Breaking: Justice Department Ends Use of Private Prisons

According to what I've just read on Foxnews, the private prisons have less safety and security than government run ones and since the prison population has gone down since the late 1990's, when the program began, there's no longer any need for them. The Obama administration is to be commended for this move.

 

Good move..
should have been done way before election season though.

better late than never.
also curious to see if Clinton actually lets the contracts expire once she gets into office.

 

Sort of progress but not really. As long as people are granted power over other people and remain unchecked (which is the real problem) there is much potential for corruption and abuse.
Case and point:
The Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures was a series of social psychology experiments conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram. They measured the willingness of study participants, men from a diverse range of occupations with varying levels of education, to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts conflicting with their personal conscience; the experiment found, unexpectedly, that a very high proportion of people were prepared to obey, albeit unwillingly, even if apparently causing serious injury and distress.
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The Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) was a study of the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner or prison guard. The experiment was conducted at Stanford University on August 14–20, 1971, by a team of researchers led by psychology professor Philip Zimbardo using college students.[1] It was funded by the U.S. Office of Naval Research[2] and was of interest to both the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps as an investigation into the causes of conflict between military guards and prisoners. The experiment is a classic study on the psychology of imprisonment[3] and is a topic covered in most introductory psychology textbooks.[4]

The participants adapted to their roles well beyond Zimbardo's expectations, as the guards enforced authoritarian measures and ultimately subjected some of the prisoners to psychological torture. Many of the prisoners passively accepted psychological abuse and, at the request of the guards, readily harassed other prisoners who attempted to prevent it.

I wouldn't be celebrating just yet. The pervasive culture to dehumanize other human beings runs so much deeper than just 'private prisons', If anything private prisons are but a symptom of the true sickness.

Stanford prison experiment - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Milgram experiment - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Came here initially to post this. I would think though that it is inevitable on all levels.
Maybe states and locals are taking a 'wait and see' approach?
I think the reason this is even being implemented in the first place, is because of 'allegations' of 'wide-spread' 'abuse'. Like the nurse who got raped. For all we know her senseless rape was the catalyst for this.

 

Without ever examining the actual causes of crime, like poverty and lack of jobs, and why people re offend. They never see how other parts of the globe are doing things to lower the crime rate. No that would require some actual thinking. Lets just speed up the time people spend on death row and execute them even faster, that would totally stop crime...not.

Also regarding supreme court decisions; several state and local officials already had difficulty implementing laws surrounding abortion and use of birth control and gay marriage licensing, combine that with the kick backs from the private prison industry which has its own gang back it up as well and well supreme court is going to have to use a stern grown up voice.

 

sounds great and all but i wonder what their greater motivation is?

 

Prisoners are among the biggest welfare recipients within any given country, especially in the US ... considering how they have such a high prison population. People generally fail to see it that way, but ... here's an idea. ...

Believe it or not, it takes taxpayer money to run prisons. Even 'private prisons' require some sort of incentive in the from of government aid in order to operate, since it isn't exactly a typically 'profitable' service to begin with.

so .. Instead of giving these poor people free food and housing after they have committed a crime .. why not give poor people free food and housing .. before they have to resort to committing crimes?

 

poor people in the US do get "free" (taxpayer funded) food and housing. Through either state or federal programs.
Plus millions of the prisoners aren't poor and live in houses and buy food.. believe it or not.

 

Good! Maybe finally we can slowly see the full legalization of the medicine if this is truly the case. I once read that private prisons benefit the most from the war on drugs.

 

Never thought I'd see the day. Great step in the right direction.