Joe wrote:
"Let me get this straight; my original example was of an adult male who RAPES AND MURDERS a five year old girl, and you would NOT EVEN INCARCERATE such a person!! Whaddaya wanna do; issue him a parking ticket and hope it's an isolated offence?"
I fear rational conversation just flew through the window as loud and graceless as the corpse of a 5 yr old.
"We indeed have nothing more to say to each other on the issue, for there is nothing further I can say concerning the issue to a person who holds and defends such a "beyond the pale' position."
Your distortion of my position was quite amusing, but will get us no-where.
Small steps Joe. A radical overhaul of our justice system and how people understand crime and punishment is a long way off. For now it is only possible to make small changes. The first kinds of changes can begin with improving prison conditions (especially where sexual assault of inmates is concerned). Brutalising criminals (or should I say *possible* criminals!) on the inside breds resentment, fear, pain and more brutality. It should be evident to anyone familiar with recidivism rates and crime rates that prison does not act as much of a deterrant, nor does it reform. However, it most certainly punishes; for many it tortures. Prison appears to be little more than a way of avenging a victim by perpetrating more victimisation.
Regarding the problem of oppression you said that:
"I still hold the opinion that I voiced in my comparison of 'gender' and
'nature' ecofeminists; that dominance/submission paradigms are
imprinted during childrearing, and to eliminate them, we must discover
noncoercive ways of raising our young."
I would agree with this. But I do not understand why such a practice could not be extended to social interaction generally.
The spirit behind this notion also informs criminal rehabilitation. Taking revenge on the criminal only puts the person is a worse position. Taking revenge is the result of the visceral feeling we have when someone harms us. Taking revenge does not account for the social complexities and impoverishment of circumstance or conscience that are involved in the making of a criminal.
When criminals meet their victims (in what is known as an "encounter") they have the chance to understand how their actions have harmed real people: "for offenders, hearing the victims’ story not only humanizes their victims but also can change the offenders’ attitude about their criminal behavior." The whole point of this is to deal with the feelings of hostility both criminal and victim feel and move towards reconciliation. It is important to understand that though it is difficult to isolate exactly how responsible a criminal is for his/her actions (due to the complexity of socialisation and life-context), the criminal must consider him/herself accountable. For more see:
http://www.restorativejustice.org/rj3/Introduction-Definition/Encounter-2.htm
The principles of restorative justice have been applied to schools; see:
http://www.transformingconflict.com/
Restorative justice would need to be supported by policy and institutions which support its methods and that competently deal with the causes of crime.
Perhaps prisoners can have their sentances reduced if they choose to take part in "encounters" with their victims. Maybe eventually, we can be rid of prisons and their deleterious effects on humanity.
I am not in any position to plan a society with less prisons, where prisons are only used for cases which seem to be beyond reform (which probably count for your rapist/murderer example). However, one possible option for many prisoners is illustrated by recent experients with electronic tagging, allowing prisoners to live outside their prisons, with family and friends, and to carry on working and earning, while under surveillance to moniter criminal activity.
Criminals aren't usually monsters. Usually they need help with financial, social and psychological problems. Your case of the rapist/murderer is certianly unusual and extreme, and as such, the criminal would not likely benefit from restorative justice. However, he would also certainly not benefit from prison violence.
Benefit!? But he's a violent and cruel criminal!? Why are we discussing benefit!? Becuase it is the only rational option. Increasing this criminals misery does nothing but make this dangerous person more dangerous. It also reinforces the violent behaviours of those prisoners that would choose to rape and beat him. Treating him with respect and giving him the chance to improve opens up possibilities for constructive and positive actions or thoughts by the criminal, or to at least minimize the cycle of violence and reinforcement found within prisons currently.
Male rape in prisons expresses and reinforces deeper oppressive social and psychological structures.
"By turning some men into 'women' these inmates use sexuality to dehumanise and degrade fellow inmates." (Sim, J. - "Men in Prison", in Newburn, T. and Stanko, E. (eds.) Just Boys Doing Business? , p107). The example of male rape illustrates two points. First of all it is indicative of the ideology of male supremacy that is core to the ideology of masculinity. This is indicated by violently forcing other men to be in the position of “the Other”; that is a woman or homosexual. These Others are outside and subordinate to the dominant male heterosexual hierarchies, thus forcing another man into this lower category, forcing another man beneath him, illustrates the rapist’s power and gain.
The second related point is that men must emasculate each other to some degree so as to gain status, to rise above, by knocking another down. This competitive vampirism need not be violent (though in an institution like the prison or army barracks it is more likely to be), it can take more subtle forms according to the institution the hierarchy is embedded in, like public humiliation, demonstrating how less cool or tough another male is, gloating over winning a game, intellectual browbeating, sexual conquest at the other man’s expense and so on. In this way, masculine identity is always subject to erosion or even destruction, it is constantly under attack and must be defended by reciprocating these attacks within the given hierarchic frameworks by gaining status by whatever means are acceptable. " 'Man' is an ideology which all men are striving to achieve and has to be competitively accomplished." (Brittan, A. - Masculinity and Power, p36. Also see Horrocks, R. - Masculinity in Crisis and Jefferson, T
. - “Theorising Masculine Subjectivity” in Newburn, T. and Stanko, E. (eds.) Just Boys Doing Business? , p13).
However, the violence and competition inherent in masculine ideology ensures that failure can be catastrophic for a man and those around him. Men like Peter Sutcliffe, better known as “The Yorkshire Ripper”, felt that he was not a “real man”, and murdered women to prove that he was in fact a man. The deeper misogyny and fear that permeates masculine ideology is exemplified by these failures, revealing the psychotic tendencies that define it. (Horrocks, R. - Masculinity in Crisis, p125-128).
Walpurgis
---- This message was posted by Walpurgis to the Virus 2002 board on Church of Virus BBS. <http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=51;action=display;threadid=25800>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sun Sep 22 2002 - 05:06:16 MDT