konvicts should work for their food and bed in prisons..that is my two cents on this issue.

#2
people should by now be aware of the fact, that not all that come and share their opinion on snort have English as their first or even second language. and should stop correction people when we all know what they meant.
comming from a danish person with german and swedish as hes second and third language.

Where I live , we closed down 25 prisons last 5 years, because don't have enough prisoners, we even get prisoners from surrounding countries... There are now 9,000 prisoners and we have more then 10,000 guards/staffmembers on duty. (in total of 18.000.000 residents)

Getting quickly back to the video guys! I have to say that although some awful crimes are committed by some young individuals in America as I am sure they are all over the world. Putting a 10,11,12,13 year old in prison with NO chance of parole (Parhole piroll parool to please #1#2&#3 above) is just insane.
Okay if the crime was committed against someone I loved, I'm going to be more than pissed off & would likely be joining the said criminal in prison if I got my hands on the perpetrator. BUT give them 30/35/40 years. Make them an old man/woman before they get out, but don't give them no hope otherwise they have no reason to do anything positive with their lives. You are just going to create someone with nothing to loose and behaviour to match.
Oh and by the way #4 9000 and 10000 is 19000 not eighteen million!! I don't mind people getting spelling wrong but for goodness sake man get the maths right lol

not to forget the fact that prisons are run by private corporations and they force the inmates to work ( http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-prison-industry-in-the-united-states-big-business-or-a-new-form-of-slavery/8289 )

You might want to compare with the Norwegian prisons where they focus more on the rehabilitation-part?.

#5...i think that #4 referred to the number of people from his country...

It is not a failed experiment to the government. $75 billion/yr is pretty awesome. If we need to change this system, it seems to me the change needs to start with our money hungry politicians.

You wouldn't be so caring about prisoners if one of them killed a member of your family, you would want that individual to rot in there.

Stop being hypocritical, unless you are willing to NOT put someone that did something bad to you behind bars... yeah... that's what I thought.

I bet that the person that made this video would have had different views if his child was molested by one of thous that are now behind bars, he would no be so forgiving as he seemed.

Don't show this to victim's families.

#5 Read again. 18 million in a country where 9000 are prisoners and 10000 guards.

I wish they'd incarcerate Mass.

The penal system in the USA is a grave, grave blight on the principles of freedom, equality and fairness. Not only is the number of people put in prisons way too high, it's also more often than not the wrong people (r.i.p. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubin_Carter). The number of black and hispanic people in jail is disproportionately high compared to the overall population. Don't read this as though most crimes are committed by non-whites, but rather as a sign that racism runs rampant through society.

And the worst criminals go scot-free because their crimes are never brought to court: leaders of big corporations who pocket huge bonuses because they saved their companies tons of money with ruthless disregard of responsibility to the people or the environment (tons of examples, e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Canal); government officials who purposely look the other way are just as bad. One can only guess how many lives this destroyed.

I am not saying it's ok to turn to crime, but if people weren't so damn poor there would be a lot less of it.

America. Land of The Free. ROFLMFAO.

#7#10 naw, I know someone who knows him and he definitely can't count lol

#9: "You wouldn't be so caring about prisoners if one of them killed a member of your family"

You can go to jail for stealing food in the US. It's naive to think everyone locked up is a murderer.

Let's not pretend we don't need prisons or the death penalty. If you were to start a small local society, one of the things you'd have to do is remove the bad people from the good people otherwise you'll have no good people (they'd go elsewhere).

We can discuss (and should heartily) the costs which are usually much higher than they should be often the result of unions winning big compensation packages with ridiculous pay practices and unnecessary multiple appeals processes that take decades to bring a person to justice.

There could be something to the accusation that prisons are private and you need a population to sustain the "corporation" but that could be rather easy to uncover and should be squashed with vigor.

It can be bad to over incarcerate, but it's equally bad to let folks go especially for heinous crimes. It's a brain defect and in many cases cannot be reformed.

#9
Two points
1) I think you missed the point of the video. It isn't that bad people should not be punished (i.e. not go to prison) but that we focus too much on the punishment aspect (being in prison) and not enough on the rehabilitation aspect (making sure "bad people" can one day become productive members of society).

2) Assumptions are bad but since many of the visitors on Snotr seem to be American and many Americans are (nominally) Christian/religious, allow me to assume you are, and appeal to you religiously. No person should be denied the grace of God. Even the most wicked person was saved by Jesus while on the cross. We are all born with sin (according to Christians), but we are all, according to the Bible, possible of redemption (being saved from sin, error, or evil). I hope you can at least believe/agree that everyone deserves a chance to correct their errors or at least given the chance to atone for them on this earth (else they pay for sins in eternity of hell or as a lesser being in another life).

(For a refreshingly new way of handling recidivism, check out how Judge Alm of Hawaii is being tough on crime but not criminals, and giving criminals a real chance at rehabilitation).

#9 You're welcome:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_States#Violent_and_nonviolent_crime

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_drugs#United_States_domestic_policy

Poor, poor Mexico...

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2504022/