Will the US ever stop imprisoning everyone under the sun??

[darkendless]

Make examples, make drug related crimes carry rediculously harsh punishments, bring back capital punishment.

If people want to commit stupid crimes punish them for their stupidity heavily.

From the outside it seems that the American system is a joke, almost as if jail is a career.

 

[Alceste]

What bothers me even more than our idiotic drug laws and imprisoning people for years for victimless crimes is the uneasy feeling that if the U.S. ever wises up on the drug laws, the government will find some other way of filling the prisons. In my more paranoid moments, I sometimes wonder whether the War on Drugs isn't just a pretext for putting such an infrastructure in place.

I think it's more to do with the hysterical fear the relatively small ruling class in the US has of liberal radicalism within the masses. They studied recreational drugs in the 60s enough to know that one of the first things you come up with on pot or hallucinogens is how completely ludicrous and illusory the whole "authority" set-up is, and how it can only exist if we cooperate. Smoking is fine because it just slowly kills you and stresses you out. Drinking is OK because it makes you stupid and ill, and eventually kills you. Drugs that make you question the status quo are the worst nightmare of the public-fearing elite.

 

[Smoke]

I think it's just a bunch of prudes who have a problem with people getting high. Just look at all the lies that are still being spread about pot.

That's part of it, and racism was also a big part of it. Advocates of prohibition warned that black men who smoked pot would start raping any white woman they could find. Federal officials also warned that black and white people were smoking marijuana together, breaking down the rigid racial segregation of the time. The same tactics were used to urge the prohibition of cocaine -- a drug that was enjoyed by Freud, Queen Victoria, and Pope Leo XIII -- as the spectre of "cocaine crazed Negroes" assaulting white women was used to frighten people into prohibition. The alarm was raised over opium when it was warned that formerly respectable white women in New York were falling into lives of degradation as a result of opium, and racist anti-Chinese propaganda was freely used in the campaign for prohibition.

It's impossible to ignore the racist background of U.S. drug laws, and also the racist enforcement of them.

 

[Twilight Hue]

From one side, its always been taught to people that America is the land of the free home of the brave, and this is what drove people firstly to come here to live.
Now on the other side there is the sobering fact that as of present, we Americans now live in the most incarcerated, heavily monitored (Maybe Britain beats America per capita on this one but I'll wager we will catch up), and non-free nation in the entire WORLD. If statistics are correct, it is said that every 1 out of 25 Americans will at sometime in their lives, get arrested for a type of offence and become incarcerated in the overcrowded mess of what is called the prison system. "Solutions" most commonly heard from unemphatic politicians?

More aggressive laws, police, and more prisons are the solution.... Gee wonder where that will eventually lead down the road?

I'm not one for finding credence in conspiracies as well as others, but sometimes...I really wonder if something actually is going on......

It is said there are now more ongoing construction projects of new prisons than there are of new schools, and statistically, it is implied that there are actually more prisoners than the entire population of farmers in the nation.

 

[Father Heathen]

Make examples, make drug related crimes carry rediculously harsh punishments, bring back capital punishment.

Grossly excessive punishments for petty, victimless crimes is already part of the problem, and thus not the solution. And capital punishment should only be used for heinously violent crimes, if at all.

If people want to commit stupid crimes punish them for their stupidity heavily.

Often times it's the law and not the crime that's stupid. Alcohol is more addictive, unhealthy and harmful than cannabis, and locking people up for addiction to harder drugs doesn't make sense. The harsh prison environment requires inmates to be hardened, violent and racist just to survive. They often come out worse than when they went in.

 

[darkendless]

Grossly excessive punishments for petty, victimless crimes is already part of the problem, and thus not the solution. And capital punishment should only be used for heinously violent crimes, if at all.

Evidently not if people are stupid enough to keep committing crimes.

Capital punishment for rape, murder, GBH and the such i would have no problems with. I would also have no problems seeing it for gang related crimes as well as repeat offenders for stupid crimes. It just shows they din't learn their lesson inside.

Often times it's the law and not the crime that's stupid.

People are stupid enough to break those laws, they're the stupid ones. People always say law enforcement is too harsh but if you don't commit crimes theres nothing to worry about.

 

[Twilight Hue]

People are stupid enough to break those laws, they're the stupid ones. People always say law enforcement is too harsh but if you don't commit crimes theres nothing to worry about.

I would normally agree with this in principle concerning the obvious but it seems that there are so many laws being brought forth now that it may eventually it may soon become impossible to avoid infractions due to the scrupulous nature in how a number of them are worded and designed, and the fact that laws have ultimate limits of where they should not cross over when speaking of in a free society.

Are you saying that no matter what, even stupid established laws must be ultimately be obeyed in lockstep simply because it is made into law?

At least there are a number of police officers around who are well aware of where a laws practicality lies and the stupidity starts, as exemplified by the well knowen Pima County Sheriff's stance in wake of Arizona's totally stupid law regarding its policy on immigrants.

Lets go to the opposite end of law where D.C, police were actually purported to be enforcing Sharia law by way of trespass upon women peacefully praying in a forbidden section of an Islamic center on Embassy Row under direction of an Iman, and the racist related incidents like Peterson vs. Greensville of which an established valid (and stupid) ordinance was violated and an arrest was made and nullified by a Judge contrary to what the still valid and legit ordinance stated. Would you still follow such a law if it a religious or racist law simply on the grounds it "legitimately" passed?

 

[Revoltingest]

It's impossible to ignore the racist background of U.S. drug laws, and also the racist enforcement of them.

Whatever role racism played in the past, I sure know an awful lot of white folk going to jail for drugs.
Either it's the demographics of running a self storage facility, or the gov't hates white guys now.

 

[darkendless]

I would normally agree with this in principle concerning the obvious but it seems that there are so many laws being brought forth now that it may eventually it may soon become impossible to avoid infractions due to the scrupulous nature in how a number of them are worded and designed, and the fact that laws have ultimate limits of where they should not cross over when speaking of in a free society.

Are you saying that no matter what, even stupid established laws must be ultimately be obeyed in lockstep simply because it is made into law?

At least there are a number of police officers around who are well aware of where a laws practicality lies and the stupidity starts, as exemplified by the well knowen Pima County Sheriff's stance in wake of Arizona's totally stupid law regarding its policy on immigrants.

Lets go to the opposite end of law where D.C, police were actually purported to be enforcing Sharia law by way of trespass upon women peacefully praying in a forbidden section of an Islamic center on Embassy Row under direction of an Iman, and the racist related incidents like Peterson vs. Greensville of which an established valid (and stupid) ordinance was violated and an arrest was made and nullified by a Judge contrary to what the still valid and legit ordinance stated. Would you still follow such a law if it a religious or racist law simply on the grounds it "legitimately" passed?

Well i can only really talk about laws in Aus. The most common is drug posession. My problem with people complaining about this law is that 1) you have to be pretty ignorant to not know that its illegal and 2) if you're stupid enough to ignore the law why is it unreasonable to harshly punish these people?

Look what happens in Indonesia for carrying drugs, its the death sentence. An Australian got 20 years for carrying weed into Bali. Whats the point of laws if people aren;t afraid of breaking them?

Certain laws are stupid yes, but its up the state to educate people about what iss, and what is not illegal.

 

[Father Heathen]

People are stupid enough to break those laws, they're the stupid ones. People always say law enforcement is too harsh but if you don't commit crimes theres nothing to worry about.

Would you consider blacks who defied Jim Crow laws or homosexuals who engaged in relationships when it was considered illegal stupid?

 

[kai]

Evidently not if people are stupid enough to keep committing crimes.

Capital punishment for rape, murder, GBH and the such i would have no problems with. I would also have no problems seeing it for gang related crimes as well as repeat offenders for stupid crimes. It just shows they din't learn their lesson inside.



People are stupid enough to break those laws, they're the stupid ones.

People always say law enforcement is too harsh but if you don't commit crimes theres nothing to worry about.

now that makes sense, instead of decriminalising crimes why not just avoid crime altogether and you wont end up in prison ---that seems to be a radical idea these days.

 

[Father Heathen]

now that makes sense, instead of decriminalising crimes why not just avoid crime altogether and you wont end up in prison ---that seems to be a radical idea these days.

Even if said laws are irrational and unjust? The progression of civil rights often required the breaking of such laws.

 

[kai]

Even if said laws are irrational and unjust? The progression of civil rights often required the breaking of such laws.

which ones are unjust?

in recent decades the U.S. has experienced a surge in its prison population, quadrupling since 1980, partially as a result of mandated sentences that came about during the "war on drugs." Violent crime and property crime have declined since the early 1990s.[13]


i suppose there are two ways of looking at this .

1. the drug guys are off the streets
   
2. if you decriminalise drugs these guys wouldnt be in prison

Incarceration in the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



just to throw the cat among the pigeons i wonder if the drug guys being in jail has affected the violent and property crime? (just a thought)

 

[Father Heathen]

which ones are unjust?

in recent decades the U.S. has experienced a surge in its prison population, quadrupling since 1980, partially as a result of mandated sentences that came about during the "war on drugs." Violent crime and property crime have declined since the early 1990s.[13]


i suppose there are two ways of looking at this .

1. the drug guys are off the streets
2. if you decriminalise drugs these guys wouldnt be in prison

Incarceration in the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



just to throw the cat among the pigeons i wonder if the drug guys being in jail has affected the violent and property crime? (just a thought)

But what benefit is there to gain from overcrowding prisons and ruining the lives of those who've only committed nonviolent, victimless crimes? And as previously mentioned the prison environment only worsens an individual rather than correcting and rehabilitating them. Also studying and understanding the U.S. prohibition during the 1920s should explain why "the war on drugs" is a ridiculous folly.
It's sad how some people think blindly licking the boots of a corrupt authority is somehow a stance of moral superiority.

 

[kai]

But what benefit is there to gain from overcrowding prisons and ruining the lives of those who've only committed nonviolent, victimless crimes? And as previously mentioned the prison environment only worsens an individual rather than correcting and rehabilitating them. Also studying and understanding the U.S. prohibition during the 1920s should explain why "the war on drugs" is a ridiculous folly.
It's sad how some people think blindly licking the boots of a corrupt authority is somehow a stance of moral superiority.

You would have to detail for me the people in jail for non-violent,victimless crimes, why are they being jailed etc. ( who are they? and what is going on?)


I agree Prison does worsen an individual.

I have stated this many times on RF but in my country Tobacco and alcohol are legal but multi millions are made by violent and non violent criminals dealing in illicit tobacco and alcohol because of the tax imposed.

To legalise and decriminalise drugs you would have to make it unattractive to criminals which means take the profit out of it.

 

[Father Heathen]

You would have to detail for me the people in jail for non-violent,victimless crimes, why are they being jailed etc. ( who are they? and what is going on?)


I agree Prison does worsen an individual.

I have stated this many times on RF but in my country Tobacco and alcohol are legal but multi millions are made by violent and non violent criminals dealing in illicit tobacco and alcohol because of the tax imposed.

To legalise and decriminalise drugs you would have to make it unattractive to criminals which means take the profit out of it.

When alcohol went from illegal to taxed and regulated, the organized crime associated with it disappeared since it was no longer profitable for them (they've moved on to drugs and prostitution, two other victimless crimes that are more harmful due to being forced underground). Also, the alcohol was often more dangerous due to dubious manufacturing practices (such as diluting supplies with embalming fluid) when it was an unregulated black market.

 

[kai]

When alcohol went from illegal to taxed and regulated, the organized crime associated with it disappeared since it was no longer profitable for them (they've moved on to drugs and prostitution, two other victimless crimes that are more harmful due to being forced underground). Also, the alcohol was often more dangerous due to dubious manufacturing practices (such as diluting supplies with embalming fluid) when it was an unregulated black market.

well we never had prohibition and our criminals are well into tobacco and alcohol as well as drugs and prostitution. Mainly because the government taxes the heck out of it and that leaves a pretty hefty profit margin for criminals to supply.

where there's profit there's criminals.

As for drugs yeah make them legal but criminals wont stop selling them unless there's no money in it.

 

[Father Heathen]

well we never had prohibition and our criminals are well into tobacco and alcohol as well as drugs and prostitution. Mainly because the government taxes the heck out of it and that leaves a pretty hefty profit margin for criminals to supply.

where there's profit there's criminals.

As for drugs yeah make them legal but criminals wont stop selling them unless there's no money in it.

Criminals also sell bootleg movies.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

makes me wonder how many prison owning millionaires there are in the USA.
Some one must be gaining from all these prisoners.

 

[kai]

Criminals also sell bootleg movies.

Thats very true , all i am saying is that legalising drugs will not necessarily mean the end of criminal interest.