[HN Gopher] In Britain, even jails have a class system
___________________________________________________________________
In Britain, even jails have a class system
Author : pepys
Score : 122 points
Date : 2020-02-25 03:05 UTC (19 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theatlantic.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theatlantic.com)
| mcguire wrote:
| Spice, in case anyone isn't familiar:
| https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/synthetic-c...
| arethuza wrote:
| I can strongly recommend _" A Bit of a Stretch"_ - I read it
| after reading _" The Secret Barrister: Stories of the Law and How
| It's Broken"_ which is pretty terrifying.
| netcan wrote:
| An honest look at criminal justice is actually terrifying, even
| moreso because we don't even have a lead on alternatives.
| AQuantized wrote:
| Decriminalization of non violent drug use and a prison system
| focused on rehabilitation would be a start.
| netcan wrote:
| >> _A December 2017 parliamentary report said up to 90 percent of
| prisoners have mental-health problems, and 12 percent turn to
| self-harm or attempt suicide multiple times._
|
| How could it be otherwise? Even ignoring the likely correlation
| between psychological problems and incarceration... Prison is a
| terrible environment by its nature and by design.
|
| Would we be surprised if concentration camp or gulag inhabitants
| had mental health issues?
|
| Effectively, psychological injury is part of the punishment.
|
| It's strange to think that prisons are relatively new.
| crispyporkbites wrote:
| How many prisoners entered with mental health problems?
| Probably the majority.
| iovrthoughtthis wrote:
| This is a slippery slope my friend. I'm not sure we should go
| this way.
| gowld wrote:
| > Prison is a terrible environment by its nature and by design.
|
| Usually, yes. But not necessarily.
|
| A prison _could_ be more like a residential college or a
| boarding school.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halden_Prison
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| New Zealand appears to be doing a reasonable job of youth
| detention, where the facilities are more like high schools
| than prisons.
|
| _Wandering through New Zealand 's Korowai Manaaki youth
| detention centre, you can't help but notice the basketball
| court, veggie patch and classrooms -- it feels more like a
| high school than a prison._
|
| https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-07-27/nz-youth-detention-
| ce...
| pysxul wrote:
| > In June 2016 [...] He was sentenced to five years in prison and
| sent to Wandsworth
|
| > He was released in December 2018.
|
| Theses 5 years were pretty fast
| golover721 wrote:
| Its pretty normal in a lot of places in the US as well to only
| actually serve 40-60% of a sentence.
| Denvercoder9 wrote:
| He was arrested in 2012 already and probably spend a
| significant amount of time in prison before he was sentenced.
| ChrisKnott wrote:
| No, that was almost certainly on bail
| botwriter wrote:
| nah for white collar crime in the UK he'd be out on bail.
| ChrisKnott wrote:
| Almost all custodial sentences in the UK, you serve half in
| prison and half on license; this means you aren't in prison,
| but are monitored by the Probation Service. They can recall you
| to prison if you step out of line. Essentially, your actual
| prison sentence is half what it sounds like.
| yarrel wrote:
| No, American jails have a class system.
|
| British ones contain one.
| emiliobumachar wrote:
| Please elaborate. As it is, this flew over my head.
| wpietri wrote:
| I'm guessing it's a reference to how rich people can end up
| in more pleasant, less restrictive conditions. This is
| nominally based on security level, but plenty of people seem
| to think that social class has something to do with it. See,
| e.g. the notion of Club Fed [1] and how things go for people
| like Brock Turner [2]. Or Ethan Couch [3], the "affluenza"
| [4] kid.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Fed
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People_v._Turner
|
| [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethan_Couch
|
| [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affluenza
| lidHanteyk wrote:
| It's to do with British English vs. American English. In the
| USA, a TV remote control has batteries; in the UK, a telly
| clicker contains batteries.
| mprev wrote:
| My remotes have batteries. The box I bought the batteries
| in contained them. Now they're in use, they're not
| contained as that's a temporary state before use.
| crispyporkbites wrote:
| > _People of the prisoner class have really, really bought into
| the capitalist dream. But they were too unlucky, ill-educated,
| unfortunate, or born in the wrong place to have all the things
| that society has told them they should have. They were taught
| from a very early age: You can have it all, not just the wealth
| but the stuff. Trainers [sneakers] are a big deal, watches are a
| big deal, cars are a big deal._
|
| This almost nails it. The reality is that the British lower
| classes can have all the stuff they want; trainers, watches, cars
| are within the grasp of anyone above the poverty line. But wealth
| is almost unattianble for the lower classes in the UK. It just
| doesn't go in that direction.
| dmix wrote:
| > Lewis: Tell me about "spice," which seems to have become the
| British prisoner's drug of choice.
|
| > Atkins: It was so ubiquitous. You could tell straightaway if
| someone was on it, they'd be zombified, with glazed eyes. They'd
| just be lying on their bed in a vegetative state.
|
| > I think [spice users] are used to smoking strong cannabis. And
| you can't really get away with that, because of the smell. But
| spice doesn't smell. The sniffer dogs can't get it.
|
| > It's the law of unintended consequences. An older screw
| [prisoner officer] said, it used to be that inmates would smoke
| weed. But then [jails] brought in drug testing, and marijuana
| stays in the system for a month. So they stopped doing that, and
| started to do spice, which makes people vegetative and violent.
|
| There's hundreds of laws like this outside of prison. You take
| one thing away [with good intention] and then people find a new
| thing. But the new thing leaves society worse off (in this case
| crazy and violent off spice).
|
| I personally believe the whole obsession with prison time for
| punishment in the US is a good example of this. The general
| public gets very vindictive, then you send them to con-college
| and they come out a worse criminal. With difficulty finding a job
| but plenty of new friends in the criminal world and a reputation
| as a tough-guy.
|
| Consequently the whole war on drugs is the perfect example of
| unintended side-effects. Creating a hundred-billion dollar black
| market funding the worst cartels and street gangs. And hey we
| have thousands of tough guys coming out of prison in need of
| work.
|
| Zoning laws are another good example of something that sounds
| like a good idea that ultimately hurts communities more than it
| helps - resulting in the mass suburbanization of America and
| urban ghettos [1]. Now people are moving back to cities with a
| serious lack of housing density, food deserts [2], driving to
| work becomes mandatory, etc etc. Then there's the War on
| Terrorism.....
|
| I could go on.
|
| [1] https://www.amazon.com/Zoned-Out-Regulation-
| Transportation-M...
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_desert
| stronglikedan wrote:
| While I agree with most of what you're saying, I'm not sure
| suburbanization is a good example. Some people, like me, like
| the suburban lifestyle and thrive in it. Others prefer city or
| rural. When dealing with a matter of opinion, I'm not sure one
| can say that suburbanization "hurts" communities - anymore than
| any other type of zoning, at least.
| jgwil2 wrote:
| The externalities of North American-style sprawl (road
| congestion, pollution, etc) are pretty unambiguously harmful.
| stronglikedan wrote:
| I'm just saying that the same could be said for cities and
| rural areas, just different (and some same) harmful
| effects, which makes suburbanization a bad example. One is
| not _worse_ than the other - it 's just a different set of
| trade-offs. It's nice that we all don't have to cram into
| uncomfortable cities or suffer through the banalities of
| rural areas, if we don't want to.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| This misses the elephant in the room: How can they "find"
| anything in prison?
|
| The only answer is corruption of the prison staff. That has to
| be the root cause.
|
| [1] https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/sep/01/rise-in-
| pris...
| majormajor wrote:
| Root cause is a vague term. What's the root cause of people
| being corruptible, and how do you fix _that_?
| irrational wrote:
| Put them in prison?
| ilammy wrote:
| They did, even issued them uniforms.
| ghostbrainalpha wrote:
| I know Hacker News isn't usually a fan of Humor, but that
| comment made my day.
| save_ferris wrote:
| Not necessarily. Smuggling contraband into prison has got to
| be as old as the existence of prison itself, and there are
| numerous examples of contraband being snuck in and traded
| without the knowledge of the staff. It's errant to assume
| that all cases of contraband existing in prison is due to
| corrupt staff.
|
| In fact, this issue is becoming more and more of a challenge
| today as drone technology advances and decreases in price[0].
|
| 0: https://www.npr.org/2017/11/15/564272346/prisons-work-to-
| kee...
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Smuggling is impossible unless staff turn a blind eye, or
| procedures are sufficiently lax. Preventing visitors from
| passing things to inmates is not rocket science, if you
| allow visitors at all.
|
| As for drones, let me try to fly a drone over GCHQ or the
| Pentagon and let's see what happens... But over a prison
| and then actually drop something? "Oh well, what can we do?
| Can't even find what they drop..."
|
| The point in all of this is that no-one cares too much so
| it happens, but it is avoidable.
|
| I was expecting a bit more of a can-do attitude on HN
| instead of accepting this sorry state of affairs!
| Traster wrote:
| Yeah and hacking is impossible unless software developers
| turn a blind eye or procedures are sufficiently lax.
| ozim wrote:
| Good one. People just don't see how life in general is
| complicated. How much more details are hiding in someones
| else job. They don't see how their senses are limited.
|
| Prison guard - standing all day with rifle, anyone can do
| that. Nurse - giving pills and injections, what is so
| hard about it? Software dev - sitting behind computer all
| day lazy slob, he could get some real job :)
| 6510 wrote:
| ha-ha,
|
| If you give people enough time of course they will do
| that what you couldn't imagine possible in 20 seconds.
| function_seven wrote:
| Your first comment said:
|
| > _The only answer is corruption of the prison staff._
|
| But what you're describing here seems just as likely to
| be a resourcing and procedure issue.
|
| For example, do you think it's fair that all visitors
| must undergo a full cavity search before being allowed to
| see an inmate? Even attorneys? If not, then should the
| inmate go through that procedure after every visit? Will
| we all be happy with the increased costs to hire
| additional staff?
|
| The creativity of prisoners is much higher than you
| expect. To 100% eliminate smuggling into prisons, you'd
| need to operate every facility as if its SuperMax.
| rwmurrayVT wrote:
| Smuggling in and out of the visitation room is only
| possible at lower security facilities. They constantly
| monitor via video and after the fact on recorded video.
|
| Once they busted the main supplier at Morgantown people
| got desperate and started trying the visitor's room. One
| poor guy in a wheelchair got busted with 2 cell phones, 4
| packs of cigarettes, and pills coming out of visitation.
| Absolutely stupid. You could definitely get in suboxone
| or a couple of cigarettes. Anything bigger than that it
| wasn't going to work. When you go back in they pat you
| down, but randomly you can get a significantly more
| thorough search.
|
| The only place where the guards are an issue are mediums.
| A $6 pack of cigarettes becomes $20 at a minimum, $50 at
| a low, and $100+ at a medium. At low and above you'll
| often find they're selling little matchstick sized
| cigarettes that are rolled up from the person responsible
| for cleaning up after guards. It's usually "used" chewing
| tobacco.
|
| At the medium level you don't get to talk to visitors
| face to face normally. That makes even visitation
| smuggling impossible. It can only filter in from guards
| or from the satellite minimum security camp.
| gavinray wrote:
| This is not true, I had a troubled youth and did a short
| stint in my late teens for trespassing.
|
| There are a lot of ways you can get drugs in to prison
| without the aid of guards.
|
| - Repeat offenders used to getting arrested (particularly
| drug dealers) would carry their drugs in what is termed a
| _cock sock_ , which is as you may guess, a sock worn
| around the male bits to hold things. They would tie pre-
| weighed bags of drugs up in balloons, and if it smelled
| they were going to get arrested they would make an
| attempt to dig them out and swallow them, and then erm,
| _retreive them_ later in the jail.
|
| - A more creative way was for spouses/relatives to soak
| certain types of paper in a liquid solution in which had
| been dissolved drugs like meth, and then allowed to dry.
| The paper was then written on like a regular letter, and
| sprayed with perfume (which is a very normal thing in
| jail/prison) to mask any trace scent of the drug and the
| fact that it looked like it had been wet and dried.
|
| - Inmates that were in the lower-security units such as
| _day workers_ , in which they were taken out during the
| day to perform community service under supervision, would
| devise elaborate plans to smuggle things in. There were
| certain work areas that had things like public restrooms,
| and they would phone a girlfriend/wife the day before to
| go drop a bag of drugs in the ceiling of the bathroom and
| then retrieve it while working there the next day. They
| would place it _you know where_ to avoid having it found
| when they were strip-searched when taken back to the
| unit. This was rare though, and more common was that they
| would pick up cigarette butts as they worked, empty out
| any remaining tobacco, and then stash it _you know where_
| in some sort of balloon /saran wrap to bring back to the
| unit to smoke. This was done by _popping a socket_ ,
| which is where you use pencil lead stuck inside of an
| outlet to spark a piece of paper (typically from a book
| or newspaper) rolled with aforementioned garbage-tobacco.
|
| IF I HAVE ANYONE'S ATTENTION:
|
| The American criminal justice system is one of the most
| dehumanizing, corrupt, and inhumane places I have ever
| seen.
|
| I saw inmates have bones broken by guards for saying
| things they didn't like. They are not allowed to throw
| punches or kicks during restraints, so what they do is
| put 3-4 guards on a man and will repeatedly knee/elbow
| them, particularly in the head, whilst screaming STOP
| RESISTING, despite there being zero resistance.
|
| It was a common tactic for them to strip a person to
| their underwear, and put them in a restraint-chair [0]
| with a hood over their face so that they cant see or move
| any limb, and then wheel them off to a back room and
| accidentally _forget_ about them for 4-8 hours.
|
| [0] https://kutt.it/a8OHDg
|
| I don't have anything else to say besides the fact that I
| want to raise awareness for any of you who may not know
| what our justice system is like.
| rwmurrayVT wrote:
| We used the brillo pads from the kitchen and a battery. I
| was very inept at doing it so I just lit it from
| someone's already lit cigarette. The most we ever did
| with outlets was making little stingers.
| gavinray wrote:
| One stupid choice as a reckless 18 year old was enough of
| an experience for me to decide I was never going back
| there again.
|
| Unfortunately that trespassing was the lowest-class
| felony so it has made it one hell of a time for me
| getting a job later in life, with HR policy in most
| places and the fact it never leaves your record.
| rwmurrayVT wrote:
| Once was enough.
|
| I was very fortunate when I first got home. I went to a
| fairly good, borderline great, engineering school. I was
| lucky enough to be picked up back in my same field. Once
| I can get my security clearance back or even just naval
| base access it'll be better.
| rodgerd wrote:
| My father in law has a great story from when he was
| young: his brother worked out that the easiest way for a
| then-14-year-old to get tobacco was to head to the local
| prison. Prisoners then got a tobacco ration, but had no
| access to sweets. So he would chuck bags of lollies over
| the wall, and the prisoners would throw bags of tobacco
| back.
| ArchReaper wrote:
| You should consider doing more research on a topic before
| trying to present your opinion/viewpoint as fact. You are
| stating patently false things, which invalidates your
| credibility.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Inconvenient things perhaps, but not false things...
| Unfortunately.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > or procedures are sufficiently lax.
|
| ...or effective procedures would toss human rights into
| the bin. Client-Attorney communication secrecy and
| visitation rights are one point, body cavity searches and
| visitation rights for close relatives of inmates another.
| rwmurrayVT wrote:
| In a minimum security facility there are often no fences. I
| was at Morgantown and you could get anything you wanted for
| approximately 4x the retail value. It was so fucking hot
| there guys would have their families buy a "prison" issue fan
| on Amazon and send it to someone who's family lived in
| Morgantown. Then they'd run out and bring it back in the
| middle of the night. Cigarettes were $2 each or $20 for a
| pack. Dip is like $12 a can for the Kayak brand with a 99c
| sticker on it.
|
| There were over 800 of us and around 10 staff on actual
| security detail at a time. There were maybe 40 searches a
| week and they were normally targeted on the people that they
| had suspicions about. It happened to me one time and they guy
| found my camel crush. Thankfully I had been there less than 3
| weeks so he just assumed someone stashed it there since I
| moved into an empty bunk. After that I never had another
| issue.
|
| Spice is horrible. We'd have people vomiting regularly.
| They'd get "stuck" outside when we got called back into the
| units. It's really gnarly stuff that I would not willingly
| ingest. The most popular drug was definitely suboxone. The
| drug tests were not working for subs when I was still there.
| Supposedly they were just starting to come out with some for
| it that the BOP used.
|
| Every thing went in a cycle. One guy would run most of the
| smuggling for the white people. I'm not going to name names
| here, but his balance sheet showed about $75k in profit over
| a rolling 6 month period. Another ran it for most of the
| African Americans. Eventually runners would get caught or the
| ring leader would get busted with a cell phone. That gives
| you an immediate upgrade to the next highest level facility.
| Prices would jump until someone was crazy enough to start it
| all back up again.
|
| Right before I left the biggest person got caught with a sim
| card. Prices for cigarettes went up to nearly $15 each. That
| was if you were remotely lucky enough to find one. A guy came
| back on probation violation and luckily enough I was his bunk
| mate. Things went back to regular within a couple of weeks.
| He made more in Morgantown than he did on the street...
|
| Subs/meth/vape juices could be applied to paper inside of
| books or letters. Anything liquid and dried usually could
| come in that way, but in a minimum it's not even worth the
| hassle.
| coldtea wrote:
| People have been able to find stuff in prison since the time
| of Julius Ceasar, in every country and every time.
|
| There's no avoiding that...
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| > _There 's no avoiding that..._
|
| Of course it's avoidable. But no-one cares enough: As long
| as it is hard enough to escape then the public does not
| care too much whether inmates use drugs, rape/fight each
| other, or what not, especially if stopping that would mean
| spending more on prisons.
|
| The fallacy (or hypocrisy) is to pass off lack of will as
| practical impossibility.
|
| The UK and the US are among the richest countries on Earth
| and they are democracies. There is no escaping that the
| state of their prisons represents the collective decision
| of society (us all).
| tokamak-teapot wrote:
| It is indeed the root cause. But it's not easy to tackle. If
| you consider the possible remedies, which seem viable?
| bananamerica wrote:
| Spending more money would probably help.
|
| At least in the US, most people are not fond of the idea of
| spending more money with the prison system.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| To tackle corruption of staff and, granted, to enforce
| serious procedures, is the easiest and most effective route
| to solve drug issues in prison. As long as drugs can enter
| prisons they will.
|
| Clearly there does not seem to be much political will to do
| so. It's easier to pretend and, after all, the victims are
| only inmates.
| DanBC wrote:
| It's very easy to smuggle things into English prisons and it
| doesn't require corrupt staff.
| Grustaf wrote:
| Thank God for that, it would be absurd and harmful to mix tax
| evaders and murderers. And more expensive since the entire prison
| needs to be safe enough for its most violent inmate.
| m0zg wrote:
| The _visibility_ of the class system is one thing that surprised
| me about the UK. It seems to be a very visibly stratified
| society. Unlike in the US where everyone likes to pretend they
| are a temporarily embarrassed millionaire and assumes there's
| ample social mobility (which there isn't as much as they think),
| in the UK most folks seem to know exactly where they belong, and
| they seem to be more content with their position in the class
| hierarchy. Or at least that's the perception from spending a
| month in London and vicinity. I'm sure someone will argue
| vehemently against it.
| mprev wrote:
| Economic class seems very visible in the Bay Area, to me as a
| Brit visitor.
|
| Class is as much cultural and, in terms of upper class,
| hereditary here in the UK. I could never be upper class as I
| don't have the right ancestors.
| jxramos wrote:
| I'm guessing any group of humanity will naturally form
| hierarchies. Seems like part of human nature.
| lidHanteyk wrote:
| No, there have existed non-hierarchical groups of humans, and
| all human endeavors are natural.
|
| Any group of humans will naturally form _social relations_.
| Some of these relations will be _power-responsibility
| relations_ , where people trade responsibilities to do things
| which maintain the society in exchange for the power to choose
| how the things are done. This does not entail hierarchy,
| because it does not entail rootedness; there need not be any
| single person nor group of people who hold ultimate power and
| responsibility.
|
| Interestingly, you know what _does_ naturally form hierarchies?
| Capitalist markets, especially those which alienate laborers
| from the profits of labor. It is straightforward maths to show
| that markets tend to accumulate wealth in a few lucky
| individuals, and that wealth alone can be used to manipulate
| markets arbitrarily.
| crispinb wrote:
| There are evolutionarily-created biases, which often counter
| each other. So, yes, it's part of human nature, but so is a
| sense of fairness. Cultures differentially encourage and build
| on these native biases in different ways.
|
| A deeply historically-entrenched class system is to a natural
| hierarchy bias is as an ocean is to a pond. I grew up in the
| UK, and the upper class were quite literally _a different type
| of human_ , placed by history and the structures of society
| above us in every way. In my local town, even their school was
| physically placed to look over us. They spoke with different
| accents. Their schools were allotted places in the top
| universities. We were allotted places in local farms. Their
| failed children were given positions (often in the old
| colonies) which guaranteed them lifelong ease and comfort. This
| was all a long way removed from 'natural hierarchy'.
| wpietri wrote:
| Sure. Humans are also naturally violent. We naturally get
| tuberculosis, too. As conscious beings, it's up to us to decide
| the good and bad in our natural heritage. To amplify the former
| and mitigate the latter.
| jsjddbbwj wrote:
| What's wrong with hierarchies?
| oarabbus_ wrote:
| Fair question - I'd say those at the bottom tend to dislike
| the system.
| wpietri wrote:
| I am having trouble taking this as a sincere question.
| You've honestly never seen or heard of hierarchical power
| being misused? I mean, just to pick one enormous historical
| trend, there's a reason the world has mostly gotten rid of
| monarchies, and it's not because we thought crowns and
| scepters were maybe a bit tacky.
| verall wrote:
| Careful, you're going to hear some lobster arguments...
| wpietri wrote:
| Is that what we're calling authoritarians these days?
| ploxolo wrote:
| The opposite of hierarchies is not some blissful state of
| civilized anarchy, it is chaos, violence and free for
| all. If you think some leftist state is the solution,
| sorry for breaking it to you but they are highly
| hierarchical if not more than state tending toward
| classic liberalism. Most experiments in this vein have
| ended badly (millions dying), see communist China (now a
| hierarchical dictatorship btw), USSR, Cuba, Venezuela,
| Argentina, Brazil (thankfully steering of peril right
| now).
| wpietri wrote:
| I agree that left-wing authoritarianism is as bad as
| right-wing authoritarianism. But thinking that the only
| alternative to hierarchical power is chaos is going to be
| one sort of authoritarianism or another.
|
| As I explain elsewhere in this thread, one alternative of
| hierarchical authority is carefully limited, distributed
| power. There are historical examples of it working pretty
| well for hundreds of years:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22415807
| luckylion wrote:
| A society with hyper exaggerated social classes, with
| voting rights only for property owners, indentured
| servitude, slavery and all that was "carefully limited"
| in its hierarchical authority?
| wpietri wrote:
| Sure. Which was mostly way better than what Europe was
| doing at the time. And which, more importantly, led us to
| keep seeking that "more perfect union". Where each
| generation has said, "Maybe we could do yet better. And
| here's how." And where quite often we have done better.
| jsjddbbwj wrote:
| Everything can be misused, that doesn't make everything
| bad per se. Saying that hierarchies must be mitigated
| (because they are bad, I assume) is unreal.
| wpietri wrote:
| Good thing I didn't say that, then. What I said was that
| we must look at what's natural and decide which bits
| require amplification and which require mitigation.
|
| And of course saying that hierarchies should be mitigated
| is far from unreal. It was the central message of the
| people who started America. They put a great deal of
| effort into checks and balances on power both at the
| federal level (between the 3 branches) and in having
| local, state, and federal governments, none of which have
| a hierarchical relationship. They put a strong emphasis
| on individual rights, which are counter-hierarchical as
| well. And let's not forget the freedoms of press and
| political speech, first among the Bill of Rights, which
| is very much a check on hierarchy.
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| I'm not from the US, so excuse my ignorance.
|
| I was under the impression that US federal law trumps
| state law. Is this not the case? And wouldn't that imply
| a hierarchical relationship?
| philwelch wrote:
| > I mean, just to pick one enormous historical trend,
| there's a reason the world has mostly gotten rid of
| monarchies, and it's not because we thought crowns and
| scepters were maybe a bit tacky.
|
| How did that work out for them?
|
| * The abolition of the English monarchy led to the brutal
| military dictatorship of Cromwell, which ended only with
| the reestablishment of the monarchy.
|
| * The abolition of the French monarchy led to the
| military dictatorship of Napoleon, which ended in a
| cataclysmic continent-wide war and the reestablishment of
| the Bourbon monarchy.
|
| * The abolition of the German and Austrian monarchies led
| to Hitler.
|
| * The abolition of the Russian monarchy led to the Soviet
| Union and the mass murder of tens of millions.
|
| * The abolition of the Chinese imperial monarchy led to a
| half-century-long civil war between Nationalist,
| Communist, and warlord factions, leading ultimately to a
| Communist dictatorship and the mass murder of tens of
| millions.
|
| Hierarchical power is a human universal, and trying to
| abolish it without recognizing this fact only leads to
| its reemergence in even more violent forms within the
| space of a few years, decades if you're lucky.
| wpietri wrote:
| Thank goodness I'm not talking about abolishing
| hierarchies, then.
| chacha2 wrote:
| The Rhetoric of Reaction Albert O. Hirschman [1]
|
| Hirschman describes the reactionary narratives thus:
|
| - According to the perversity thesis, any purposive
| action to improve some feature of the political, social,
| or economic order only serves to exacerbate the condition
| one wishes to remedy.
|
| - The futility thesis holds that attempts at social
| transformation will be unavailing, that they will simply
| fail to "make a dent."
|
| - Finally, the jeopardy thesis argues that the cost of
| the proposed change or reform is too high as it endangers
| some previous, precious accomplishment.
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rhetoric_of_Reaction
| philwelch wrote:
| Which is not what I'm doing at all.
|
| If we're going to talk about the abolition of monarchies,
| how is it that some of the freest and most prosperous
| countries in the world today are constitutional
| monarchies? Norway, Australia, Sweden, Netherlands,
| Denmark, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom,
| Belgium, Japan, Luxembourg, and Spain all rank within the
| top 25 of countries by HDI as well as the top 25 of
| countries by Democracy Index. All of those countries are
| monarchies.
|
| And you still haven't addressed the historical fact that
| the styles of radicalism that led to the abolition of
| monarchies in England, France, and Russia utterly failed
| to make things better and, in fact, largely made things
| worse. That doesn't mean it's futile or counterproductive
| to improve society, but merely removing the existing
| hierarchy and attempting to install something bespoke in
| its place has historically been a failing proposition,
| while reforming and improving an existing system has
| historically been much more successful.
| wpietri wrote:
| When I said "mostly gotten rid of monarchies", I include
| constitutional monarchies in that. The monarchs in at
| least most of those countries have approximately zero
| power compared with their historical antecedents.
|
| If anything, they're a fine example of the kind of
| dealing realistically with our heritage I'm talking
| about. Actual monarchies have a track record I would
| generously call mixed, and perhaps more properly call
| horrific. But being half-evolved primates, humans seem to
| like having an officially recognized big monkey to rally
| around. So we keep the Queen of England around as
| something akin to a hood ornament on the car of that
| nation. It works, even if it's not particularly rational.
| But then, neither are we.
| jumpman500 wrote:
| You're just thinking about one edge case. Any child is
| born into a hierarchy if they have a guardian of any
| sort. If you want to learn from a teacher you have to
| enter into a student teacher hierarchy. Any engagement
| with other human beings results in a formation of some
| kind of hierarchy. We all have different minds, bodies
| and skills that lead to different natural hierarchies.
| wpietri wrote:
| I deeply disagree that "much of human government through
| most of human history" is an edge case. I do agree that
| families are somewhat naturally hierarchical, and that
| can be good. However, there are plenty of examples of
| that being taken too far. I disagree that teaching and
| learning can only be accomplished through hierarchy,
| although that's certainly the common mode in industrial
| education.
|
| So it's as I said: we have to look at our natural
| heritage and decide which parts are good. Natural does
| not equal good.
| jumpman500 wrote:
| I think I misread the comment I was responding too.
|
| I was more trying to say hierarchies are not always
| wrong, but I realize now that's not exactly what he was
| claiming. You're right they're often abused and should
| always be challenged. Nothing about nature is good or
| evil it just is.
| lukifer wrote:
| The analogy I use for this is gravity vs. space travel.
| Anyone who says "gravity is the natural state of nature, it's
| impossible to fly or go to space" would clearly be wrong. Yet
| someone who says "gravity is a social construct, if you're
| not able to fly, just flap your arms harder" is wrong as
| well.
|
| To overcome gravity requires a deeply precise and intricate
| understanding of gravity. So it is with human nature: the
| point of a deep understanding of our biological nature and
| evolutionary baggage is not to succumb to them as _fait
| accompli_ , but to increase our agency and efficacy within
| those constraints, such that we become able to transcend
| them.
| wpietri wrote:
| Absolutely.
|
| To me the two poles here are the naturalistic fallacy and
| the moralistic fallacy. The former is basically "what is
| natural is right", and the latter is "what is right is
| true". Both of them for me are Mencken's "clear, simple,
| and wrong".
|
| "Natural" is basically a billion years of historical
| accidents, so there's no reason to expect it to be optimal
| from our perspective. We need to think about what we truly
| want the world to be. But we can't assume that the world is
| just going to be like we want. As when building anything,
| we must look closely at the characteristics of the raw
| materials and work with them to achieve our goals.
| lonelappde wrote:
| In the US, this is called "minimum security" (see Orange is the
| New Black) and "Club Fed" for posh accommodations for high status
| people.
|
| The Atlantic's breathless headline is misleading as usual.
| arethuza wrote:
| It seems to me that it is referring to the "class" system
| _within_ Wandsworth prison.
| seemslegit wrote:
| "People of the prisoner class have really, really bought into the
| capitalist dream. But they were too unlucky, ill-educated,
| unfortunate, or born in the wrong place to have all the things
| that society has told them they should have. They were taught
| from a very early age: You can have it all, not just the wealth
| but the stuff. Trainers [sneakers] are a big deal, watches are a
| big deal, cars are a big deal."
|
| I'd say this is fraudulent writing but it would be stating the
| obvious since written by someone literally convicted of fraud.
| The "stuff" comes _before_ wealth for most people in all systems
| but it is actually in socialist societies where personal wealth
| does not generally exist that the acquisition of basic consumer
| goods is given central significance, gifting them becomes an
| accepted and expected way to get people dispensing nominally free
| or fixed-cost social services to deliver first preferential and
| later merely adequate service.
| Gusen wrote:
| Attorney General Barr will not resign; not before President Trump
| does. Barr is the same as Mueller, Schiff, Nadler, Pelosi: feign
| opposition to cover the true motive of obstruction to keep Trump
| in power. FBI Deputy Director Wray & Supreme Court Justice Alito
| are on board also. See latest updates. Sorry, this post has been
| removed by the moderators of r/movies. Moderators remove posts
| from feeds for a variety of reasons, including keeping
| communities safe, civil, and true to their purpose. "Impeachment"
| Is A Diversion And Delay - Part II: Blocking of the "impeachment"
| witnesses was collusion planned before the new year. Listen to an
| FBI agent's disclosure from January 1, 202O here. The President
| was to resign late summer securing election for DNC. See latest
| updates.
|
| Here is the zip file, which was also made available in the
| 3Jan2O2O update. The file within is VID_20200101_201948.mp3. Turn
| up the volume and put on headphones.
|
| BB10Mp3Footage31Dec1Jan.zip 122.4mb
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IXOOhQhHybwky8Z5pGdr9ZXhWpI...
|
| The dialogue about the impeachment starts near the beginning.
| Having Biden in the White House is as good as Trump or anyone
| else in their organization. Obviously Schiff and Nadler pledged
| their allegiance to the organization by raping boys on the
| record, with their task being to drag out an impeachment designed
| to obstruct and delay any real efforts to remove the President,
| thus keeping Trump in power. The witness blocking was to cause an
| apparent uproar delaying things with legal actions until late
| Summer. Soon after, the President would resign, leaving any other
| candidate with not enough time or support to compete with an
| opportunistic Biden, who is as good as Trump or any other
| Illuminati friendly politician in the Presidency.
|
| 168 page PDF [last update: February|24|2O2O]:
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1S7T_kDv48E40eHzus6CTXHxcm0W...
|
| Previously reported:
|
| \Wag The Dog: first was feigned impeachment hearings meant to
| obstruct, now an attack on Iranians in Iraq. Here is what they
| are trying to distract from & cover up to retain power. $100+
| billion in bribes to the highest offices in this country. 815+
| deaths from child rapes to prove loyalty!
|
| See the latest PDF updates: FBI Director Wray, AG Barr, SoD
| Shanahan, & SoS Pompeo each raped boys and were paid billions in
| bribes for a Soros & Koch funded child rape org. So did Trump &
| his "impeachment" team Nadler,Schiff,Mueller.So did media moguls
| Redstone,Murdoch,Moonves. What are they trying to set up? Who can
| arrest them since they are all bribed and in on it ?
|
| Their strategy to stay in every office and obstruct until forced
| to leave no matter what. Feigning impeachment: see page 13O.
| pojobnujwednblkmbgereg,ewewrf nnea vle veegr.
|
| \\\if;Download the video/audio file, put on headphones and turn
| up the volume. You will hear these people committing these
| crimes. Audio was broadcast into my apartment by outdated
| surveillance equipment illegally embedded within my walls. This
| very same technology was being used to broadcast me to the
| internet for five years without my consent. I own this footage.
| Please use this to prosecute all found within. Note:: I am
| obliviously speaking throughout the video, and it can be quite
| loud at times relative to the desired content. The are dozens
| more links, including these, that can be found in this PDF that
| was last updated on FEB 24, 2O2O:
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1S7T_kDv48E40eHzus6CTXHxcm0W...
|
| All members of the "Illuminati"; "....an underground organization
| of homosexuals and child rapists..." (from pg 26: Barack Obama
| with Jack Dorsey).
|
| President Donald Trump:
|
| Demands a $4 billion dollar bribe here at 10:18am 4thJan2019:
|
| 3JanCh3_900-1100.avi
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Grdr8xF2psKNsuYlEnl9dIRV-77...
|
| 3JanCh2_900-1100-avi
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LUmVygl_q0XVs8h2cWr8jZl-24f...
|
| 3JanCh4_1000-1100.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZpP1pJbJakBgg-y-MWNozTxp3wJ...
|
| President Trump rapes and kills twelve boys, including five boys
| in a "who can rape five boys to death the fastest" game:
|
| 14JanCh3_600.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ufPmglde9Mep0m6xYMJ9c4TWTjj...
|
| 14JanCh2_600-700.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/136qLJdEn8eCs9tI4QtIxl4opW_L...
|
| Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi:
|
| Accepting a $3 billion dollar bribe at 1033 am on the 17 Jan 2019
| to ensure Asian boys can get through the border at "Monterey"
| undocumented to be raped:
|
| 17JanCh3_949-1100.avi
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eodHu4o5Cm3xEWhDqipSuTj-M1C...
|
| 17JanCh4_1017-1100.avi
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y-nWEQbempkVZSz230j9wTyduZN...
|
| Speaker Nancy Pelosi also "preps" boys with First Lady Melania
| Trump, defined as in she performs oral sex on the boys' penis and
| anus, as a child rapist like Henry Porter would, while trying to
| remove fecal matter from the boy prior to handing them over to be
| raped and then subsequently murdered, for Supreme Court Justice
| Samuel Alito, who apparently decides he would rather just have
| ten billion dollars instead. US Attorney for Western New York
| James Kennedy rapes these boys instead:
|
| 12JanCh3_1533-1638.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AgFkDsbPbI4b5Xd3Wbz2EVNNx25...
|
| Attorney General William Barr with FBI Deputy Director
| Christopher Wray raped and killed boys for billions in bribes in
| Buffalo, NY on the 17th Jan2019 at 7:50am:
|
| 18JanCh4_700mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UIdZkS5ZVksZdHYsnHk2t5losi0...
|
| 18JanCh2_700.mp3 gorepqkberqaoper,bqpo,rfbv.
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1DFK8IAxm5pQVqZv9L518nfgP7_o...
|
| 18JanCh3_725-.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1DG5ej59Ic8RT9UhbyMdwT0BDcKI...
|
| Secretary of State Michael Pompeo and Secretary of Defense
| Patrick Shanahan each raped and killed boys on 5Jan'19 at 17:39
| for billions in bribes: ashungde, njsjnuhsb.
|
| 5JanCh2_1721-1818.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eSlD4otX4KZqWXboQM92Mu-6J02...
|
| Leaders of the "impeachment" effort Jerrold Nadler, Robert
| Mueller, and Adam Schiff all rape and kill boys between 11:20pm
| and 1:10am:
|
| 14JanCh4_2300-0000.mp3 Nadler starts at about 20 minutes in-
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Kuvv2Zmbw5Jw7onbRI2hCZ0M8FU...
|
| 14JanCh2_2304-2359.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nofp5xF-aXXcCSgQVwj30KlzE9W...
|
| Mueller at 12:25am, next is Schiff starts at 12:55-ish:
|
| 15JanCh2_000-100.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1EsmHfguwBuo2PbavJ1WYyhiML62...
|
| 15JanCh2_100-200.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NZnWRnBryalNQu2yJmfJUdS2pA_...
|
| 15JanCh4_000-100.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZEDJR6jb6ARpcNnWJTokBUKb2J2...
|
| 15JanCh4_100-200.mp3
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/173aYWvWHH4VGht1h_2nM0IMdw74...
|
| Complete Media Protection: Lester Holt, of NBC NightlyNews,
| apparently a member of the Illuminati since the 80's, along with
| ABC Nightly News lead anchor David Muir, stop over to the Porter
| studio in Buffalo, New York on 14Jan2019 at 5:00 am. They both
| rape and kill about two dozen boys by 6:00 am. Muir starts around
| 5.15am, then Holt about 5:38 am. Multi-billionaire Rupert
| Murdoch, owner of News Corp and also Fox Corporation, takes his
| turn after Holt. Video links below:
|
| 14JanCh3_500-601.avi Bjhkblkmerger, rthrkemnhpoer
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1i7NKepeyG_FfdQRrM7KsnFOZOOX...
|
| 14JanCh2_530-600.avi
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NZzgN5ilI7ToroU5cfqMaL4o2u1...
|
| Adding to the media protection and reason this is not picked up
| by the media, CBS and Viacom owner Sumner Redstone and Leslie
| Moonves rape and kill boys following the President.
|
| 14JanCh3_700.avi
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/10XDw6x3ldnnQiq7oIjpdYVENyXa...
|
| 14JanCh2_700-800.avi
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NS_e6AzEZ05wnfljkGMETGU5CWY...
|
| 169 page PDF [last updated: Feb|24|2O2O]:
|
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1S7T_kDv48E40eHzus6CTXHxcm0W...
|
| \\\\. Please repost in USA! Post gets censored in US
|
| Recently more relevant:
|
| From page 49, Senator Mitch McConnell:
|
| At 1632 Senator Mitch McConnell checks into the Porter camera
| system inquiring if he can be part of the "eviction" for $10
| million dollars. He is informed by group members that there are
| enough people for the event already and his participation is not
| necessary. At 1634 McConnell states "I fucked 15 kids, how am I
| not getting paid by you?" He is dismissed by Donald Reeves with
| "I think that will be all Mr. McConnell."
|
| 13JanCh3_1600-1700.avi
| https://drive.google.com/file/d/1L7bqOpvaEWmLiJpMhJNQDrfsQAH...
| riazrizvi wrote:
| > Atkins: People of the prisoner class have really, really bought
| into the capitalist dream. But they were too unlucky, ill-
| educated, unfortunate, or born in the wrong place to have all the
| things that society has told them they should have. They were
| taught from a very early age: You can have it all, not just the
| wealth but the stuff.
|
| My favorite part. They don't realize that capitalism itself is
| regressing to a class-based system. People like Trump, Johnson,
| Cameron can fake invoices, but the interviewer, just an ordinary
| member of the public has to play by the rules.
| masonic wrote:
| A fictionalized example is in the original (1969) film "The
| Italian Job".
| sys_64738 wrote:
| Did he have to slop out?
| microtherion wrote:
| The "class system" in the title reminded me of a report I read
| yesterday that Harvey Weinstein hired a "prison consultant" a
| while ago to prepare him for a potential (and now highly likely)
| imprisonment.
| 0xff00ffee wrote:
| I'm confused by why this is a surprise. It has literally been a
| cliche in the US for decades. Although prison in UK does sound
| marginally better than in the US despite having the same budget
| issues.
|
| Oddly, this quote seemed appealing: "Prison moves at a glacial
| pace. As you adapt to the environment, you start moving at a
| glacial pace." Probably because I'm not rich.
| throway1n wrote:
| " They were closer to me than the mentally ill drug addicts or
| the Romanian gangsters." - the english criminal doesn't appear to
| hesitate at throwing racist remarks around does he?
| uk_programmer wrote:
| What is racist about it? I don't see any racism in that
| statement.
|
| He was simply stating that he was more comfortable around other
| white collar criminals.
| throway1n wrote:
| had he said black or jewish criminals you would have been
| raging on twitter spewing woke slogans. he was simply
| singling out an ethnicity, the english criminal did.
| jsjddbbwj wrote:
| I agree with you. If it said "black thugs" everybody would
| go crazy over it. (I believe both things should be okay to
| be said)
| pbhjpbhj wrote:
| I suspect you've missed a subtlety about the situation.
| If there was a black population, and I've referred to
| them all as "black thugs" then that's racist. If there's
| a subset of the population who are thugs and black, and I
| refer to them as black thugs then that's descriptive.
|
| Like, if he said "the a Romanian programmers gather
| outside at lunch to smoke", that's not racist if that's
| what the Romanian programmers do, it's simply
| descriptive.
|
| Sure, sometimes there's an underlying motivation of
| unnecessary racial discrimination behind why someone
| points out a fact, but facts aren't racist of themselves.
| broodje wrote:
| Could it not be that he was speaking from first hand
| evidence of the people he was locked up with?
| tramp0line wrote:
| could it be that if bloomberg says the same about US
| minorities, it is called racist, but this is not? odd
| folk
| broodje wrote:
| Is identifying someone by their nationality racist?
| spinglespingle wrote:
| not at all, but singling out a single ethnicity out of a
| massively mixed prison, quite is. particularly when it
| falls in the line of dailymail propaganda. or is racism
| racism only when against certain groups and not all?
| uk_programmer wrote:
| He didn't single them out. He mentioned actually
| mentioned drug addicts first (which are most likely
| English) and then the Romanian Gangstars. I would imagine
| they either stood out in his mind or he happened to be in
| the same wing of the prison. If I met a Romanian Gangstar
| it would definitely stand out in my mind.
|
| Also labelling criminals from Romania as Romanian is
| simply a statement of fact. If they were Japanese Yakuza
| or Chinese Triads I would expect him to call them
| Japanese and Chinese respectively.
| dang wrote:
| Could you please stop?
| Lio wrote:
| He's not identifying a minority and labelling them
| criminals though, he's identifying other criminals that
| come from a particular minority.
|
| All Romanians != Subset of Romanians in UK prisons.
|
| He also mentions gangsters. It's quite within the bounds
| of what he's written that Romanian criminals in UK
| prisons that aren't gang members might also not want to
| associate too closely with the gangs.
| lolc wrote:
| The statement does not suggest that Romanians are
| gangsters, just that there were Romanian gangsters in that
| prison. I think I would have found "black gangsters"
| acceptable in that context too. "Jewish gangsters" would
| have surprised me because it doesn't fit the stereotype I
| have of Jews. But I don't think I would have found it
| racist.
|
| Don't be angry at the messenger. He's explaining how the
| separation happens. Not talking about it doesn't make it
| better.
| wpietri wrote:
| I was surprised to learn about it as well, but
| historically, Jewish gangsters were notable figures in US
| organized crime: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish-
| American_organized_crim...
| ploxolo wrote:
| Oh must have missed Romanian is an ethnicity and not a
| nationality.
| uk_programmer wrote:
| People in the UK are usually referring to people that
| come from the country of Romania when they say Romanian.
| The ethnic meaning I don't think is used much over here.
| luckylion wrote:
| I mean, the parent's argument is weird, but yeah, you've
| missed something: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanians
| 101404 wrote:
| Where did you see "racism" in that comment?
| botwriter wrote:
| you're not from the UK or Europe are you?
|
| There are a lot of eastern european criminals who come to the
| UK to do business. I'm not saying its good or bad I'm just
| saying its part of life in the UK.
| tramp0line wrote:
| now say that there are many muslims terrorists and black
| criminals coming there to do business, see how that is
| different?
| botwriter wrote:
| there are gangs of muslim men in the UK raping children,
| muslim terrorists and black criminals.
| spinglespingle wrote:
| "there are" !== "a lot". see where that little racist
| dailymail twat surfaced? let me guess, you call yourself
| "liberal" and hate it when trump claims mexicans are
| rapists eh? but don't hesitate to claim there are "a lot"
| of east european criminals in the UK are you mate?
| UnFleshedOne wrote:
| I think the point there is not that there are a lot of
| them (how many raping gangs is a lot?), but that they are
| predominantly of those origins.
| [deleted]
| Lio wrote:
| It's difficult to even have a balanced conversation about
| this without tabloid types trying to exploit the
| situation to cause divisions.
|
| Historically these gangs have been a problem here. They
| have used fear of racism as a cover for their activity.
|
| This is from the Independent. The right wing media have
| even more reports and they are, as you would imagine,
| slightly hysterical (and not in a funny way).
|
| https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/grooming-
| gangs-a...
| detritus wrote:
| Yeah, as in literally Romanian Gangsters.
|
| The irony of this troll's stance is that he's parroting the
| 'woke slogan spewing twitter user' he's so critical of.
|
| And yes, I did just assume troll's gender.
|
| .
|
| I really should know better than to engage with trolls, but I
| did find it amusing how keenly he's shooting himself in his
| feet.
| seemslegit wrote:
| So the Atlantic/Hellen Lewis consider it a negative that non-
| violent and mentally healthy people aren't housed together with
| violent and mentally ill ones ? Isn't this basically what the US
| prison reform advocates want to see their system make its way
| _up_ to ?
| skrebbel wrote:
| No, the article didn't say that at all.
| seemslegit wrote:
| It kinda does, the "lower class" here is violent and mentally
| unstable, the "white-collar club" is non-violent and
| functional in the prison environment, in spite of their best
| attempts to try and to throw in a racial aspect no evidence
| is brought that it plays a role, no hints or accusations that
| money is used to bribe guards or prison authorities.
|
| Anyone with basic penology background will consider it a
| textbook success on progressive grounds - the default in most
| places is that the prison "upper class" are the violent
| career criminals who keep the population in check for the
| prison guards as the white-collar prisoners pay them
| protection money.
___________________________________________________________________
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