Crime…and Punishment

Prisons almost everywhere are overloaded. This reduces the supervision available and eliminates the opportunity for restorative education and treatment. Governors and warders under stress are least well equipped to reconcile offenders with society. Locking someone in a cell for twenty-three hours a day is hardly conducive to a new view of humanity or even a good try at revived education. At least the concept of punishment, especially in some religions, is changing from hurt to reconciliation.

The essence of punishment is still widely accepted as ‘hurt’ . “A” hurt “B” so “B” retaliates by hurting “A” back. A century ago this was applied so literally that a crying baby was said to be hurting its parents and the appropriate response was not to pay it any attention except to smack it. Isolation and pain thus induced was thought to toughen the baby to cope with the grim world. The result was that grim people repeated the exercise with their children. Grim is something we all understand. Retracing from grim to civilised behaviour is a long and painful journey. We have barely begun to travel it.

The essence of civilised behaviour is discipline. From military drill to performing the most delicate medical operation, discipline demands perceptive diagnosis, clear objective, practised process and intelligent adaptability. All of which requires education. The upbringing and personality of most people lacks one or more of these skills. We are taught, encouraged, harangued and ordered to be disciplined but not told how. This usually happens after the age when it could have been induced as a rational requirement for a fulfilled life.

Teaching the young is a subject we understand little about - and learn even less about during our own childhood. Obedience is put at such a premium that our exploratory and creative instincts struggle to survive what we believe we must do. Rules come from many sources - parents, teachers, divine authority at second hand, the government, employers, people older and supposedly wiser than ourselves. So many sources, in fact, that some laws turn out to contradict other laws leaving us to choose. In the event, we ignore them.

Disobeying laws, even the ones we don’t understand, leads to punishment. A retributive punishment may give a frisson of satisfaction to a victim. It is unlikely to create rational or lasting obedience in a perpetrator. The published experience of prison suggests that the tendencies of a prisoner at the start of a sentence are reinforced by the punishment. Those inclined to reform do so. Those not inclined to reform become recidivists, drug addicts and aficionados of torture, guiltridden sex and rage against society. Some end up regarding prison as home.

Criminals in prison are some way along the process of character forming. That is not to say they cannot reform any more. Some undoubtedly can. The cost to society of helping them to do so is high and many people are not prepared to bear it to recover a damaged human. That attitude devalues humanity, not only the prisoner but the bearer of the view. There is, of course, a limit to the amount of money that can be devoted to reconciling criminals. I suggest we have not reached anywhere near the limit yet.

Reading people to help them appreciate the value of our humanity is the most rewarding thing one human can do for another. That applies in parenting, education, skills training, creative thinking, life. Our humanity is precious and we should understand and value it.

But first we should perceive it more clearly.

Good morning

John Bittleston

Prison visitors do a wonderful job of bringing some light into the darkness of failure. Bless all those who give time to switch that light on from time to time.