I am interested to hear everyone's ideas about why US has more people in jail than any other country in the world - and more per capita than either Russia or China which we tend to view as punitive countries with less respect for human rights.
Is it because we have more crime or because we define crime more broadly?
This probably has a lot to do with the situation. I have not seen many other countries statutes, but I am guessing they are not as codified as in the United States.
For instance, I was looking at the California Education Code... The damn thing is practically more voluminous than the dictionary. Now, of course these codes are ways to protect everyone against wrongdoers, or it is for clarification. I'm guessing you won't find many other nations splitting hairs like this.
So there are laws people aren't even aware of that are laws. Somehow every citizen is expected to be Joe Lawyer.
Is it because we have more criminals or because we have more aggressive law enforcement?
I actually don't see law enforcement being all that aggresssive, especially for petty crimes. For instance, I pull somebody over (boating) and conduct an inspection of their vessel. In the course of my inspection I see a small plastic baggy containing what appears to be small amounts of marijuana.
My partner overreacts and suggests that the man be arrested and processed. I told him not to be stupid, that all you're going to do is piss off the Long Beach police department for wasting man hours, plus do you really think this guy is now going to stop smoking marijuana? I told him it's not like we found 5 kilos of cocaine. I said, you're going after the little guy. Go after the big fish, becaue all you're going to do is give this man a criminal record.
Or is it merely a reflexion of cultural influences on youth that are stronger in the US than elsewhere, e.g. Hollywood glamorization of crime or some such?
Yes, I definitely think this is a factor. And because this glorification is moving across the pond, you are beginning to see increases of violent crime in countries that allow the same garbage we do.
Shouldn't Americans be ashamed of this statistic, and if not, why not?
I don't know if "ashamed" is quite the word. But the statistics should say something about the current state of affairs.
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