Lets face it prisons have been part of human society for a very, very long time. weather they work or not, is still yet to be proven.

There are those who go in and out of prison as if it is a normal routine and I'm not talking about prison officers.Some would argue that the reason this guys or girls (don't want to be sexist) keep re-offending is that, they just can't fit into society and some have real problems and they need help rather than a prison sentence and i agree, to some extent but anyone who believes this fully is slightly conceited. i say this because it doesn't put into consideration the victims Right.

I believe fundamentally prisons serve two purposes reassuring victims and punishing law breakers.

lets be honest prisons aren't doing much punishing this days. no wonder why some homeless people end up doing petty crimes so they could get off the street and get free meal as well.
They are still covered by the human right act and they could get the vote as well. lets not forget that the tax payer funds prisons.

I know it is very easy to get off topic but please lets stay on topic and also please do not miss-interpret this question as (is the law Fair?) unless you are doing this to prove a point. if not lets leave the law out of it.

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its actually quite simple in my eyes, prisons excist for a couple of reasons

• to keep those that in the eyes of most people are to dangerous to leave alone on the street

• to teach people structure and to respect authority

• to give the victims a sense that the culprit has payed for what he has done

• to scare people in being 'good'

its actually people that found prison inhuman that kinda destroyed the purpose of the prison, becuase prisons are getting softer and softer, becoming more like hotels then prisons.

the second problem is that there are people that don't act like criminals by choice or a bad up bringing in those cases prison isn't the answer but a psychological sentence would be better, but that would defy point 3. The victim would probly feel that the culprit got away easy.

the last problem is, when someone leaves prison and they actually are rehabilitated, they want to do good, they are usually forced back into crime because of how people view ex-cons, giving them low chances for a normal life and the fact that they know few people out side of the criminal circuit. Its just to easy and to aluring to fall back into old paterns.

so to me prisons work aslong as 1 % of all criminals passing through there reform and lead a life they enjoy without breaking the important laws.

[img]http://i718.photobucket.com/albums/ww187/D_dragon/omfgpudding-1.jpg[/img]

Depends what country is in question.
Around here prisons are more like rehabilitation
facilities where you can't leave.

Now, in USA, there are private prisons.
People get money when there are people
in the prisons. When you go there, you are
there for good, since you are an important resource.

In many places the whole system works on vengeance and
a lot of people have the same mentality as in witch-hunts, just
like D_dragon here says:

its actually people that found prison inhuman that kinda destroyed the purpose of the prison, becuase prisons are getting softer and softer, becoming more like hotels then prisons.

The criminals are not seen as some kind of patients that need
help, but as beasts that have lost all their worths as humans
and should be gotten rid of out of vengeance.

well, in america they sorta do. people have to pay extra taxes the more people go to jail because of all the workers and the food expenses. some people actually want to go to prison because you dont have to pay taxes, you dont have to do anything, and everythings' free. it seems really nice except for the part you cant ever get out and you have no free will. 🙁

Quote from D_dragon

its actually quite simple in my eyes, prisons excist for a couple of reasons

• to keep those that in the eyes of most people are to dangerous to leave alone on the street

• to teach people structure and to respect authority

• to give the victims a sense that the culprit has payed for what he has done

• to scare people in being 'good'

its actually people that found prison inhuman that kinda destroyed the purpose of the prison, becuase prisons are getting softer and softer, becoming more like hotels then prisons.

the second problem is that there are people that don't act like criminals by choice or a bad up bringing in those cases prison isn't the answer but a psychological sentence would be better, but that would defy point 3. The victim would probly feel that the culprit got away easy.

the last problem is, when someone leaves prison and they actually are rehabilitated, they want to do good, they are usually forced back into crime because of how people view ex-cons, giving them low chances for a normal life and the fact that they know few people out side of the criminal circuit. Its just to easy and to aluring to fall back into old paterns.

so to me prisons work aslong as 1 % of all criminals passing through there reform and lead a life they enjoy without breaking the important laws.

"Sixty-seven percent of former inmates released from state prison in 1994 were charged with at least one serious new crime within the following three years, the U.S. Justice Department report shows."

Thats taken from an online article which proves the how the prison system needs to be reformed. Going to jail just makes you a better criminal! And you say as long as 1 % of the criminals goes through the system and never returns the system works. That is more the laws of probability than the system working. You make good points, but the sytem need to be centered on rehabilitation not punishment.

An instant or an eternity. Both are the same, in the passing of an instant lies the beauty of eternity.
-Ginen Shounen

Because I am a small man, my heart is moved by what's in front of my eyes, not by what the whole world needs.
-D.Gray-man

depends on the prisoner if he/she was a drug addict that has been imprisoned for possession then that person should enter rehab, and if a person was imprisoned for fraud then people should be warned not to do business with said person. i guess what im saying if only people who purposely did psychological or physical harm onto other human beings were imprisoned then im all for prisons if not then i think prisons need to be reformed

Prisons are good because:
-They keep criminals away from the population

They are bad because:
-They don't address the cause of "crimes" and are merely reactive.
-They are expensive
-They have become some sort of free motels instead of a place to rehabilitate criminals. In analogy, to me prisons are to prisoners what unemployment benefits are to unemployed. They are great for a little while, but you start relying on it, it becomes an addiction. In prisons, you get free meals, electricity, running water, a bed. You can do manual labor to earn some "money" to get some "wants" and there are a few activities to stimulate your brain, but that's it.

Prisons should:
-Mimic society as in get prisoners to learn to "earn a living"...pay for part of their "meals" and utility costs associate with them. By doing so, once they get out, they will look at fulfilling basic needs first with the pocket money they got from the prison instead of blowing it out on unnecessary "wants".

It looks like I have more cons than pros, but a prison's first objective is still to keep criminals from committing another crime and protect the population from them, so for that purpose, they are good.

"A prison's first objective is still to keep criminals from committing another crime and protect the population from them, so for that purpose, they are good."

Then why use them? If they come out, they wont change, most of them. Ok. There are crimes like stealing or brawling, for this u can use a prison. But murderers, rapist, drog dealers don't deserve to live. This scum must be punished another way. Castrate the rapist with scalpel or medicament, drog dealers, make them drug addicts and then should they go through rehab. Murderers, throw away the key.
But the most hated child abusers, pedofils and the rest of the pack. I cant even write down what they deserve.
Human nature in isolation like in a prison in time deteoriate. They became twisted.
Crime can't be erased, but our society must be changed to lower the crime rate.

Quote from kainord

"A prison's first objective is still to keep criminals from committing another crime and protect the population from them, so for that purpose, they are good."

Then why use them? If they come out, they wont change, most of them. Ok. There are crimes like stealing or brawling, for this u can use a prison. But murderers, rapist, drog dealers don't deserve to live. This scum must be punished another way. Castrate the rapist with scalpel or medicament, drog dealers, make them drug addicts and then should they go through rehab. Murderers, throw away the key.
But the most hated child abusers, pedofils and the rest of the pack. I cant even write down what they deserve.
Human nature in isolation like in a prison in time deteoriate. They became twisted.
Crime can't be erased, but our society must be changed to lower the crime rate.

True. They won't change, who know if they will do the same thing again. They cannot be considered as normal human anymore, they are st under-average 😉 😃

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I agree with the concept of prisons, which is, to penalize criminals for criminal behavior and to protect society from dangerous criminals.

However, the prison system is only just as long as the law itself is just and good. If the law ceases to be just then I do believe the prison system does more harm than good.

Personally I believe for a crime to be a real crime there must be an outside victim involved (it is not a crime to 'victimize' yourself). Murder, rape, assault, and theft are examples of crimes that have a victim. I absolutely support prison sentences for people who commit such acts.

Unfortunately most governments go beyond this and legislate the personal lives of people. I'll use the United States as an example since I am most familiar with their law (I live in the US). Why is it criminal to hire a woman for consensual sex? Why is it criminal to smoke weed in your own house? Why is it criminal to build a porch one foot too close to the sidewalk for the city's taste? Why is it criminal to carry a weapon for peaceful self-defense in many places/cities?

All of these are examples of what I do not consider real crimes. When governments add such non-crimes to their list of crimes it dilutes any sense of justice and good that was once associated with the law.

I think it depends on the situations, but it is definitely better than having no prison at all. Sometimes prison isn't enough to stop certain people.

Quote from Mamsmilk

The criminals are not seen as some kind of patients that need
help, but as beasts that have lost all their worths as humans
and should be gotten rid of out of vengeance.

Totally agree here.

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Quote from LawX

You are like the dense main character in a shoujo manga.

Quote from Crenshinibon

And you will murder someone one day, pika. If you're my daughter.

First of all: prisons are necessary. They were created to protect people from criminals. If someone commits a murder and gets caught, you can't let this person contact others because he or she may commit another crime. That's the main objective of prisons, as someone said. Being imprisoned as a punishment is not that important (it's a bit like a side effect), although at a fist glance it may seem otherwise.

I think that the problem with prisons nowadays is that people think about them in the punishment aspect too often. They kinda lump together all criminals, while you can (in my opinion) divide them into three groups:

1. people who are innocent or just made a mistake and were imprisoned because of this
2. people who committed some crimes but they did it because of their upbringing and if they understand what they did was wrong they may change
3. criminals who have no intention to change and won't change

Because you can't keep each prisoner in a separate cell, you have to group them together - and that's the problem. If I'm not mistaken (and I may be), prisoners are divided into groups according to how serious their crime was. And that's bad, because if you put people from group 1 and 2 with a person from group 3 they will soon become corrupted. People from group 3 should be isolated (and not killed; I'm strongly against death penalty because no human has the right to kill another human). But, unfortunately, it's impossible, because you just can't analyze every single prisoner.

So, do prisons do more harm than good? I can't say they do more harm, because, as I said, they are necessary. But I think that they would work better if people changed their way of thinking.

Sorry, that was a bit long.

Quote from kainord

"A prison's first objective is still to keep criminals from committing another crime and protect the population from them, so for that purpose, they are good."

Then why use them? If they come out, they wont change, most of them. Ok. There are crimes like stealing or brawling, for this u can use a prison. But murderers, rapist, drog dealers don't deserve to live. This scum must be punished another way. Castrate the rapist with scalpel or medicament, drog dealers, make them drug addicts and then should they go through rehab. Murderers, throw away the key.
But the most hated child abusers, pedofils and the rest of the pack. I cant even write down what they deserve.
Human nature in isolation like in a prison in time deteoriate. They became twisted.
Crime can't be erased, but our society must be changed to lower the crime rate.

I can sympathize with parts of what you said, but I disagree. I used to be for the death penalty, but I have heard too many cases of people who were sent to prison for murder, only to be found innocent at a later date when new evidence surfaces.

When I hear about somebody who was judged guilty of murder, I do not instantly believe that person is guilty of murder without any shadow of a doubt - nor should you or anybody else unless you witnessed the act. Instead, I simply view the person as one who was judged to be guilty by a jury based on the best evidence available at the time. This evidence may change in the future.

Obviously the same argument can be applied to rape. There are malicious women out there who will falsely cry rape, and there are innocent men who will be sent to jail. Are you going to castrate them, only to find out later they weren't guilty after all?

I don't believe in the drug war. I don't believe drug dealers should be jailed unless they sell drugs to minors, or unwillingly trick/force others into using drugs (Trick EX: spiking the fruit punch bowl at a party).

i know a guy who was with me in high school and dropped out after being suspended for attempted rape.....now he makes money by taking blame and going to jail for people....he has high a high grade prostitute visit him for conjugal monthly after faking papers of marriage.....he gets meals without doing work and money after getting out....

so i think prisons shud me more cruel to avoid such slacking >:-(

best shonen manga couples :

shinichi X ran
natsu X erza
ippo X kumi
naruto X gaara

Sorry for the english, i don't use it much.

I don't believe in the drug war, so you can pretty much guess what my position is about disciplining drug dealers and drug users.
The users are victims too, they are prisoners of their own, their punishment is worse than death, living like this. They must be rehabilitated somehow but that's not an easy task. The drug war can't be won. In my opinion the drug use must be legal, in controlled enviroment. Those how want to try it, should try it in a clean place with medical staff, whit clean drogs. Who knows what they sell on the streets.
I don't belive in the justice system. In my country it's working. For example, there were some people who found pedofil porn sites on the net. They reported to the police, their computers seized, and sent to the technics. After the inspection they were punished because they broke the copyright law. Whats important money or the children?
My father found a briefcase with 100000 Ft, a security cam taped it. He was treated like a criminal because the owner tell the police that the amount was over 250000 Ft. My father was punished and must payed 40000 Ft punishment fee.
I belive in the death penalty, it has it's merits too, here in Hungary, after they erased the death sentence, happened so much shit, bombing, killing, school shooting, brutal abuse and murder. Lately the tension is high and 25 years in jail is something that not scare the criminals atall.