NobleSavage
Veteran Member
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/prison-crisis-dutch-style-too-few-prisoners
Wouldn't that be a nice problem for the US to have? What are the Dutch doing right and what are we doing wrong?
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Prison crisis, Dutch style: too few prisoners
- Thread starter NobleSavage
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Wouldn't that be a nice problem for the US to have? What are the Dutch doing right and what are we doing wrong?
Being liberal and progressive.
Being conservative.
I'm sure you can also throw in a handful of inherent social differences.
dystopian
Veteran Member
If only it were so simple. While we are, traditionally, a liberal and progressive society, we've been in a period of increased conservative reactionism for over a decade now; and it doesn't look like this is going to change any time soon. And saying that our current justice department is liberal and progressive is also a joke; unless one's talking about being liberal with privacy and progressive in its use of drones and the like. Then there are also those who don't just think that prison sentences for violent crimes are too light, but for various other crimes too. The right has a habit of painting our empty prisons as being the fault of weak judges who make the streets unsafe by letting criminals off with a light tap on the hands, playing on the fears and prejudices of a disturbingly sizable minority of people.
arkirk
Veteran Member
It seems it is a matter of efficiency of the system they have. Our system in the U.S. pays thousands of people to guard thousands of people who are not a danger to our society and would not be if they were released. Money spent on incarceration can be spent elsewhere in socially far more productive operations. They seem to be closer to a better balance in their spending and their actions.
Jason Harvestdancer
Contributor
They don't have our drug war.
arkirk
Veteran Member
Right wing....its argument is the same in every venue. Common people need to be disciplined. They are not to be trusted with themselves or for that matter, the vote either! Right wing has little to do with reality. It is actually a belief that there are special people who are fit to rule and own everything. The unspecial ones are the ones that end up in the jails.
In California, we also have a very powerful prison guards union that helps get our governors elected. To them, prisoners are what fuels their livelihood...never mind the ruination of the lives of those they make their living from. I must admit we have some real criminals in California but I feel this over-incarceration of our population is actually detrimental to insuring we get dangerous people off the streets. Our criminal justice system just seems to hunt down the low hanging fruit, those who are not too dangerous to handle. It makes their jobs easier and keeps the need for more cops and guards elevated. It is an industry, separated in purpose from justice.
RavenSky
The Doctor's Wife
Maybe we should pay the Dutch to house some of our non-violent (really shouldn't be in prison in the first place) prisoners. It could be a win-win-win: Dutch maintains their employment at our expense, the U.S. saves money, the prisoners get what could only be considered a holiday compared to the U.S. prison system. 
Jason Harvestdancer
Contributor
It's funny, but I see that in both conservatives and in progressives. One side feels that they are the only ones moral enough to rule over everyone else, the other feels they are the only ones smart enough to.
Are you saying California is a "right wing" state?
Nice Squirrel
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This is a big part of the problem.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands
It is an simplistic comparison.
Netherlands has apopulation of about two of our NYC spread out over Rhode Island. Ithas nhigh homogeneity and no large disenfranchised minoritypopulation as the heirs of a system oi slavery.
The crime in theUSA is clustered in areas of large cities plagued withunderdevelopment and unemployment. Plus the proliferation of gangs with international affiliations. IOW drugs.
It is an simplistic comparison.
Netherlands has apopulation of about two of our NYC spread out over Rhode Island. Ithas nhigh homogeneity and no large disenfranchised minoritypopulation as the heirs of a system oi slavery.
The crime in theUSA is clustered in areas of large cities plagued withunderdevelopment and unemployment. Plus the proliferation of gangs with international affiliations. IOW drugs.
dystopian
Veteran Member
You have got to be fucking joking. First, Rhode Island? The Netherlands is bigger than Maryland which is ten times as big as Rhode island. It is also one of the most urban countries in the world (Not counting microstates, only South Korea, Bangladesh and Taiwan have a higher density). Secondly, no, the Netherlands does NOT have high homogeneity of the kind you describe, and DOES have a large disenfranchised minority population who are the heirs of a system of colonialism. I've explained this to you before on the other board Steve, guess the facts didn't kick in. The populations of major Dutch cities like Amsterdam and Rotterdam consist of more than 50% immigrants.
And where do you believe crime in the Netherlands to be clustered? Farms? Crime in the Netherlands is also clustered in large cities and conurbations, duh? Furthermore, being the gateway to Europe makes the Netherlands one of the major cogs in international organized crime; it's no secret that major drug cartels past and present have headquartered their global operations here. So, I don't really see your point. Contrary to popular perception, we most certainly *do* have a 'drug war'. It's just handled a little more sensibly, but it's not as if people who get caught trafficking (and a LOT of them get caught here) don't face steep jail time.
Also, pot is legal in the Netherlands, so even when bad guys want to go out and commit crimes, they tend to just sit on the couch and eat potato chips instead.
dystopian
NL is a tiny country with relativelyminor political issues and little of the social ills engendered bythe scope of the USA as single entitl y.
European states tend to be smaller moreeasily managed by centralized control.
Id you look at the economicdemographics over here unemployment tends to be highest in blackpopulations, IMO a residue of slavery followed by Jim Crow.
LA alone is far more socially,economically, and politically complicated than NL.
Trying to compare NL with the USA onany level is IMO simple ignorance of American history and politics.We have deeply divided factions on social programs,education, andcrime not easily reconciled.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands
16 million people
16,000 square miles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryland
6 million people
12,000 square miles
When I came to Seattle in the early 90sthere was no gang violence. Gangs migrated north to Portland andSeattle. Now Seattle has carjackings and drive by shootings. CentralAmerican related gangs and drugs.
NL is a tiny country with relativelyminor political issues and little of the social ills engendered bythe scope of the USA as single entitl y.
European states tend to be smaller moreeasily managed by centralized control.
Id you look at the economicdemographics over here unemployment tends to be highest in blackpopulations, IMO a residue of slavery followed by Jim Crow.
LA alone is far more socially,economically, and politically complicated than NL.
Trying to compare NL with the USA onany level is IMO simple ignorance of American history and politics.We have deeply divided factions on social programs,education, andcrime not easily reconciled.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands
16 million people
16,000 square miles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryland
6 million people
12,000 square miles
When I came to Seattle in the early 90sthere was no gang violence. Gangs migrated north to Portland andSeattle. Now Seattle has carjackings and drive by shootings. CentralAmerican related gangs and drugs.
dystopian
Veteran Member
You are seriously mistaken to think we have "relatively minor political issues."; also, a population of 17 million does not qualify as tiny on the global stage. It has us fit into the 'middle' size rank.
You are once again, mistaken.
Except in many respects we're more decentralized than the US is. This has been true since our founding.
So? Exactly which groups in the Netherlands do you think have the highest unemployment? Because it sure as fuck isn't white people.
This couldn't be more laughably wrong. First off, the idea that a country with a two party system could be more politically complicated than a country with dozens of viable political parties is simply absurd. Even more so when you add in the many complicated *layers* of politics that we have which the US doesn't. Secondly, Dutch cities are in fact more ethnically and culturally diverse than LA, by a considerable margin. Amsterdam has more nationalities living within its bounds than any other city in the world (177 in total). 51% of Amsterdam's population is foreign born, the majority of which are of non-western origins. These figures are not unusual for our cities.
The mere fact that you can probably type this with a straight face reveals your own ignorance instead. Yes, I am well aware of the divided nature of American history and politics. You however, seem completely oblivious to the basic fact that divided politics is an inherent feature of every country on the planet. Furthermore, arguing that it is ignorant to compare the Netherlands and the US on any level is in fact demonstrative of your ignorance of your own history; the United States as a nation, including its political form, was directly inspired by and based on the example of the Dutch republic, and any historian with a background in the period can tell you that the history of the American Republic very much mirrors that of the Dutch Republic. We can most certainly draw historical comparisons. Furthermore, we can also draw more modern comparisons.
Yes, and? It is a basic fact that greater population densities increase the risk of crime, irrespective even of cultural factors. The Netherlands is far more densely populated than the US; which would indicate that our crime rate ought to be higher than it is.
Nonsense. Literally no more than 5 seconds of googling reveals that in 1993, a study in Seattle showed that members of youth gangs were five times as likely to engage in violent crime as those who were not members of such gangs: http://www.ojjdp.gov/jjbulletin/9808/youth.html
These things have been happening in Seattle for a lot longer than just now.
And again, making a big point about how you have some examples of violent crime, just goes and shows your ignorance of other countries again. What, you think we don't have organized crime cartels engaging in brutal executions? Hell, I remember them shooting at courthouses with fucking rocket launchers.
It isn't that we don't have the exact same sort of cultural, social, and economic triggers for crime. Because we do. We have impoverished minorities, racial tensions, crime cartels with billions on the line. We have it all. So you can't point to a supposed absence of those things when trying to determine why we have less crime than you do.
braces_for_impact
Veteran Member
Privately owned prison for profit doesn't help. If there's money in it, people will be screwed over.
RavenSky
The Doctor's Wife
Agree
Clivedurdle
Member
Where are 1% of American adults?