Dammit, Doqz, you're going to get my arse canned with this debate. I'm at work, dude. ;)
Response to point one: Sweden. AFAIK (and maybe [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] can help me out here), Sweden has a rehabilitative rather than punative approach to crime, and they have an extremely low per capita crime rate.
Response to point two: Apologies for the garbled-ness - I'm at work and trying to type a lot in a hurry and trying to put too many things into the pne sentence. My main point was that jail should always be the last resort, not the first, and mandatory sentencing harms more than it helps. And yeah, drug deriminalisation might be something to consider. To sum it up? Jail only when all else has failed, and intsitute rehabilitative programs in jail to break the cycle. Believe me, after six years working in the courts, you get sick of seeing the same people again and again. And jail does squat to change that. Also, changing laws isn't that easy. Only the government can change a law, and they have to be convinced it's wrong before they will. The NT three strikes law was overturned when the conservative state government was voted out, but most of the time they're left on the books and legislated over. Makes for interesting research - old defunct laws that are clearly ridiculous, but managed to slip through the cracks because it was easier to stop enforcing them than to actually change them. US law might be different - I don't know the system that well.
Point three: Yes, targeting of minority groups occurred before three strikes laws. But until the system is changed to avoid that, they are going to be the ones who bear the brunt of it. And as the Royal Commission into Black Deaths in Custody showed, jailing Aboriginals is frequently effectively a death sentence due to cultural differences that mean they're more likely to commit suicide in custody than any other prisoner. So if you have a system that targets blacks, and then introduce a law that means they'll be locked up even more often, you're looking at genocide. And yes, the system should chnge. But bringing in legislation like the three strikes law that makes a bad situation worse... that's just insane troll logic.
Race might seem to be an "unrelated social ill", but the justice system is a reflection of the values of a particular society. It is not divorced from it. Just as it used to be an acceptable defence to rape to say the woman had a promiscuous history or was wearing 'provocative clothing', the colour of someone's skin or their mental health/intelligence affects their chances of arrest, being found guilty, and being jailed. Look at the proportion of blacks in US prisons compared to whites, especially in the Southern states. And yes, you might say that they're there because they've committed a crime, but _why_ did they commit the crime? Is it because blacks are inherently criminal? That kind of thinking went out with eugenics. Or maybe it's because proportionally black people are poorer, have less employment, less health care, and are more likely to be on welfare? Which, under a conservative government, is being shredded any way. Add to that the growing gulf between rich and poor, and you're cultivating a situation of anger and resentment. And if someone sees that someone else has what they don't, and won't have even if they work twelve hours a day in the local factory, then maybe one day they'll stop thinking and one day _do_. Especially when they're told that the only success that matters is financial success - if you can get only that success by dealing drugs, then so be it.
My point is, the justice system isn't separate from the rest of society. It's part of it. And to change one you have to change the other.
Last point: You got cut off so I'm not sure what it was. *grins*
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Re: They already do...
Date: 2003-04-10 07:46 pm (UTC)Response to point one: Sweden. AFAIK (and maybe [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] can help me out here), Sweden has a rehabilitative rather than punative approach to crime, and they have an extremely low per capita crime rate.
Response to point two: Apologies for the garbled-ness - I'm at work and trying to type a lot in a hurry and trying to put too many things into the pne sentence. My main point was that jail should always be the last resort, not the first, and mandatory sentencing harms more than it helps. And yeah, drug deriminalisation might be something to consider. To sum it up? Jail only when all else has failed, and intsitute rehabilitative programs in jail to break the cycle. Believe me, after six years working in the courts, you get sick of seeing the same people again and again. And jail does squat to change that.
Also, changing laws isn't that easy. Only the government can change a law, and they have to be convinced it's wrong before they will. The NT three strikes law was overturned when the conservative state government was voted out, but most of the time they're left on the books and legislated over. Makes for interesting research - old defunct laws that are clearly ridiculous, but managed to slip through the cracks because it was easier to stop enforcing them than to actually change them. US law might be different - I don't know the system that well.
Point three: Yes, targeting of minority groups occurred before three strikes laws. But until the system is changed to avoid that, they are going to be the ones who bear the brunt of it. And as the Royal Commission into Black Deaths in Custody showed, jailing Aboriginals is frequently effectively a death sentence due to cultural differences that mean they're more likely to commit suicide in custody than any other prisoner. So if you have a system that targets blacks, and then introduce a law that means they'll be locked up even more often, you're looking at genocide. And yes, the system should chnge. But bringing in legislation like the three strikes law that makes a bad situation worse... that's just insane troll logic.
Race might seem to be an "unrelated social ill", but the justice system is a reflection of the values of a particular society. It is not divorced from it. Just as it used to be an acceptable defence to rape to say the woman had a promiscuous history or was wearing 'provocative clothing', the colour of someone's skin or their mental health/intelligence affects their chances of arrest, being found guilty, and being jailed. Look at the proportion of blacks in US prisons compared to whites, especially in the Southern states. And yes, you might say that they're there because they've committed a crime, but _why_ did they commit the crime? Is it because blacks are inherently criminal? That kind of thinking went out with eugenics. Or maybe it's because proportionally black people are poorer, have less employment, less health care, and are more likely to be on welfare? Which, under a conservative government, is being shredded any way. Add to that the growing gulf between rich and poor, and you're cultivating a situation of anger and resentment. And if someone sees that someone else has what they don't, and won't have even if they work twelve hours a day in the local factory, then maybe one day they'll stop thinking and one day _do_. Especially when they're told that the only success that matters is financial success - if you can get only that success by dealing drugs, then so be it.
My point is, the justice system isn't separate from the rest of society. It's part of it. And to change one you have to change the other.
Last point: You got cut off so I'm not sure what it was. *grins*