Cynicism is about people with agency. Saying you're not a cynic about the actions of an organization/institution with no agency/sentience is completely nonsensical.
Edit: I've been rate limited; to the person below:
> So, to be clear, I do not believe all prison guards and staff
Do you believe his confinement was decided by one guard (selflessly)? Do I need to explain to you how organizations with rules/processes/guidelines function?
Edit 2:
> Absent that evidence, your assumption of malice is unfounded, even if in general the prison system is corrupt and/or awful
Besides the clear contradiction here (at least from a Bayesian perspective), I think you are either unaware that (or do not understand why) "innocent until proven guilty" of individuals is explicitly codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (not the "Universal Declaration of Corporate Rights").
Edit 3:
> Prisoners convicted of a crime in a court of law no longer have the presumption of innocence for that crime, by definition. Moreover, they lose many other rights, due to the fact that they are prisoners, and not general civilians.
You are accusing him of a new crime. Prisoners are still afforded their constitutional rights.
> I have no idea what point you’re trying to make, but I implore you to read what I’m saying and not what you think I’m saying.
I have already made my point at the beginning of this thread: you are doing an inordinant amount of free intellectual labor justifying the actions of an authoritarian institution.
1. a person who believes that people are motivated purely by self-interest rather than acting for honorable or unselfish reasons.
So, to be clear, I do not believe all prison guards and staff are motivated purely by self-interest rather than acting for honorable or unselfish reasons. Others do believe that.
I am doing no such thing. I have no idea if he committed a crime. I am not litigating anything. He did an interview without getting permission, breaking the rules of his confinement. That’s obvious, since the interview aired. I don’t need to litigate it, and I’m not attempting to.
> Prisoners are still afforded their constitutional rights.
No, they aren’t; this is plainly untrue. They are afforded some of their constitutional rights, but not all of them.
While prisoners do not enjoy full constitutional rights, they do receive 8th Amendment protection from cruel and unusual punishment. For example, the Supreme Court ruled that California jails must abide by the court-mandated population limits to prevent overpopulation, and thus affording inmates a minimum standard of living in Brown v. Plata.
There are some other rights, like due process, protection under the 14th amendment from discrimination and unequal treatment based solely on their race, sex, or creed, etc.
Lastly, incarcerated individuals are guaranteed the right to religion and free speech as long as their status as prisoners does not interfere with these protected rights.
Please educate yourself: https://www.jailhouselaw.org/your-rights-prison
Prisoners do not have all their constitutional rights. If your argument is that they should, then that’s a different discussion.
That is not what I said, and it not the most charitable interpretation of what I said either.
Of course these choices aren’t made by a single guard. But there is no evidence that in this case it was not done for reasons that were reasonable. If it comes out that it was done purely as punishment, and not to assess what the fuck had just happened, I’d agree with you.
Absent that evidence, your assumption of malice is unfounded, even if in general the prison system is corrupt and/or awful.
You can separate the forest from the trees; in fact, you must.
Sometimes, the justice system incarcerates innocent people and abuses prisoners. That’s fucking awful, and we need to fix it.
But also, sometimes, the justice system works properly and locks up actual criminals who have committed actual crimes. SBF is one such case. There is no evidence he has been abused, unlike other criminals who had been abused.
If you want to make this an argument about whether incarceration is beneficial at all, or if we should focus on better rehabilitation, I’d almost certainly agree with you, but that’s not the discussion we’re having, and it isn’t the system we have.
[edit] > I think you are either unaware that (or do not understand why) "innocent until proven guilty" of individuals is explicitly codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (not the "Universal Declaration of Corporate Rights").
Please. I’m very aware of this. Your extremely confident belief that you are right is clouding your ability to actually see what I’m saying.
SBF is, in fact, a convicted criminal. He was considered innocent until he was, ahem, proven guilty in a court of law, by a jury of his peers. They deliberated for less than an hour, I assume because the evidence was apparently very clear.
Prisoners convicted of a crime in a court of law no longer have the presumption of innocence for that crime, by definition. Moreover, they lose many other rights, due to the fact that they are prisoners, and not general civilians.
I have no idea what point you’re trying to make, but I implore you to read what I’m saying and not what you think I’m saying.
I’m done with this conversation, mostly because the rate limiting is annoying. Have a lovely weekend.
Slave workers
Punishment
That’s implicitly authoritarian.
Many other countries try reparation and resocialization
We do a poor job in this respect. We seem incapable of integrating all three. So you have people who get irrationally squeamish about retribution, demonstrating a total lack of understanding and appreciation of the severity of crimes and of the nature and demands of justice. False compassion abounds. Some people cannot distinguish between chattel slavery and debt slavery (where in the latter case, this would mean penal labor, something that can have the benefit of both providing value to the society wronged to whom the perp is indebted and in punishing the perp). You have people who express hatred for the guilty under the pretense of justice, caring nothing for their rehabilitation. You have those who claim that the prospect of punishment doesn't deter crime, which is patently absurd.
The justice system should most definitely punish criminals prudently in proportion with the crime, but it should also provide means of correcting the person and leading them away from a criminal life. Learning skills could be a part, even if not exhaustive, of such a rehabilitation, whether they ever leave prison or not.
It’s precisely the desire for the rule of law that make it so unsettling right now.
Huh? If a someone commits unspeakable crimes against a loved one of yours and the state is mounting a case against that person, you'd view it as an adversary?
1. A disgraced crypto bro trying to throw a hail mary to get out of prison
2. An authoritarian state growing by leaps and bounds daily
Again as a rational person, which of these two is more serious and therefore warranting action (even at the level of constructing good faith interpretations)?
I am not relitigating his conviction here. I am assessing the relative threat were he to succeed and be pardoned. Simple.
Also, yeah, anyone thinking 24 hours in solitary is no big deal -- spend a weekend trying it for yourself. Look up the conditions, and mimic it to the best of your ability and see how it goes.
Also, as someone who has spent more than 24 hours in solitary confinement, I can say that doing it for a full day is pretty mild. You contemplate, use the toilet as needed, eat what's given to you, sleep and the time passes pretty quickly unless you're also being abused in some other way such as temperature extremes or having your clothes removed (I've had to deal with both and they make even brief solitary much worse)
Doing it for long stretches is a different story of course, but a day or two without "special" and basically abusive measures as mentioned above is very mild unless you have one very pathological aversion to any solitude. Claustrophobia could be a factor too but since prison is a confined place either way, it never fully stops applying (though Solitary cells are more claustrophobic than prison living outside of full lockdown.)
Padded room too, just in case.