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Would you rather be homeless or in prison.
- Thread starter banshee150
- Start date
Homeless obviously. I can at least try to fix homelessness, but if I am in prison, not much I can do.
Prison as long as I go to the lower security levels. I'd rather have the certainty of food, clothing, hygiene, (diminished) medical care, and TV vs. the uncertainty of whether or not I am going to eat, or bathe, or get mugged that day. Some spots are really nice and you can even have DVDs and video games sent in. The assaults and rapes don't really happen at the minimum (camp) and low security levels. Someone mentioned something about pets, and stray cats do end up as prison pets at some spots.
You aren't trapped in place you can't get away from though, when you're homeless. There's an existential aspect to being in prison where the years just slip away. You lose your life to nothing. It's an empty experience. When you're homeless you can still have more diverse experiences and meet different people. Being beholden to a rigid routine for the rest of your life, or for any significant time, is extremely limiting. What if you decide 'I don't want to do this anymore'? You have no choice, unless you kill yourself. There is no opportunity to change the circumstances of your life.
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In the UK I'd rather be homeless, but that's because I've got mad tech skills and I would recover even if I had to start again in a call centre. Homelessness isn't a simple thing, it's a process that progressively deprives you of your basic rights. I can well understand that people who try but fail to dig their way back up end up in a very desperate state.
Prison, too, isn't a monolith. American prisons can be brutal, so I hear. On another thread I've discussed how Norway (a European country that is loosely associated with the EU) runs its justice system so as to have a quite small prison population who can be kept in relative comfort and without bars or brutality, and trained in skills that will make them more productive members of society. If I were ever to mess up, obviously a Norwegian prison would represent a ladder back to the right path.
www.resetera.com
Prison, too, isn't a monolith. American prisons can be brutal, so I hear. On another thread I've discussed how Norway (a European country that is loosely associated with the EU) runs its justice system so as to have a quite small prison population who can be kept in relative comfort and without bars or brutality, and trained in skills that will make them more productive members of society. If I were ever to mess up, obviously a Norwegian prison would represent a ladder back to the right path.
Norway reforms prisoners, and it works
A BBC article about Norway's prison reform miracle. Vote and comment in the thread. You may select as many options in the poll as you like, though obviously some combinations are not compatible. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-48885846
www.resetera.com
You've listened to too many Woody Guthrie songs. Put down the Steinbeck novel and step away from the guitar.
Norway, it has to be said, isn't to everybody's tastes. Most of the country is rather cold. Oslo, the capital, is at 60 degrees North, which seems frightening even to me sitting here in Sunderland at about 55 degrees North. Nevertheless the average minimum winter temperatures are remarkably mild for the latitude.
On the plus side for English speakers, many of those in Norwegian prisons don't have Norwegian as a first language so Prison Officers are required to be competent in English.
I'd be interested to know how homelessness is treated in Norway. It's never much fun to be homeless in any climate, but prolonged rough sleeping in a cold climate can be lethal.
Honestly, given my network of family and friends, it'd be 100% impossible for me to truly be homeless (unless living in someone else's home counts), so that option means that something seriously horrifying happened. (Like everyone I know dying.)
Really skews my answer, if it's a personal "Would I, specifically, rather be..." instead of a generic "is it better to be..." type of thing.
Really skews my answer, if it's a personal "Would I, specifically, rather be..." instead of a generic "is it better to be..." type of thing.
If you are talking about US prisons this absolutely is not true. They do happen.
The pets in prison are basically just a few prisons in the entire country, chances of you having that as an option are extremely low. Would it be good if they expanded programs like that nationwide? Absolutely. But it's not reality.
Bingo. First night back in Sunderland three years ago, I met a young homeless man shivering in the cold of a very frosty late March. I was unable to help him out much, but I gave him my gloves and hat so he had a chance of retaining some heat, and about £40 so he'd be able to get something to eat. I didn't risk letting him stay the night at our new flat because I'm not that trusting, even though he didn't seem bright enough to be much of a risk.
In many societies the duty of hospitality is regarded as sacred. Not here, though. I did what I could for a young man enduring very cold conditions in a town where I knew nothing about how to get him to a hostel, but if I hadn't had a hat and gloves to give him I don't think he could have survived.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...Vaw3F4H-JLvZ7CDq3VC88QeLz&cshid=1562621551245
http://sciencenordic.com/housing-first-homeless-people-norway
Norway has been pretty effective at addressing homelessness.
OP should never make a thread like this again, their entire opening post is a trashfire.
I'm just speaking from my own personal experience. I spent 8 years 2 months at a low security federal prison (population: about 1200) and no one ever got raped there to my knowledge. If someone did get raped, everyone in the yard would know. Inmates got nothing better to do than gossip. Assaults were rare. Mild fistfights over stupid stuff happened about once a month or so. Really bad assaults where someone really got beat down by more than one person were like twice a year. I was smart and respectful while I was there, so I never felt like I was in any real danger of getting attacked, raped, or extorted. I heard the horror stories from inmates that dropped down from higher security about the crazy stuff that goes on there though. It seems to get exponentially worse as you go up.
I'm not trying to say this stuff doesn't happen, but at the low - minimum level (where about half of the federal inmate population is), it's not at the level of what people think of when they think of OZ the TV show or Shawshank Redemption. They don't show what happens at low security prisons on Lockup because it'd be really boring TV. Just guys trying to pass the time.
When I talked about the pets, I just meant that a lot of stray cats came to live on our yard. The camp next door had a lot of stray cats too.
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Is this a forever thing? How long are we talking? Am I able to improve my situation somehow if I'm homeless? Am I in prison with no parole and a really long time? What kind of prison (white collar resort of pound me in the ass prison)?
My answer to this may surprise you depending on how you provide the context.
My answer to this may surprise you depending on how you provide the context.
I mean just because people gossip doesn't mean you are going to hear about people being raped. That's kind of naive to say, both about rape happening on the outside and inside prison, especially in an all male prison considering men are less likely to report rape/sexual abuse than women.
You are absolutely right, minimum security prisons are much, much safer than maximum security prisons, and federal minimum security prisons are probably the safest prisons in the US because federal prisons have better funding and better staffing than state prisons. Most people aren't incarcerated in federal minimum security prisons though, and even then in federal minimum security prisons abuse still occurs. State prisons are usually way worse and where most of this abuse is occuring. Honestly I think the federal government should run the entire prison system, many states have proven they can't handle it.
I'm glad your prison experience wasn't as bad as it could've been, I'm also glad you are sharing your experiences here. This forum needs more firsthand accounts of the system.
User Warned: Inappropriate joke.
Homeless. I'll cash in my Nickels and dimes for a shotgun and make a killing.
Most likely homeless, regardless of location. I was thinking prison might be better in Scandinavia for example, but being homeless is DEFINITELY better there too (welfare, assistance, housing, etc). In the US, definitely homeless... doesn't matter where I'll just get busses to California.
Wouldn't you prefer the deodorant-free life of a boxcar hobo though?
I know someone that's been in prison for almost 25 years. His exact quote to me a long time ago was "you don't want to be in here, it does something to your mind and soul." Give me homelessness.
Good question. Considering the high chance of abuse while being homeless and the average age of death being 43 for a man I'd rather be in prison. Of course if I could choose an institution it would be a secure psych hospital as I took a trip round broadmoor and it seemed unbelievably cushy
It's the shower-free, clean clothes-free life that I dread. Also food-free. I don't eat much, but I do love to be able to eat.