Should flogging be an alternative to prison?

orourkeda · 28-06-2011 11:13AM

chin_grin wrote: »

No. Physical wounds heal. Contrast that to their mental state after being continually raped by "Bubba" in prison. Now that's punishment. (Depending on the crime of course! I'm talking about heinous ones.....not petty theft).

Sounds like a plan. Don't whip someone because someone their wounds will heal but a violent arse f*cking in the shower will solve everyones problems.

The King of Moo · 28-06-2011 11:21AM

Rawhead wrote: »

As an interesting aside I have talked to some of the most violent and hardest nuts in our prison system and they nearly all agree on one thing, they quietly admit to liking the harsh strict system that is operated in the punishment block in Cork prison. They have had such chaotic, crazy lives, that they like the order and regiment of the Block.
The idea of boot camps starts to make sense.

That seems to be one of the tricky things about prison to me, it's not an equal punishment as different prisoners react differently to it. Some enjoy it as you say, and others no doubt despise it and become hardened by it, and therefore possibly more likely to reoffend and wind up back there.
I think there'd be the same problem with flogging: some wouldn't be bothered by it at all, and see it as a light punishment and not a deterrent, yet others would probably be humiliated and bitter by it. Neither would probably feel much like reforming their criminal ways.

Monty Burnz · 28-06-2011 11:22AM

tayto lover wrote: »

Violence solves absolutely nothing.
Community service is the answer. Cutting grass and roadside hedges, painting O.P.D's, cleaning up estates, graffiti etc. Good hard work for their dole is the answer to crime.

So basically, their punishment for crimes is to do what normal citizens do anyway? Work for their money?

I'm not saying you are totally wrong, just something to think about.

Dyr · 28-06-2011 11:23AM

I saw a video of a fella being caned in malaysia or soem such place...I think he learned his lesson judging by the roars of him

The King of Moo · 28-06-2011 11:34AM

Monty Burnz wrote: »

So basically, their punishment for crimes is to do what normal citizens do anyway? Work for their money?

I'm not saying you are totally wrong, just something to think about.

That's the difficulty with community service: making sure that it qualifies as punishment, especially these days when so many can't even get work when they want to. Simply doing physical labour for nine or ten hours a day, as you say, is what lots of people already do anyway.
There has to be certain loss of liberties to go along with it. I think the biggest difference between community service and work has to be the compensation. The state would have to ensure these people survive if they're doing full-time community service and don't have time for a job. But they should try to make sure that they're given enough to survive on and not much else. The easy way would be to provide food and shelter and no wage, but then you're starting to blur the line between prison and community service.
To be honest, I'm not in a position to state how exactly to go about making sure community service works as punishment, but I think it could be made into a viable alternative to sending young pettyish criminals to prison with hardened scumbags.

southsiderosie · 28-06-2011 12:04PM

The King of Moo wrote: »

That's the difficulty with community service: making sure that it qualifies as punishment, especially these days when so many can't even get work when they want to. Simply doing physical labour for nine or ten hours a day, as you say, is what lots of people already do anyway.
There has to be certain loss of liberties to go along with it. I think the biggest difference between community service and work has to be the compensation. The state would have to ensure these people survive if they're doing full-time community service and don't have time for a job. But they should try to make sure that they're given enough to survive on and not much else. The easy way would be to provide food and shelter, but then you're starting to blur the line between prison and community service.
To be honest, I'm not in a position to state how exactly to go about making sure community service works as punishment, but I think it could be made into a viable alternative to sending young pettyish criminals to prison with hardened scumbags.

The problem with some convict work programs is that the state then works hand in hand with employers to essentially supply them with cheap labor. I believe this was an issue in Colorado - convicts were working for $1.25 an hour, which is far below the minimum wage, but it was being billed as a rehabilitation program. I believe there was something similar in Scotland as well, and people raised similar concerns. This kind of thing can create gross incentives to support harsher sentencing because it can provide a cheap - and legal - workforce. It also takes jobs away from law-abiding people who really need them.

I think the best thing would be some kind of combination of life in a group home with strict rules and chores combined with therapy. The main thing seems to be helping people deal with their own issues while giving them some kind of structure and responsibility. Some programs have had a lot of success with putting inmates in charge of dog training, so perhaps something like that would be beneficial as well?

There is also the cost issue, which is why flogging may appeal to some as a quick and easy way to deal with prison overcrowding.

pickarooney · 28-06-2011 12:26PM

southsiderosie wrote: »

The problem with some convict work programs is that the state then works hand in hand with employers to essentially supply them with cheap labor. I believe this was an issue in Colorado - convicts were working for $1.25 an hour, which is far below the minimum wage, but it was being billed as a rehabilitation program. I believe there was something similar in Scotland as well, and people raised similar concerns. This kind of thing can create gross incentives to support harsher sentencing because it can provide a cheap - and legal - workforce. It also takes jobs away from law-abiding people who really need them.

I think it's called WPP in Ireland.

RachaelVO · 28-06-2011 12:39PM

ronan45 wrote: »

Bit Barbaric............What about dusting off the stocks in dublin castle and having a 15 inch rubber dildo shoved up your arse outside Berties office in Drumcondra while strapped up?

I dunno about the dildo thing (well not for this anyway

), but for petty criminals a bit of mortification a few rotten tomatoes with 24 hours in the stocks in a town/city centre would be enough of a deterrent. Could ya imagine a few drunkards in college green throwing a loada rancid kebabs at ya... *shivers*

Monty Burnz · 28-06-2011 12:42PM

RachaelVO wrote: »

I dunno about the dildo thing (well not for this anyway ), but for petty criminals a bit of mortification a few rotten tomatoes with 24 hours in the stocks in a town/city centre would be enough of a deterrent. Could ya imagine a few drunkards in college green throwing a loada rancid kebabs at ya... *shivers*

And it would be cheap.

I don't really care about how embarrassing it is for criminals to be honest - if it works, it should be used. Every criminal is a volunteer. If you don't want to volunteer for our punishments, don't commit crimes against your fellow human beings.

robman60 · 28-06-2011 12:43PM

I'm not exactly in favour of flogging, but I do think prison does very little for the reform of inmates.

My personal stance is that community service and other similar methods are far better than locking someone in a cage, and hoping they'll emerge as a saint when the sentence has been served.

Rawhead · 28-06-2011 12:43PM

The King of Moo wrote: »

That seems to be one of the tricky things about prison to me, it's not an equal punishment as different prisoners react differently to it. Some enjoy it as you say, and others no doubt despise it and become hardened by it, and therefore possibly more likely to reoffend and wind up back there.
I think there'd be the same problem with flogging: some wouldn't be bothered by it at all, and see it as a light punishment and not a deterrent, yet others would probably be humiliated and bitter by it. Neither would probably feel much like reforming their criminal ways.

I probably put my case about wrongly. What I was trying to point out was the chaos that exists in most of these fellas lives. The Sunday World would have us believe they are living rock star lifestyles and sticking two fingers up at us. The reality is that they live chaotic, squalid, paranoia filled short little lives. Even the few at the top live in a constant state of paranoia and fear. They are praying that when the door is kicked in that its a Garda at the end of the gun and not a coked up 18 year old paying off a drugs debt.

A well known Limerick gang leader told me that the first proper nights sleep he had in two and a half years was the first night he was locked up. This is the world that most of these yokes exist in so how in the name of funk can you threaten them with anything when even the hardest prison regime is a break from the mad world that they live in. The point I was making about a tough regime was that some actually like the order of a tightly controlled system when compared to the chaos of their day to day lives, they never had order from a young age, most had no father and a teenage mother who couldn't or wouldn't discipline them. It might not work for all but a boot camp system would have some success for some of the younger scrotes.

RachaelVO · 28-06-2011 12:53PM

Monty Burnz wrote: »

And it would be cheap.

I don't really care about how embarrassing it is for criminals to be honest - if it works, it should be used. Every criminal is a volunteer. If you don't want to volunteer for our punishments, don't commit crimes against your fellow human beings.

Be really cheap, supermarkets sell off their rotten produce, it can be thrown at the culprit, then collected and used as compost (or what ever). I don't particularly care how mortified the criminal would be either, but I think that the idea of it would act as a greater deterrent than any current punishments!

LeeHoffmann · 28-06-2011 01:00PM

I don't particularly care how mortified the criminal would be either

how many of you actually know any criminals? I know a few who should be locked up but aren't and I know one who is locked up when he probably shouldn't be. This guy is young (just turned 21) and was a very small time drug-dealer. He got 10 years in Mountjoy. I don't think throwing rotten tomatoes at him and/or humiliating him in public would make him a 'better person' or stop him from doing the same again :rolleyes:

The King of Moo · 28-06-2011 01:00PM

Rawhead wrote: »

I probably put my case about wrongly. What I was trying to point out was the chaos that exists in most of these fellas lives. The Sunday World would have us believe they are living rock star lifestyles and sticking two fingers up at us. The reality is that they live chaotic, squalid, paranoia filled short little lives. Even the few at the top live in a constant state of paranoia and fear. They are praying that when the door is kicked in that its a Garda at the end of the gun and not a coked up 18 year old paying off a drugs debt.

A well known Limerick gang leader told me that the first proper nights sleep he had in two and a half years was the first night he was locked up. This is the world that most of these yokes exist in so how in the name of funk can you threaten them with anything when even the hardest prison regime is a break from the mad world that they live in. The point I was making about a tough regime was that some actually like the order of a tightly controlled system when compared to the chaos of their day to day lives, they never had order from a young age, most had no father and a teenage mother who couldn't or wouldn't discipline them. It might not work for all but a boot camp system would have some success for some of the younger scrotes.

I get what you mean. It's interesting how different people react to a strict regime, I'd imagine many prisoners would also automatically buck against it.
A boot camp system does sound like a good idea, especially for younger criminals who I'd imagine would be easier to put on the straight and narrow. But as you say it might not work for some, so it might be difficult to determine who would benefit from it. I think that's why prisons are appealing to governments, they see them as a catch-all solution for a variety of criminals, regardless of whether prison would actually be effective for all of them.

Spread · 28-06-2011 01:01PM

Could there not be a way of getting prisoners to apologise publiclyfor their crimes, to trigger the % of time off for good behaviour? Plus, some of the wardens should be checked out. You get guys going to jail who, probably dabbled, emerging with serious drug problems. Not all the stuff is taken in by visitors or catapulted. And if they're given drugs inside, they've got to pay when they come out by becoming complcit in drug criminality. That is the cycle.

Monty Burnz · 28-06-2011 01:05PM

LeeHoffmann wrote: »

how many of you actually know any criminals? I know a few who should be locked up but aren't and I know one who is locked up when he probably shouldn't be. This guy is young (just turned 21) and was a very small time drug-dealer. He got 10 years in Mountjoy. I don't think throwing rotten tomatoes at him and/or humiliating him in public would make him a 'better person' or stop him from doing the same again :rolleyes:

We don't know that until we try, do we?

Do you think his stint inside will make him a better person? Because, on average, it doesn't seem to. By the way, since when do small-time dealers get locked up on a first offence?

LeeHoffmann · 28-06-2011 01:11PM

Do you think his stint inside will make him a better person?

no but then again I don't think he should be in there at all. As per my first post on this thread, I think there should be another way of dealing with non-violent crime.
It wasn't his first offence - I think the 2nd or 3rd (stupid, I know). His trial was just after that famous model died from cocaine at a party- there had been a couple of high-profile drugs deaths around that time. I don't know if that kind of thing affects sentencing (not ideally but realistically)

Monty Burnz · 28-06-2011 01:16PM

LeeHoffmann wrote: »

I don't know if that kind of thing affects sentencing (not ideally but realistically)

You're probably right, it does. But a guy who is determinedly selling illegal drugs, particularly hard drugs, in spite of being caught and convicted a few times before, has no grounds for comlpaint in my view. He's a volunteer, just like the rest of them.

Which does not mean that there are not other/better alternatives to banging him up of course.

du Maurier · 28-06-2011 01:16PM

southsiderosie wrote: »

The article says that serious offenders (rape, murder, assault) would not be eligible for caning - it would essentially be for stuff like vandalism, petty theft, etc.

Who's this Bubba fella? He seems to be in every prison with an isatiable appetite for the newly inducted.

LeeHoffmann · 28-06-2011 01:25PM

:pac::pac::pac:
thanks for that du Maurier, gave me a good ole chuckle

My name is URL · 28-06-2011 01:48PM

Sure, flog them, humiliate and demean them.. anything to make the wider public feel better about living in the same world as them. Something tells me that a potentially violent criminal wouldn't be put off by the threat of a spanking..

Incidentally, the guy suggesting this idea also suggested that drugs should be legalised, which would most likely lead to a greater reduction in rime rates than if flogging were reintroduced.

What sort of crimes would be punishable by flogging? If it's only the likes of rape and grievous assault then I wouldn't have much of a problem with it per se. But I can just imagine it being dished out to people who commit minor offences, like being caught in possession of small amounts of drugs and for failing to pay fines. In that case it's not really a deterrent, but a threat to people's liberty.. 'cross the state and feel our wrath'. Fcuk that.

hatrickpatrick · 28-06-2011 02:52PM

Flogging is pointless because it deals with only one of two reasons people are sent to prison - punishment.
The other and in my view more concerning reason is to keep the rest of the population safe from dangerous people. Now if someone tried to rape or murder you and failed, would you sleep soundly knowing they had merely been corporally punished and then set free back on the streets, to try again?

Monty Burnz · 28-06-2011 02:54PM

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

Flogging is pointless because it deals with only one of two reasons people are sent to prison - punishment.
The other and in my view more concerning reason is to keep the rest of the population safe from dangerous people. Now if someone tried to rape or murder you and failed, would you sleep soundly knowing they had merely been corporally punished and then set free back on the streets, to try again?

The guy specifically states that it's not appropriate for serious violent criminals. Read the OP for details.

All about Eve · 28-06-2011 03:01PM

Flogging should be used in conjunction with prison. For cases of anything dodgy to do with children. Rape and Murder. And scumbags who harrass the elderly or steal cars . Heroin dealers.
Our system is far too easy.
Last year a Roma Gypsy Woman got 3 years for beating her 3 year old baby to death for wetting the bed. She claimed she had depression. Welcome to Ireland where your life means nothing in the eyes of the LAW. If i was ever to meet that woman she would have a real reason to be depressed.
Your husband can come along and beat you with a brick and kill you and he will do 4 years .
Ireland needs to man up and stop taking crime lying down. too many liberals here.

Monty Burnz · 28-06-2011 03:04PM

All about Eve wrote: »

Ireland needs to man up and stop taking crime lying down. too many liberals here.

Don't try to take the classic US liberal/conservative false dichotomy and apply it to Ireland.

I'm a liberal - I believe in personal freedom. I don't see how this implies that I think criminals should be treated as leniently as they are here.

All about Eve · 28-06-2011 03:08PM

Monty Burnz wrote: »

Don't try to take the classic US liberal/conservative false dichotomy and apply it to Ireland.

I'm a liberal - I believe in personal freedom. I don't see how this implies that I think criminals should be treated as leniently as they are here.

Ok your a liberal i didnt mean to offend you, but do you think the Irish justice system is too liberal? or is it fair?
I do not belive in personal freedom for rapists , or paedos or murderers. Thats just my opinion

CorkMan · 28-06-2011 03:09PM

A Chuck Norris roundhouse kick should suffice.

Monty Burnz · 28-06-2011 03:17PM

All about Eve wrote: »

Ok your a liberal i didnt mean to offend you, but do you think the Irish justice system is too liberal? or is it fair?

I don't think it's too liberal - I think it doesn't work. The solution might entail harsher sentencing and more prisons, or it might entail less prison time or none at all for certain crimes. I don't pretend to have the answers, but I would like to see more people asking the questions.

By the way, 'liberal' isn't an insult. Stay away from Faux News, it will damage your brian... (sic)

decisions · 28-06-2011 03:21PM

poll needs a spoil option

charlemont · 28-06-2011 03:34PM

ilovesleep wrote: »

I like getting my bum flogged, and caned and spanked. It is very good. Just saying like. Could do with a bating right now actually.

Are you female ??

Are you in the Cork area ???

:eek:

Should flogging be an alternative to prison?

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