> due to the enormous amounts of abuse that went on

There’s an enormous amount of abuse in homeless encampments and on the streets. Shutting down psych hospitals didn’t reduce the abuse, it just moved it from a system we’re responsible for and could improve, to an un-system we can ignore and can’t improve. IMO, shuttering the wards was cruel.

It's indeed not a very popular opinion, but I think if you ask most people in private, they would happily tolerate the most abusive asylums/penal institutions if they could live in a legitimately polite, safe society, where even minor property crimes are a vanishingly rare occurrence.

Why does it have to be "most abusive" though, like isn't it obvious this just exacerbates problems to anyone with a mote of empathy and foresight?

Maybe you know different people than I do but I don't think that line of thought is as common as you think.

I never said they have to be abusive, only that even significant abuse of the violent minority would be tolerated by the peaceful majority. As to why they have to be abusive at all, I would ask you what is the difference between unwarranted abuse and effective operant conditioning?

Yeah, how about neither?

You know there's countries out there which aren't trapped in endless recividism cycles and enormous organized crime recruitment in the penal system right?