zlacker

>>gruseo+(OP)
In the United States, the problem started with the war on drugs. The increasing privatization of the prison system made crime a business opportunity, which in turn lead to more things being criminalized.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/54/US_...

But that's not all; prison labor is now used as cheap labor to compete with foreign countries, instituting a new age of under-the-radar slavery.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwT6CisM0mU

The more you look at this cyclic process, the more disturbing it becomes.

>>macemo+65
> But that's not all; prison labor is now used as cheap labor to compete with foreign countries, instituting a new age of under-the-radar slavery.

This is BS IMHO. Would you rather see prisoners set free or do nothing all day?

Do you really think that a person will come out of a 6 year prison sentence (without working a day) and then start working and be a productive member of society?

In the old days in my country there was a sentence called "hard labour" - which meant that criminals got a shorter sentence and learned valuable life skills (if they were co-operative) or learned how to make big rocks smaller (if they were uncooperative).

>>w00pla+7p
Why does this comment keep being downvoted? I think he is making a fine point, would you rather prisoners sit around do nothing all day, or are given some work to do which improves them and improves the country in a way paying back their dues.

Seeing as there was this article which said that keeping busy makes us happy, the least the downvoters can do is state as to why prisoners should not be made to work?

If you are going to compare prison with slavery, how about starting with the one thing they have in common, they both are denied their right to liberty!

>>Ardit2+Zp
If the point is to make the men work, then pay them a fair wage. Until then, no intellectually honest person can call it anything but slavery.

>>bluebe+fQ
> If the point is to make the men work, then pay them a fair wage.

I agree they should be paid a fair wage. They should be given a bill for their housing and their debt to society and their victims which they can pay off with their wage. The vast majority of prisoners owe society (and their victims) more than they could ever hope to earn in a lifetime.

The whole idea of being a prisoner is to take away rights of someone who have done harm to others. This is done by taking away his freedom (i.e. by locking him up in a prison cell), taking away his right to vote (in many countries) and removing his right to freedom of association.

Locking a prisoner up is not the same as kidnapping (since you make false equivalences). Since a prisoner’s time is already wasted (by locking up in a cell), that time could just as well be used for something productive.

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You know what is slavery though? Forcing the taxpayer to pay for the housing and maintenance of a criminal. The taxpayer doesn’t have any say in the matter and doesn’t have a choice. Each person in jail had a choice.

>>w00pla+QQ
The point here is that prisoners are used to fill entire factories with labor for private benefit, while taxpayers foot the bill and prisoners work without fair wage. You're turning this into a prisoner's rights issue when it isn't anything of the sort.