The myth of "give them a few digs and that'll learn 'em"

No beacuse they know if they try and burn down your house or beat you up/ harm you that they will get off lightly if not scot free in court (if they get caught).
So there is no fear stopping them from doing anything major back to you.

later12 wrote: »

Unfortunately, most people also think that liberal pinkos (and I include myself in that) are opposed to long stints in prison. Not necessarily so.

Same as myself. My bleeding heart turns to stone when it comes to scumbags. One thing about the ra, when they were around in Belfast there was very little anti-social behaviour.

later12 wrote: »

charlemont wrote:

willmunny1990 wrote:

If someone thinks that you're looking at them the wrong way you can get a bat across the head these days.

Scumbags are winning out because society and our justice system is too lenient on them.

Sure don't you know Gardaí, Judges and solicitors tend to live in relatively crime free areas.

I think this is a strong and a valid point. This is largely an issue of inequality, and pertains to the removal of which public representatives and some members of the legal professions feel from the lower working classes. Unfortunately this is a fact of modern life.

Unfortunately, most people also think that liberal pinkos (and I include myself in that) are opposed to long stints in prison. Not necessarily so.
I think this is a strong and a valid point. This is largely an issue of inequality, and pertains to the removal of which public representatives and some members of the legal professions feel from the lower working classes. Unfortunately this is a fact of modern life.

Unfortunately, most people also think that liberal pinkos (and I include myself in that) are opposed to long stints in prison. Not necessarily so.

But when these guys get into the state's custody, we must learn to do something with them,not simply treat them as though they were in a standing pen at Nenagh Mart. That old (almost 200 year old) aspiration of creating schools of industry and schools of virtue from the prisons must be realized. And this must correspond with stricter sentencing if necessary.

Society is very sick at the moment, we cannot carry on as we are doing, and yet, unfortunately, prisoners' needs are unlikely to be a relevant issue in this country within the next 50 years (i.e. our lifetime)

There's a set of tacit assumptions tacit assumptions in there - that the system is somehow "soft" or "lenient", that "scumbags" as an identifiable group exists, and that the "liberal" workings of the system come down to a bleeding heart bias among Gardaí, legal professionals and the judiciary. If you'd spent any time in the criminal courts, you'd know that none of these are true.

And, of course, there's that old chestnut that anyone who doesn't go in for hang 'em high is somehow cossetted away from the "real world". Personally, I live in north inner city Dublin, I'm from a dog rough midlands town, went to a dog-rough school, I have regular interactions with the criminal classes through work, and I have a masters in criminology ... but when it comes to crime, I'm supposedly the one who's detached from reality. :rolleyes:

Because I still think that prisons don't work, the crime problem isn't as bad as it's made out to be, that the media skews peoples' perceptions, and that a lot of peoples' attitudes come down to plain, old fashioned snobbery.

You are right that inequality is an issue, but not in the way you're putting it. Part of the problem is that "criminals" and "scumbags" have been set up in the media as one dimensional hate figures in our society, operating in the same way as Commmunists did for the Americans during Cold War. This is even more an issue in the neoliberal schema, where there's very little else left to believe in:

Aeschylus wrote:

unanimous hatred is the greatest medicine for a human community

Fact is that prisoners' rights were more of an issue in the 80s, when the economic situation was equally bad to now. And even if prisons did become *ahem* schools of industry and virtue, I still don't think that prison will do a thing to reduce the crime rate. Some of you probably don't want to hear this, but there's strong evidence to show crime is a function of societal problems like social exclusion and deprivation, seems that the best way to reduce crime will be to work towards a fairer and more equal society.

Personally, I think it's the keyboard warriors who need to get real - it's just unreasoning hate most of the time.

OP, I agree to an extent, if you go picking a fight with a "scumbag", you're likely to get your head kicked in. But if there's one thing I've learned from boards in the past week, it's that internet tough guys love talking tough.