Title: Injustice in the Prison System - Prison system
Headings: Injustice in the Prison System
Injustice in the Prison System
Content: Angela Davis, an advocate against the prison system states “Given the recent emergence of supermaximum-security prisons … in general which are being divested of educational, recreational, and other programs historically associated with rehabilitation projects. ” To accommodate the ever growing prison populations, funding has been cut from rehabilitation projects, and placed into filling the prisons up to capacity. By simply reducing the sentences of those convicts who are inside for nonviolent crimes this process could be avoided altogether and society would be far better off in the long run. Those convicts who would remain inside the prisons would be able to learn valuable skills which in turn they could use to be successful in the outside world without committing further crimes. To combat the increasing number of convicts in the prison system the states which have an excess number of prisoners have had to turn to the privatization of prisons. Companies such as Corrections Corporation of America, and Wackenhut Corrections Corporation are prisons setup as businesses with one goal in mind, to maximize profit; this completely undermines the idea that went behind the creation of penitentiaries. Angela Davis notes in her article “The penitentiary-the historical manifestation of the prison as a site for punishment (rather than as a holding facility for people awaiting trial and punishment) – was conceived architecturally and theoretically as a plan for the moral reformation of the individuals. By using these prisons to “maximize profit” the penitent individuals never learn their lesson, or are given tools to succeed in the outside world. This relates to Beccaria’s beliefs on the purposes of punishments, he believes that “Punishments and the method of inflicting them should be chosen that, … will make the most effective and lasting impression on men’s minds and inflict the least torment on the body of the criminal,” (23).