I had a conversation at work this week about a fellow workmate’s relative that had driven a vehicle while extremely intoxicated and fatally hit a cyclist. This man spent many years behind bars and has since been released. This man chose to use his time in jail to better himself and was released with not only a high school diploma but an accounting degree. So 10 years later he walked out educated, perhaps even employable and free.
My fellow workmates were outraged
I was elated that our justice system had worked.
When I asked them why they were so upset one stated that he should be in jail to suffer not prosper while the other was hurt by the irony that the dead cyclist was actually an accountant.
The idea of jail makes me uncomfortable. As humans we get a lot of things right but to me, jail isn’t one of them. I’ve never understood the concept of locking people away.
In the animal kingdom there are ways that species deal with the undesirables, the anti social, and the genetic failures. They banish them or kill them....we lock them up.
We poke the bear with a stick for a month, year, decade, decades and then we let them out. Sure we isolated them but we let them back in. Actually we don’t let them back in, we try to integrate an angrier, more violent, frustrated version of themselves back into our lives....and we expect them to behave, to live by the law, and to contribute to the society that failed them.
The accountant is a rare story and perhaps if it wasn’t I wouldn’t feel so uncomfortable about jail. I’m not a bleeding heart...anyone that knows me understands this. I have seen what jail can do to people. I’ve seen the person that comes out of jail and I know it is never the same person that went in, and I know it isn’t a person that many people would like to meet. Locking someone up doesn’t teach them a lesson. It doesn’t make them repent for their sins and it certainly doesn’t make them want to belong to society again. If they were given opportunities to better themselves, to learn skills, to value themselves then I can guarantee that they will come out better people, they will come out with the skills to survive in society and they will value themselves and their place within society more....put simply they will not NEED to reoffend....and isn’t that what correctional and rehabilitation facilities are meant to be about?? If we focussed more on the rehabilitation rather than the correctional side our jails wouldn’t be overflowing, they wouldn’t be filled with 80% of re offenders and crime...well that’s the funny thing as people that belong and find their place and value in society don’t need to commit crimes.
I’m not just speaking on behalf of the criminals as I have had loved ones taken by crime. If they ever do find the men that killed my grandparents, I hope they would have the opportunity to rebuild their lives, to feel a part of our society, to want to actually contribute to our society again. I say this not from a place of forgiveness but because I don’t want another family to lose love ones to the barrels of their guns as well. As rehabilitation is hard, like most things worthwhile, and is 100% our responsibility. It is so easy to condemn these people, to wipe our hands of them but the next time you hold your children tight out of with fear of the big bad world please know that everyone of us made that world and the danger of it is simply a reflection on ourselves.
The good news is we have the power to change it.
