Comment by agumonkey | Hacker News Reader

Comment by agumonkey | Hacker News Reader

Gonna throw some weird idea about prison, what about:

- Smaller but individual cells. (have to think about how to keep them very clean)

- No outside yard for crowd.

- No plural bathroom.

Everything you do is for the benefit of society 90% and the rest for you.

- Clean something outside, plant trees I don't know, so you get walk, sun and forest time.

- You can read books, or some journals.

- You can talk to old wise persons.

- You don't have TV, video games.

- You can work (producing parts, fixing things) again for the benefit of society.

- You can do exercice: biking, rowing. Qi gong or Yoga too. (bonus, plug bikes to generate electricity)

- You get simple healthy food: raw veggies, some meat, some fruits. No sauce, no dessert.

Basically a cheap mindful retreat with optional work. Lowering costs as much as possible and prisonner suffering at the same time. You can improve your mind and your body while paying your mistake by being cut from the group. Nothing more.

What about taking a step back to really think about why the US has such an absurd (and the largest) number of people on lockup? [1][2]

Someone certainly stands to gain from it and it certainly isn't society at large, as you can easily grasp from the results on the "war on drugs"... [3]

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2015/07/... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_United_States_in... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs#Arrests_and_incar...

Right, absurd laws should be removed too.

i like the idea but there is not much you can do to coerce folks into doing the activities you suggest. Not everyone in prison is of a good nature.

Nobody is forced to do anything actually. Only outside things will be done chained, loose enough to do the thing but otherwise no orders or anything.

My idea is that people with nothing to do, and no absurd violent crowds will start to soften and try stuff out of boredom or old desires (say before they turned into the "dark side").

You either stay silently in your cell or you do something that won't cost society and will give them something back, and you will also get something on the way (new knowledge, less boredom, health, etc).

FYI: this is how it works in various other countries

Which ones ? I know most in Europe and USA have the usual non single rooms + central yard. Lost of networking causing more illegal acts. Violence to coerce people into helping bad convicts.

Nordic countries have a reverse philosophy. Prison is a step to be helped into being better, it's comfortable, apparently very effective, but it's a bit unfair for peaceful homeless and victims that have lower quality of life. Hence my "frugal but human" proposal.

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