Just So You Know....

...If you ever get convicted of a crime, I probably won't come visit you in prison.

It's not that I'm really that selfish (although some would contest that), it's just that prison is quite a scary and depressing place.

We visited Paparua Prison today as part of our course, learning about the criminal justice system. We went to the cells, the exercise yards, and the youth unit, and the areas where the inmates work. Wandering around the youth unit, I felt really quite sad. While I recognise that in life, there are some people who are just inherently bad, little-old-liberal me, feels for those kids who have just never had a chance. They have never had the opportunity to get out of the hell-hole that is their life. Mum is an alcoholic, Dad beats you up. School is a place where you don't fit in, and your friends introduce you to drugs/crime/sex/and just general bad behaviour. Given this country's propensity to under-fund social welfare, and over fund the America's Cup, it's not surprising there is a cycle ofviolence and crime that some of these people can't get out of.

I know there are exceptions to that. i know that some people are just born bad, and some people come from reasonable backgrounds and commit heinous crimes, and some people who do come from bad backgrounds don't end up badly. But the reality is, poverty breeds poverty, and poverty breeds crime, and crime leads to gangs and prison and then more crime and poverty. It's a vicious circle people!

And as much as the Department of Corrections preaches 'reducing re-offending', I wonder how a person is meant to rehabilitate, when they never have a clear, unobstructed view of the sky?

I know there is a school of thought that thinks that prison should be rock-banging, bone-crunching work. With bread and water and no televisions and no priveleges. But surely the punishment of taking criminals out of society, away from their families, and putting them in a place where there is always walls, always someone watching, and no control over anything that happens to them is enough?

There you go Bells. Happy now? (sorry about the $2.)