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failrate

Prison labor is slave labor.

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Locking people in a cage for years and controlling every detail of their life: okay

telling them to dig a hole: slavery

Can you point out which poster said this?

That's what I'm reading when I hear that forced labor by prisoners is slavery.

If that is slavery, then what is locking them in a box and not letting them leave? Would that be kidnapping? Abduction?

Why is locking someone in a box an acceptable punishment, but making them do work while locked in the box unacceptable?

It does not seem fair, when someone tells you one thing, to imagine that they believe some other thing they have not mentioned and then ask them why they believe those two things together.

I'm not telling someone they believe those things. I'm saying that I don't see how you can believe one without believing the other, since they both require the same leap of logic.

And I don't think people believe that locking prisoners up is actually kidnapping and abduction - I am actually more of the mind that people don't really think it is slavery, but are just saying that as a rhetorical point.

Just like many conservatives don't really think abortion is murder, which is why they don't want to punish aborters the same way they want murderers to be punished.

It seems much more likely that the people who insist on calling forced labor compelled using the threat of torture "slavery" (which, to be clear, is not really an opinion about whether or not we ought to do it) are opposed to the vast majority of the imprisonments in the USA than that they are fine with them.

It would really be more about the concept of putting someone in a box, rather than the implementation of it, which surely is flawed.

I hear: "Slavery is never acceptable"

But then I also hear: "Sometimes locking someone in a box forever is acceptable"

I can't square those two viewpoints.

It looks like you are once again the only user in the whole comment section posting the things you claim to be hearing.

I will agree narrowly though: US prisons should not use torture to compel labor by prisoners.

Right. No one is saying that putting people in a box is kidnapping/abduction because it is baldly ridiculous . However, it is the same exact logic as calling prison labor slavery.

If someone can tell me how prison labor is slavery, but putting them in a box is not kidnapping/abducting, I would be most edified.

I am claiming that putting someone in a box is abduction. Whether or not the safety of society requires e.g. a violent criminal to be sequestered from that society is immaterial. Taking someone from the world and sticking them in a box is abduction.

Please get this Twitter-style debate tactics out of this space. Putting words in other peoples' mouths is a hideous trait.

Saying "no one is saying this" is putting words in other people's mouths?

> prison labor is slavery, but putting them in a box is not kidnapping/abducting

No one ever claimed this in this comment space. You are inventing a straw-man.

I am happy to vouch for the claim that prison labor is slavery and prison in general is coercive detention, ie, kidnapping, as are many others I'm sure.

In the comment you're replying to, I literally say "no one is saying this"

Why does prison labor get called slavery, but prison detention gets the euphemistic treatment of "coercive detention"? Why isn't prison labor "coercive labor"?

Arrest is kidnapping. When someone other than the state does the crime of imprisonment, that crime is "false imprisonment," so there doesn't seem to be a big divide between the language we use for the two things.

Totally unrelated to language issues, kidnapping and imprisonment are very harmful and people ought to exercise great care to do them very little.

At least in the US we have this statement in the Constitution:

> Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

There is no such supporting language for calling imprisonment "kidnapping", whereas compelling labor from prisoners is explicitly identified here as your choice of "slavery" or "involuntary servitude".

I believe that even before emancipation was finally achieved, slave holders were already looking for the next slavery analogue: share cropping, jobs which were paid in tips, and prison labor.

> making them do work while locked in the box unacceptable

It's more the "incarcerated workers in the U.S. earn an average of just between 13 cents and 52 cents per hour" that's unacceptable, I think, rather than just the concept of prisoners working.

Yeah, humans shouldn't lock other humans in cages. It is a tragic failure mode.

The problem is the conflict of interest that it creates.

> Locking people in a cage for years and controlling every detail of their life: okay

Not "okay". Far from okay. Potentially justified on the theory that imprisoning people may be necessary to protect society and deter offenders. (Although many other countries obtain better results with lower/fewer prison sentences and better conditions.)

Forcing people to dig holes, on the other hand? Not necessary. And yes, it is slavery.

The prison part is the slavery, the digging the whole is the labor. As you have pointed out, there's an odd pearl clutching among a lot of people on the matter. I think those who argue of the negative incentives it creates are right, but too many appeals to emotion over the term slavery. The reason the 13th amendment included the crime provision is so that we can continue to imprison people, any work they do or don't do is secondary to the loss of rights.

The slaves freed through the civil war committed no crime. They were taken or born slaves.

Criminals have shown their behavior to be counter productive to the laws of our society.

Let me guess, middle class upbringing with little to no contact with the living conditions of the poors?

My country doesn't have quite the level of wealth disparity as the united states.

Let me guess, you think certain demographics are only entitled to certain viewpoints? /s

Slavery is a broader term and concept than just referring the civil war era slaves in America

> Criminals have shown their behavior to be counter productive to the laws of our society.

Or were wrongly convicted. Or were convicted of an unjust law. Or any number of other things.

"Broke a law" doesn't justify making someone a slave. Even the "undesirables" are human.

In the USA we have plenty of (IMO) unjust laws meant to put people into the system.

If Democrats really supported bodily autonomy, they would push to make all drugs legal.

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