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Originally Posted by Ace_O_Spades
Wrong... That fact is comparing equal sentences for equal offenses.
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I think there was some misunderstanding. I was replying to your comment that prisoners who recieve community sentences have a lower recidivism rate than those who recieve the same sentence in prison. I personally don't consider that to be equal, since one (prison) I assume is much more harsh than the other. To me, the sentence is more than the duration, but also the location. I would be interested in seeing why certain criminals were given community sentences and others prison for supposedly the same offense.
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And as for your doctor's office/hospital correlation, I can't make heads nor tails of it... Perhaps you can clarify it so I can respond.
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The point I was trying to make with the medical comparison is this: you must make sure that your variable is truly the cause of the observed concequence, and there isn't another factor you are overlooking. It seems recidivism is less for those who get community sentences as opposed to prison-you assume it is because of the enviroment. I would assume it's because those who get the community sentence in the first place are less criminal (for lack of a better word) than those who get prison terms. Just like you could assume that it is the environment (hospital) causing more deaths, ignoring the fact that surgery done in a hospital is usually for more severe medical cases than that done in a doctor's office. I hope that cleared it up some.
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I say it again and again, murder is the statistically least likely offense which occurs every year. It totals .01% of all crime in Canada... hell, it is only 1% of the VIOLENT crime in Canada.
The vast, vast, vast majority of crime is people who are from poor socioeconomic backgrounds, with poor education, and are unemployed. We can help these people! I have much more faith in the human species than to relegate all of them to slow torture behind cold walls when we can actually prevent them from reoffending and heal the hurt done to the community instead of creating more criminals.
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You assume that murder is the only heinous crime. There are many other crimes that can show as much lack of respect for others as murder. I agree that there is socioeconomic reasons for many crimes, but I would rather deal with the problem before a person becomes a criminal, than waste money on salvaging damaged goods. There are some cases where rehabilitation might be useful, and those should be identified. But I think these cases are vastly fewer than you would like to believe. Simply because many of the factors that contribute to making someone commit a crime in the first place are hard, if not impossible to change. Criminals who commit crimes severe enough to deserve prison would rarely see leniency as a time to change, they see it as a break and will go back to their own habits. It is unfortunate, but the kind of mindset that leads many people into crime is ingrained over years, and is hard to break.
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These people are HUMAN BEINGS... they have made serious mistakes, yes... BUT, they also will run the course of their prison sentences eventually, and then... *GASP* they are released back into the community, often with no rehabilitation, and are expected to be contributive members of society. The law states we can't keep them locked up forever, so why not try to heal the hurt, and create a better society?
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I don't expect them to necessarily contribute, I just expect them to follow the laws. I don't see criminals as victims of a heartless society, I see them as people who were unable to follow society's rules and need to be punished for it, hopefully to force them to stay in line. That's one of the reasons I greatly support 3 strikes laws, and similar laws: it gives society a way to elimitate individuals who cannot adapt to civilized society. I am not worried about rehabilitation, I would rather direct that energy in the direction of helping people who came from bad circumstances and didn't become criminals. You shouldn't reward bad behavior, it only makes it mroe likely to happen in the future.