[Politics]The Right to Arm Bears in a Crowded Theater

[Drolyt]

It is stupid not to try to get away when a racist white dude who has attacked you in the past comes onto your porch and says "I'm gonna stab you, n-----." You'll get no argument from me on that. But the kid got 18-20 years after he pled down to manslaughter. And that is not a reasonable sentence for defending yourself from a racist who attacks you on your own porch.

Was that far too harsh a sentence? Hell yes. But I agree with the principle that if he could have just went inside without anyone getting hurt he should have, because that is preferable to someone dying, even if that someone is a racist bastard. If he could not have done that then obviously we have a serious miscarriage of justice.

[Grek]

In fact Grek's line of reasoning seems to suggest we shouldn't do that, if it isn't okay for people to kill in order to defend their lives how in the fuck is it okay to put people through living hell to punish them?

Indeed, I also believe that the current prison system is monstrous and there needs to be either a massive overhaul in conditions in US prisons, or a change away from using imprisonment as the default punishment for serious crimes.

[Stahlseele]

so how would you deal with them then?
forced organ donations?
make them be living crash test dummies and test subjects for untested medicine to further research into safety for others?

[Kaelik]

so how would you deal with them then?
forced organ donations?
make them be living crash test dummies and test subjects for untested medicine to further research into safety for others?

No, people who kill someone in self defense should go to 20 year education camp where it is drilled into them that the correct response in the case of someone killing them is to let themselves be killed.

[Grek]

so how would you deal with them then?

Well, the obvious answer is "less terrible prisons". But if making the prisons not be horrific rape-and-murder pits is not an option for some reason, there's still things you can do:

For non-violent crimes, fines, parole, public shaming and registration can work. I imagine that making convicted burglars go door to door with their parole officer and explain what they did wrong and why they're not going to do it again would be a reasonably effective punishment.

For violent crimes, if imprisonment isn't an option (due to a lack of humane prisons) and the criminal is not bad enough to merit execution, you're pretty boned. Exile is an option, I guess but you'd be hard pressed to find anywhere willing to take violent criminals.

The real answer is "build prisons that are not terrible", though.

[zugschef]

But the point of prisons in a modern constitutional democracy is not punishment but resocialization.

[Drolyt]

so how would you deal with them then?
forced organ donations?
make them be living crash test dummies and test subjects for untested medicine to further research into safety for others?

That depends largely on the crime but:

• For the most serious crimes prison is the only way to keep the community safe, but prisons should be made more humane. If someone is too dangerous to allow outside of prison they should at least be made relatively safe and comfortable. Most importantly there needs to be means for the prisoner to improve themselves, access to education, artistic expression, counseling, and the like.
  
  Humane mental institutions should be there for those that clearly need them.
  
  Drug crimes and the like should involve mandatory rehab.
  
  Fines are great for nonviolent crimes. Especially financial crimes.
  
  Community service is always a good option.
  
  Basically reserve prison for only the most serious crimes and introduce more humane sentences and you will have more money to make the prisons humane.

public shaming and registration

What the fuck is wrong with you? If the point is to rehabilitate you need to allow people to reintegrate into society after they have served their sentence. You are trying to make this more difficult.

But the point of prisons in a modern constitutional democracy is not punishment but resocialization.

What are you, Finnish? This might be the ideal, but in the US prisons are little more than organized rape camps and very few countries are much better.

[Kaelik]

Drug crimes and the like should involve mandatory rehab.

So, when someone who doesn't use drugs is arrested for selling them they should go to rehab? Yeah, that's a great idea, put all the pushers in the same place as the people who want to avoid drugs.

PS, we know what we would do, the question is what the psychotic Grek who thinks that people should be punished in some way for defending themselves when they had no other option instead of committing suicide.