What to do after dismantling the prison system

Ultraviolet #31
I can see little different in your two positions - perhaps harrison’s post (#13) being more succinct is more likely to provoke an immediate response?

I'd ignore the ups and downs unless the numbers become huge, atleast double digits. As Auld-bod says though adhering to marketing tricks is likely to generate clicks. (not saying harrison is doing marketing...)

This from the "Dialectical Delinquents" site seems relevant:

(from here: http://dialectical-delinquents.com/?page_id=9 )

By the way the last time I posted a thread taken from this text (about soft cop policing) it was taken down by the LibCommissars within 2 hours and with no explanation or admission it had been taken down. This was despite the fact that I had changed all references to the man the central committee of Libcom admin had supported to merely his initials. So there was no reason that could be understood from Libcom's posting guidelines that it was unacceptable. Typical politicians.

ultraviolet, the ups and downs are misleading, i've seen intelligent posts get ignored or downrated, and some silly ones uprated massively. out of pure coincidence i'd been talking with a housemate for about an hour about prison reform, so i'd more or less solidified and condensed my arguments by the time i came to post on libcom.

No, but i am commodifying the libcom form

Well i think the fundamental problem with the libcom committee is that most of the admins have (i think) been romantically involved at some point with gerry healy - as a result it sometimes seems to me that libcom performs a functional role in line with that of an extension of the Unison executive. How do the LibCommissars fit into this? An interesting question.

Hey Ultra, I'd been meaning to comment on this. Personally, I upped Harrison's post because he tackled, head on, two anarchist myths that need to be addressed: namely that we'll release all prisoners during a revolution and that anarchism won't need any means to keep certain people partially isolated from the wider society.

So, no I don't think you're in any way guilty of the somersault. It was, for me anyway, the directness of Harrison's post that got my up vote.

Incidentally, on this wider topic, I have a brother who's in a state-mandated rehabilitation program (and that's rehab in both sense of the word), although it's run by a private charity. It's basically like what was described by you in post post 11: therapeutic, a lot of pyschological and social support, variable useful work is provided, there's free room and board and clothes and all necessary personal items are provided, education is provided and required, and a paying job is guaranteed to by the time they leave. There's even room for mistakes to be made (all participants are expected to relapse at least once during the year-long program). As the programs continues, participants are given increasing freedom and privacy and allowed to leave the center for work and free time.

And even once the program is completed, participants can rent a private room for 100 bucks a month indefinitely and are entitled to come back for free meals for the rest of their lives if they want to. And there's an ongoing jobs program with businesses who specifically look to hire people who've come through the program (mostly small businesses run by ex-addicts).

It's not perfect--it's fundamentally designed to rehabilitate people back into capitalist society--but even then the result have been fucking amazing - personally and in terms of overal recidivism rates. But it seems to me a that the entire programs is suggestive of the way any rational justice system should be run and, in an anarchist world where mutual aid is the defining factor in how society is organised, such programs would be that much more effective.

LibCommissars is definitely my favorite mental pejorative for the secret, ruling libcom cabal that has been thwarting the revolutionary impetus of the global working class since BEFORE EVEN THE ADVENT OF THE INTERNETZ!!11q1z

hey, thanks everybody for answering my question. i feel more popular already.

chilli sauce, that place sounds cool! i'm glad to hear news of things like that working in real life, not just my anarchist imagination.

also want to thank ally_s for starting the thread, it's an important topic to discuss.

Build a cell full of degenerative art, and make them cry.

I find it really frustrating that so many people think that nearly all seriously violent crime is caused by our unjust social order, and that people who do such things can be rehabilitated.

Here are my points.

1. Despite the fact that repeat rapists, psychopathic murders, sadists and serial killers are a small minority of the prison population, doesn't lessen the importance to how to deal with them.

2. Despite the fact that social factors are huge here, if you don't think a large percent of such people have biological factors, from genetic influences to brain injuries, influencing their behavior, I think you are naive as hell.

3. There isn't much evidence that i know of, that people who lack empathy or are dangerously insane can be cured.

4. I DO AGREE with the idea that we must find alternatives to the prison system., not just shrinking it or radicalizing it.
But I think that we should think of most anti-social crime as something that will lessen, but not go away. And the worst examples of it, such as serial killers, will NOT lessen.

This is a question that needs real creative attention, real invention and research, not just finding some kind of ideological line. The state has failed to solve this problem. As have we.
Admitting that seems like a good start.

I also think we should see the state the way marx saw capital, with both horror and admiration, rather than moralistic condemnation. The point is to surpass and supercede it, not take a purist attitude towards it.

@memyselfandi did you actually read anything in this thread?

Hopefully in an anarchist society there wouldn't ever be murder, if anyone did it people would discuss collectively what the root of the problem is presumably it wouldn't happen again. Rehabilitating in other words helping someone to change there ways isn't law, because it isn't coercive. I hope if people aren't alienated from each other and disturbed there won't be any murders, rapes or similar atrocities. Another way to non-coercively prevent crime is the abolition of money. I'm anti-punishment, this a bit of a cliche, but two wrongs don't make a right. Also I've got a syllogism: what people who are in prison have done is generally speaking wrong, it's wrong mainly because of cruelty to other people, the way people In Prison feel is a result of Similar cruelty, so two wrongs, it's illogical to say two wrongs make a right, therefore prison is wrong.