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Show Of Hands December 21st, 2025 2:36pm

What percentage of people locked up in prison do you think deserve to be there? Not just guilty vs innocent, but fair sentencing, etc.

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Liberty 4,032,064
Dec 21, 4:16 pm

I’ll go with about 30%

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pipishere Gocked and Evil
Dec 21, 3:47 pm

Less than ten percent. Punitive punishment is a cruel and ineffective concept, prison should be exclusively for people who are an imminent threat to the wellbeing of others, and the goal should be to rehabilitate efficiently and get people back to being healthy cogs of our society. Also, nobody should be in prison without a trial, and almost nobody actually gets a trial in America. Meanwhile the people doing the most harm, exploiting lifetimes worth of labour to enrich themselves while their employees struggle to pay bills, are never punished, because there is no link between "legality" and "morality". Our justice system is a joke.

pipishere Gocked and Evil
Dec 21, 3:48 pm

But what else do you expect to hear from a prison abolitionist? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

historylover Navy Seawolves
Dec 21, 3:45 pm

There is a tremendous amount of unfair sentencing.

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suppressedID destiny is right now
Dec 21, 2:54 pm

It comes down to fair sentencing. The mandatory sentencing rules and this puritanical lust for penance has unnecessarily filled the prisons with people who should have had more rehabilitation. Not to mention that White Collar crime - mostly financial - has far wider impacts and that can last generations and essentially gets a pass.

We need more community service and financial penalties (ones that Trump doesn’t pardon).

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ovcourse Commiefornia
Dec 21, 1:52 pm

There are a whole lot less in prison than deserve to be.

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Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 1:52 pm

Between 90-100% and much closer to 100.

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IrishAlzheimer
Dec 21, 2:25 pm

It’s a human rights abuse like no other country. A Nazi wet dream

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 2:33 pm

If it was, you wouldn’t be able to post to SoH because you would be too busy breaking rocks with a sledgehammer.

suppressedID destiny is right now
Dec 21, 2:55 pm

That’s just Doop’s way of admitting he’s a Nazi.

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 3:04 pm

No, that is a correct analysis of the fact that if the criminal justice system was an exercise in Nazism, there would be no free communists running about vocally on the Internet.

Why do I have to do all the reasoning for you, sID?

suppressedID destiny is right now
Dec 21, 3:06 pm

Your twisted Aryan precision is showing.

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 3:08 pm

Precision is Aryan now? I gather you were the racist all along,

ptellini GET OVER HERE
Dec 21, 3:16 pm

Doopy, you are being trolled

suppressedID destiny is right now
Dec 21, 3:19 pm

Ah yes, it’s Sunday - when PT gets on the app and makes up for a week’s worth of stupid comments. It’s his post-Church ritual, where pretends he’s a “good Christian”.

Cool. Get it out of your system.

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 3:20 pm

Trolling is better-natured than these two.

IrishAlzheimer
Dec 21, 5:26 pm

“The internal security of the United States requires the identification, surveillance, and control of individuals whose allegiance is to international communism.”
— Internal Security Act (also known as the McCarran Act)

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 5:28 pm

He said, from outside of prison.

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 5:30 pm

Face it, Nazis did not let communists run free. They imprisoned the few they left alive.

America lets communists run free. More than any sane country should, in fact.

ptellini GET OVER HERE
Dec 21, 5:30 pm

But aren't we all in some sort of prison…?
Hmmm somethings make you think.
SID and IA don't ponder. I don't want to be responsible for your brains exploding.

IrishAlzheimer
Dec 21, 6:32 pm

The U.S. is the cause of so many communist deaths. Read book Jakarta method. The U.S. spends billions censoring communists and killing them when they have to. They bombed several street blocks out of existence in Philadelphia 1985 killing multiple children in order to take out a few communists

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 6:40 pm

“The U.S. is the cause of so many communist deaths.”

Yes, but the relevant fact is that we allow survivors to wander around society in much the way Nazism never would.

IrishAlzheimer
Dec 21, 9:50 pm

Not people who actually make a difference. Maybe people like me who have a degree in philosophy and consider themselves an artist with a family and a lot to lose. I’m not the problem.

Doopy Notional Good Guy
Dec 21, 10:27 pm

Yeah, failed artists never become dictators.

TomM
Dec 21, 1:39 pm

As far as I know there are still many for drug offenses with life sentences from the three strikes laws. To me using drugs should not in itself count as a strike and they should rather be in treatment than prison.

Regarding the vote I just put 70%. I have no idea what I would vote with more info, it’s a bit random number.

CudOfCow Oregon
Dec 21, 12:26 pm

The prison system is worse than the education system.

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zimmy Florida
Dec 21, 12:06 pm

Probably 40%

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SFLiberal
Dec 21, 4:06 pm

🤡

SFLiberal
Dec 21, 4:49 pm

Zimantha - 🤡

Zheeeem Outer Banks
Dec 21, 11:10 am

Nearly 1/3rd are there just for drugs. A small fraction of the rest are there as a consequence of mental issues, and some are there because they couldn’t afford a decent lawyer or just looked like a criminal to the jury.

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ptellini GET OVER HERE
Dec 21, 12:01 pm

So you look at it as you don't agree with the law while it could also look at this as whether the person is innocent or guilty.

Zheeeem Outer Banks
Dec 21, 6:28 pm

I think “deserve to be there” encompasses both.

tdUSMC Noblesville
Dec 21, 10:32 am

I’ve been mentoring young men In prison for the last 8 years. Every prisoner I’ve met in the last 8 years deserved to be behind bars. For a criminal to actually land behind bars it always includes multiple offenses and very serious crimes.

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lcamino Florida and Georgia
Dec 21, 10:32 am

70% Months can be spent waiting for trial, with no sentence. A lot of politics can be involved with the prosecution, involving charges and plea deals. Not that many go to trial, or can pay for a better attorney. I doubt some convictions, where there is reasonable doubt. Not many people can pay to fight a sentence. A more sympathetic person may get a lighter sentence than one the judge, prosecutor, or jury doesn’t like.

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historylover Navy Seawolves
Dec 21, 3:49 pm

Many who commit property crimes are sentenced more harshly than those who commit violent crimes. In many cases, that is an atrocity.

daverator Connecticut
Dec 21, 9:50 am

No justice system is perfect, but ours is pretty damn close to as good as it gets in terms of trials and such. I’d say somewhere in the 70-80% range? I can be convinced otherwise, just spitballing.

pipishere Gocked and Evil
Dec 21, 3:40 pm

Over 95% of criminal cases never get a trial. If that's as close to perfect as we can get it's time to abandon the project.

daverator Connecticut
Dec 21, 3:57 pm

That’s true. I do think that’s because a log of people plea out though. It’s an important strategical move to reduce sentencing. Some people do get stiffed by the process which is why I don’t think it’s 100%. But imagining the alternative is something like North Korea, where they’ll just shoot and kill you, I’d gladly play my odds here lol.

makem Chinese Xinjiang Camp
Dec 21, 9:29 am

I'd guess 1/3. The more minor crimes could do with more creative punishments and the most severe could do with more corporal punishments.

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historylover Navy Seawolves
Dec 21, 3:50 pm

Agree. I guessed 70 percent for the poll. I believe almost all are guilty. I take issue with a great deal of the sentencing.

Texas1 did not proofread
Dec 21, 8:45 am

The political split at one hour in on this poll is wild!

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mark4
Dec 21, 8:28 am

I’ve spent many hours in prisons (HEY! Don’t get ahead of me here!) repairing equipment and talking to prisoners, everything from maximum security on down. Everyone I met was innocent.😲 Some few would tell me so with a smile.😇 Are some there unjustly? Well,people are people after all. My guess is that the most popular response is correct.

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