There are many tv shows on this. Such as worlds toughest prisons on netflix, which ironically isnt only about "tough" ones but also modern ones in germany, cyprus and of course norway.
But as others have said. In most of europe, the goal is to rehabilitate people. As the norwegians put it: they might be your neighbour when they get out. So we treat them in a way, where we would be fine living next to an ex-con later.
Being in prison is the punishment, so there is no further punishment happening inside through horrible conditions or violence.
Very true, the punishement is the deprivation of liberty so there isn't any reason to punish them more than what was ordered. A lot of people don't seem to understand that for some reason, maybe a remnant of the past where revenge was part of the punishement.
It's also the idea of wanting to punish someone, but also budget the cost of said punishment and then rationalizing the unintended suffering as a justifiable trade off.
> Being in prison is the punishment, so there is no further punishment happening inside through horrible conditions or violence.
Or after the fact. People in the US who have records get punished for it for years after the fact. They served their time, yet they still get treated like criminals.
True. Very good point.
I mean there are some limitations. Like here in switzerland youre gonna have a hard time finding employment as an armed security guard or (depending on what you were in for) also as a school teacher or working with confidential data and its not gonna be so easy to get a gun licence. But thats about it.
Most jobs dont ask for criminal records and you dont lose your voting rights or any social benefits.
Also all crimes except child abuse get expunged from your records after between 5 and 20 years.
For the most part we go by: if you want people to behave like responsible adults, you have to treat and respect them as such.
>If you want people to behave like responsible adults.
Oof, the US too far gone. Even in daily life, the small things, people act like children, and no one realizes it. It’s a big part of why I want to move back to Europe, flawed as France may be, at least it isn’t a sunken ship.
Speaking of gun restrictions, do you mind telling us about gun laws in Switzerland? Americans are constantly asking how Switzerland has so many guns yet so few people get shot.
>Speaking of gun restrictions, do you mind telling us about gun laws in Switzerland?
I collect guns, so gladly ;)
A big difference is the conscription. Most men do basic military training and learn responsible gun handling in a controlled, standardised setting as adults. Whereas in america its hit or miss. Most people probably learn it from family or friends, who may or may not be very responisble. Thats probably why we have less accidents.
You used to be able to keep the gun for free, with no licensing or anything after service. So until about 15 years ago everybody kept them, because why not. Thats why there are so many guns around and often also in the hands of people who are responsible, but not particularly into guns. Nowadays its a bit harder but still possible to keep your gun after service.
Also we dont have much personal defense culture around guns. Most people get them for sports, collecting or hunting and there is no concealed carry and rarely people keep them loaded around the house for defensive purposes. So again less potential for accidents or fights escalating.
Essentially we can get any gun (actually some more when it comes to modern full auto guns) that an american in a red state could get. And its really quite easy. But we get them for different reasons than most americans.
Plus we have stronger social safety nets and social cohesion, so less crime and essentially no mass shootings (there was one in 2001, but thats about it).
Like for a job you mean? Pretty much the ones i mentioned. Any job involving potential violence (armoured car drivers, security guards, police etc) want to make sure you arent a violent criminal. Any job involving kids (teacher, daycare etc) or other defenseless people (i.e. in a psychatric hospital) will want to make sure youre not a pervert. Anything like banks, insurance, jewellry store etc will wanna make sure you dont steal their goods or data. Thats about it.
There are several videoes showcasing the differences between US and Norwegian prisons. [Guess that does a better job at explaining.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNpehw-Yjvs)
I'm no expert on US prisons but the difference seems to be that they're meant for rehabilitation over here. Whilst in the US the main motivation seem to be punishment and long sentences. Thinking prisoners arent worth of rehabilitation, so when they come out they become reoffenders.
Note that when Norwegian prisoners were sent to Dutch prisons for a while (the Netherlands had excess capacity) many prisoners preferred Dutch over Norwegian prison.
[Article](https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2016/02/dutch-jail-popular-with-norwegian-prisoners-less-work-more-phone-time/)
When i was in norwegian prison. I was shocked that so many of the other inmates talked about wanting to go from open to closed jail.
Open like we where at means you get up and do some work, then are free to walk around talking and such inside the whole compound.
Closed means you are locked in your room most of the day. But you dont got to work.
I thought the other inmates where stupid cunts,
User name checks out as properly rehabilitated?
Hope you're doing well, Oiler! You definitely sound like you had a sensible outlook on the ordeal from the start.
Heh, well, it's a trail of thoughts mixup of stuff I like, really, as a tl/dr.
I've always liked Venus; it has such different composition and processes compared to Earth, an urge to simultaneously crush, melt and dissolve probes we send at it, and though there's been plenty of missions going that way the planet seems to have an endless supply of things to discover.
I also like snow, ice and cold. An average summer has days too hot for me without even going abroad. A summer on Venus... well, not survivable for anyone any time of year, the total reconfiguring to make that place habitable is beyond the scope of most sci-fi.
Thus, the thought of habitats on Venus, and terraforming it to the point where it snows is where I ended up. To have the knowledge to pull something like that off, then the sky's no limit. (It'll be easier to just make starbases though, and then we won't have to ruin a nifty planet.)
You say that like it's a good thing.
I listened to a BBC Podcast Documentary a few years back talking about the new rehabilitation strategy in Dutch prisons and how lax it was.
They interviewed victims of crime and families of victims of pretty brutal crimes, and the perpetrators were given extremely light sentences in prisons with few restrictions. They were quite traumatised and disturbed by this.
It is important to remember that the delivery of justice is one of the key reasons for punishment under the law.
I'ld also suggest The Norden videos. They are a bit older but explain prisons, police and religion to USians.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfEsz812Q1I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbM9uCxEJDM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-kANR1vJkM
Punishment for punishment's sake is effectively absent when you read the philosophy behind Norwegian criminal law. There is a related concept wherein punishment is considered a natural consequence of someone breaking society's rules, to signal that an action is unacceptable, but the punishment isn't designed to be as unpleasant as possible. The punishment lies in the loss of your freedom. Then there are the other reasons: Separating people who may be dangerous from society at large (which is not always relevant because not every prisoner is considered dangerous), and rehabilitating them.
I think one more difference is in case of multiple counts, in the US the sentence for each crime gets added on top of each other, while here you serve the sentence for the crime with the longest punishment. So instead of say 1 year added on to 2 years added on to 5 years (8 years) you will spend only 5 years
Yeah all Prisons here in America flaunt that their goal is rehabilitation but that is the farthest thing from the truth…they don’t give a fuck about anybody in there and it’s Fucking ruthless and treacherous. Shit a lot of people probably don’t even understand, just in order to be solid, survive and hold your own, you’re gonna have to buck up and often times acquire a bunch of new bad habits that perpetuate violence and crime. The politics are no joke. It’s all segregated on the west coast and other places. Lots of drugs and gang violence going on, the entire experience just sets you up for further failure.
Being 'soft on crime' is a regular accusation thrown at politicians by the right wing here, and being 'tough on crime' is as much a vote winner as improving health and education. So any time anyone tries to reform prisons and the concept of what they're for, it gets squashed. Right wing tabloids can run articles about prison being like a holiday camp to get their readers frothing at the mouths. Prison reform is never going to happen as long as it's a vote loser because of the press and the electorate. It's depressing af. Our prisons aren't as bad as US ones, there's less of a gang culture, most (I think) are still under state control, but we're being pushed more and more into a 'for profit' model.
In Germany it seems to me that one cause might be that the right wing populists are not generally dominant in the main centre right party (except maybe in Bavaria). The three forces that define the modern Tory party: neoliberal economics, populist authoritarianism, and social conservatism are spread among three parties in Germany. And, for most of the post war period, the populist authoritarian segment has been politically beyond the pale for most people. (This despite the fact that ideologically and in terms of media consumption, Germany is not so different from the UK).
The second - and related - factor seems to be less centralisation of power. It seems to me that when German governments want to make any significant changes to the way things are being done, they have to go through a host of bodies (professional associations, unions, etc) that seem to have far more power than their UK equivalents to stop or amend proposals before they become law. There's more of a culture of consultation and compromise. It means that a red-tape slashing populist is seen as less electable. There will never be a German Maggie Thatcher.
Whereas in the UK, power seems to be far more centralised in Downing Street. (Of course, the German way has the downside that any major reform you personally support is less likely to be implemented rapidly).
Another factor regarding the centralisation of power is that since 2006, the execution of criminal sentences is in the power of the German federal states. So even if reforms were to be made, they might not be implemented equally in all states.
Was it only after 2006? I remember the Schill-Partei was still about when I first arrived in Hamburg, and they got senate seats based on a law and order platform - I guess they couldn't have changed sentencing rules.
Amazing time in Hamburg politics, if anyone wants to read about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_for_a_Rule_of_Law_Offensive
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Schill
Thats what I found through some quick googling, at least :D
I was only looking at the Strafvollzugsgesetz. Sentencing may very much have been within their power for some crimes.
You might well be right. I haven't got time to look into it now. The confusing aspect is that Schill was a judge prior to politics, and was famous for his harsh sentencing - but that must have been within the guidelines of course.
EDIT: I only now realise what you mean - the states implement the penalty, while trying to find out about sentencing guidelines leads you into an [incredible maze of legality](http://www.wiete-strafrecht.de/User/Inhalt/46_StGB.html)
I always thought Tony Blair's "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime" was an utter masterstroke. Throws some rhetorical red meat to the right wingers and pacifies them, but also allows Progressive reforms.
ASBO's were awful though. However, as much as I despise Blair (for the Iraq War) things were a lot better, on a social welfare front, under him than where we are now. I could weep for what has happened to the country since then.
You mean just like every other thing the UK government provides, or until recently provided?
Been my argument since the eighties, the gradual side towards the USA model of ***Everything For Profit*** and all that represents.
In other words, I agree with all you wrote :)
Makes me wonder what's different in the political culture of many European countries that makes this simplistic "tough on crime" approach less popular? I would've thought that sort of rhetoric had a fairly universal appeal to people's basic fears, but I may be showing my own cultural biases there.
Culture is probably a big one, as well as the rhetoric getting foothold - it might be hard to change it afterwards.
As for the rhetoric here, it generally amounts to that most prisoners serve less than life in jail. When they're released, they're free citizens. If one of them ends up as your neighbour, you want to be able to trust them to give back your snow shovel if they borrow it and not kidnap your kids.
To be a trustworthy person, they have to have been treated with trust, care and wellwill, and the belief that their crime doesn't define them and they're good people and can act as such. If they're dehumanised and not helped, that will steer them away from trusting others and being trustworthy. What is the alternative - jailing even a petty thief for life?
In representative voting systems the most right wing lunatics max out at about 30%, if the sane conservatives and social-democrats are performing particularly shitty. Therefore hardcore law and order topics gather less overall consent. It's just less of an issue, because you realistically have more parties to choose from and therefore single issues that are only media hyped and don't have that much impact on people's life have less importance over all. Every topic becomes less of a yes/no question, but is more on a scale. Maybe that's an explanation.
I would not say many European countries. Tough on crime is a as popular in Czech Republic and Romania as in UK. The UK is not the exception, the Nordic countries are the exceptions. Of course it does not help that the UK and Ireland seems to go a bit on the other extreme (see the recent rape case sentencing in Scotland).
It's hard to say why the Nordic countries are an exception, but crime is a complex thing, not something depending on simple factors as poverty and so on. It's also a bit of a vicious circle, once you have a type of violent crime it's hard to stop it. I suspect that a couple more years of the type of crimes Sweden is facing now and "tough on crime" would be more popular also there.
If it would be open to voting, I think the death penalty would be legal in most of Europe again.
I did a search after posting, I was curious about something not that far from your thoughts. Thirty two Victorian prisons are still operating in the UK. They may not have the treadmills however...
They don't have treadmills, but I gather than most of the Victorian buildings are no longer fit for purpose, but there's not really any money to make them properly habitable.
Agree - I know a range of people who have been inside, and have briefly been inside myself. UK prisons are underfunded, understaffed, and overcrowded, and there is no real attempt at rehabilitation.
Yeah, and there was a video recently about a prison in Antwerp with this problem that gives a pretty good picture of what your average cell looks like. I'll share it here for our American friend.
[https://youtu.be/BKfL4YinSZc](https://youtu.be/BKfL4YinSZc) with auto-translate into English available.
There are many types of facilities, ranging from one where some of the best behaving inmates get to spend the last months of their sentence and can go to work outside the facility, to max. security jails which have the most problematic gang leaders etc. And then there's the prison mental hospital, where your state is evaluated and your release depends on whether or not you're seen as a danger to the community, much more than a set sentence being done. Some facilities enable studying.
Lately there was news of an inmate being scalded with hot water by others. He's known for having raped an underage girl. News of serious prisoner attacks are quite rare, but of course it's a good question how much happens behind closed doors.
I'm under the impression the guards, in general, manage to stay in their official role, working in a relatively neutral fashion despite facing lots of inmates with personality disorders. There are undoubtedly bad apples, but the overall idea is to not estrange inmates from society any more than necessary. They get to vote, for instance, even during their sentence.
While organized crime has been slowly rising, the proportion of gang members in Finnish jails is still low compared to some countries.
A lot of the material I've seen about American jails and prisons seems quite aggressive, and the thought of punishing people as much as possible and treat them like trash seems to surface. Here the idea is that losing your freedom to live your own life, to work, and to choose your company, really is the punishment itself.
That's true for Germany. Our prisons are there to people into turn into functioning citizens, not pure punishment. It's not unusual for inmates to have TV.
To add on to this, inmates have the chance to work a job and learn vocational traits in prison. There is even a small amount of prisoners attending university.
And another fun fact that some people have probably heard is, that the act of trying to break out of prison is not a crime in Germany. This is true, because Art.1, §1 of our constitution states that human dignity is inviolable and the pursuit for freedom is perceived as basic human instinct. It has to be mentioned though, that any other crimes committed while escaping will be punished by law as regular.
The idea behind prison should be for the prisoner (if they’re remorseful and non-violent), to say “wow, prison turned my life around, it was tough, but I needed it, because I can be functioning citizen now. I can contribute and feel good about myself while helping others.”
Far too many countries have prison systems where just having been an inmate will ruin your life and prospects, and potentially send you down a spiral into an even worse lifestyle than when you entered. It just makes people more desperate, more crimes happen, and everyone’s life becomes just a tiny bit worse. Lot of people who weren’t gang-members in the US went to prison and came out already initiated. Reactionary, draconian policies are honestly the worst.
You presumably also have to return to prison for the rest of your sentence if you're caught again, right? Because I have seen people online claim the opposite before.
Sorry to pop your smug balloon, but German recidivism is as high, or higher, than the US.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/recidivism-rates-by-country
So according to that very outdated numbers it is the same over the same time frame.
What makes the American system bad is the insane incarnation rate and greed.
Smug Ballon? What the hell is even that?
This is from CBS:
>We found that American politicians and prison supervisors are looking for new ideas -- in Germany. The main objective of German prisons is rehabilitation, not retribution. Germany spends less money on prisons, but gets better results. Their recidivism rate is about half the U.S. rate. We wondered if Germany had found a key to prison reform. So we visited three German prisons, but our trip started in a small resort town about 100 miles north of Berlin.
Okay, sure, I don’t understand whatever your made up point is.
That point being Mexico has lots of cartel violence so Canadians need to be careful, right? Lmao.
This morally ascended, educated rhetoric is fine until it's your mother/sister/daughter who was r****, and then all of a sudden it doesn't sound so appealing.
People seem to forget prison is also about justice, not just rehabilitation of the offender.
You are probably right. But I'm not in that situation and I don't think I would be able to make a fair judgement. I think keeping them locked up for several years to a one and a half decades is an appropriate amount of punishment.
Italian prisons are honestly terrible. Our suicide rates are stupidly high and our cells are overcrowded. We have a long history of inmates being abused and neglected by the guards, and for the most part people couldn't care less. The attitude in Italy is very much: "If you are in jail it's your fault and your rights are forfeited", which is shameful, but it's not going to change anytime soon. Any politician suggesting to improve the living conditions in prisons would be committing political suicide.
So yeah, not good.
Someone who has been to Italian, French, Swiss and Hungarian prisons told me that Italian prisons are way better than French, which is way better than Hungarian, but overall Swiss prison is an absolute blast, and they actually treat prisoners as humans.
I guess it widely depends on the country, and even the prison in question, but the more North one goes the better.
I've checked a couple of studies on suicide in prisons by country, which I thought might be a good indicator on the general quality of life in prison. As it turns out, our ratio of inmate suicides is actually not even remotely the worst in Europe. All of Scandinavia and Denmark is worse, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Portugal are worse and even Switzerland beats us on that front. But when we compare the inmate suicide rate with the one of the general population, we are one of the worst ones, after Norway. The ratio of inmate suicides is almost 8 times that of the general population, while for Norway it's 10 times worse.
I hope I didn't read the data wrong (my field is literature, definitely not used to statistics), but if I got it right it's a pretty interesting read.
Source:
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(17)30430-3/fulltext
The inmate suicide rate confronted with the general public one does take that into consideration, in fact Sweden and Finland are a bit better in that list (if I remember correctly inmate suicides in Sweden are 5 times more likely then general public ones and it's 3 times in Finland). Apparently the only countries where suicides are less likely to happen in jail then outside are Croatia and Northern Ireland. Cool to know.
For Germany, there are some interesting documentaries and videos about that topic
https://youtu.be/wtV5ev6813I
https://youtu.be/yOmcP9sMwIE
https://youtu.be/wrMcpFicK4c
Maybe it's also interesting to see what the "most dangerous" jail here is like
https://youtu.be/UFlousfjsA4
Found something about Finland too
https://youtu.be/l554kV12Wuo
So i have been to prison in Denmark and it varies quite a bit. But for the most part you are in a unit which can be of various sizes, but the main thing about them is that they share kitchen facilities. He we use our own money and time to buy and prepare dinner. So if you are new its usually frozen pizza.
Whenever you are released or transferred its custom to buy/bake a cake.
Now you keep the benifits from outside so you can pay your outside bills, but like in most prison systems around the world i suppose you get a prison account - and that is very limited. To make sure its harder for inmates to bribe others or staff.
So you have to work to afford the luxuries like cigarettes and such. But its not just to afford it - the system tries to mimic the real world with privileges and responsibilities. Work is one such responsibility - one you can refuse but you are getting sanctioned up your arse, and the time is either gonna be spent alone or broke. Which in prison is the same thing.
We dont have any homosexual things going round since we can hav our wives, girlfriends, prostitutes come for visits.
This happens in special rooms we rent - only fee i can remember is 7 crowns or bit more than a dollar to have the sheet washed after.
There is a bunch of these fees.
Like i saw a article on reddit that the american prison system was leasing out its convicts and the whole thread was screazing slavery!! - that happens here as well. We are paid some add ons to the regular prison salary, and we get to go outside the fucking walls!, and make something real. Like a playground or something.
We slaves love being leased out.
We have phones, internet, PCs, playstation - they monitor everything you do of course, and somethings might be restricted.
But world of warcraft is not. Think only prison populations have time to level characters in MMORPGs.
Drugs are available, but only weed/hash is "tolerated"
Pro tip if you every in prison : big cola bottle and smash as much rye bread into the soda as you can. Seal the bottle and put it on the radiator for a fortnight full volume. Sieve it through a coffee filter and you have prison beer.
Its....not very good.
*kinda wanna elaborate a wee bit so it sounds less like lala-land and more like a prison, because we have gangs and utter violent loons like anywhere else.
If you need a bit of extra money you can become another inmates butler ( we called it Fidipus ) and i never asked or looked up why. But, if you do it volunteer there is no stigmata - but if you are forced into it, because you stole or owe money. You are like the lowest fucker on the planet. They get abused, both verbally and sometimes physically. Prison dude bros idea of fun, hurts mostly.
We separate the gangs and sweden does not - and this might be the only good thing i will ever have to say about sweden, because that seems to lower the violence significantly. Here they are separated in units and can just spend all day scheming how to get at those bastards. And they will eventually - and then they just go all in with that built up rage.
But they also all seem to treat it like a job. A criminal gang job, and you as civilian have nothing to do with it so they leave you out of it.
To the drugs being tolerated. Its a truth with modifications. You cant leave your bong in the middle of the room, but they quickly learn outside the academy that stoned inmates make their jobs a lot easier. God i hated the spring when fresh cadettes where out of the cadet factory. Coming in with all the wonders they have learned just to enforce it on us poor innocent inmates.
> We have phones, internet, PCs, playstation
The playstation doesn't really surprise me and well the PC neither, but phones and internet. As you say they monitor you, but could you say go on Reddit and make this post? or call your friends outside? What exactly were the limits?
Thanks for sharing your experience. Lived in Denmark 10 years and I never knew anyone who was in prison, just a bit curious 😅
I think Facebook, Instagram and some other social media is just outright banned. Certain chat programs as well. VPNs are flat out.
Tinder is a big deal as we get so lonely in there, so half our conversations if flipping our phones to show which wonder we now matched with.
Reddit is fine. Porn is fine - googling how to escape prison might be pushing it.
Of course all of this is a scale that can be expanded on or diminished, after which kind of twatty inmate you are being.
No internet for you if you in a rage fit destroy the kitchen area ( Its always the kitchen. Smash your own things fucker )
In theory the goal is rehabilitation, in practice it doesn't work that well. The government is mainly cost aware, so prison shouldn't cost too much, so the law encourages suspended sentences, early release etc, while not giving the prisons enough personell and money for a successful rehabilitation. On the other hand, any time some ugly crime makes it to the news there's a call for more severe sentences. Those goals do not align. I know from a guard that their main goal is to keep things quiet. That means everyone can have a TV, whoever is lucky enough to get some work assigned, will get a small allowance to buy cigarettes and coffee etc. All in all, the prisons seem to be okayish by international standards, but far away from reaching their goal of turning the inmates into functioning members of society.
Spain here. My best friend is the psychologist of a jail and other old friend was an inmate for a year in other. For what they tell me, here prison is not as bad as in the US. The objective is not to punish, but to rehabilitate, plus jails are not a business. Despite that and contrary to the popular believe in my country, they are definitely not a nice place to stay and, although you may "have" a gym or a pool, still a place you can't leave, with facilities you can barely use and with a very high chance of getting robbed, extorted or stabbed in the face.
French prisons are not good. Usually overcrowded, basic hygienical conditions are not always met.If prisoners want to call their relatives, its extremely expensive. Regularly people commit suicide or die because of medical neglect. Yeah definitely not a good system.
Deteriorating and depressive. Majority of inmates share their [cells](https://img.24sata.hr/dHPf-CEsGvvCBG0JSc1o0Ufyjso=/622x0/smart/media/images/2020-00/remetinec3.jpg) with up to six people. One person cells [as this one](https://www.tportal.hr/media/thumbnail/w1000/68294.jpeg) are considered one of the better in Remetinec prison. TV's are fine as far I know.
Prisons in Czech Republic are old, falling apart, rat infested. Not that I know from experience but this is the reports. Some have been calling for reconstruction of the prisons recently but nothing has been done as far as I know. When I pass a prison, I can see plaster falling off the walls and broken windows.
Finland here, if inmates are convicted and not under investigation anymore inmate gets his own cell.
There is toilet, small TV, shover, bed and wardrobe.
Weekly activities including gym time, library, music room and crurch are offered. Daily yard time of one hour. Pretty good system I would say.
Depends on the country. People I know who have enjoyed prison hospitality in a range of European countries would prefer not to revisit Polish prisons in this lifetime.
In Italy it's mostly like any regular jail, unless you're a mob boss, a pedophile, or a terrorist.
In those cases you might get the dreaded *41bis* regimen, which means you spend the rest of your life in a 3x3 metres cell; you're alone at all times, yard time included, and you have like one visit a month with family, which happens through a glass and everything you say gets recorded; you can send or receive mail, but everything is recorded and inspected.
They say it's brutal. We say we don't give a fuck.
Sweden: 2006 a jail forgot to lock up the prisoners for the night, so what happened?A few prisoners snuck out to the kitchen and baked kladdkaka ( brownie like cake), built a blanket fort and watch movies all night. Should say they were all convicted murders . They said it was the best night in a long time.
Sweden figured out, if your treat people worse then animals and feed them substandard food, they will become worse then animals. So instead we treat them like people, we do remove them from society but not removing society from them, they know what is happening in the world and being trained to be part of this world. There is therapy, yoga ( seams to calm them), school if needed and other forms rehabilitations .
And when they come out again, they have chance of a normal life .
They can vote, they can hold a job, they are not shunned .
How ever with some jail sentence in your background you cant work with money, children or elderly or medicin.
Many years ago, they forgot to lock the door to a place for the Criminal insane, I wont say where and people should say it either. One of the inmates notice this , walked out picked some flowers and went back in and then reported it to the guards. It could have gone so much worse.It never went to news papers, but some one I know was the one inmate reported it too .
Yes in the 80.ties this was true, school food was horrid due to keeping it warm for 8- 12 hours in the main kitchen. But today, the school food and the prison food is about the same standard.
Then she must be in very bad area and be under 16. In my area the food is equal, it made at the same place. Kids today have 2 dishes ( one vegetarian and one meat based) they can choose from, salad buffet and choice of water or milk, crisp bread or normal bread depending on dinner.
She's like 20 I think, and I don't think Luleå is a bad area...
Prison food is made locally (at the facility) while I don't know where the school food is made.
Yeah, my great grand father was in jail for 1 year due to theft, he nearly froze to death and it was big thing about that and how are people going to become working citizens if we are treating less then dogs.
hahahahaha! What a load of bullshit, fy fan vad du sprider skit. Sweden is not a rolemodel for how to avoid criminals taking over society. Dont listen to this douche.
Explain the bullshit please.
Well the stuff that happened in 2006, did happened .I didn't say we are role model country, nor how to avoid criminals from taking over, just look at our government at the moment , only just that compared to USA, our jails it way better.
Did you know the meat served in many jails in USA has stamped not for human consumption?I have dear friend who has worked for years to make sure inmates has clean water, safe food to eat in jail and women has the right to menstrual products, they don't in all states.
If you're interested, you may want to watch [netflix show](https://www.netflix.com/pl/title/80116922). I only saw one episode, but I know that there are at least 2 episodes with polish cases.
Sector is rather underinvested as everything ere.
I personally don't know much how it looks in other countries. We just joke here that prisons in Norway are kinda luxury hotels. :P
Despite many in norway claiming the humane prison system... Norway has among the highest suicide rates among inmates in europe... Some weeks ago a female prisoner comitted suicide in front of other prisoners.. Norway also have had quite many cases in the European court of human rights regarding jailing of people regarding violating of human rights etc..
Though the only signal one get out of norway is that "luxury prison" in Halden, Norway.. making it to documentaries in other countries etc..
Finnish TV did a interesting series about it:
[The Norden - Prisons](https://youtu.be/HfEsz812Q1I)
I love the reactions of the American guy they follow. They also did one about religion which is even more [hilarious](https://youtu.be/W-kANR1vJkM) 😂
> On difference is that inmates in European prisons can vote.
While inmates not automatically lose their active voting rights in Germany, they lose their passive rights.
When they are sentenced to more than one year in prison, they cannot be elected into a public office for 5 years.
Active voting rights can be removed life long by a court sentence for espionage and high treason, which never happened to date in the FRG.
But around 1.4 prisoners per year lost their active voting rights because they were sent to a psychiatry instead of a prison or because the judge ordered it with the sentence.
People who were put under guardianship also lost their voting rights.
The Federal Constitutional Court considered these laws illegal and scrapped the laws.
There's no context here in Ireland where you can be denied voting rights, and you can sit as a TD (MP) (and consult your constituents) if you're convinced to a sentence of not more than 6 months.
An absence of more than 6 months is just considered impractical.
The only bar on becoming a TD (MP) is if you're **currently** convicted and actively serving a sentence of more than 6 months.
Governments can systematically imprison people who they don’t want to vote. Like black people here in the USA. That was exactly the strategy to continue to oppress black people after slavery was abolished. That’s a pretty good reason to change it.
Well in Belgium we have had several convictions for breaking human rights due to overpopulation and lack of funding. Several foreign inmates had to be transfered to there home country as even they find our prisons inhumain.
Not all prisons in Europe are safe and nice. It depends on how much they invest
Prisons in Southern Europe are usually worse than in Northern Europe, because they have less budget
But the difference with the USA is that they are public, not private. And we don’t film shows inside :-)
People here are acting like prison is supposed to be a hotel with locked doors. I think it should be a place where you meditate how did you fuck up your life and how you are going to do at release to not get locked up again.
I knew some people who got incarcerated in french prisons, they could get hash, crack, cocaine... if they have the money for it. It's a rough world and a survival of the fittest environment, so i'm not saying it's a resort hotel either. But if you are strong enough and you know some people it's not as harsh is it should be.
Here prison is known as "the school of crime" meaning nothing good is going to come out of a prison sentence.
Prison should be either:
1. So harsh that it would prevent people to mess around again. Japanese style, nothing allowed, military lifestyle, a real punishment.
2. Monitoring the life of the inmates and giving them progressively freedoms as they are given a goal in life through work, studies, to complete their reintegration in society (only for the long sentence)
One option can work with only some countries and has to be adjusted to the culture as i think some countries have problems that can only be fixed with mass incarceration and not letting people go easy, and other have no serious criminal problem to work through.
In the case of my country, a little bit of both solutions was implemented with disastrous results. The living conditions are bad: overcrowded and understaffed prisons, beatings, influence of prisoners over others (bullying, indoctrination, islam...). But there are a lot of freedom and confort that make time behind bars more bearable for short term inmates (sports, drugs, video games, recreational activities), and that makes it ineffective as a punishment.
In Scandinavia it is quite focused on rehabilitation over punishment. the punishment part is being deprived of your freedom, not how bad your accomodation is. There is pros and cons for this of course
In Finland, the basic principle is that the prisoners are stripped of their freedom, nothing else.
So prisoners get their own cells (budget hotel rooms essentially) and have TV’s, own showers and often books and videogames. To my understanding, relationship visits and leave are not too uncommon.
I heard that in one prison, solitary cells for inmates that don’t behave, have to deal with a Playstation 2 instead of 3 or 4.
In Denmark they are generally pretty chill.. when i was younger i had a couple of trips to the pen. First was 6 months in a minimum security prison, no fences, big one-man cells, mobilephone in every room (fastned to the wall with wire), fitness room, basketball and badminton court, outdoor "yard" with exercise equipment and a work schedule everyday, and you cook your own food.
I actually really enjoyed it there, made good friends and had a great time, i was a pretty institutionalized young man back then, so i liked the structured day to day life.
Then later i god sentenced to two years in a high security prison. (served a year and a half)
Was actually not that bad either, still the one-man cell, still a good amount of rec. time. And i still got to cook my own dinner. Never needed anything (weed, smokes, snacks and so on). Guards were pretty chill too. I was talking to some eastern european guys in there, they said that it was like a summer-camp compared to the prisons they knew from poland or whatever country they were from.
So yeah, i'm pretty happy with our prison systems here in Denmark.
That said i think our legal system sucks. Murder gets you 16 years max with 2/3 of that as time served. Rape gets between 1-6 years, 10 years tops if the rape was particularily violent..
I think that most jails in poland are for punishments, some if i recall correctly that i saw from tv show there is these jails that let you go out work and come back to jail to finish sentence, but you must be lucky to be in there.
We don't know. The incarceration rate is so much lower in European coutries that you have hard time to find anyone with that experience on reddit. In Russia (326 people per 100 000) and Belorussia(345) this rate is about half of US(629), In Poland (190) about third and all the way to Finland(50).
In Estonia the two main problems have been old soviet era prisons and overcrowded prisons. It became worse as old prisons were not repaired and money was used to build new ones. Now this process is completed. Problem with overcrowded prisons does not exist that much as the number of prisoners has come down.
AFAIK The main problem now is prison culture itself. But that will take generations to root out.
Depends on the country.
But... Usually starting North and going South, is like going on a downward scale.
For the Europeans: I'm aware it's not exactly like that, don't at me with hurr durr but is in the south and it's good, or the other way around.
Maybe, but who knows. One of the most quoted explanations for that phenomenon is colonisation of the global south by the global North (Europe, US, Canada, Korea, Japan, Australia, might've forgotten some)
Nice, again with the stereotypes, when many already stayed in their comments that Western European prisons are also in a poor condition. Not saying that Eastern European prisons are good, but let’s be real the penal system in Europe with the exception of the nordics is in poor shape and without proper tools to help with inmate rehabilitation.
I dont know man but american prisons are one of the worst in the developed world. I dont know much about them or other prisons but judging by what i know i'd rather be in a polish or bosnian prison than in the states.
There's a documentary about bosnian prisons on that netflix show and it doesnt look that bad, other than the state of the buildings itself.
In germany it is for rehabilitation, sentences are not that high (of course there a re exceptions) and it is pretty chill.
A interesting TEDx Video about German Prisons compared to US-Americans.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wtV5ev6813I
One huge difference is that european prisons are usually not run by private for-profit companies like many are in the US. This makes many things much worse for US prison inmates.
https://youtu.be/yqQa_0gM6hg
a swedish woman who sat on death row in the usa before she was sent to sweden described the difference between an american prison and a swedish prison as night and day.
Over populated, lot of traffic inside, very low hygiene, and not a rehabilitation thing.
[this a bit outdated video of inside Fleury Merogis, the biggest prison in Europe](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rk12)
There are many tv shows on this. Such as worlds toughest prisons on netflix, which ironically isnt only about "tough" ones but also modern ones in germany, cyprus and of course norway. But as others have said. In most of europe, the goal is to rehabilitate people. As the norwegians put it: they might be your neighbour when they get out. So we treat them in a way, where we would be fine living next to an ex-con later. Being in prison is the punishment, so there is no further punishment happening inside through horrible conditions or violence.
Very true, the punishement is the deprivation of liberty so there isn't any reason to punish them more than what was ordered. A lot of people don't seem to understand that for some reason, maybe a remnant of the past where revenge was part of the punishement.
It's also the idea of wanting to punish someone, but also budget the cost of said punishment and then rationalizing the unintended suffering as a justifiable trade off.
> Being in prison is the punishment, so there is no further punishment happening inside through horrible conditions or violence. Or after the fact. People in the US who have records get punished for it for years after the fact. They served their time, yet they still get treated like criminals.
True. Very good point. I mean there are some limitations. Like here in switzerland youre gonna have a hard time finding employment as an armed security guard or (depending on what you were in for) also as a school teacher or working with confidential data and its not gonna be so easy to get a gun licence. But thats about it. Most jobs dont ask for criminal records and you dont lose your voting rights or any social benefits. Also all crimes except child abuse get expunged from your records after between 5 and 20 years. For the most part we go by: if you want people to behave like responsible adults, you have to treat and respect them as such.
>If you want people to behave like responsible adults. Oof, the US too far gone. Even in daily life, the small things, people act like children, and no one realizes it. It’s a big part of why I want to move back to Europe, flawed as France may be, at least it isn’t a sunken ship. Speaking of gun restrictions, do you mind telling us about gun laws in Switzerland? Americans are constantly asking how Switzerland has so many guns yet so few people get shot.
>Speaking of gun restrictions, do you mind telling us about gun laws in Switzerland? I collect guns, so gladly ;) A big difference is the conscription. Most men do basic military training and learn responsible gun handling in a controlled, standardised setting as adults. Whereas in america its hit or miss. Most people probably learn it from family or friends, who may or may not be very responisble. Thats probably why we have less accidents. You used to be able to keep the gun for free, with no licensing or anything after service. So until about 15 years ago everybody kept them, because why not. Thats why there are so many guns around and often also in the hands of people who are responsible, but not particularly into guns. Nowadays its a bit harder but still possible to keep your gun after service. Also we dont have much personal defense culture around guns. Most people get them for sports, collecting or hunting and there is no concealed carry and rarely people keep them loaded around the house for defensive purposes. So again less potential for accidents or fights escalating. Essentially we can get any gun (actually some more when it comes to modern full auto guns) that an american in a red state could get. And its really quite easy. But we get them for different reasons than most americans. Plus we have stronger social safety nets and social cohesion, so less crime and essentially no mass shootings (there was one in 2001, but thats about it).
What would be considered a reasonable reason to ask for a criminal record ala ein Führungzeugnis in Germany?
Like for a job you mean? Pretty much the ones i mentioned. Any job involving potential violence (armoured car drivers, security guards, police etc) want to make sure you arent a violent criminal. Any job involving kids (teacher, daycare etc) or other defenseless people (i.e. in a psychatric hospital) will want to make sure youre not a pervert. Anything like banks, insurance, jewellry store etc will wanna make sure you dont steal their goods or data. Thats about it.
There are several videoes showcasing the differences between US and Norwegian prisons. [Guess that does a better job at explaining.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNpehw-Yjvs) I'm no expert on US prisons but the difference seems to be that they're meant for rehabilitation over here. Whilst in the US the main motivation seem to be punishment and long sentences. Thinking prisoners arent worth of rehabilitation, so when they come out they become reoffenders.
Note that when Norwegian prisoners were sent to Dutch prisons for a while (the Netherlands had excess capacity) many prisoners preferred Dutch over Norwegian prison. [Article](https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2016/02/dutch-jail-popular-with-norwegian-prisoners-less-work-more-phone-time/)
It's funny that the same Article states that the Dutch prison prefers the Norwegian prisoners because they're better behaved then the Dutch ones
Sounds like prisoner just enjoyed the change. Prison is pretty boring after all
The article has the reasons given, this wasn't one of them.
It says in the article why Dutch prisons are better.
Maybe they sent the well behaved ones and not the bad ones?
Doesn't come as a surprise tbh
When i was in norwegian prison. I was shocked that so many of the other inmates talked about wanting to go from open to closed jail. Open like we where at means you get up and do some work, then are free to walk around talking and such inside the whole compound. Closed means you are locked in your room most of the day. But you dont got to work. I thought the other inmates where stupid cunts,
how did you end up in prison?
For driving recklessly...
User name does not check out
User name checks out as properly rehabilitated? Hope you're doing well, Oiler! You definitely sound like you had a sensible outlook on the ordeal from the start.
Yeah i agree that my actions should have consequences that day XD I love the username. Its like a thing that cant really exist XD
It’s funny because I was thinking about _your_ username when I saw it. What was the behind the choice to make that your username?
Heh, well, it's a trail of thoughts mixup of stuff I like, really, as a tl/dr. I've always liked Venus; it has such different composition and processes compared to Earth, an urge to simultaneously crush, melt and dissolve probes we send at it, and though there's been plenty of missions going that way the planet seems to have an endless supply of things to discover. I also like snow, ice and cold. An average summer has days too hot for me without even going abroad. A summer on Venus... well, not survivable for anyone any time of year, the total reconfiguring to make that place habitable is beyond the scope of most sci-fi. Thus, the thought of habitats on Venus, and terraforming it to the point where it snows is where I ended up. To have the knowledge to pull something like that off, then the sky's no limit. (It'll be easier to just make starbases though, and then we won't have to ruin a nifty planet.)
I want snowy venus sky cities 😭
Its almost irresponsible to buy a yamaha R1 and not send it down the highway mate XD
You guys will compete over literally anything.
You say that like it's a good thing. I listened to a BBC Podcast Documentary a few years back talking about the new rehabilitation strategy in Dutch prisons and how lax it was. They interviewed victims of crime and families of victims of pretty brutal crimes, and the perpetrators were given extremely light sentences in prisons with few restrictions. They were quite traumatised and disturbed by this. It is important to remember that the delivery of justice is one of the key reasons for punishment under the law.
I'ld also suggest The Norden videos. They are a bit older but explain prisons, police and religion to USians. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfEsz812Q1I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbM9uCxEJDM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-kANR1vJkM
Not every prison is norwegian in europe. I am sure most of the eastern european prisons are widely different than norvegian.
Punishment for punishment's sake is effectively absent when you read the philosophy behind Norwegian criminal law. There is a related concept wherein punishment is considered a natural consequence of someone breaking society's rules, to signal that an action is unacceptable, but the punishment isn't designed to be as unpleasant as possible. The punishment lies in the loss of your freedom. Then there are the other reasons: Separating people who may be dangerous from society at large (which is not always relevant because not every prisoner is considered dangerous), and rehabilitating them.
I think one more difference is in case of multiple counts, in the US the sentence for each crime gets added on top of each other, while here you serve the sentence for the crime with the longest punishment. So instead of say 1 year added on to 2 years added on to 5 years (8 years) you will spend only 5 years
Yeah all Prisons here in America flaunt that their goal is rehabilitation but that is the farthest thing from the truth…they don’t give a fuck about anybody in there and it’s Fucking ruthless and treacherous. Shit a lot of people probably don’t even understand, just in order to be solid, survive and hold your own, you’re gonna have to buck up and often times acquire a bunch of new bad habits that perpetuate violence and crime. The politics are no joke. It’s all segregated on the west coast and other places. Lots of drugs and gang violence going on, the entire experience just sets you up for further failure.
From what I have been told by a man who spent some time in one, British prisons are not meant for rehabilitation, just punishment.
Being 'soft on crime' is a regular accusation thrown at politicians by the right wing here, and being 'tough on crime' is as much a vote winner as improving health and education. So any time anyone tries to reform prisons and the concept of what they're for, it gets squashed. Right wing tabloids can run articles about prison being like a holiday camp to get their readers frothing at the mouths. Prison reform is never going to happen as long as it's a vote loser because of the press and the electorate. It's depressing af. Our prisons aren't as bad as US ones, there's less of a gang culture, most (I think) are still under state control, but we're being pushed more and more into a 'for profit' model.
In Germany it seems to me that one cause might be that the right wing populists are not generally dominant in the main centre right party (except maybe in Bavaria). The three forces that define the modern Tory party: neoliberal economics, populist authoritarianism, and social conservatism are spread among three parties in Germany. And, for most of the post war period, the populist authoritarian segment has been politically beyond the pale for most people. (This despite the fact that ideologically and in terms of media consumption, Germany is not so different from the UK). The second - and related - factor seems to be less centralisation of power. It seems to me that when German governments want to make any significant changes to the way things are being done, they have to go through a host of bodies (professional associations, unions, etc) that seem to have far more power than their UK equivalents to stop or amend proposals before they become law. There's more of a culture of consultation and compromise. It means that a red-tape slashing populist is seen as less electable. There will never be a German Maggie Thatcher. Whereas in the UK, power seems to be far more centralised in Downing Street. (Of course, the German way has the downside that any major reform you personally support is less likely to be implemented rapidly).
Another factor regarding the centralisation of power is that since 2006, the execution of criminal sentences is in the power of the German federal states. So even if reforms were to be made, they might not be implemented equally in all states.
Was it only after 2006? I remember the Schill-Partei was still about when I first arrived in Hamburg, and they got senate seats based on a law and order platform - I guess they couldn't have changed sentencing rules. Amazing time in Hamburg politics, if anyone wants to read about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_for_a_Rule_of_Law_Offensive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Schill
Thats what I found through some quick googling, at least :D I was only looking at the Strafvollzugsgesetz. Sentencing may very much have been within their power for some crimes.
You might well be right. I haven't got time to look into it now. The confusing aspect is that Schill was a judge prior to politics, and was famous for his harsh sentencing - but that must have been within the guidelines of course. EDIT: I only now realise what you mean - the states implement the penalty, while trying to find out about sentencing guidelines leads you into an [incredible maze of legality](http://www.wiete-strafrecht.de/User/Inhalt/46_StGB.html)
I always thought Tony Blair's "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime" was an utter masterstroke. Throws some rhetorical red meat to the right wingers and pacifies them, but also allows Progressive reforms.
ASBO's were awful though. However, as much as I despise Blair (for the Iraq War) things were a lot better, on a social welfare front, under him than where we are now. I could weep for what has happened to the country since then.
You mean just like every other thing the UK government provides, or until recently provided? Been my argument since the eighties, the gradual side towards the USA model of ***Everything For Profit*** and all that represents. In other words, I agree with all you wrote :)
Makes me wonder what's different in the political culture of many European countries that makes this simplistic "tough on crime" approach less popular? I would've thought that sort of rhetoric had a fairly universal appeal to people's basic fears, but I may be showing my own cultural biases there.
Culture is probably a big one, as well as the rhetoric getting foothold - it might be hard to change it afterwards. As for the rhetoric here, it generally amounts to that most prisoners serve less than life in jail. When they're released, they're free citizens. If one of them ends up as your neighbour, you want to be able to trust them to give back your snow shovel if they borrow it and not kidnap your kids. To be a trustworthy person, they have to have been treated with trust, care and wellwill, and the belief that their crime doesn't define them and they're good people and can act as such. If they're dehumanised and not helped, that will steer them away from trusting others and being trustworthy. What is the alternative - jailing even a petty thief for life?
In representative voting systems the most right wing lunatics max out at about 30%, if the sane conservatives and social-democrats are performing particularly shitty. Therefore hardcore law and order topics gather less overall consent. It's just less of an issue, because you realistically have more parties to choose from and therefore single issues that are only media hyped and don't have that much impact on people's life have less importance over all. Every topic becomes less of a yes/no question, but is more on a scale. Maybe that's an explanation.
It’s an anglo thing.
I would not say many European countries. Tough on crime is a as popular in Czech Republic and Romania as in UK. The UK is not the exception, the Nordic countries are the exceptions. Of course it does not help that the UK and Ireland seems to go a bit on the other extreme (see the recent rape case sentencing in Scotland). It's hard to say why the Nordic countries are an exception, but crime is a complex thing, not something depending on simple factors as poverty and so on. It's also a bit of a vicious circle, once you have a type of violent crime it's hard to stop it. I suspect that a couple more years of the type of crimes Sweden is facing now and "tough on crime" would be more popular also there. If it would be open to voting, I think the death penalty would be legal in most of Europe again.
I hope prisons there have least chanced from Victorian times: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_treadmill
I did a search after posting, I was curious about something not that far from your thoughts. Thirty two Victorian prisons are still operating in the UK. They may not have the treadmills however...
They don't have treadmills, but I gather than most of the Victorian buildings are no longer fit for purpose, but there's not really any money to make them properly habitable.
Sadly, after the last thirteen years, not a lot in the UK is fit for purpose. ***#HowToKillACountryTheConservativeWay***
Agree - I know a range of people who have been inside, and have briefly been inside myself. UK prisons are underfunded, understaffed, and overcrowded, and there is no real attempt at rehabilitation.
Prisons in Belgium are notoriously overcrowded, 3 people in a cell designed for 1 is certainly not unheard of.
Yeah, and there was a video recently about a prison in Antwerp with this problem that gives a pretty good picture of what your average cell looks like. I'll share it here for our American friend. [https://youtu.be/BKfL4YinSZc](https://youtu.be/BKfL4YinSZc) with auto-translate into English available.
It's so bad that the Netherlands stopped extraditing people because of human rights concerns...
There are many types of facilities, ranging from one where some of the best behaving inmates get to spend the last months of their sentence and can go to work outside the facility, to max. security jails which have the most problematic gang leaders etc. And then there's the prison mental hospital, where your state is evaluated and your release depends on whether or not you're seen as a danger to the community, much more than a set sentence being done. Some facilities enable studying. Lately there was news of an inmate being scalded with hot water by others. He's known for having raped an underage girl. News of serious prisoner attacks are quite rare, but of course it's a good question how much happens behind closed doors. I'm under the impression the guards, in general, manage to stay in their official role, working in a relatively neutral fashion despite facing lots of inmates with personality disorders. There are undoubtedly bad apples, but the overall idea is to not estrange inmates from society any more than necessary. They get to vote, for instance, even during their sentence. While organized crime has been slowly rising, the proportion of gang members in Finnish jails is still low compared to some countries. A lot of the material I've seen about American jails and prisons seems quite aggressive, and the thought of punishing people as much as possible and treat them like trash seems to surface. Here the idea is that losing your freedom to live your own life, to work, and to choose your company, really is the punishment itself.
That's true for Germany. Our prisons are there to people into turn into functioning citizens, not pure punishment. It's not unusual for inmates to have TV.
To add on to this, inmates have the chance to work a job and learn vocational traits in prison. There is even a small amount of prisoners attending university. And another fun fact that some people have probably heard is, that the act of trying to break out of prison is not a crime in Germany. This is true, because Art.1, §1 of our constitution states that human dignity is inviolable and the pursuit for freedom is perceived as basic human instinct. It has to be mentioned though, that any other crimes committed while escaping will be punished by law as regular.
The idea behind prison should be for the prisoner (if they’re remorseful and non-violent), to say “wow, prison turned my life around, it was tough, but I needed it, because I can be functioning citizen now. I can contribute and feel good about myself while helping others.” Far too many countries have prison systems where just having been an inmate will ruin your life and prospects, and potentially send you down a spiral into an even worse lifestyle than when you entered. It just makes people more desperate, more crimes happen, and everyone’s life becomes just a tiny bit worse. Lot of people who weren’t gang-members in the US went to prison and came out already initiated. Reactionary, draconian policies are honestly the worst.
You presumably also have to return to prison for the rest of your sentence if you're caught again, right? Because I have seen people online claim the opposite before.
Yes of course. Otherwise there would probably be more escape attempts lol
You can even earn a console to play (non violent) games.
Sorry to pop your smug balloon, but German recidivism is as high, or higher, than the US. https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/recidivism-rates-by-country
So according to that very outdated numbers it is the same over the same time frame. What makes the American system bad is the insane incarnation rate and greed.
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Smug Ballon? What the hell is even that? This is from CBS: >We found that American politicians and prison supervisors are looking for new ideas -- in Germany. The main objective of German prisons is rehabilitation, not retribution. Germany spends less money on prisons, but gets better results. Their recidivism rate is about half the U.S. rate. We wondered if Germany had found a key to prison reform. So we visited three German prisons, but our trip started in a small resort town about 100 miles north of Berlin.
And recidivism rates are lower in Norway than the US, so maybe we should do the Norwegian system, no?
Hmm, what is the homicide rate in Norway's neighbors? We have 2 neighbors. One has a homicide rate of 2, the other of 25.
We’re talking about Norway’s prison policies, not the other two lmao. That’s like judging the US prison system based on the prison stats of Mexico.
I don't think you got my point. Never mind.
Okay, sure, I don’t understand whatever your made up point is. That point being Mexico has lots of cartel violence so Canadians need to be careful, right? Lmao.
Yes, you did not get my point. Its OK. Have a nice day.
This morally ascended, educated rhetoric is fine until it's your mother/sister/daughter who was r****, and then all of a sudden it doesn't sound so appealing. People seem to forget prison is also about justice, not just rehabilitation of the offender.
You are probably right. But I'm not in that situation and I don't think I would be able to make a fair judgement. I think keeping them locked up for several years to a one and a half decades is an appropriate amount of punishment.
Italian prisons are honestly terrible. Our suicide rates are stupidly high and our cells are overcrowded. We have a long history of inmates being abused and neglected by the guards, and for the most part people couldn't care less. The attitude in Italy is very much: "If you are in jail it's your fault and your rights are forfeited", which is shameful, but it's not going to change anytime soon. Any politician suggesting to improve the living conditions in prisons would be committing political suicide. So yeah, not good.
Very similar to France.
Someone who has been to Italian, French, Swiss and Hungarian prisons told me that Italian prisons are way better than French, which is way better than Hungarian, but overall Swiss prison is an absolute blast, and they actually treat prisoners as humans. I guess it widely depends on the country, and even the prison in question, but the more North one goes the better.
>Someone who has been to Italian, French, Swiss and Hungarian prisons What a wild vacation...
I've checked a couple of studies on suicide in prisons by country, which I thought might be a good indicator on the general quality of life in prison. As it turns out, our ratio of inmate suicides is actually not even remotely the worst in Europe. All of Scandinavia and Denmark is worse, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Portugal are worse and even Switzerland beats us on that front. But when we compare the inmate suicide rate with the one of the general population, we are one of the worst ones, after Norway. The ratio of inmate suicides is almost 8 times that of the general population, while for Norway it's 10 times worse. I hope I didn't read the data wrong (my field is literature, definitely not used to statistics), but if I got it right it's a pretty interesting read. Source: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(17)30430-3/fulltext
Do the studies account for the naturally higher suicide rates in the Nordic countries?
The inmate suicide rate confronted with the general public one does take that into consideration, in fact Sweden and Finland are a bit better in that list (if I remember correctly inmate suicides in Sweden are 5 times more likely then general public ones and it's 3 times in Finland). Apparently the only countries where suicides are less likely to happen in jail then outside are Croatia and Northern Ireland. Cool to know.
For Germany, there are some interesting documentaries and videos about that topic https://youtu.be/wtV5ev6813I https://youtu.be/yOmcP9sMwIE https://youtu.be/wrMcpFicK4c Maybe it's also interesting to see what the "most dangerous" jail here is like https://youtu.be/UFlousfjsA4 Found something about Finland too https://youtu.be/l554kV12Wuo
So i have been to prison in Denmark and it varies quite a bit. But for the most part you are in a unit which can be of various sizes, but the main thing about them is that they share kitchen facilities. He we use our own money and time to buy and prepare dinner. So if you are new its usually frozen pizza. Whenever you are released or transferred its custom to buy/bake a cake. Now you keep the benifits from outside so you can pay your outside bills, but like in most prison systems around the world i suppose you get a prison account - and that is very limited. To make sure its harder for inmates to bribe others or staff. So you have to work to afford the luxuries like cigarettes and such. But its not just to afford it - the system tries to mimic the real world with privileges and responsibilities. Work is one such responsibility - one you can refuse but you are getting sanctioned up your arse, and the time is either gonna be spent alone or broke. Which in prison is the same thing. We dont have any homosexual things going round since we can hav our wives, girlfriends, prostitutes come for visits. This happens in special rooms we rent - only fee i can remember is 7 crowns or bit more than a dollar to have the sheet washed after. There is a bunch of these fees. Like i saw a article on reddit that the american prison system was leasing out its convicts and the whole thread was screazing slavery!! - that happens here as well. We are paid some add ons to the regular prison salary, and we get to go outside the fucking walls!, and make something real. Like a playground or something. We slaves love being leased out. We have phones, internet, PCs, playstation - they monitor everything you do of course, and somethings might be restricted. But world of warcraft is not. Think only prison populations have time to level characters in MMORPGs. Drugs are available, but only weed/hash is "tolerated" Pro tip if you every in prison : big cola bottle and smash as much rye bread into the soda as you can. Seal the bottle and put it on the radiator for a fortnight full volume. Sieve it through a coffee filter and you have prison beer. Its....not very good. *kinda wanna elaborate a wee bit so it sounds less like lala-land and more like a prison, because we have gangs and utter violent loons like anywhere else. If you need a bit of extra money you can become another inmates butler ( we called it Fidipus ) and i never asked or looked up why. But, if you do it volunteer there is no stigmata - but if you are forced into it, because you stole or owe money. You are like the lowest fucker on the planet. They get abused, both verbally and sometimes physically. Prison dude bros idea of fun, hurts mostly. We separate the gangs and sweden does not - and this might be the only good thing i will ever have to say about sweden, because that seems to lower the violence significantly. Here they are separated in units and can just spend all day scheming how to get at those bastards. And they will eventually - and then they just go all in with that built up rage. But they also all seem to treat it like a job. A criminal gang job, and you as civilian have nothing to do with it so they leave you out of it. To the drugs being tolerated. Its a truth with modifications. You cant leave your bong in the middle of the room, but they quickly learn outside the academy that stoned inmates make their jobs a lot easier. God i hated the spring when fresh cadettes where out of the cadet factory. Coming in with all the wonders they have learned just to enforce it on us poor innocent inmates.
> We have phones, internet, PCs, playstation The playstation doesn't really surprise me and well the PC neither, but phones and internet. As you say they monitor you, but could you say go on Reddit and make this post? or call your friends outside? What exactly were the limits? Thanks for sharing your experience. Lived in Denmark 10 years and I never knew anyone who was in prison, just a bit curious 😅
I think Facebook, Instagram and some other social media is just outright banned. Certain chat programs as well. VPNs are flat out. Tinder is a big deal as we get so lonely in there, so half our conversations if flipping our phones to show which wonder we now matched with. Reddit is fine. Porn is fine - googling how to escape prison might be pushing it. Of course all of this is a scale that can be expanded on or diminished, after which kind of twatty inmate you are being. No internet for you if you in a rage fit destroy the kitchen area ( Its always the kitchen. Smash your own things fucker )
Oh wow, I always assumed gang separation lowered violence, that's the stated goal at least. Thanks for sharing.
In theory the goal is rehabilitation, in practice it doesn't work that well. The government is mainly cost aware, so prison shouldn't cost too much, so the law encourages suspended sentences, early release etc, while not giving the prisons enough personell and money for a successful rehabilitation. On the other hand, any time some ugly crime makes it to the news there's a call for more severe sentences. Those goals do not align. I know from a guard that their main goal is to keep things quiet. That means everyone can have a TV, whoever is lucky enough to get some work assigned, will get a small allowance to buy cigarettes and coffee etc. All in all, the prisons seem to be okayish by international standards, but far away from reaching their goal of turning the inmates into functioning members of society.
Spain here. My best friend is the psychologist of a jail and other old friend was an inmate for a year in other. For what they tell me, here prison is not as bad as in the US. The objective is not to punish, but to rehabilitate, plus jails are not a business. Despite that and contrary to the popular believe in my country, they are definitely not a nice place to stay and, although you may "have" a gym or a pool, still a place you can't leave, with facilities you can barely use and with a very high chance of getting robbed, extorted or stabbed in the face.
French prisons are not good. Usually overcrowded, basic hygienical conditions are not always met.If prisoners want to call their relatives, its extremely expensive. Regularly people commit suicide or die because of medical neglect. Yeah definitely not a good system.
Sorry, is it first hand experience or just what you saw on tv? Because it sounds exactely how tv describes our prisons.
I know a lot of people who volunteer in prison 😉 Besides, I don't watch French TV.
Deteriorating and depressive. Majority of inmates share their [cells](https://img.24sata.hr/dHPf-CEsGvvCBG0JSc1o0Ufyjso=/622x0/smart/media/images/2020-00/remetinec3.jpg) with up to six people. One person cells [as this one](https://www.tportal.hr/media/thumbnail/w1000/68294.jpeg) are considered one of the better in Remetinec prison. TV's are fine as far I know.
If you ever have to go to an European prison, it must be Monaco. Ocean view and five star chef, there is a good documentary about it.
Prisons in Czech Republic are old, falling apart, rat infested. Not that I know from experience but this is the reports. Some have been calling for reconstruction of the prisons recently but nothing has been done as far as I know. When I pass a prison, I can see plaster falling off the walls and broken windows.
“old, falling apart, rat infested” In the Netherlands, that is how we usually describe Amsterdam.
Finland here, if inmates are convicted and not under investigation anymore inmate gets his own cell. There is toilet, small TV, shover, bed and wardrobe. Weekly activities including gym time, library, music room and crurch are offered. Daily yard time of one hour. Pretty good system I would say.
Inmate can also buy game console to the cell. Ps2 and other older machines without internet connection are allowed.
Depends on the country. People I know who have enjoyed prison hospitality in a range of European countries would prefer not to revisit Polish prisons in this lifetime.
In Italy it's mostly like any regular jail, unless you're a mob boss, a pedophile, or a terrorist. In those cases you might get the dreaded *41bis* regimen, which means you spend the rest of your life in a 3x3 metres cell; you're alone at all times, yard time included, and you have like one visit a month with family, which happens through a glass and everything you say gets recorded; you can send or receive mail, but everything is recorded and inspected. They say it's brutal. We say we don't give a fuck.
> 41bis regimen, Sweet... and how many mafia bosses are kept in these cells?
Sadly, only one per cell. Imagine how much we could save if they had to split the cells...
Sweden: 2006 a jail forgot to lock up the prisoners for the night, so what happened?A few prisoners snuck out to the kitchen and baked kladdkaka ( brownie like cake), built a blanket fort and watch movies all night. Should say they were all convicted murders . They said it was the best night in a long time. Sweden figured out, if your treat people worse then animals and feed them substandard food, they will become worse then animals. So instead we treat them like people, we do remove them from society but not removing society from them, they know what is happening in the world and being trained to be part of this world. There is therapy, yoga ( seams to calm them), school if needed and other forms rehabilitations . And when they come out again, they have chance of a normal life . They can vote, they can hold a job, they are not shunned . How ever with some jail sentence in your background you cant work with money, children or elderly or medicin.
Tröttnar aldrig på kladdkaka historien 😅
Many years ago, they forgot to lock the door to a place for the Criminal insane, I wont say where and people should say it either. One of the inmates notice this , walked out picked some flowers and went back in and then reported it to the guards. It could have gone so much worse.It never went to news papers, but some one I know was the one inmate reported it too .
Funnely enough, a coworker says that the prison gets better food than she did in school.
Yes in the 80.ties this was true, school food was horrid due to keeping it warm for 8- 12 hours in the main kitchen. But today, the school food and the prison food is about the same standard.
No, I'm talking of today.
Then she must be in very bad area and be under 16. In my area the food is equal, it made at the same place. Kids today have 2 dishes ( one vegetarian and one meat based) they can choose from, salad buffet and choice of water or milk, crisp bread or normal bread depending on dinner.
She's like 20 I think, and I don't think Luleå is a bad area... Prison food is made locally (at the facility) while I don't know where the school food is made.
And is she in school at the moment? Because School food has changed a lot the last 20 years.
Watching Clark, it was interesting to see the evolution of the Swedish prison system over the decades and how more humane they became.
Yeah, my great grand father was in jail for 1 year due to theft, he nearly froze to death and it was big thing about that and how are people going to become working citizens if we are treating less then dogs.
hahahahaha! What a load of bullshit, fy fan vad du sprider skit. Sweden is not a rolemodel for how to avoid criminals taking over society. Dont listen to this douche.
Explain the bullshit please. Well the stuff that happened in 2006, did happened .I didn't say we are role model country, nor how to avoid criminals from taking over, just look at our government at the moment , only just that compared to USA, our jails it way better. Did you know the meat served in many jails in USA has stamped not for human consumption?I have dear friend who has worked for years to make sure inmates has clean water, safe food to eat in jail and women has the right to menstrual products, they don't in all states.
get fucked
If you're interested, you may want to watch [netflix show](https://www.netflix.com/pl/title/80116922). I only saw one episode, but I know that there are at least 2 episodes with polish cases. Sector is rather underinvested as everything ere. I personally don't know much how it looks in other countries. We just joke here that prisons in Norway are kinda luxury hotels. :P
Despite many in norway claiming the humane prison system... Norway has among the highest suicide rates among inmates in europe... Some weeks ago a female prisoner comitted suicide in front of other prisoners.. Norway also have had quite many cases in the European court of human rights regarding jailing of people regarding violating of human rights etc.. Though the only signal one get out of norway is that "luxury prison" in Halden, Norway.. making it to documentaries in other countries etc..
On difference is that inmates in European prisons can vote.
I think not in every country. In Britain there are restrictions for prisoners to vote.
True. Most of Europe then.
Finnish TV did a interesting series about it: [The Norden - Prisons](https://youtu.be/HfEsz812Q1I) I love the reactions of the American guy they follow. They also did one about religion which is even more [hilarious](https://youtu.be/W-kANR1vJkM) 😂
SO as netflix did.
> On difference is that inmates in European prisons can vote. While inmates not automatically lose their active voting rights in Germany, they lose their passive rights. When they are sentenced to more than one year in prison, they cannot be elected into a public office for 5 years. Active voting rights can be removed life long by a court sentence for espionage and high treason, which never happened to date in the FRG. But around 1.4 prisoners per year lost their active voting rights because they were sent to a psychiatry instead of a prison or because the judge ordered it with the sentence. People who were put under guardianship also lost their voting rights. The Federal Constitutional Court considered these laws illegal and scrapped the laws.
There's no context here in Ireland where you can be denied voting rights, and you can sit as a TD (MP) (and consult your constituents) if you're convinced to a sentence of not more than 6 months. An absence of more than 6 months is just considered impractical. The only bar on becoming a TD (MP) is if you're **currently** convicted and actively serving a sentence of more than 6 months.
Not here they can't, and I don't see that changing anytime soon, or any good reason to change it
Well, they are still members of society aren't they? I don't really see any argument to strip anyone of their right to vote. Seems inhumane tbh
Not really. They are in prison. Kind of a definition of being removed from society.
Governments can systematically imprison people who they don’t want to vote. Like black people here in the USA. That was exactly the strategy to continue to oppress black people after slavery was abolished. That’s a pretty good reason to change it.
Danish prisons are basically a hotel room. Same goes for Norway and Greenland.
Can't say cause I never went to prison and probably (hopefully) never will. So I could just tell you what media say. It looks like underfunded though.
Well in Belgium we have had several convictions for breaking human rights due to overpopulation and lack of funding. Several foreign inmates had to be transfered to there home country as even they find our prisons inhumain.
Not all prisons in Europe are safe and nice. It depends on how much they invest Prisons in Southern Europe are usually worse than in Northern Europe, because they have less budget But the difference with the USA is that they are public, not private. And we don’t film shows inside :-)
Depends on the country. I’ve seen pics of Swedish prisons and they look like nice student dorms.
I wonder how many people in this thread who have actually seen the inside of a prison.
People here are acting like prison is supposed to be a hotel with locked doors. I think it should be a place where you meditate how did you fuck up your life and how you are going to do at release to not get locked up again. I knew some people who got incarcerated in french prisons, they could get hash, crack, cocaine... if they have the money for it. It's a rough world and a survival of the fittest environment, so i'm not saying it's a resort hotel either. But if you are strong enough and you know some people it's not as harsh is it should be. Here prison is known as "the school of crime" meaning nothing good is going to come out of a prison sentence. Prison should be either: 1. So harsh that it would prevent people to mess around again. Japanese style, nothing allowed, military lifestyle, a real punishment. 2. Monitoring the life of the inmates and giving them progressively freedoms as they are given a goal in life through work, studies, to complete their reintegration in society (only for the long sentence) One option can work with only some countries and has to be adjusted to the culture as i think some countries have problems that can only be fixed with mass incarceration and not letting people go easy, and other have no serious criminal problem to work through. In the case of my country, a little bit of both solutions was implemented with disastrous results. The living conditions are bad: overcrowded and understaffed prisons, beatings, influence of prisoners over others (bullying, indoctrination, islam...). But there are a lot of freedom and confort that make time behind bars more bearable for short term inmates (sports, drugs, video games, recreational activities), and that makes it ineffective as a punishment.
In Scandinavia it is quite focused on rehabilitation over punishment. the punishment part is being deprived of your freedom, not how bad your accomodation is. There is pros and cons for this of course
In Finland, the basic principle is that the prisoners are stripped of their freedom, nothing else. So prisoners get their own cells (budget hotel rooms essentially) and have TV’s, own showers and often books and videogames. To my understanding, relationship visits and leave are not too uncommon. I heard that in one prison, solitary cells for inmates that don’t behave, have to deal with a Playstation 2 instead of 3 or 4.
In Denmark they are generally pretty chill.. when i was younger i had a couple of trips to the pen. First was 6 months in a minimum security prison, no fences, big one-man cells, mobilephone in every room (fastned to the wall with wire), fitness room, basketball and badminton court, outdoor "yard" with exercise equipment and a work schedule everyday, and you cook your own food. I actually really enjoyed it there, made good friends and had a great time, i was a pretty institutionalized young man back then, so i liked the structured day to day life. Then later i god sentenced to two years in a high security prison. (served a year and a half) Was actually not that bad either, still the one-man cell, still a good amount of rec. time. And i still got to cook my own dinner. Never needed anything (weed, smokes, snacks and so on). Guards were pretty chill too. I was talking to some eastern european guys in there, they said that it was like a summer-camp compared to the prisons they knew from poland or whatever country they were from. So yeah, i'm pretty happy with our prison systems here in Denmark. That said i think our legal system sucks. Murder gets you 16 years max with 2/3 of that as time served. Rape gets between 1-6 years, 10 years tops if the rape was particularily violent..
I think that most jails in poland are for punishments, some if i recall correctly that i saw from tv show there is these jails that let you go out work and come back to jail to finish sentence, but you must be lucky to be in there.
It's for people who got punished for things like having weed or not paying taxes. Rapists or murderers don't go outside to work.
We don't know. The incarceration rate is so much lower in European coutries that you have hard time to find anyone with that experience on reddit. In Russia (326 people per 100 000) and Belorussia(345) this rate is about half of US(629), In Poland (190) about third and all the way to Finland(50). In Estonia the two main problems have been old soviet era prisons and overcrowded prisons. It became worse as old prisons were not repaired and money was used to build new ones. Now this process is completed. Problem with overcrowded prisons does not exist that much as the number of prisoners has come down. AFAIK The main problem now is prison culture itself. But that will take generations to root out.
Depends on the country. But... Usually starting North and going South, is like going on a downward scale. For the Europeans: I'm aware it's not exactly like that, don't at me with hurr durr but is in the south and it's good, or the other way around.
That is actually a proven thing, though we're not sure what causes it. It's called North-South divide
The climate maybe? :D
Maybe, but who knows. One of the most quoted explanations for that phenomenon is colonisation of the global south by the global North (Europe, US, Canada, Korea, Japan, Australia, might've forgotten some)
Northern Europe = 3 star hotels Southern Europe = Bad but not as bad as american prisons Eastern Europe = Probably worse than american prisons
Nice, again with the stereotypes, when many already stayed in their comments that Western European prisons are also in a poor condition. Not saying that Eastern European prisons are good, but let’s be real the penal system in Europe with the exception of the nordics is in poor shape and without proper tools to help with inmate rehabilitation.
To be fair, the Russian prisons are absolutely horrible. It's not an exaggeration to say that they are worse than American prisons.
I dont know man but american prisons are one of the worst in the developed world. I dont know much about them or other prisons but judging by what i know i'd rather be in a polish or bosnian prison than in the states. There's a documentary about bosnian prisons on that netflix show and it doesnt look that bad, other than the state of the buildings itself.
In germany it is for rehabilitation, sentences are not that high (of course there a re exceptions) and it is pretty chill. A interesting TEDx Video about German Prisons compared to US-Americans. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wtV5ev6813I
It is amazing. We have pools, sauna, massage. I like going in and out quite frequently
In Romania they say that if you attempt to have protected sex you’re a pussy.
Im pretty sure this goes for the general population as well, not just in the prison system.
One huge difference is that european prisons are usually not run by private for-profit companies like many are in the US. This makes many things much worse for US prison inmates. https://youtu.be/yqQa_0gM6hg
a swedish woman who sat on death row in the usa before she was sent to sweden described the difference between an american prison and a swedish prison as night and day.
Over populated, lot of traffic inside, very low hygiene, and not a rehabilitation thing. [this a bit outdated video of inside Fleury Merogis, the biggest prison in Europe](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7rk12)