Prisons and Dehumanization

Jordan Ballor of Acton’s PowerBlog shares some great thoughts on prison reform and dehumanization (click here to read it).  He summarizes:

The term dehumanization gets used often to describe what happens to a victim, particularly of a violent crime. But it’s all [too] often what happens in the realities of the American system of criminal justice.

Simply because people commit crimes, heinous, violent, or otherwise, it does not mean that they cease to be human persons.

I’ve long held that many of the inhumane elements of our prison system would be improved with a more straightforward application of justice.  People who steal from others should be forced to repay their debts.  This benefits the victim, points to true justice, and allows the criminal to repay his debt and resume a rightful place in society.  This is true justice.  Simply putting such people in prison to live for months or years on taxpayer dollars without making any substantial contribution to society does nothing to benefit the prisoner or the victim.

This principle could be extrapolated beyond simple theft to include reasonable punishments for crimes like drug possession (perhaps such criminals could be forced into counseling, strict rehab, and serving in a rehab center).  The essential point is that we are seeking to achieve a more immediate form of justice.  You could argue that prisons are the least humane form of punishment.  They trap the prisoner for months, years, or even decades without any chance to make up for his crimes.

If this more immediate justice was in place, perhaps we could avoid the kind of inhumane treatment Ballor mentions in his article (a police officer threatened a man taking video on his cell phone, saying “Guys in jail are going to rape you”).  We too often want to categorize all inmates as lesser human beings, perpetually tainted by their crimes, instead of allowing them to redeem themselves and become contributing members of society once again.  We need to rethink this system.