{"id":1418,"date":"2011-10-10T11:31:19","date_gmt":"2011-10-10T15:31:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/10\/some-uk-folks-having-doubts-about-catching-up-with-us-in-prisons.html"},"modified":"2011-10-10T11:31:19","modified_gmt":"2011-10-10T15:31:19","slug":"some-uk-folks-having-doubts-about-catching-up-with-us-in-prisons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/10\/some-uk-folks-having-doubts-about-catching-up-with-us-in-prisons.html","title":{"rendered":"Some U.K. folks having doubts about catching up with U.S. in prisons"},"content":{"rendered":"Will Self wrote 7 October 2011 for the BBC,\n\nA Point of View: Prisons don’t work<\/a>\n
\n\n<\/a>\nIt was Dostoevsky who said: “The degree of civilisation in a society\nis revealed by entering its prisons.” But in contemporary Britain you\ndon’t even need to do this, you can simply stand on a street corner and\nwait for the ghosts to come flitting past in order to appreciate its\nparlous condition.\n

\nWe now have the highest prison population in Europe by a considerable\nmeasure, and following the recent riots there is no likelihood of it\ndecreasing.\n

\nOf course, we aren’t quite at the levels enjoyed by our closest allies,\nthose prime exponents of the civilising mission the United States, whose\nextensive gulag now houses, it is estimated, more African American men\nthan were enslaved immediately prior to their Civil War – but we’re\ngetting there.\n<\/blockquote>\nWhy the second thoughts?\n\n\n

\nTime and again addict inmates I’ve spoken to have told me that it’s\neasier to obtain heroin in jail than out.\n

\nContrary to the view of prison as a deterrent and a way of keeping\ncriminals off the streets, almost all enlightened opinion now concurs\nin the following.\n

\nNot only does prison, for the vast majority of those who endure it,\nnot work, either as punishment or as rehabilitation, but there is no\nescaping the conclusion that it functions as a stimulant to crime,\nrather than its bromide.\n<\/blockquote>\nWell, that’s great if you run a private prison company!\nMore repeat customers!\n

\nOh, you don’t run a private prison company?\nBut Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) does.\nThey run the Georgia ICE immigration prison,\nand they want to build a private prison in Lowndes County, Georgia.\nTell the Industrial Authority:\nwe don’t need a private prison.\nLet the state spend those tax dollars on rehabilitation and education instead.\n

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