Monday, May 11, 2020

The Prison System Of America - 1052 Words

The â€Å"Prison Industrial Complex† was a term that was used by anti-prison activist within the prison abolishment movement to argue the attendant interest of prison industrialization, and t development of a minority prison labor force (Davis, 2003). This giant prison enterprise is an essential component of the U.S. economy, and has as its purposes such as profit, social control, and an interweaving of private business and government. These giant financial institutions recognized that prison building is one of the fastest growing industries and one of the best stock performers in the United States. The notion that global private cooperation’s currently rely on the prison complex as vital source of profit gives reason to believe that prison privatization trends of both the increasing presence of corporations in the prison economy and the establishment of private prisons connect to the historical efforts to create a profitable punishment industry based on free black mal e laborers. The Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) builds and staffs prisons. Currently they have 67,000 beds (approximately 62,000 inmates) in 63 facilities from California to Oklahoma to Montana to the District of Columbia and have plans to build more. The CCA also provides food service and recreational services to their prisoners, at a cost. This private corporation, founded in 1983, trades on the New York Stock Exchange and employs approximately 15,000 personnel. The United States incarcerates moreShow MoreRelatedThe Flawed Prison System of America1039 Words   |  5 PagesUnites States of America’s prison system is a flawed mess. To open the eyes of our government we must first take a stand against unlawful government decisions, and show support for the greater good of society. What are our own tax-dollars paying for, what are the flaws in the justice/prison system, why is overcrowding in prisons causing tension, and what are ways our society and government can rebuild the system that has been destroyed over the years? Most criminals in prisons are not a danger to ourRead MoreAmerica s Spending On The Prison System916 Words   |  4 PagesAmerica holds 16.3 trillion dollars in debt and the debt continues to increase for the next twenty years. Arizona follows with the accumulating debt of 42.7 billion dollars. Arizona crimes rates increased in the last decade and the state now serves over 42,000 inmates by providing food and cells at the taxpayers’ expense. To accommodate the numerous prisoners, Arizona expanded the spending on the prison system while ignoring methods that cut state’s expense and the escalating crime rate. InsteadRead MoreAmerica s Prison System And The Justice System929 Words   |  4 PagesAmerica’s prison system has become permanent part of the justice system. It was not long ago that prisoners were chained up together and perform hard labor on day to day basis. Nowadays prisons are very different and offer variety programs. The Sixth Amendment guarantees the right to speedy and public trial. Everything starts with a judge issue an arrest warrant. Arrest warrant must include a probable cause that someone committed a crime, as well as person name, a description of the offense, dateRead MoreThe Effects Of Substance Use Disorder On America s Prison System1339 Words   |  6 Pages20th century, those convicted of crimes and sentenced to serve time in prison, who also have an addiction have been treated unfairly. Substance use disorder has been viewed as a disease for decades now, and despite this, this disease is not being treated in America’s prison systems properly. The recent sentencing of Cameron Douglas, son of legendary actor Michael Douglas, to four and one half years additionally in federal prison has brought this crucial injustice to light. Cameron was serving a fiveRead MorePrison Reform : Effective And Reliable Correctional System1352 Words   |  6 PagesPrison reforms are necessary to better the conditions for prisoners to enable the creation of an efficient and reliable correctional system. In reforming the prison system, it is essential for alternatives to incarceration to be explored (UNODC). There has been a sizeable escalation in the number of individuals serving prison sentences in American prisons. In fact, America has the world’s highest number of incarceration cases with over 2.2 million Americans in prison. The increased number of inmatesRead MoreAmerican Prison System Essay945 Words   |  4 PagesAmerican Prison Systems Introduction In many countries national prisons are operated and supplemented by provinces and state counterparts. Prisoners are held in prisons and jails throughout the country and globally convicted of various crimes and offenses. The nature of the offense determines where the prisoner is held and the lengths of times. There are institutions that vary in level of security in both the state and federal prison system. However, the majority of prisoners areRead MoreU.S. Prison Costs Essay example1610 Words   |  7 PagesU.S. Prison Costs After reading the essay, â€Å"A Homemade Education,† an autobiography of Malcolm X, I became quite curious about how many dollars America spends toward the prison system and how it affects our society. The autobiography itself covers how Malcolm X gained a homemade education simply by reading books while serving time in prison. He claimed, â€Å"I don’t think anybody ever got more out of going to prison than I did†¦prison enabled me to study far more intensively†¦sometimes as muchRead MoreThe American Penal System : The United States Essay1705 Words   |  7 PagesThe American Penal System Crime has been an ever-present figure in America even before America officially became a country. Where there is crime, there must be a way to suppress it. That is where prisons come into play. When a person commits a crime, he or she might stay in a prison while awaiting trial and might also stay in a prison as a punishment if that trial does not end in his or her favor. According to The Sentencing Project, as of 2015, the United States’ rate of incarceration was the highestRead MoreA Brief Note On Academic And Professional Communications1471 Words   |  6 PagesCORRECTIONS IN AMERICA CJ526: Academic and Professional Communications in Public Safety Kaplan University Author: Jerry Dembrosky Professor: David A White, Ph.D., M.P.A., CFE Date: December 7, 2015 Abstract The idea of privatized corrections in America has been around since around the 1980’s; this was due largely in part because of the financial burdens faced by both federal and state run facilities, however, as the privatization of correctional facilities became more prevalent, so too didRead MoreThe Problem Of Prison Population1536 Words   |  7 PagesAfter decades trying to prevent it, prison population continued to increase. Mandatory minimum sentences and the privatization created more prisoners, rather than cutting down on the amount incarcerations. Since the 1980’s, the prison population has quadrupled and today one in every one hundred adults are in prison (Mandatory Minimums (HBO)). Infact, America leads the world in prisoners with 20% of the earth’s prison population (The Prison Crisis). In a study done by The American Prospect, charts

Wednesday, May 6, 2020

Wielding the Sword of Truth Free Essays

There is that famous saying that â€Å"pen is mightier than sword†. A common interpretation to this statement goes like this: a pen is a better weapon, may it be for offense or defense, than any weapon for destruction. But another interpretation is also apt for the statement: the pen of the writer, and the output it produces, shall be able to withstand any blow from any weapon, however destructive, that tries to destroy or repress the ideas it tries to share to the world. We will write a custom essay sample on Wielding the Sword of Truth or any similar topic only for you Order Now Throughout the world, through countries’ experiences of political turmoil and all the civil repression that comes along with most of it, time only seems to lend more and more credibility to this statement. â€Å"Didn’t you know that manuscripts don’t burn? † (Bulgakov, 1967), this is a much-quoted line from Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita. It was spoken by Satan (in the person of a foreign professor/magician named Woland) to The Master, a writer who burned his completed novel in an effort to keep the Soviet authorities from reading it. Being one of Bulgakov’s main theme in the novel, it highlights the important role of writers: observing and writing about the social situation, amidst all the threat of a repressive and controlling government, with the object of sharing to others what the writer has seen and not just putting it away, never to be read, out of fear of arrest or torture—to shed the light of freedom in the darkness of an unfree world. This theme was said to be based on Bulgakov’s personal experience of burning the early version of The Master and Margarita in fear of punishment from Soviet authorities. Thus it can be said that The Master has some autobiographical element from the author itself. The period when the novel was set corresponds to the time that Bulgakov wrote it: 1930’s, with the communist Bolsheviks reigning over all of Soviet Russia, and Stalin as the head of the said ruling party and of the country. This period was characterized by severe government control, not just on the economy, but on almost every move of the citizen of its country. And while in this time Russia is deemed to deliver good results, as it is considered as one of the superpowers of the world, internally, the system is mired with conflict and threat-and-control-subjected citizens. Those people who challenge the status quo and the government’s way of running the country are immediately taken into custody and sent to psikhushka where they are to be imprisoned as to stop them from â€Å"polluting† other people’s minds. Thus, to avoid imprisonment and torture, several writers, Bulgakov included, chose to destroy their deviant literary works. However, in writing the second draft of the novel, and with it having the abovementioned theme, it seems that Bulgakov has realized the futility and repugnancy of destroying one’s own work in favor of a trouble-free existence. This is reflected in the much-quoted line and in Woland’s returning of The Master’s burned novel. The scene and the theme corresponding to it signify the author’s revised stand that a person whose eyes had been opened and exposed to the truth has then the responsibility of spreading this truth to the society, no matter how much that person is to be oppressed. That person has to have the courage to bump through the walls that the oppressors build before them because he/she has been entrusted with a great responsibility. It is cowardly for that person to deny the world of his/her knowledge since with it; the person denies the world the chance to know what they ought to know. At the same time it is cowardly, destroying one’s own truth-revealing work is also futile since even though the output has been destroyed, thus removing any implicating physical evidence of deviance, the idea is still on the person’s, and perhaps of other people’s minds. Bulkagov, upon making the statement about the futility of manuscript burning, sends a hopeful and encouraging message, most especially to writers to shed their fears and rally for truth even amidst the threat of retribution from the authorities who seek to repress the truth by repressing the writers’ and the people’s ideas. Knowing the truth, it is said, is a privilege of everybody. Therefore, those who have initially been exposed to it have to extend this privilege to others—the truth becomes their responsibility. And since this world of ours there are people who try to deny this privilege to persons other than themselves—those autocrats who usually believe that common people deserve to know only what they choose to divulge, however small a peek to the whole picture it is—the truth-knowing person, in this case, the writer needs to whip out his pen and use it as the weapon that shall thwart the repression of truth. True, the pen is mightier than the sword. But the pen is only as strong as the courage and nerve of the writer that wields it. By the bye, a pen is only a pen; a written paper is still only a paper; easily destroyed by fire or any other means, but the idea and observation of a writer, or any person for that matter, remains his/hers alone—irrepressible, and once acknowledged, indestructible by any controlling authority. Unless the writer sharpens his/her pen with courage for the revelation of truth, however sad to say, in that case, the pen shall forever lose to the swing, no, even from the mere presence of the sword of repression. How to cite Wielding the Sword of Truth, Papers