In article ,
Clive George wrote:
How are you going to do this work without putting other people out of
work yet still being paid?

They would do work that was not economically viable elsewhere.
Work that needs doing but doesn't get done.
There are canals to clear out. Litter to pickup. Graffiti to remove.
Waste to recycle. Chewing gum to remove from pavements.

So where does the money come from?

From the taxpayer, of course. Public money being used to pay prisoners to
work. You know it makes sense...

--
*i souport publik edekashun.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:43:26 -0800 (PST), harry
wrote:

I don't see anyone acting as apologists, simply people who see no
reason to gloat over their deaths or believe that it is *good* that
they were killed.
Obviously, you have never been the victim of a crime and lack the
imagination to see how victims feel.

You would be wrong on both counts.

Perhaps you have never been falsely accused of a crime and become the
subject of vigilante attacks?

Ah. Moving the goal posts again?

No, I am simply asking you the same sort of question as you asked me.

The "vigilantes" are criminals too.

Yes - which rather makes the sort of vigilante attitudes expessed by
posters on this thread a bit questionable, don't you think?

Especially if acting on rumour.

How about a newspaper article?

If a criminal is caught in the act, I don't blame anyone for beating
the shit out of them these days of half wit judges and greedy lawyers.

So you *do* approve of vigilante action. I thought so.

Consider that even if "caught in the act" it is seldom 100% certain
that the person is in fact guilty of what he appears to be guilty of.
Misinterpreting someone's actions is quite common.

Not to mention the fact that if someone were to catch you in the act
of taking vigilante action, then by the same principles they would
also be justified in taking action against you - and so on and so on.

So tell us your first hand experiences then.

Done to death in this group - use Google.

--
Cynic

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:23:49 -0000, "'Mike'"
wrote:

Always amuses me when the unions say that they 'Will work to rule'. Why
aren't they 'always' working to rule and setting an example? What are
'rules' for? ....... Not that I have much time for unions anyway. They want
to run a business without putting their neck on the block and taking the
risk.

My understanding of "work to rule" means that the workers will do the
*absolute minimum* that the rules dictate they are obliged to do. It
does not imply that they usually break the rules, only that they
usually do a bit more than they absolutely have to do. i.e. they
become ridiculously inflexible in their attitude.

--
Cynic

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:59:46 -0000, "dennis@home"
wrote:

The difference is under the control of the driver. The slower he is
going, the better chance of survival.

Sure, and staying at home in bed is the safest of all.

Just to point out that you have removed the author of what you quoted and
left me in.
Please try harder.

Yes Dad. Sorry Dad.

--
Cynic

On Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:51:18 -0800 (PST), harry
wrote:

Sure, and staying at home in bed is the safest of all.

For all sensible people however, it is a question of assessing the
risk/reward ratio and taking the risk if the ratio falls below a
certain threshold. =A0Most things we do contains *some* element of risk.
The question is *not* whether something bad happened as a result of a
person taking a risk, but whether the risk taken was reasonable in the
circumstances or not.

If everyone were to drive in a manner that eliminated *all* risk of
causing death, modern society would not be able to survive.

There are plenty of people out there who are not sensible.

"Sensible" is a subjective rather than an objective criterion. A huge
number of major advances have been made by people who the majority did
not consider to be behaving very sensibly. Personally I don't think
it is very sensible to pay money to watch a group of men kicking a
ball around a field, but obviously many people would disagree.

There are people out there (seemingly beyond your ken) who are evil
*******s and don't give a toss about anyone else.

*Very* few people fall into that category - probably under 0.01% It
is however common to dismiss a *large section* of people as being
unworthy of consideration. In fact, such an attitude is even
*necessary* in certain circumstances (such as for soldiers in
warfare). Perhaps you yourself "don't give a toss" about anyone who
is considered to be a criminal?

Taking a risk that effects yourself is one thing. If it effects
someone else,that's another.

Yes, they do indeed merit different considerations, but it is
routinely necessary to make decisions that will affect and put at risk
other people besides yourself. You do so every time you drive.
Parents must routinely make risk assessments on behalf of their
children, and make decisions that put the child at some degree of
increased risk.

You can't get that into your thick head can you?

Ad-hominem is a very childish way to debate any topic, Harry. Please
try to act a bit more grown-up.

--
Cynic

On Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:36:18 -0800 (PST), harry
wrote:

It is not chance. It is statistics which is a science. And by driving
at a safe speed we cana ffect out comes. ie improve survivabilty.

Driving at dangerous speeds is not "chance". It is a deliberate
action so anyone who is killed was killed by a deliberate action..

And what decides whether a particular speed is "safe" or "dangerous"?

Statistics is indeed a tool that can help us decide. Statistics can
tell us the probability of surviving a crash at a particular speed in
a particular type of vehicle, and also the probability of having a
crash under particular conditions. It may surprise you to learn that
an impact with a stationary object at just 20 MPH does not have
anything like 100% survivability. And an impact at 200MPH does not
have 0% survivability. Yet I am fairly certain that you would regard
the former as being usually "safe" and the latter as being usually
"dangerous" in a car on an average type of road.

So what statistical risk do you consider is "safe", and what
statistical risk is "dangerous"? And does that figure change
depending on how important to yourself it is to arrive at your
destination by a certain time?

A person's behaviour is influenced by their own *perception* of risk
rather than the actual statistical risk that exists. Which is why
many safety devices actualy result in an increase in risk-taking and
consequtial accidents.

--
Cynic

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 22:15:28 +0000, Mike Barnes
wrote:

Quite so. But if someone was killed, chances are that that was not a
safe speed. Regardless of the speed limit.

No, that does not follow at all. Many pedestrians are killed every
year by being struck by trains. Does that indicate to you that the
train was travelling at an unsafe speed?

What you say is true only if excessive speed *was a causal factor* in
the accident. Which I believe is not the case in the majority of
accidents (including those where the driver was exceeding the posted
speed limit).

--
Cynic

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:17:48 +0000, =?ISO-8859-1?Q?=AEi=A9ardo?=
wrote:

On 25/01/2012 19:57, Clive George wrote:
On 25/01/2012 19:15, 'Mike' wrote:
In a nutshell, prison is not a deterrent.

But we know neither is the death penalty.

If it was, why is the prison population the highest it has ever been?

That's not necessarily a very simple question to answer, and it's
definitely not just because people think prison is too easy. Which
country has the easier prison life - UK or US? Most would agree it's the
UK. Which country has the larger prison population? It's the US. Their
harder prisons aren't a deterrent either.


Perhaps you've failed to notice that their population is five times
bigger than ours.

You will find that they have more crimes per unit of population than
we do.

--
Cynic

On Jan 26, 3:47*pm, (Cynic) wrote:
On Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:36:18 -0800 (PST), harry
wrote:

It is not chance. It is statistics which is a science. *And by driving
at a safe speed we cana ffect out comes. ie improve survivabilty.
Driving at dangerous speeds is not "chance". *It is a deliberate
action so anyone who is killed was killed by a deliberate action..

And what decides whether a particular speed is "safe" or "dangerous"?

Statistics is indeed a tool that can help us decide. *Statistics can
tell us the probability of surviving a crash at a particular speed in
a particular type of vehicle, and also the probability of having a
crash under particular conditions. *It may surprise you to learn that
an impact with a stationary object at just 20 MPH does not have
anything like 100% survivability. *And an impact at 200MPH does not
have 0% survivability. *Yet I am fairly certain that you would regard
the former as being usually "safe" and the latter as being usually
"dangerous" in a car on an average type of road.

So what statistical risk do you consider is "safe", and what
statistical risk is "dangerous"? *And does that figure change
depending on how important to yourself it is to arrive at your
destination by a certain time?

A person's behaviour is influenced *by their own *perception* of risk
rather than the actual statistical risk that exists. *Which is why
many safety devices actualy result in an increase in risk-taking and
consequtial accidents.

There was an article about cyclists wearing helmets and they find cars
drive closer
to them because they are safer wearing helmets. ;-0

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 21:05:59 -0000, "'Mike'"
wrote:

Far more resources put into rehabilitation. Which would include support
after release.

And when that fails?

Let's try it first, and then cross that bridge. Because it's clear
that our present system doesn't work too well, and nor did the far
harsher system that we used to have.

It was tried in the 1970's and it failed. I know because I was involved. I
was on the Training Scheme. I wrote a course for them which gave them a City
and Guilds Certificate. "I" was the writer of the course and "I" was the
City and Guilds Assessor and it was rolled out over the whole Prison System.

The methods that were attempted were watered-down compromises
involving just a few elements of the techniques originally proposed,
and they were quickly abandoned when they did not achieve *immediate
and spectacular* results.

Rehabilitation does not mean paying lip-service to some sort of
in-prison "training" (which is all that happened in most prisons) and
issuing a nice certificate, with little post-prison followup or
aftercare. It involves a whole raft of techniques designed to address
the root cause of the offending behaviour - of which lack of education
and marketable skills is just one. One program will *not* fit all -
offenders (and *potential* offenders) must first be categorised and
then the appropriate rehabilitation method should be applied to each
category.

And you should not expect to see results until the methods have been
in operation for at least 5 years, and probably twice that long.

--
Cynic

In message
,
whisky-dave writes
A person's behaviour is influenced *by their own *perception* of risk
rather than the actual statistical risk that exists. *Which is why
many safety devices actualy result in an increase in risk-taking and
consequtial accidents.

There was an article about cyclists wearing helmets and they find cars
drive closer
to them because they are safer wearing helmets. ;-0

Could it be their perception that they are safer wearing a helmet and
thus venture into more aggressive traffic situations?

My modest contribution as this thread heads for the 300 count....

regards



--
Tim Lamb

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 21:05:59 -0000, "'Mike'"
wrote:

One of the prisoners was in for taking cars. "It would be cheaper for the
Government to buy me a car" he said one day. I politely told him that he
should get a job and pay for his car as I had done. I then put a deterrent
scheme to him. "If you were sentenced to 14 days with the proviso that next
time it would be 28 days and when you got to prison all you were doing was
shifting a pile of sand from one end of a corridor, and when that was done
you would shift it all back again, would you think twice before putting your
hand on a car door handle with the view to pinching it, knowing you will be
shifting sand for 28 days and the next term 56 days etc?" He agreed it would
be a deterrent.

You believed him because he told you what you wanted to hear. Did you
similarly believe all the inmates who undoubtedly told you they were
innocent?

There have been so many studies that show that it is the probability
of getting caught rather than the severity of the punishment that is
the deterrent that I wonder how you can seriously believe any
different. People commit crime because they do not seriously believe
they will get caught. It makes no difference if you don't get caught
and sentenced to community service than if you don't get caught and
sentenced to 10 years hard labour. The result is exactly the same in
both cases.

--
Cynic

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 21:19:25 -0000, "dennis@home"
wrote:

Yes, I'm sure you would be far more comfortable living in the
middle-ages. Or perhaps even less civilised - as a caveman?

Then what would we do with the offenders, kill them?

Depends on the type of offending. For some offences, my solution
would be to remove the unnecessary laws so that what they are doing is
no longer an offence at all. For most other offences my preference
would be to remove the cause of the offending behaviour in the
long-term and attempt to rehabilitate the person so that they become a
productive member of society rather than a drain.

Only after those things fail should lengthy imprisonment be considered
as a final solution.

So basically you agree with me.

My understanding of your position is that you would lock people up for
a long time *before* making any effort to rehabilitate them or remove
the root causes of their crimes. you would also want to make their
lives a misery whilst they are in prison - though it is difficult to
see why that is at all necessary or what it would achieve if your sole
purpose is to prevent them offending by removing them from society -
incarceration does that of itself.

--
Cynic

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 23:24:18 +0000, Bill Wright
wrote:

Could be all sorts of reasons. It is quite common for children who
were raised by very responsible parents to do silly things,

Far less likely than the children of the feckless, by a ratio of 100:1
or more I'd say. If any of my friends' kids got into trouble we'd all be
astonished and shocked, whereas on the dodgy estates if a kid gets into
trouble no-one thinks it's worth a mention.

Can you honestly say that you have *never* in your life done anything
that was extremely stupid to the point of being dangerous?

Between the ages of roughly 12 and 20, the greatest influence on
behaviour is the peer-group. The type of peer-pressure a child
experiences correlates very closely to the type of neighbourhood the
child lives in. Many parents do not have a great deal of choice over
the area they live.

It must be really nice living in your black-and-white World.

--
Cynic

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 17:45:15 -0000, "'Mike'"
wrote:

Parents fault. They had not been subjected proper discipline.

Like dogs. There's no such thing as a bad dog, only a badly trained dog
owner

Perhaps you would like to speculate on the effect it would have on a
dog if, just after the beginning of the dog's training, the owner was
obliged to leave the dog in a kennel for 6 hours a day, where it mixed
with 100 other dogs, most of which were aggressive and untrained.

--
Cynic