But then ... we don't really do a great job at even attempting to rehabilitate anyone. When we stick a non-violent offender in a prison, it's "Not A Good Time™️" for them. They become institutionalized, they make criminal connections, they join gangs ... they do these things in order to survive; for protection not only from other violent inmates, but also from abuse by corrections officers.

Let's not lose faith in rehabilitation before we've actually tried rehabilitation.

I see people say things like this, but I don't understand it. Why is the subject so obviously at fault and not the process? At 30 years old it all just sounds more like "We've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas!" than anything more sincere.

If a person can’t be helped by their close friends and family, why would one expect a monolithic system to do any better?

> close friends and family

First, not everyone has close friends and family. Second, dysfunctional families and bad friends are absolutely a thing and can even be the cause of problems.

Friends and family can be an important part of rehabilitation, there's no doubt in that, but I don't see a reason to abandon people just because those have failed them, if they even had them available to rely on at all.

> why would one expect a monolithic system to do any better?

Because such systems have the resources available to hire and manage trained professionals. What in particular do you think makes a monolithic system unsuitable for solving the problem of effective rehabilitation?

Yeah, The problem is so many normal activities are criminalized in our puritanical society. Recreational drugs, recreational sex.

So many "criminals" don't need rehabilitation cause they haven't done anything wrong, anything rehabilitable.

The actual dysfunctional people are small percentage.