Prisons Should Be Dehumanizing (From America's Prisons: Opposing Viewpoints, P 99-109, 1991, Stacey L. Tipp, ed. - See NCJ- 159858)

• NCJ Number: 159870
• Author(s): G R Newman
• Date Published: 1991
• Length: 11 pages
• Sale Source: Greenhaven Press
• Publication Type: Survey
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This article argues that prisons should be places in which inmates are taught the meaning of suffering.

Abstract

The author contends that all prison terms should be at least 15 years; the goal of incarceration should be to make the gap between ordinary, moral citizens and criminals even greater in practice than before. Prisons serve a retributive function more completely than corporal punishment by affecting the inmate's mind as well as his body. The Judeo-Christian view of retribution holds that the crime in question must be resolved through its punishment, and that the punishment must involve long-term suffering.