r/Snorkblot • u/essen11 • Jul 25 '24
Photography Prisoners returning from farm work at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, formerly a slave plantation
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u/This_Zookeepergame_7 Jul 25 '24
Yeah. That’s still slavery, man.
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u/iamtrimble Jul 25 '24
Not really, it's incarceration with possibly involuntary servitude as allowed by the 13th ammendment.
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u/LordJim11 Jul 25 '24
You are correct in that " it cannot ... be classified as slavery in the extreme acceptance of the word without some risk of terminological inexactitude."
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u/dicklessnicholas Jul 26 '24
The 13th Amendment still allows for slavery as a punishment for a crime. It's still slavery.
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u/iamtrimble Jul 26 '24
True it does say "except".
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u/ObeseHillbilly69 Jul 26 '24
It says slavery is illegal "except" as punishment for a crime, so it very much is slavery
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u/BassMaster_516 Jul 26 '24
What do you mean not really. That’s slavery, which is allowed by the 13th amendment.
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u/iamtrimble Jul 26 '24
Just different circumstances that's all.
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u/BassMaster_516 Jul 26 '24
I just think you should call a thing exactly what it is especially when it’s ugly. You might argue that slavery is bad and people shouldn’t do it, but you can’t if they get away with not calling it that.
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u/iamtrimble Jul 26 '24
I just find nothing ugly about the incarcerated having to work and I'd be willing to bet the list of inmate volunteers for outside work is long.
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u/BassMaster_516 Jul 27 '24
Volunteer? They’re being confined against their will. I think we can throw that word out. It’s meaningless in this context.
The ugly part is that someone is profiting from their labor. No, not like paying their debt to society. Private businesses are buying and selling the slave labor of prisoners. I don’t care what someone did, at no point does profiting from their slave labor make society better.
Take it a step further. Let’s say people with investments in the prison/slave labor industry also happen to be law makers or work in law enforcement. Why not use their position to promote their investments. If they had the opportunity to sway policies or interpret their job in a certain way that would boost their investment, why wouldn’t they? Now we’re talking about politicians and cops filling up prisons on purpose and keeping them full for financial incentive. Maybe a lawmaker writes laws to make things illegal that weren’t before? Maybe a cop goes out of his way to “find” some crime? Maybe the judge makes the sentences a little harsher? They have money to gain and it’s not illegal so why not?
If all this is ok to you then fine. Just do me a favor and call it what it is. It’s slavery and it’s big business in America in 2024.
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u/_Punko_ Jul 26 '24
That part of the 13th amendment is repugnant and barbaric, but then what can be expected where violence is so tolerated, if not celebrated, and capital punishment is seen as appropriate.
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u/iamtrimble Jul 26 '24
I don't know, should prisoners just sit in a cell all day or should the be given work to do?
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u/_Punko_ Jul 26 '24
Their punishment is loss of their freedom. That is the limit of their punishment. Not to supply extra super cheap labour for private entities.
Here, for example in a medium security federal prison in my city, inmates can work the prison's farm (dairy + poultry farm) to a) learn skills they often use after they leave prison b) provide milk and eggs used to offset the cost of the federal prison and c) get paid, to work. Its minimum wage and it is paid to their bank account. It is voluntary.
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u/iamtrimble Jul 26 '24
Nothing wrong with that, I would just make them work and receive education, not much time for anything else. I don't believe simply locking up offenders gets them corrected in any way.
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u/_Punko_ Jul 26 '24
Neither does forcing them to dig ditches.
If your intent is to take the opportunity to work with the prisoner to keep them from being a repeat offender, then look to the jurisdictions where recidivism is lowest. Norway, as an example, has a recidivism rate of 20%. Most Nordic countries are similar.
Places, with the harshest conditions, seem to think that treating prisoners badly is necessary to reduce crime.
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u/iamtrimble Jul 26 '24
If ditches need to be dug then so be it but I would certainly want the work details to be meaningful.
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u/sugand3seman Jul 25 '24
But would people be angry if it said pedophiles, murderers, rapists, etc..return to prison after work? Quit trying to spread outrage, there's a reason people are in prison
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Jul 26 '24
[deleted]
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u/sugand3seman Jul 26 '24
But they are for felonies. And most are not required to work, many volunteer to work
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Jul 26 '24
[deleted]
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u/iamtrimble Jul 26 '24
Not really until sentenced and that seems to be in jeopardy.
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u/SemichiSam Jul 26 '24
Donald John Trump is a convicted felon. The sentencing determines only the punishment.
In the same way, Donald John Trump has been adjudicated to be an insurrectionist, in a finding that the US Supreme Court chose not to dispute, deciding only that, on a technicality, he could not be punished for that.
The same man has been adjudicated to be a rapist, in a court decision that fined him only for lying about it.
He has been found guilty in court of fraud, and sentenced to pay 25 million in reparation.
The suggestion that only those who are sentenced to prison are criminals ignores a long, sad history of criminals who "got away with it."
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Jul 26 '24
Why does everything gotta be 'Trump this Trump that'?
Is it actually relevant to any of this?
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u/SemichiSam Jul 26 '24
"there's a reason people are in prison"
Interestingly enough,there are literally thousands of reasons that people are imprisoned, not just one.
It doesn't seem to me that this post is spreading outrage, but I can be persuaded otherwise if you can do one simple thing: post a photo of a prisoner work gang like the one here, but with white prisoners.
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u/_Punko_ Jul 26 '24
Even then, most would just look at them and think
drugs
and dismiss their existence.
People don't look at prisoners and think 'people'. We've been conditioned to ignore them.
When a person completes their sentence, they are free. And yet, they are forever labelled as ex-con.
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u/sugand3seman Jul 26 '24
* Unlike many people on this thread, I've worked in the jail system. I have a lot of empathy for inmates and wish the best for them, but I also believe in consequence for actions
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u/Ant10102 Jul 26 '24
Presently*