h a l f b a k e r y"Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
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Comas can damage the brain. How would one go about putting them in and removing them from the comas?
I'm sorry, but that qualifies as "Cruel or unusual" here. |
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On the contrary, it is the very opposite of cruel. I've known a number of people who have been in jail, and i think they would MUCH rather have spent the time in a coma. But, people in comas are not at all 'low maintenance', so it doesn't make economic sense. Comas for aircraft passengers, THAT is a good idea! |
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A "matrix" like setup where the prisoners/aircraft passengers are in a seat in a simulated reality while having nutrients pumped into the back of their heads might work. |
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Maybe it's me, but I'd rather not I've nutrients in the back of my head. Perhaps the stomach instead?
Perhaps it's just me but I'd wager that it'd be expensive and warrant a _lot_ of care. Should one prisoner die, they'll be protestors un you like a swarm of pitbulls on Meatman the Amazing. |
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Prison as a mere punishment serves no practical purpoise. The two reasons for putting someone away, to my mind, is to protect the public from the criminal while they are criminally maladjusted, and to try to rehabilitate their behaviour. The second of these is already hard enough to acheive. Under this scheme, no rehabilitation would be possible at all. Which would mean for lifers (who might otherwise entertain the possibility of parole), this coma is, essentially, a long slow death. |
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In short: Me no likey. lots. |
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Agreed. Punishment doesn't rehabilitate unto itself. Otherwise criminals would simply be given a harsh spanking and sent to their room with no dessert. We find acts to be 'criminal' when they go against the morals of a majority of the populous, and these people are separated from society for that reason.
Oh, and longtime offenders would have to go into a costly rehab program.
Thanks. |
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Surely that should say "politicians" instead of "populous", [watermelancholy]...? |
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<muttering to self> just take them all out behind the jail and shoot them </muttering to self> |
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Definitely the tonic if what you want is to spare inmates the experience of incarceration. Might even be said to defeat the "punishment" purpose, yes no? Unless of course you consider that upon awakening, comatose inmates would have lost X number of years off their lives (like dying that much earlier) and would be totally zonked on lost muscle tone etc. (goes to the cruel and unsual argument above). On the rehab side, prisons today are a wareouse for "badguys" anyway, right? main drawback there is cost bro'. Prisons are housing and security; comas require hospital care, tube feeding, bedsore ointment rubdowns... sounds like major $$$. and what about visiting days for the spouse and Lefty Jr.? now there's a can of worms. |
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This is essentially what happens to prisoners in *Minority Report*. |
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I don't have to link to my "Crime and Punishment" rant again, do I? |
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I'm not sure that this is a "punishment". If the inmates are truly in a coma they will have no sense of the passage of time. They will leave the prison the same way they went in. There will be no "retributive" element i.e. making nasty things happen to them, nor will there be any "rehabilitation". |
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Either they have to have a very bad experience (in the hope that fear of repetition acts as a deterrent) or be rehabilitated in some way. The jury seems to be out on this one. See link. |
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Better to do the Star Trek Next Generation thing where Jordi gets punished by having a memory of prison time implanted. No real time elapsed, no cost to house and feed, but the offender still feels like they were in prison for an appropriate amount of time. |
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But my opinion, put them all to work, prison is far to cushy. |
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<rant>
I note that most American "solutions" to crime essentially involve exile to a horrific and/or remote place. Clearly, this assumes that crimes are only committed by some group of "others" who are not properly American citizens, and that we are best off ejecting them from society to protect the "proper" citizens. Leaving aside all issues of wrongful imprisonment, this assumption is clearly at odds with both the principles of a humane society, and logic, insofar as these criminals will evantually come back from their exile. |
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The famous police motto is "Serve and Protect". Clearly, in a humane society, this extends to the criminals themselves who are, after all, still citizens. |
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We can only serve our criminal citizens if we help them mend their wicked ways, either in jail or shortly thereafter, thereby protecting them from themselves. Given that most offenders are poorly educated young men with no viable alternative to crime, simple job education is one obvious solution. |
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This leaves aside the issue of punishment, which is still a fair response (and deterrent) to law-breaking.
</rant> |
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"Prison as a mere punishment serves no practical purpoise. The two reasons for putting someone away, to my mind, is to protect the public from the criminal while they are criminally maladjusted, and to try to rehabilitate their behaviour." |
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Um...what happened to justice, a concern for the victim and restitution for the crime committed? |
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Your understanding of the prison system rests on a fundamental mis-understanding of why criminals are sent to jails, and your two reasons for putting someone away conveniently overlook the victim in favor of the perpetrator of the crime. The penal system is in place for those who’ve infringed-upon the rights of others. Consequently, when you commit a crime and you are caught, part of your penalty is to PAY for it and this comes in the form of forfeiting a share of your rights. In short, you “do time” in order to pay for your trespass. What's more, rehabilitation follows upon justice--not before it or in place of it--and protecting the public from the criminal is a only one aspect of imprisonment.
"Punishment doesn't rehabilitate unto itself."
Good point...but it's not supposed to. Again, punishment is for the sake of the victim, and rehabilitation for the offender, and one follows the other. |
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I think you misunderstand my understanding. I understand everything you say, but disagree with much of it. |
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//punishment is for the sake of the victim// |
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And that is why. Renumeration for the victim, any kind of positive support to try to make life as if no crime had taken place, I support wholeheartedly. But Revenge is not right, not good, and leads to no improvement. "Justice" is not a tangible thing. It is either apportioned by some god (whatever or whomever you may believe that to be) or is a construct of human perception. In either case, I cannot see what good it does to pretend that one human has control over this "thing" in another human's life. For this reason, it seems obvious to me that we must be totally pragmatic about crime, firstly protecting the innocent, then working to eradicate the elements in our society which lead to it. In this case, I mean rehabilitation. |
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Also, i'd like to take issue with the idea of punishment being a payment for a crime. That almost implies that a crime is "ok" if you're willing to pay for it. No crime is acceptable, by definition. Once you accept that, all there is to do is to see what can be done to make amends. For that, pure punishment is pointless, does nothing. |
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The saddest thing I have ever seen, I think, was a documentary on the excecution of a man who had killed a large number of his familly ten or twenty years previously. His own cousins were baying for his blood, crying with relief when his appeals to live were denied him. They felt they could only feel whole again by his distruction. I cannot see how this was healthy for them. Whether or not he deserved to die was not something any other person could tell, no matter how hideous his crime was. But I felt more sorry for his family. I do not believe an act of destruction could be the same as an act of healing. |
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Just so you folks know, the origin of the idea came about as follows:
I misspelled *comparison* as *comaprison* on an annotation elsewhere. Transposed those 2 letters on said annotation, posted this idea. Interesting debate. |
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The existence of such people, and the things that they have done tear at my heart. |
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That's a difficult thing to come to terms with. |
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For me, it means that I'm not going to allow myself to be the one who judges them. My soul won't allow me to believe in a world where they won't pay for that. But for us to visit that on them is only going to double the human misery. It may be what the familly has been sentenced to, but will seeing their revenge make them forget that? No, it will rather deepen their hatred and bitterness. |
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Similar principle: fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity.. |
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Plus: I never said they should be allowed to just walk away. |
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Yamahito, you may understand what I write, but you fail to address the thrust of my argument and at this point I’m more concerned about your understanding of reality.
Things such as love, hate, hope, despair, greed, courage, faith etc., are all intangibles---yet they are very real and are manifested in our actions, some of them good, others bad. And Justice---as it exists in the forms of laws, courts, judges, etc.,---helps regulate the effects of these actions and it is by our common sense, decency and virtue that we, as humans, share in the divine and have come to establish the “system”.
It’s no coincidence that a scale held up by a person with a blindfold is what we use to signify the Justice system. Laws are simply agreed upon universals that are applied to particular real circumstances. When they are “broken”, injustice occurs and punishment ensues. For instance, when you steal something from someone and you’re caught, the scales of Justice are tipped in your favor, and an imbalance exists in nature. Now, in order to restore the balance that existed prior to the crime, Justice requires that you return that item to that person AND that you be punished for committing the offense---for it is insufficient to simply return the item since there was a certain length of time that the person was without the item. In lesser forms of trespass, we call it community service, in larger forms we call it imprisonment. And that is simply one form of Justice.
If a forfeiture of rights, work and imprisonment are considered Revenge---as long as it’s administered by a governing body elected, and approved by society---I argue it IS a good, a good for the whole of society. (Your example uses the most extreme, debatable and questionable form of punishment to address a less complicated issue and one that I don’t plan on arguing for or against.)
PS Peace does not come without a price and those who have the freedom to voice their opinions are indebted to those who’ve staked their lives in order to protect those rights…and also establish it. |
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[Susen] brings up a very effective and fast solution for dealing with prisoners. I don't know why this isn't practiced. |
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This idea is offal- plane and simple. What does the offender learn? Nothing! Yeah, they can't hook up with the Comatose Crips, or the Nutrient-Enriched Bloods, but it's like free room and board for crime taken to the extreme. And as has been mentioned, it's damn expensive. No more rehabilitation occurs than with traditional prisons, and it has the exact same advantage: separating prisoners from the general population. Blech. And what is the advantage to this approach? |
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What 8th, polartomato and Mephista said. Without a chance of rehabilitation you might as well... what Susen said. |
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Iuvare, I think this is in danger of becoming an exclusive two-way conversation. Let me assure you that I absolutely understand the thrust of your argument (which is not to say you don't understand mine: there *is* such a thing as pure disagreement, after all). A few years ago I would have agreed with it, too. |
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As for my example, I don't see how the principle changes: I was not making a comment on the morality or ethics of the death penalty (although I would make very similar, related arguments), but on the nature of revenge, which I believe to be a wholly negative thing. |
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On "imbalances in nature:" I think you are either ascribing attributes to the natural world which do not exist (if man itself makes up the rules, a breach is an offence against man (i.e. the government), not nature) or you are talking about something altogether more profound and (dare I say) spiritual. If the former, we must be absolutely pragmatic, in which case it is of no advantage to simply punish for punishment's sake. For the latter, such an imbalance cannot be righted by punishment. It is like paying back a debt with only words: punishment is *not* the price or cost which can right the wrong of a crime. |
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I understand if you feel strongly about such a thing, as I do. If you want to continue the debate, however, it might be better to do so in private. Please feel free to contact me; there are plenty of details on my profile. |
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UB - I don't even see the point in gracing this idea with an anno. Bu**er. |
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Good call, yamahito, this really is a tangental discussion, but I don't realllllly feel that strongly about the subject; although I appreciate the offer to take this off-line. |
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coma prison = profoundly unacceptable. |
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A non-brain damaging stasis cell would be a better alternative. |
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See this idea Half-Baked in the film Demolition Man. |
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The idea is to be punished - meaning negative fedback, not a long cozy nap. I'm all for keeping them awake the whole time. Hard Labor in Alaska sounds even better. |
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I like this—it’s sort of like transportation, but temporally. Sending the offenders into the future, where they won’t know how to start a car, much less steal one. Where all of their criminal buddies will be dead. And during the time spent in suspended animation, they won’t learn a thing from the other prisoners.
It’s a primitive form of time travel. |
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1) becuase it would greatly reduce prison costs
2) prisoners would be weak as crap when they got out pretty much insuring they wouldnt get up to any major violence
3) anyone could work at a prisson not just young male guards
4) unlike the demolishn man argument if the prisoner was in for long engoh he would be old when he got out
everyone he knew would be old as well
5) you could pack more coma prisoners into a prison than you could regular prisons each one would have most likely some sort of pod that would have them suspened in some sort of salt water soultion with a oxygen hose food hose iv and vairous wast tubes and im sure every manner of heath monitoring equpment. |
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Now THIS is what I meant to do in Eternal Rest. But with capital punishment added. So why is it that nobody here points out the trouble of keeping someone in a coma for that long? Just do the thing from the Condemmed movie, and you'll be fine. Of better yet, Battle Royale. The Battle Royale manga is way better than the Condemmed. |
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Unnfortunately, fiction isn't a good basis for justice. |
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True. Just forget the Condemmed reference. |
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