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Why Do Chain Gangs Be Outlawed?

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The idea of a prison system has been present in nearly all societies since the dawn of time. Prisoners throughout history have usually been made up of people from marginalized groups such as enemy countries, the lower class, or racial minorities. The form of punishment that prisoners have experienced throughout has history has often been delegated to be one that is labor-focused. The treatment that prisoners have experienced following their release from the prison system is one that is filled with a lack of privilege. Now and throughout all of history, prisoners have often been subject to much discrimination and prejudice both in person and how they’ve been portrayed in media.
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For instance, in Ancient Egypt it was chain gangs that led to the building of the pyramids. In the article “Les Miserables: Chain gangs and the cruel and unusual punishments clause,” the author WI Peloso argues that chain gangs are a form of cruel and unusual punishment that should be outlawed. In order to support her argument, Peloso refers to several legal cases and instances of specific chain gangs. For instance, she recounts one instance of a chain gang in Alabama where the prisoners were harmed. Following this occurrence, the laws relating to chain gangs were changed. Chain gangs were very popular in Hugo’s time and continued to be until the late …show more content…

However, many prisoners do work. This work is discussed in Genevieve LeBaron’s article “Rethinking Prison Labor: Social Discipline and the State in Historical Perspective.” She claims that the labor of prisons is vital for the functioning of capitalism in the United States. The economic theory that she uses is the political economy theory which is one that is centered around the idea of a producing class who produces product, some of which is necessary product and some of which is the surplus. The surplus goes to the appropriating class. According to this theory, LeBaron argues that prisoner workers are necessary to the

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“there were in 2005 some 9 million prisoners in the world, more than two were being held in the United States.” More prisoners are in the United States, some have committed big crimes and some were locked for committing violent. The author describes that more black man are on prisons, some are high school dropouts and some are just working men. The author considers this issue as more than technical issue. The author connects the Nation of Jailers as his personal issue.

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365 Words | 2 Pages

How were juvenile gangs formed in the 1920s? In the 1920s, Frederick Thrasher studied over 1,300 youth groups in Chicago and discovered that social, economic, and ecological factors in cities generate breaches in the usual fabric of society, allowing gangs to form. These organizations establish initially to meet needs such as play, enjoyment, and adventure, but if a confrontation with adult authority persists, the groups solidify and their activities become primarily criminal, leading to the formation of gangs. In places of high poverty and confrontation with adult authority, these groups solidify and become gangs.

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1209 Words | 5 Pages

The authors Eve Goldberg and Linda Evans, writers, and filmmakers, published "The Prison Industrial Complex." This text discusses how the government and private corporations increase mass incarceration for profit. The text states, "For private business, prison labor is like a pot of gold. No strikes. No union organizing.

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In the institution of prison there are many difficult Pains that the prisoners face daily. According to Sykes and Messenger there are five main pains of imprisonment. These views are also reflected in the book, “In the Belly of the Beast” by Jack Abbot. Although the three do agree on quite a few things about imprisonment, there are also some disagreements between them that will be talked about. “The Pains of imprisonment”(Sykes & Messenger 1994), leads into how the social system works in prisons.

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This gang consisted of hundreds of people forming together to not only rely on each other but to protect each other from harm's way. I mean don't get me wrong they still did illegal acts, gang members were given a list of illegal activities that they would have to do in order to recieve benefits of being in the gang which in turn if

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924 Words | 4 Pages

Even seemingly barbaric gangs search for order in society and provide security and comfort for the impoverished. People are naturally inclined to help others and act socially, especially

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Imagine if you were in prison because of something little you did and you got a long , unnecessary sentence or as you were in prison got abused . Even though some may say that prison industrial complex is fair because they get what they deserve; overall , there are many social injustices  such as abuse against prisoners, and unfair sentences and sexual assault . An example of why prison industrial is unfair is because abuse against prisoner . In the text of , ‘ What We Know About Violence In America’s trial complex is unfair is because , of abuse on prisoners’ , It says “ 19% of all male inmates in US prisons say they’ve been physically assaulted by other inmates (gilson) ”.

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Sofia Garbenis 05/14/2018 PHI 115 Final Essay Anjela Davis – Are Prisons Obsolete? The theme of the prisons, the living conditions of prisoners, the justice of punishments, and the sense of deprivation of liberty becomes one of the key topics of public discussion. Angela Davis in her article sets out a contrast between the early ideas of the purpose of the prison (as captured in the ideas of John Howard and Jeremy Bentham) and the prisons of today. John Howard published The State of the Prisons. His writing clearly expressed the idea that a prison should correct criminals in the interests of society.

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In the mid nineteenth century gang members performed an illegal act known as “cooping,” it was a method for

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Politicians, reporters, and activists from across the political spectrum have analyzed the ongoing crisis of mass incarceration. Their accounts of our current system sometimes show our current system as an expression of puritanism, as an extension of slavery or Jim Crow, or as a shift but haunting reality of capitalism (Lancaster 2017). “Prison abolitionists are dismissed as utopians and idealists whose ideas are at best unrealistic and impracticable, and, at worst, mystifying and foolish” (Davis 2003). This is a measure of how difficult it is to envision a social order that does not rely on the threat of punishing people in dreadful and harmful places designed to separate them from their communities and families. Prisons are not equipped for

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Our democracy claims equality and equal opportunities but in reality, the systems within our democracy continue to perpetuate systemic racism and classism. The prison itself was a way to continue slave labor after slavery was abolished in 1865 and because of a loophole within the thirteenth amendment which states that slavery and involuntary servitude would not exist in the United States except as a punishment for crime. In Davis’s Are Prisons Obsolete she explains the systemic racism engrained within the prison industrial complex and explains “In the twenty-first century, antiprison activists insist that a fundamental requirement for the revitalization of democracy is the long-overdue abolition of the prison system” (Davis 35). Davis annunciates that in order to revitalize democracy the prison system must be abolished as when systems built on inequality are allowed to continue those inequalities continue to be perpetuated.

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References Egley, A., & Howell, J. C. (2012). Highlights of the 2010 National Youth Gang Survey. Retrieved from: https://www.ojjdp.gov/pubs/237542.pdf Sanders, R., & Moore, S. (n.d.). Mandatory Waiver for Juvenile Gang Members in Tennessee. Retrieved from: http://www.belmont.edu/burs/pdf/Social%20Work-%20Sanders%20and%20Moore.pdf Searles, K. (2017).

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1516 Words | 7 Pages

However, penal labor provides some benefits to prisoners. It instills within them practical and social knowledge which they can take advantage of upon release from prison. Unfortunately, this still occurs at the expense of the general population of the US. Perhaps if prisoners were employed to make the prison self-sufficient by only manufacturing goods for the prison and the US military, with no corporations involved, penal labor would be devoid of the more harmful consequences that have not yet been

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610 Words | 3 Pages

For murder, capital punishment was encouraged, but for criminals of theft, they were to be put to work and “if a slave [was] lazy it [was] permissible to whip him (More 29-30).” Furthermore, all slaves were distinguishable as being so because they all had “A little piece of one ear… cut off (More 30).” Additionally, the same punishment went for prisoners, captured during war. This labor system stated that the slaves will “…not only [be kept] constantly at work but also in chains (More 95).” For all slaves they were also not to associate with the public, or with anyone

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1228 Words | 5 Pages

Throughout the 17th-century gangs have been causing havoc in people's life and destroying the society. The National Institute of Justice (2011) has defined a gang as "A group of collective members which create an atmosphere of intimidation among citizens. " Many of these gangs are well organized, using different forms of violence to control neighbourhoods and to conduct their illegal activities. The National Gang Threat Assessment (2011) reports that “Gangs are responsible for an average of 48 percent of violent crime in most jurisdictions.” Street Gangs have caused incidences of violence that is confined in the inner city of many countries.

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