How Many Times Do I Have To Punish You?

Today's justice system is focused on punishment and it usually involves paying restitution, fines, probation, jail, or the death penalty. All of these options focus on punishment by taking away things such as money, freedom, or right to life. I disagree with this retributive approach on justice and think it should focus more on being rehabilitative.

In order to make prison more rehabilitative, we first need to learn the difference between punishment and restraining people. Punishment is used to treat someone a lesson or to inflict pain onto them for wrong doing. On the other hand, restraint is used to separate people from the general population in order to stop them from being a danger to themselves or others. Some evidence that shows that harsh punishment is not really an effective tool and this can be seen with children who were severely punished. Research has shown that children who are severely punished are more likely to become violent adults and this can be compared to prisoners who live in prison, a typically violent setting, for a long period of time. It makes sense that individuals who spend time in prison are likely to become repeat offenders and end up returning to prison. I think prison should serve to separate individuals from the general population, but not constantly punish the individual day in and day out for one major mistake they made. I believe prison should also offer education and psychological help to teach prisoners how to become productive members of society again.


Based on this belief, I think that what they did to Victoria was not effective and that it was rather cruel. The main reason why I disagree with her punishment is because it did not give her the opportunity to learn from her mistakes. Victoria completely broke down when she was tortured and told about the crime she had committed, but they never gave her the opportunity to learn from it because her memory was just erased again. I disagree with what White Bear Justice Park did to Victoria, but I think if they were to do similar things to other offenders they should only do it once and have them still remember what they did. I feel like they still could have inflicted fear into Victoria without erasing her memory. I think repeatedly punishing her for the same crime was wrong because it never gave her the opportunity to change and become a productive member of society again. Overall, I think having things such as White Bear Justice Park would be an ineffective and cruel solution to justice and that society would be better off giving prisoners the means to learn from their wrong doings and become productive members in society again.