• banazir@lemmy.ml
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    2 hours ago

    In the US, slavery is legal for prisoners. The US has the largest prison population in the world. This is not a coincidence.

  • asg101@lemmy.ca
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    6 hours ago

    More fun facts, slavery is still legal in the USA (for prisoners) and the USA imprisons a higher proportion of its population than any other country. The ruling class just makes everything illegal and enjoys unlimited slave labor!

  • blitzen@lemmy.ca
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    11 hours ago

    Not only do I think non-incarcerated felons should have the right to vote, I think currently incarcerated should as well. Hell, set up a voting location in the prison.

        • Klear@piefed.world
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          11 hours ago

          I added the qualifier mainly because of New Zealand. AFAIK the country has otherwise its shit together.

          • nightlily@leminal.space
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            1 hour ago

            They’d like you to think that. Truth is there’s even less „checks and balances“ there than the already paper thin ones in the US. The courts have no teeth with the government and it’s a effectively unicameral system. Theoretically the King has executive power but he would never step in. Prisoners not being able to vote has been ruled by the courts to be against the Bill of Rights and they were just ignored.

          • ProfessorHoover@infosec.pub
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            3 hours ago

            New Zealand also lets the team down by allowing medical advertising. IRC it’s the only country other than the US with prescription medical advertising.

      • blitzen@lemmy.ca
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        11 hours ago

        Certainly cutting back 9 out of 10 prisons is a good idea. I don’t object to the idea that there is a certain amount of people who need to be removed for their own and the public’s safety.

        • RmDebArc_5@piefed.zipOP
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          10 hours ago

          But is a prison really where someone like that should go/it should be called? I would argue those people should be in a mental asylum, not what we have as prisons today (though today’s mental asylums aren’t necessarily more humane)

          • WhiskyTangoFoxtrot@lemmy.world
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            7 hours ago

            Mental hospitals should be places where people with mental illnesses can go for care and treatment. They shouldn’t do double-duty as prisons.

            • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              5 hours ago

              True, but the opposite is the case now: several times more people with mental illness resulting in or at least contributing to unwanted behavior are imprisoned than are receiving any kind of treatment.

              As indicated by the fact that the most incarceration-happy country in the world continues to have a much higher rate of violence and enrichment crimes than most rich countries, the prison industrial complex doesn’t work for anyone except for the people profiting financially and electorally from its abuses.

              If you want to actually reduce crime and make a better society, poverty alleviation, improving mental health services, and restorative justice is the way to go.

              The current model of increasingly draconian oppression only leads to MORE crime AND more false imprisonment.

          • optimisticturtle@lemmy.world
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            5 hours ago

            I don’t think people realize how limited psychiatric hospitalizations are. If someone committed a crime because of impulsivity due to untreated mood or psychotic disorder, then a psychiatric stay would likely be appropriate. However, someone who is say psychopathic or committed a crime of passion but has no psychiatric history would get minimal to no benefit from a psych stay.

          • blitzen@lemmy.ca
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            10 hours ago

            I mean, if responding to my comment about removing some people for “their own safety,” then sure, there are better places that prisons.

            But really what I was saying is there are people who do and will continue to be violent toward others, and prisons probably are the right place for them.

            But I’m in full agreement that the US incarcerates far far too many people that don’t fit into that description.

            • ricecake@sh.itjust.works
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              9 hours ago

              The justice system should, not is but should, be in the business of making things right for people who have been wronged and rehabilitating people who have done wrong, as an extension of preventing wrong from recurring, which is itself part of making things right for those wronged.

              There is some theoretical minority of people who can’t be rehabilitated and don’t belong in medical treatment. There are some people where putting them in a medical facility would itself be an injustice to the staff and other patients. The vast majority of people with mental illness are perfectly safe and more likely to be the victim of a crime. Mixing them with billy mcSlapChop the worst person imaginable just creates a lot of dead people with poorly managed bipolar disorder.

              The vast majority of crimes can be handled by the judge finding you guilty and then just letting you go.

  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    10 hours ago

    Lee Carter is a former Democratic Socialist member of the Virginia House of Delegates (2018–2022) who actively championed prison abolition and criminal justice reform.

    • PenguinMage@lemmy.world
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      5 hours ago

      Funny enough according to many states can’t vote. But somehow can be voted for. But I’ve been informed by my eldest sibling that I have some sort of thing they call TDS and I don’t give enough of a fuck to care about what stupidity that means.

  • Zephyr@sh.itjust.works
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    11 hours ago

    Wait until you hear about countries that prevent even their non-criminals from actually voting. They usually hold an election but it’s just theatrical, your text in vote for the next pop idol is more statistically valuable.