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Comment by Alex3917 | Hacker News Reader

"People are holding hunger strikes to stand up against the corruption. When was the last time that happened in the US?"

The last major one was July 1st, 2011 in the California prison system.

Not sure why this is being down-voted. The over 2 million Americans that are imprisoned do count as citizens, and the prison system is as corrupt as they come, from cases of judges being paid by private prisons(1) to give harsh sentences to minors to the blind eye given to assault and rape behind bars(2).

(1. http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/peopl...)

(2. http://www.hrw.org/news/2007/12/15/us-federal-statistics-sho... )

Very true. The US prison system is on equal footings with the worst gulags of history.

Now that is a serious exaggeration, and an unproductive one as well.

What percent of your lifetime income / net worth would you give up to avoid a 6 month term in a maximum security penitentiary?

A smaller percent than if it were the actual Gulag?

Ok fair enough, but considering that gulags are known to us via old propaganda stories and prisons are part of the modern human rights (intellectual) blind spot that most affluent western people suffer from, it's not surprising that you consider them drastically different.

In my opinion, the notion of almost certain rape and being locked into a cell with a violent individual in a system where violence is tolerated is about as cruel a punishment as one could possibly inflict. The worst psychological torture combined with brutal physical subjugation.

Going to take a wild guess here, and speculate that you haven't read any Solzhenitsyn.

I have not. I realize there are things that are more horrific on a larger scale of human suffering, but for the individuals involved at a micro level the US system is cruel and unusual to the extreme.

While I don't disagree with the validity of your statement, I feel like you are splitting hairs... I was mainly using that as a demonstration of the relative differences in corruption between the two countries.

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