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eradicate punishment from the law system. instead, teach.
we as a species should learn to teach right from wrong instead of simply casting away our own species into seclusion, and hoping the problem will go away.
popular law and politics dictates that we should make examples of people who commit a crime to show other people that an action shouldn't be done through means of fear.
in my opinion, fear does not work for the long-run, especially in modern times where upon the public doubts governmental law and even politicians/law-makers themselves.
i propose that methods should be developed that involve mandatory psychologists and sociologists to attend court cases with follow-ups on individuals who are jailed, periodically with the intention to develop reports on as many elements as possible that led up to the crime itself.
with privacy kept in mind, reports could then be made publicly available and delivered to current law-makers/politicians to change or remove elements of a recipe for popular crime.
in cases where societal elements themselves are part of the recipe for a crime, and can be changed or removed, politicians and law-makers have the power to do so via means of education.
to do so through schools is a start, but humans don't ever stop learning throughout their lives, so other ways of educating people who have committed a crime _and_ the public (potential crime-committers) should be made available to change or remove elements of society that lead to a crime and eventually remove the crime itself.
EDIT: as Christophe Cop first mentioned, removing some people from society is necessary. while these people can still learn, i still think that they don't need to be punished in order to do so. for further information to back up my belief please see this link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinforcement#Positive_and_negative_reinforcement
Closing Statement from griffin tucker
i closed this idea early, simply because the amount and quality of feedback has led me to want to re-write the idea.
while many people demand justice by way of punishment, i believe the idea of punishment is not the best way to solve a re-occurring problem, but instead increases the likelihood of it happening again.
positive reinforcement simply works better than punishment in any case, but due to the current model of western society, there are certain restraints that mean there are more immediate demands at hand that require attention. so, other methods including punishment are used instead of positive reinforcement.
i believe social policy needs to be changed as a result.
according to the model of 'systematic evidence-based preventative social policy' (i think it needs a new name) it is what is proven to be working better than existing methods by means of already existing objective evidence.
in other words, if it works, and it's proven, the idea will be started. but this is not democracy.
currently, law-makers work on the assumption that if they don't get enough votes at the next election, they will lose their power to make laws - and since the easiest way to keep their power is to do whatever the majority says, this is what they have a tendancy to do.
law-makers react to popular opinion, but is popular opinion necessarily more correct or incorrect than evidence-based social policy? i don't know, myself.
thank-you all for your contributions.
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TAB Baldwin
Crime should be punished. Once criminals have shown that they have a true desire to contribute to rather than detract from society then they should wholeheartedly be welcomed back into society albeit on a trial basis.
Therefore, I suggest a Justice System that, instead of being a financial burden on society and keeping our criminals in a holding pen until their release date or until the overcrowding forces a 'rethink' of the severity of their crime, assists criminals to truly PAY for their crime. The prison system should be an asset to government and not a cost.
When a criminal commits a crime, he makes his last free choice since a crime results in the loss of rights one of which is freedom. I maintain that a he should have one final choice: Do I wish to pay for my crime or suffer serious punishment? If he chooses to pay for the crime then he should be put to work for the government that has a multitude of taxpayer funded jobs (street cleaning, road building, etc) that could easily be done by unskilled labor. If the criminal chooses NOT to pay for his crime then society should choose to afford the criminal subsistence living: basically bread/vegetables and water and a spartan cage. Period. I do not suggest affecting health, only comfort.
However, for our working criminals, a good 10 hour workday (with subsistence pay for their someday release), exhaustive work (so as to lessen prison violence) and dignity through productive contribution to society.
Positive results for society & the criminal. People change when habits change.
Cameron Garcia
However, I do agree with you that the prison system shouldn't be something that completely hinders us.
TAB Baldwin
Also, I am assuming that this system is a deterrent to crime in the long run so the job market would not be adversely affected except for the fact that we would have fewer citizens in jail and more in society...hopefully being productive rather than non-productive. Isn't this what we are all hoping for in this discussion?
Alystar Mckenneh
TAB Baldwin
Unfortunately, we will always have crime and criminals but we don't always have to pay for them.
Further to my post earler, I don't see prisoners deemed mentally incapacitated as serving hard time or working (other than those jobs that may ( I emphasize "may" suit them) nor do I see the aged or infirm. They could assume the less arduous duties around the prison complex (laundry, yard maintenance, light gardening, etc.) currently done by too many healthy bodies.