A Look Behind Bars

Overcrowdedness, lack of funds, prisoner gangs and fights, violence and abuse, corruption, all mixed together with non-violent offenders—a teenager in Arizona caught smoking marijuana can be sent to this prison and placed in the same room with a serial killer.However, this is just a small example of a prison system that is immoral by almost every measure. It is well known that the United States has the highest incarceration rate – but if the whole purpose of the system is to deter further criminals, why does the rate of crime continue to rise?In 2008, the federal, state and local prison system cost a whopping 75 billion dollars. It is estimated that the total cost of the drug war over the last 40 years could be over 1 trillion dollars—and that does not include opportunity costs which are, in other words, the huge amount of things that could have been achieved if so much money were not wasted on imprisoning non-violent offenders for so long. In 2010, the Department of Justice released a report about abuse in juvenile detention centers. The report found that 12.1 percent of all youth held in juvenile detention reported sexual violence; youth held for between seven and twelve months had a staggering victimization rate of 14.2 percent. One million of the 2.5 million inmates are African American.Prison is a place for reform. The intended model serves a function where felons can serve their time and learn from the mistakes they have made. So what happens instead?An estimated 217,000 Americans are raped each year. That is 600 new victims a day, and it is something you will never see on the front of newspapers or on television. Most victims of rape will not receive the same treatment that the girl from Steubenville did.That is one problem in the large failure for the prison system to recuperate prisoners and reintroduce them to society. That is why so many criminals will be released to only repeat their crimes. It is the deterrence category that remains to be a disaster.Convicted felons are never allowed to vote again. They receive track records that basically prevent them from ever finding a job past a pay rate of the minimum wage, and even then, it remains hard. So psychologically, what would ever prevent one from committing another crime? A convicted felon only stops paying his time once his life ends.Our judicial system convicts people that need to be and deserve to be taken away from the general population and imprisoned, but when we take a closer look, we realize how inefficient it is and how unrealistic it is towards achieving its goals. We either change now or we drop our societal idea of having to reform prisoners and just go back to the gallows and dungeons and cutting of hands.So how can this problem be solved? Separate violent and nonviolent offenders right from the start. Make drugs a public health problem instead of a criminal justice problem. Regain compassion and respect for those who wrong us. Allow for transformation, not merely rehabilitation. Join and support the restorative justice movement.Regardless, there is a startling necessity for change in our prison systems. It is up to all of us to question the system, face the obvious failures and think about what we can do to change it for the better.