Dignity and Maximum Participation

What the rest of the population fails to realize is that they are in fact human beings. Criminals bleed, crave affection, and want understanding just like the rest of us. They just made a bigger mistake than most of us have, or they made the same mistake and just got caught. Prisoners should be awarded their rights while in prison because at the end of the day, they are still human.

The U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights are most notable for their protection of the rights of suspected and accused individuals. All to often we forget it also covers the rights of those persons convicted of a crime. There are two positions when it comes the rights of convicted and imprisoned persons, which are rights-are-retained and rights-are-lost. In retrospect, they are both right because prisoners rights may not be granted rights nor shall rights be withheld that are not supported by law. Therefore, prisoners are given Conditional Rights because they are constrained by the legitimate needs of imprisonment. The Conditional Rights of inmates are communication and vision, religious freedom, access to the courts and legal assistance,

Every civilization in history has had rules, and citizens who break them. To this day governments struggle to figure out the best way to deal with their criminals in ways that help both society and those that commit the crimes. Imprisonment has historically been the popular solution. However, there are many instances in which people are sent to prison that would be better served for community service, rehab, or some other form of punishment. Prison affects more than just the prisoner; the families, friends, employers, and communities of the incarcerated also pay a price. Prison as a punishment has its pros and cons; although it may be necessary for some, it can be harmful for those who would be better suited for alternative means

The collateral consequences of mass incarceration are effects in an inmate’s community, social life, employment, wages, and family life. The separation of an inmate from their family causes many struggles to occur in the household such as the inability to become financially stable for their partners, a loss of connection with their partner and children, living with a social stigma, and divorce or separation. Even after an inmate gets out of prison, their life is still impacted from being incarcerated. Because of the stigma that comes with being incarcerated, “ex-offenders” find it hard to either find a job, maintain a job, or get a job with a decent amount of pay. These consequences contribute to inequality through establishing a type of status on an individual. By becoming an inmate or even before they are imprisoned, inmates’ deal with Lower-class family issues and stigmas that stick with them for life.

Article 10: All persons deprived of the liberty shall be treated with humanity and with respect for the inherent dignity of the human person.

According to the deputy director of the U.S. program at Human Rights Watch, how does the growing number of prisoners reflect a human rights problem? “As many of the people caught up in the criminal justice system are low income, racial and ethnic minorities, often forgotten by society,”

The United States incarceration system is a structural foundation of punishment in which is formed by robust authoritarian power. The United States criminal justice system is not an institution to be underestimated, as it represents the highest incarceration rate of all world nations at a staggering 700 inmates per 100 thousand citizens (Krisberg, 7). Based on the social and political structure of democracy in the United States, it is argued that incarceration systems should follow the same roots of equality and freedom; however, the current format demonstrates otherwise. Currently, the United States criminal justice system faces issues of inhumane treatment due to the sheer overcrowding, which restrict inmates from just treatment within penitentiaries. This lack of equality standards was argued in the 2011 court case, Brown v. Plata, which California prison systems were forced to decrease prisons overcapacity rate from 175% to 137.5% due to the overwhelming amount of inmate mistreatment (Koehler, 3). In the decision of Brown v. Plata (2011), supreme court justice Anthony Kennedy argued dignity should be an organizing principle in the United States justice system and demonstrated in all correctional facilities. Anthony Kennedy, along with guest lecturer, Jonathan Simon characterize dignity as a fundamental piece to the incarceration system, and without it, inmates are victimized to cruel and inhumane treatment. Dignity does not consist of domination and unequal treatment of

Introduction: Try to imagine this scenario. Taking a mini vacation in an unknown city with some friends. The night gets hectic, there is miscommunication and unimaginable words get put into the air and things happened and the police gets called. Next thing you know is your friend is in the back of the police car. Throughout my life I personally knew plenty of people who have been in the county jail and people who came from the penitentiary. Two years ago I worked at Saint Louis County Circuit Court, which is connected to the Justice Center. In Saint Louis, Missouri, we call our local county jail the Justice Center. I did a lot of research for this speech that I present to you. Today I will be speaking on imprisonment. When you do the crime you have to do the time. Throughout my speech I will be informing you on the difference between life in jail versus prison, the punishments, and life after you get released.

Another right, they should have is to be free from discrimination, meaning they can’t be mistreated based on ethnicity or religion or even age. If two people committed the same crime, then both should receive the same punishment and that should apply to all the prisoners in the nation.

The sociological conflict perspective views state of clash and struggle between haves and haves-not in all societies and cultures of the world (Turner, 1978:160). Being the essential part of society, the same conflict could also be found in prisons, where the strong, powerful and affluent prisoners treat the weak, feeble and poor prisoners to be their slaves. The haves not only force the haves-not to remain at their service, but also increase the intensity of criminal aptitude among them. Sexual exploitation serves as the most heinous crime practiced within the prisons, where the weak prisoners are assaulted, tortured and raped by the influential prisoners as well as the members of prison administration. Such a state of affair multiplies the sense of crime among the prisoners, which intend to carry on committing crimes after their release from prison in order to take revenge of cruelties inflicted upon them by the powerful stratum of society in jails. Somehow, it is not the case in every prison, as some of the prisons strictly discourage the exploitation of the weak at the hands of the

Prison inmates are not allowed to leave due to obvious reasons, but this is not a choice of the inmate; it is not a free decision. They cannot to leave the prison to take a simple stroll around the block. They cannot grab a bike and ride to the nearby park to play with their kids. While this is due to their previous actions, it still does it doesn't change the fact that their lives are not their own anymore. They do not have the full status of human beings.

Moreover, offenders loose their dignity due to their own immoral behaviour and societies attitudes (ACU, 2016, section. 4.1.1). Furthermore, the viewpoint of community, social circumstances media impacts will be considered to understand the concept of human dignity in the case of impact of parole system on the citizens of society. Additionally, it is argued that it is unfair that an offender walks unrestricted while his or her victims still suffers (). The Sentencing Legislation Further Amendment Act 1997, suggest that parole be constrained or stopped for dangerous offenders in the interest of community safety. Additionally,Kant believed that punishing someone as “respecting him as person” (Rothhaar, 2010). Besides,

Regardless of an individual’s time in their moment of life, in America they have a set of laws that they have to abide by. Within these laws are also rights that are given to Americans so they may be able to protect themselves to any unlawful actions against them. These set of laws that are located inside of the Constitution are called the Bill of Rights. In reference to jails and prisons the federal and state government handles these establishments and management and has control of the inmates that are housed within. Even though we in America are given these rights, called the Bills of Rights, prisoners are not able to have full ability to their Constitutional rights. The Bill of Rights came about in regards to the Anti-Federalists for the

today we call them human rights" (McShea 34). The issue of whether or not to

When an individual is introduced to the prison life, after violating rules and laws, he or she must come to terms about the journey he or she are about to take behind bars in prison. No one can save them, or do their time for them, and a majority of their freedom has been stripped from them either temporarily or permanently. Prison life deals with all walks of life and is not discriminative toward any race. In this paper I will discuss my perspective on prison life, policies I would enforce an inmate’s need for respect, changes on correctional policy, and why people commit crimes.