What do you think of supermax prisons?

Bad idea. Counterproductve. Dehumanizing. We are collectively going to pay a heavy price later.

Completely agree with @Trillian on this. I believe that all prisions should focus on rehabilitation. It’s barbaric to lock a person away for 23 hours a day, not to mention a recipe for disaster

That sounds like a dream vacation to me….. :P

While I also agree with @Trillian you have to bear in mind that, right or wrong, the US prison system is focused on punishment and doesn’t give half a squirt of rat piss about rehabilitation.

Until they come up with a system that can actually rehabilitate these prisoners this the only option they have.

On the other hand I think they should let them all out with the general population where they can be judged by a group of their peers (other inmates), most of them will end up killing each other then.

Then we won’t have to worry about having to feed and house the worthless scum with our tax paying dollars. That’s my opinion

In terms of confinement, I’m not against the supermax concept completely. The problem with confinement as-is is that, in many ways, it simply trains criminals to be better criminals.

However, deprival of human contact is the opposite of rehabilitative. I actually am intrigued by the idea of more effective confinement procedures until we can actually implement a rehabilitation program that is actually meant to do what it says.

“On the other hand I think they should let them all out with the general population where they can be judged by a group of their peers (other inmates), most of them will end up killing each other then.”
Really? Have you seen a human body that has been bruatlized and broken? Do you know what fresh blood, feces and urine smell like when they spill out of a body that has been beaten? Do you have any concept of the reality of which you so casually speak? Do you really advocate that?
You are woefully ignorant of what options “they” have. Perhaps you should rethink your casual dismissal of this marginalized segment of the population before you consign them to being brutalized and beaten to death.
This sounds a lot like “Kill them all and let God sort them out.”

Does it keep sociopath scum away from me? Out of the gene pool? Away from would be future victims?

@Trillian I think any person who has murdered, raped, or molested someone should be subjected to this type of death, yes I do. Have you ever been raped or molested? I’m sorry you can’t see the bruises or the aftermath of that but it leaves you feeling like you were beat up mentally, that is a lifetime mental scare that NEVER goes away, so excuse me for feeling that they (people that have committed such acts) deserve to die in the most unpleasant way possible! I will not apologize for feeling this way either!

To answer your question though trillian no I have not. But perhaps they should have rethought their actions before landing themselves in prison in the first place.

@Trillian I would also like to thank you for going out of your way to call me “woefully ignorant”! I have noticed that everyone here has very different opinions and I may not agree with some but would NEVER call someone here ignorant just for feeling differently about something than I do.

Thank you again and Happy Holidays!

While I understand why you feel the way you do, @JustJessica, the unfortunate truth is that abuse is a self-perpetuating cycle…and the prison system does nothing to intervene in the cycle. Child abuse statistics indicate:

90% of child sexual abuse victims know the perpetrator in some way; 68% are abused by family members.

Child abuse occurs at every socioeconomic level, across ethnic and cultural lines, within all religions and at all levels of education.

31% percent of women in prison in the United States were abused as children.

Over 60% of people in drug rehabilitation centers report being abused or neglected as a child.

About 30% of abused and neglected children will later abuse their own children, continuing the horrible cycle of abuse.

About 80% of 21 year old that were abused as children met criteria for at least one psychological disorder.

14% of all men in prison in the USA were abused as children

Children who experience child abuse & neglect are 59% more likely to be arrested as a juvenile, 28% more likely to be arrested as an adult, and 30% more likely to commit violent crime.

@JustJessica You assume a lot about me. Go ahead and asume whatever you like, as you are certainly not entitled to know my personal knowledge. Why would you assume and presume to state whether or no I have first hand knowledge of being raped or abused? Because I don’t feel that everyone in prison deserves to be beate to death? WHo is judging who based on disagreement with another persons “opinion”?
Your casual oversimplification reveals much about you. So you would impose a cruel and inhuman death sentence on top of what the court has already imposed? And you are personaly certain that you are qualified to determine that everyone in prison “deserves” to be brutalized and treated in an inhumne way until they are finally just killed?
I call you ignorant for saying ”...this the only option they have.” This is a fallacious argument, and I maintain that you are sadly ignorant and uninformed about what options “they” have. And as I stated, perhaps you should rethink or at least do some fact checking before coming to any conclusions about a subject of which you are, at best, under informed.
This is an area of personal interest to me and I have been doing some extensive research during the past two years. There is a defnite link between unhealthy childhood family dynamics and adult criminal behaviour which seems to stem from a substance use/abuse problem. The criminal of today that you want to write off to pain and a torturous death is the child that was not saved yesterday. The child who we neglect to save today is at extreme risk to grow up and become an adult drug user/abuser and criminal, which is an escalating cycle.
These are human lives that are just wasted, humans who will never have a chance at a normal, productive, fulfilled life, and self actualization is just right out.

@Trillian I never assumed anything about you, I was simply asking you questions. As far as you saying “This sounds a lot like “Kill them all and let God sort them out.” That couldn’t be farther from how I feel. We are no one to play God EVER.

I like the ASSumption your making about me. Perhaps you should take your own advice and do some fact checking. When I stated “this the only option they have” I was talking about the system now, the solitary confinement of the prisoners.

“On the other hand I think they should let them all out with the general population where they can be judged by a group of their peers (other inmates), most of them will end up killing each other then.
Then we won’t have to worry about having to feed and house the worthless scum with our tax paying dollars. That’s my opinion”

Kill them all and let god sort them out.

Yep.

Its unconstitutional. Despite the morality of super max prisons, it is cruel and unusual punishment.

If I’m motivated enough, I may answer this question in more detail when I’m not on my phone.

Sounds like torture to me. But then I often wonder…would I want to be in isolation, or get slaughtered in the societies that are allowed to exist in maximum security prisons? :/

@JustJessica Prisoners aren’t usually assigned to a Supermax prison by the courts on the basis of the crimes they have committed. The prison authorities normally decide who will go to the Supermax. This can be simply for infringing some petty prison regulation.

The following is a quote from the report of the Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons published in 2006

“People who pose no real threat to anyone and also those who are mentally ill are languishing for months or years in high-security units and “supermax” prisons. In some places, the environment is so severe that people end up completely isolated, confined in constantly bright or constantly dim spaces without any meaningful human contact—torturous conditions that are proven to cause mental deterioration. Prisoners often are released directly from solitary confinement and other high-security units directly to the streets, despite the clear dangers of doing so.”

Good people of our land living in fear of these fiends is cruel and unusual punishment.

Here is a podcast from howstuffworks.com about prisons, including supermax prisons.

@MeinTeil Which fiends are we talking about; the criminals, or those that see anybody behind bars as an animal and thus not entitled to be treated as a human being?
In some cases, Supermax is warranted, but not nearly as many as some people think.

@MeinTeil I am sorry if you and the others are afraid but your fear is not a punishment. Being locked up in extreme isolation could be considered cruel and unusual punishment as human beings are social creatures. The fear Americans have of their fellow citizens is the reason you have the highest rate of incarceration in the world with almost 2.5 million Americans locked up in gaol.
@kenmc Interesting podcast, thanks.

@flutherother If it weren’t for fear, how could we Americans justify cutting aid to the poor so that we can have such a huge defense budget? How could we justify paying people to grope in at the airport if not for a bit of paranoia?