—-Prison Abolition—-
(Rewrite this and other posts as frame-works for interviews and other types of public discourse aimed at constructive political action, spanning in scope from the most local to the most global.)
I would be willing to learn about alternatives to prisons from the abolition movement. Though I don’t consider myself a prison abolitionist, advocating for prisoners’ rights makes sense, as does ending the so-called War on Drugs and prisons for profit.
In addition to human and civil rights abuses, a prison system in which a person becomes less able to live in society when he or she gets out might harm not only the friends and family of the ‘ex-offender’ but also society in general.
I would keep an open mind, but I don’t see evidence supporting the idea that we should continue to allow bad conditions in prisons as a way to deter crime in our communities. Even if it worked to some degree, there may be a net benefit to both individuals and society if we don’t use fear-based (or least don’t make them the method of choice) incentives for creating cooperation and respect in our communities.
Using fear to get people to refrain from breaking laws doesn’t seem as good as creating a system in which people are more likely to believe we have a stake in the well-being of not only our immediate families and communities but in society in general as well as the world.
Barring cases of mental illness, much of the violence that occurs in society (including the direct and indirect violence of police and other authorities) stems from a break-down in community.
Whether or not we support the abolition of prisons, many of us can find common cause in ending for-profit prisons; the War on Drugs; so-called ‘tough-on-crime’ laws that tend to have a double-standard when it comes to race and class; and the economic inequality and concentration of wealth and power that is causally related violence in society (including, again, the direct and indirect violence of police and other authorities).
My guess is that proponents of ‘tough-on-crime’ laws demonize low income law breakers while valorizing the police and overlooking a lot of white collar crime. At the same time, some proponents of prison abolition might romanticize [[vocab]] prisoners, demonize police and other authorities, while over-emphasizing the political reasons people are in prison.
Either extreme is untruthful. There may be some fallacy in reason–which I myself am prone to committing–whereby we think that because we oppose a policy or an idea, our commitment to fighting it is half-hearted if we don’t take as a position its extreme opposite.
Is seeking reforms of the ‘criminal justice’ system (and along with that, reforms of the broader society which can reduce crime by addressing economic and social inequality) the same as when people advocated the reform of slavery in the US, but not abolition ?
The two cases may differ in that many people believe slavery to be wrong under any circumstances, whereas there may be good reasons to separate from general society those who engage in behaviors such as rape or murder. (This also would include those in business and government who knowingly carry out policies that cause unnecessary harm.
If the goal is to protect members of society–and not to torture or otherwise abuse or even punish the person who intentionally and unnecessarily harms others—the idea would be to take away the ability and/or the desire of the offender to repeat the behavior. Using that standard, some might argue that the case of a CEO knowingly carrying out harmful policies based on greed and/or lust for power would call for a different method of keeping her or him away from continuing to harm people than would a carjacker who attacks people in a more direct (yet possibly more limited) sense.
Many of us would agree there is no good reason for enslaving people (though fewer of us would also apply that to other sentient animals such as horses, cows, chickens, or pigs.) But are there never good reasons for keeping some people away from the rest of society?
To what extent is it far-fetched to say not having prisons nor courts of law would lead to a lot of revenge killings and feuds?
—–Anarchism, properly and improperly understood———–
Though some anarchists might look to pre-history for ideal states of human affairs, it might be useful to ask the following. If we look at the historical record, do we see a stronger case for a stateless society or a stronger case for a state which imperfectly serves the general public, and not, for example, an oligarchy?
It may be the case that anarchism, properly understood, offers a much-needed conceptual framework for minimizing the abuses of power on any level, in any social arrangement, be it families, groups, communities, or societies.
But to what extent is it the case that a distorted conception of anarchism is more prevalent than the one which gets to the gist of the abuse of power?
To what extent might ‘anarchy improperly understood’ undermine, unintentionally, the fight to defeat corporatocracy?
To what extent should those that call ourselves ‘new progressives’ or ‘radical progressives’ or simply ‘radicals,’ come to terms with how a distorted conception of anarchism conflicts with our movements that call for not the end of government, but a government that the general public controls with as little abuse of power as possible, on any level ?
To what extent do new progressives or radical progressives call for a better rule of law that makes governments and big corporations accountable to the general public ?
Does history show us the need for governments and other structures for authority to improve or does it show us the need to do away with them ?
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