chase quicker: despite your cherry picking a few crimes that may be better dealt with outside of the penal system (either by legalization, decriminalization or fines) what is your proposal for stuff like, you know, rape, murder, robbery & assault? How about fraud, arson and larceny?

LuckyR wrote:"Better off " meaning the benefit of incarcerating violent criminals away from folks is a value to the society. [Emphasis added.]

Only approximately 14% of inmates in the USA are charged with violent crimes. Considering your stated reasoning we are "better off" with prisons only entailing reference to a small minority of inmates, do we agree with my premise that we can simply release most inmates? It seems, if that is that is the case, then we both agree that prisons as they are currently used are mostly unneeded, and the question is simply what to do with the exceptions (i.e. the small minority).

LuckyR wrote:Perhaps you didn't see the quotation marks around victimless crimes since I am calling that label as a misnomer, so I guess in a way you are correct, it's a contradiction, but one that goes against your premise.

If my premises are true, contradictions would presumably go against it. I'm hoping my points are the opposite of contradictions indeed.

At this point in your post it still seems like your conclusion at the beginning of your post is still ipse dixit. Why are we allegedly "better off" with prisons? Why are we allegedly "better off" removing violent criminals (the minority) with prisons rather than the way I propose for dealing with that minority?

LuckyR wrote: what is your proposal for stuff like, you know, rape, murder, robbery & assault? How about fraud, arson and larceny?

I'm sorry; I'm not sure what wasn't clear about my proposal in the OP for those things. Do you mind elaborating on what wasn't clear so I can try to clarify it.

Interesting topic. Twelve pages of comments, though, I haven't been through them all.

Before I was retired I did a few admin work contracts with Corrections Canada at a women's prison in town.

Now, this was a Federal institution, only housing those convicted of Federal crimes (as opposed to Provincial infractions like traffic offences, etc.). Every day I came in contact with persons who committed murder. (As an aside, I found the murderers the easiest to deal with. Most - not all - of them were in for life and were resigned to their fate. The toughest cookies were the thieves and con artists, always looking for an angle and one really had to be on one's guard.)

Prisons are intended to serve two purposes: rehabilitation of those who can be rehabilitated (and we were fortunate to have some great success stories) and removing violent elements from society.

Those who were successful in rehab programs have gone on to do good things. Some weren't so successful and ended up back behind bars. And others, of course, will never leave.

I think it's important to realize, therefore, that prisons serve more than one purpose, so to ask "Does society need prisons?", one hasn't dealt with the functions of prisons to begin with.

Scott wrote:

LuckyR wrote:"Better off " meaning the benefit of incarcerating violent criminals away from folks is a value to the society. [Emphasis added.]

Only approximately 14% of inmates in the USA are charged with violent crimes. Considering your stated reasoning we are "better off" with prisons only entailing reference to a small minority of inmates, do we agree with my premise that we can simply release most inmates? It seems, if that is that is the case, then we both agree that prisons as they are currently used are mostly unneeded, and the question is simply what to do with the exceptions (i.e. the small minority).

OK, since the issue is that prisons are needed by society for violent criminals at minimum, but much less of a need than under the current situation, I agree with you.

I see the categories thusly : there are currently illegal activities that should either be legalized or decriminalized (your examples of optimal prostitution and marijuana use). I think most could eventually support this.

As usual the difficult decisions are in the gray areas. What about a carreer non-violent criminal? Say, a burglar or car thief. Or a violent criminal who is not a risk to society. Say a spouse killer, no spouse anymore, no need to commit future crime.

There are different scales that prisons perform on: society protection, deterence, rehabilitation and punishment. The OP mostly addresses protection. Opinions will vary dramatically if the full picture is considered.

@Scribbler60 thank you for your reply.

Scribbler60 wrote:Prisons are intended to serve two purposes: rehabilitation of those who can be rehabilitated (and we were fortunate to have some great success stories) and removing violent elements from society.

In the USA, the majority of inmates are charged with non-violent crimes. Thus, it seems those mustn't be the only two main intended purposes. What does it even mean to rehabilitate pacifist pot smokers? Was Martin Luther King rehabilitated when he was jailed? Does society need to rehabilitate criminals like Martin Luther King?

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@LuckyR thank you for you replies and this interesting discussion.

LuckyR wrote:

Scott wrote: (Nested quote removed.)

Only approximately 14% of inmates in the USA are charged with violent crimes. Considering your stated reasoning we are "better off" with prisons only entailing reference to a small minority of inmates, do we agree with my premise that we can simply release most inmates? It seems, if that is that is the case, then we both agree that prisons as they are currently used are mostly unneeded, and the question is simply what to do with the exceptions (i.e. the small minority).

OK, since the issue is that prisons are needed by society for violent criminals at minimum, but much less of a need than under the current situation, I agree with you.

I see the categories thusly : there are currently illegal activities that should either be legalized or decriminalized (your examples of optimal prostitution and marijuana use). I think most could eventually support this.

As usual the difficult decisions are in the gray areas. What about a carreer non-violent criminal? Say, a burglar or car thief. Or a violent criminal who is not a risk to society. Say a spouse killer, no spouse anymore, no need to commit future crime.

To answer your questions, I want these exceptional situations to be dealt with using the proposals regarding the third category listed in the OP.

Scott, perhaps I am not getting the OP right, the third category I saw was for the criminally insane going to mental institutions.

I see two unaddressed facets of the topic: folks for whom non-violent crime is their profession (what to do with them) and the deterent effect of prison on future possible criminals being lost in their diminution.

LuckyR,

The third category is indeed for people with some kind of psychological abnormality making them significantly more likely to victimize others. Those who do not pose such an abnormal behavioral risk to the rest of us need not be caged for long periods of time, in my opinion.

I am not familiar with any scientific evidence of this alleged deterrent effect you mention. Quite the contrary, all the work in the relevant sciences with which I am familiar, such as Dan Ariely's work in doing controlled experiments researching cheating, demonstrate that the factors that determine whether a person breaks the rules or not include a variety of factors other than but not including a rational cost-benefit analysis of the consequences of getting caught multiplied by the risk of getting caught; people aren't rational agents.

I imagine, if we lived in a world where things like this alleged non-evidenced deterrent effect existed, the war on drugs would have been won by now.

Everyone has heard of deterrence but in a background of dropping crime rates it can be difficult to show a deterrent effect clearly, though many feel that the George Mason University study of three strikes eligible vs noneligible felons documents a 17- 20% drop (deterrent effect) in reoffences due to the harsher penalty for the next conviction.

@LuckyR In the preceding post, the first sentence is an argumentum ad populum fallacy. The second sentence appears to be a post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy. The studies I reference such as those by professor Dan Ariely involved controlled experiments. His controlled experiments demonstrate that a greater chance of getting caught does not reduce cheating, but they do reveal many controlled alterations to the experiments that do increase cheating (which like much of his vast research reveals humans are not rational agents making decisions by doing a cost-benefit analysis). Also, I believe my previous post contained a valid reductio ad absurdum regarding the war on drugs being winnable if the alleged deterrent effect actually existed in any major way.

One thing that imprisonment does is prevent individuals from committing crimes against the general public while they are incarcerated. I suspect that some of the decrease in crime rates that we've seen is related to increased jail time. Personally I believe that three strikes laws are appropriate for those who have chosen crime as their way of life.

Wilson wrote:Personally I believe that three strikes laws are appropriate for those who have chosen crime as their way of life.

Ipse dixit. Why is it appropriate? Why do we want non-violent criminals like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to be incarcerated?

Actually, I am unaware that Prof Ariely has produced original research on the topic of criminal deterrence, rather he sought to use the subject as an example for his theory of Coherent Aribitrariness. Specifically he sought to sort the existing data in that field which he describes as "mixed", that is half the studies show a deterrent effect and half don't. He noted (unsurprisingly to my eye) that well publicized changes in punishment had a definite but temporary deterrent effect and studies done during static time periods did not show much effect.

I will say the guy does have a talent for selling books and performing on the lay stage, regardless of his skills as a researcher.