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Comment by tedks | Hacker News Reader

The solitary confinement practiced in Pelican Bay is a gross affront to humanity. In a hundred years and change, it will be considered the great moral blemish on the early 21st century, and our children's children's children will be disgusted by our complicity in it.

Solitary confinement is literally torture, and can drive people permanently insane. People can be placed into solitary confinement after being "validated" as gang members just for having political writing in their cells: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/10/solitary-confine...

This article discusses this only casually, which ultimately makes its author complicit in these crimes against humanity.

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Writing a news article makes one complicit in crimes against humanity?!

Wow. The standards and actions required for being designated an utter bastard have slipped a long way in my short time in this world..

Journalists have a public responsibility, for sure. It'd surely lack moral sense to casually report on the mistreatment of Armenians, or not bother to really mention it at all, during the Armenian genocide when covering the plight of the Armenians.

This has been recognized in history by many, to leave you with two quotes from Einstein and King respectively:

"If I were to remain silent, I'd be guilty of complicity."

"The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people."

I certainly don't want to get sentimental and I'm not one to favor hyperbole, being complicit in these crimes is too strong for my taste. But I agree with the sentiment of his post, which urges journalists to recognize their power and seize the opportunity to report on gross inhumane mistreatment of people, especially when these people are the subject of his writing. Again, I understand his wording was strong, but I wish we'd focus more on the intent of his post than on the semantics.

That's fine, and I even agree with you, but hyperbole absent a rhetorical purpose like a contrast or illustration is a plague on modern media (loss of nuance).

It needs to be challenged when seen, not passively accepted.

"but hyperbole.. is a plague on modern media."

Need I say more?

>I wish we'd focus more on the intent of his post than on the semantics.

But it's easier to score upvotes (and downvote away uncomfortable truths) by attacking semantics.

As to the strength of my wording, there were 1.5 million deaths in the Armenian Genocide, according to Wikipedia; there are more prisoners than that in prison in the United States today, and the situation has continued pretty much the same as now for the last 20 or so years.

Is the torture of tens or hundreds of millions, depending on how long the situation continues, equivalent to the genocide of 1.5 million? Maybe, maybe not. I find this sort of moral calculus distasteful, and I think that anyone who has the opportunity to reduce the amount of torture in the world, yet does not take that opportunity, is undoubtedly complicit. This journalist goes as far as dismissing a hunger strike 30,000 prisoners participated in as something "organized by gangs" as if it was just an organizational tactic. Those are 30,000 people who are being tortured to death (whether literally or by breaking their minds until they are no longer human). Belittling their struggle makes him undoubtedly complicit.

All it takes for evil to triumph is for good to do nothing.

I did 10+ years in prison systems and I actually preferred the peace and quiet of solitary to the chaos and drama of population.

How did you end up on both HN and in prison?

Are they mutually exclusive?

No, but I assume the combination is rare.

I think we should implement an all-solitary-confinement prison system.

We can make the initial prison terms shorter by an order of magnitude (a few days to a few weeks, depending on the nature of the crime). This should be hard enough time to scare most first-time offenders straight.

If you get repeat offenders, start increasing the length of solitary confinement exponentially.

The benefit is that you need less guards, the guards are better protected, less prison gangs because there would be no intermingling of prisoners, and it would protect the prisoners as well. It would help first-time offenders because they will probably get scared straight faster, and they wouldn't be in jail as long. And if you get a really violent criminal, it would be akin to locking them away and throwing away the key.

There is no evidence that suggests increased or harsher sentences serve as a deterrent to crime.

That's true, but there is strong evidence that while people prone to commit crimes are in jail that are not, simultaneously, outside of prison committing more crimes.

You and me didn't read the same article, or the same HN thread.

The guys in the SHU are in one of the highest security prisons and, still, they managed to stir a huge prison strike and (If you believe the article) lead a criminal empire that extends its influence far from the prisons.

So, point me to that "strong" evidence, and make it peer reviewed, if possible.

Why not just bring back the lash? http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/mayjune_2011/featu...

Thanks, that is actually a very nice article with a refreshing take on the problem. I wonder if there's actually any good arguments against what he is proposing (giving convicts a choice to be lashed to reduce jail time).

The best argument is that it's fucking barbaric, and if you need to consider that to reduce the prison population, your society is broken.

That's a closed minded argument.

Don't leave your mind so open your brain falls out.

What he proposes makes a lot of sense if you accept that the purpose of prison is punishment. However, the more successful prison systems of the world focus on rehabilitation, not punishment.

Also, for incorrigible criminals, lengthy prison sentences do serve the purpose of keeping them off the street, while lashing does not.

Well, it's not just punishment lashing is good for. It's also very good as a discouragement of course. He does propose that for serious (violence-involving) crimes there should always be prison for the reasons you mention.

The most succesful prison systems of the world do not have to deal with millions of prisoners in organized gangs fortunately for them.

Singapore has caning. Perhaps someone did a study on that?

Moskos is not actually proposing flogging.

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