Thorgalaeg
Deity
Nice wordplay.
Mass murderer Anders Breivik threatens Hunger Strike for better ... Video Games
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Synobun
Deity
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It was a genuine question. I don't see the value of the argument, "Since these people have worse conditions, more people should have worse conditions." so I'm interested in learning more about it if you're willing to explain it.
Quackers
The Frog
So anything which you think is too harsh = revenge but your desired punishment would, of course, be righteous justice because your heart and motivations are so pure? You are superior to the unenlightened plebs, is that what you want to feel?
Outside of opportunity cost, it's a tough one to justify. Would I be willing to shave off 1000 Euro per year of his lifestyle to spend it on other 'suffering relieving' efforts. Yeah. But, that's about it.
Well as I've said before, I don't think punishment for the sake of punishment has any value. Incarceration has three goals:
1. Prevention of re-offense.
2. Rehabilitation.
3. Deterrence of crimes by others.
Like el_mac says, the only other reason to give him any worse than luxury living is opportunity cost.
Quackers
The Frog
Incarceration itself is punishment because you're depriving someone of their liberty.
Unless you can devise a method of achieving all three goals and foregoing imprisonment you are condoning some form of punishment.
Unless you can devise a method of achieving all three goals and foregoing imprisonment you are condoning some form of punishment.
Punishment is a tool in the toolkit of deterrence and rehabilitation, it's not an end goal itself
Synobun
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I don't want to feel superior. I do, however, have an issue with hypocrisy. Painting revenge as justice is improper conduct in my eyes. In what legitimate capacity is torturing a human being seen as justice? I imagine your response to news stories about the evil terrorists torturing brave soldiers of your nation is along the lines of disgust and, "How can a human being do this? This is terrible."
Yet your response to stories of prisoners being isolated from human contact and having their standard of living reduced over the long-term is, "Good. They deserve it." Do you see only physical harm as torture? That wouldn't make such sense since you smile when you hear about prisoners who get raped or beaten by prison guards. Ohhh wait, torture is alright when it's against someone who's committed a crime and isn't in a uniform!
Two can play at the exaggeration, assumption, and hyperbole game. Please respond with a real argument next time.
I agree. It is why I support tax hikes for the rich. Shaving off while maintaining a comfortable standard of living is something I am totally for. What I'm not for is reducing someone's quality of life because someone else's quality of life is lower. It seems very illogical to me.
Quackers
The Frog
Wow, what a an almighty strawman.
You assume a huge amount about my position when I haven't even stated it. How moronic is that. You even state: "yet your response"..jesus christ..
Anyway. It is simple where you are going wrong. You equate torture with the restriction of videogames, they are not remotely comparable. Of course mental torture exists, when did I say otherwise? Again, you are making up my own position for me.
Are restrictions of videogames legitimate? Absolutely. Allow a prisoner some books maybe an hour of TV day but i'm drawing a line at this type of recreation. He shouldn't have it easy, he should get bored, let him devise ways of entertaining himself. Opportunity cost is also a good reason to not buy every prisoner an Xbox.
The irony is literally beaming from my screen.
Well, it is one thing to prison one in the Norwegian hotel-like cells with all luxuries including net-access, when he has done a crime that he may repent for and can change his course (even including some degree of murder, i suppose).
But Breivik killed 77 people, and not all in one go. He is about as likely to ever be able to be released to society as he is to transform into a wasp and fly to freedom through his cell window's bars.
But Breivik killed 77 people, and not all in one go. He is about as likely to ever be able to be released to society as he is to transform into a wasp and fly to freedom through his cell window's bars.
Akka
Moody old mage.
I've always seen these claims about "punishment is just an aside" as pure "I'm holier than you" BS made on an ideological stance completely disconnected with the world.
Justice is about having people get "what they deserve", be it good or bad. It's the entire idea. There is no justice if it's not about treating people accordingly to what they deserve - there is only "keeping order" then.
Punishment is one of the important part of justice, even if it's not of course the entirety. As humans, we need to know that "justice is served" on an ethical point (which also translate into social peace as a practical gain).
I'd need to see empirical evidence of this.
People who enjoy the suffering of others are sadists, I really doubt the world is much improved by encouraging sadism.
Formaldehyde
Both Fair And Balanced
Many conservatives still seem to prefer retribution to justice and modern criminal practices.
Naw, I support the justice system if it's designed to help keep crime down. I don't feel any urge to serve this concept "Justice", it's not a god.
Further, I think that our sense of justice is a throwback to our evolution instincts. It's naturally there, but it only be acknowledged as an urge, not as an objective good in and of itself.
Further, I think that our sense of justice is a throwback to our evolution instincts. It's naturally there, but it only be acknowledged as an urge, not as an objective good in and of itself.
Synobun
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Dude. That was the entire point. Please note the usage of the word "two". I was not insulting your body mass so as to imply you were plural. In fact, I was including myself in that reference. I have no idea why you walked right into it, but you did bring up a valid discussion point so I'll respond to that.
I do not equate torture with the restriction of video games. What I do equate with torture is the complete and total isolation of a human being. For someone in isolation, entertainment is literally the only thing that will keep them from going insane (and if they're already insane, exponentially worsen it). Restricted entertainment or entertainment that is not suitable might as well be salt in the wound. If Anders was being given daily human contact (legitimate human contact, not simply being prodded by a guard or psychiatrist) I would not even be advocating his use of video games unless he earned the right to. However, from what I can tell, the extent of his human contact are prison officials and letters.
Letters, while they do count as human contact, are starved of other characteristics of human contact. We're social animals. Even the most closeted, shy, awkward, insane individual on the planet needs human contact with physical cues, eye contact (to an extent), and proximity. More importantly, they need someone who is not treating the contact as a business necessity. I must communicate with you for this report. I must communicate with you to ensure you're not going to kill yourself. I must communicate with you to feed you. They are mandatory and thus not genuine.
I suppose it is a particularly touchy subject for me because I went three years without human contact in person. It destroys you. Both as a person and in mental health. There is no crime on this planet heinous enough to justify forcing someone to feel that torture.
So yeah, I think if people are completely isolated from others, they should probably get some video games they like to play. If you're unwilling to provide that, you're either going to need to completely cut out the human equation and soundproof the walls or you need to let them talk with others. People can become feral or catatonic from a lack of human contact. It can and will permanently alter the rest of your life once you get to that point.
I don't think Anders should ever be allowed out into the general public unless there was a guarantee that he was rehabilitated (not my place to decide, pointless to discuss). I do think we should treat him as a respected human being. It's what we wish he'd done with the people he killed, why don't we fulfill our own wishes?
Formaldehyde
Both Fair And Balanced
Justice is about far more than keeping crime down, much less any sort of throwback to a distant past.
"The administration of justice is the firmest pillar of government." George Washington
"At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst." Aristotle
"The first requisite of civilization is that of justice." Sigmund Freud
"Knowledge without justice ought to be called cunning rather than wisdom." Plato
"In the absence of justice, what is sovereignty but organized robbery?" Saint Augustine
Akka
Moody old mage.
Because the world lacks of empirical evidence of people wanting to punish bad behaviour ?
Uh ?
That's... such a ridiculous comparison I'm speechless. But I guess it speaks eloquently of the level of your reasoning if you're making it.
We're humans, we make society for humans. If society is about to ignore what makes us human, then it's failing at its most basic point.
Also, your careless throw-up of the whole justice concept is, in my eyes, simple posturing. So much of our behaviour is so intrinsically tied to the very principle of "fair" that saying it's just a relic to be tossed aside is completely void. You'd need to redo not just society, but all human relationship from scratch before this claim starts being anything but an empty shell.
The world lacks empirical evidence that punishment as an end has any value.
How so?
It's not posturing, it's just refusing to kowtow to instincts. I rationally decide that the point of the justice system is to reduce crime, and work from there. For people who want to give weight to their variant of 'justice', the reduced crime is merely a perk. Ehn, I disagree.
Depends on whether you mean punishment as part (or most of, or all) of a jail sentence. In that case i tend to agree that punishment by itself does not seem to work at all.
But historically punishment was used not so as to try to make the criminal change his ways, but so as to allow those who suffered due to the crimes to feel that some sort of "justice" has been done.
For example in the end of the Peloponnesian war the Spartans executed a couple of thousand Athenian prisoners of war, largely as a reprisal for the Athenian assemply having voted on punishing their own PoW's by "cutting one hand". This was seen as a horrible crime against the culture supposedly shared by all alliances, and so had to be publicly demonstrated to bring about retribution (according to the sources, and a relevant discussion in the WH forum a short while ago, another of the reasons was a much smaller killing of enemy PoW's by Athenians).
So punishment does seem to be instinctively part of human nature in regards to negating the scare/horror/anger and so on which resulted from a horrible crime. It is far more debatable whether it works in the prison system of most countries, which is why (if it works correctly) the Norwegian prison system is more likely to actually change most of the criminals. But again i do not see Breivik ever getting out of jail, and neither should he in my view.
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