By Edwin Cooney
Last week I invited readers to think out of the box and
consider the outrageous proposition that punishment doesn’t work and we ought
to quit it. Of the responses I
received, a little more than half agreed with me, but there were some strong
and definite negative responses.
I’ll share some of both with you.
First comes a reaction from the source of last week’s harangue.
“Well, well, well! I wouldn't have thought that that article
from my beloved hometown paper would have inspired a column, but it did and
what a terrific column it is! This, Ed, might be one of your best; and I say
that, of course, because I agree with just about every word in it.”
A proud St. Louis conservative reacted to my challenge to
think out of the box like this:
“I have strong principles and beliefs and do not think
outside the box.” In a later
communication, he asserted that thinking outside of the box is just a “fuzzy
cliché.” I responded to him by
pointing out how men such as Galileo, Columbus, Washington, Madison, Lincoln,
Einstein and Ronald Reagan thought “out of the box,” just to name a few such
thinkers.
A gentleman from Maryland isn’t so sure my head is screwed
on straight.
“...without punishment people would do whatever they please
without any fear of being held responsible for their actions. George Zimmerman
should have received some punishment so that someone doesn't try to harm him.”
This Marylander is quite right to see the protective dynamic
in punishment. Incarceration not
only protects society from the prisoner, it also protects the prisoner from the
responsibilities of living in society.
Are people in prison really being held responsible? Wow! What responsibilities does prison
life require them to face, I wonder!
For whom are prisoners responsible?
A saucy St. Louis lady challenges: “How do we know punishment doesn’t work?
That’s a fair enough question and a gentleman from
cyberspace offers a partial answer:
“I recommend the book "Beyond Civilization" by Daniel
Quinn. In it, he points out that
our current system of "Criminal Justice" isn't working. He makes the point that if it were
working, we would be closing prisons, not building more of them.”
That response makes sense to me, although many conservatives
use the same logic when it comes to whether social programs work. They insist that if social programs
worked, poverty and crime would be decreasing rather than increasing. Of course, as populations grow (as
America’s has over the past half century), both the good and bad in society
occur in proportion and sometimes in intensity.
An Alameda, California friend of mine makes the following
observation with which I heartily agree:
“...we punish because we lack imagination. We simply can't
imagine alternatives. Just like
generals send boys and girls to fight their wars because they lack
imagination."
I’d alter his example of generals to statesmen, but I think
he’s exactly right. Instant
communication is part of the reason John and Suzie Q citizen are aware of
crime, its causes and its results to a greater degree than ever before. Hence we’re sure that crime, deserving
punishment, is greater than it ever has been. Increasingly advanced technology will have an effect on the
commission, the punishment and the prevention of crime in a way we can’t
possibly imagine today. A personal
monitoring device fastened to the person of a convicted criminal may make
prisons obsolete within our lifetime.
Moving to the spiritual, a San Bernardino man scolds me
soundly! He asserts at some length
that God punishes and that because God punishes, punishment is just. He’s a personal friend of mine and he’s
worried for my soul, especially when I appear to defy scripture and minimize
the word of God. He asserts
further that I should be focusing on the nature of criminality rather than on
the nature or the necessity for punishment. He believes that fear of punishment is the only reason why
crime is as low as it is. All I
can say is that one of the attributes the good and the bad have in common is
the capacity to dare when the cause is strong enough. Remember, men on both sides during the Civil War were brave
even though one side’s soldiers fought to protect slavery.
A San Francisco friend of mine had one simple inquiry after
reading my suggestion that punishment is something we ought to quit doing. His question was: “How do we do that?
What do you suggest?”
My response was that I’m not suggesting that we change
policy. I’m suggesting that
society will be healthier when we have an alteration of mind-set. My suggestion is one that is
evolutional, not revolutionary.
Fear not, we’ll continue to kill and be killed, capture and punish those
who offend us and believe we’re administering justice.
Finally, I offer you the reactions of two ladies.
The first is a delightfully bright lady from Buffalo, home
of “The Buffalo News,” the paper from which the story of Sister Rapp came. Here’s what she writes:
“Perhaps karma could be thought of as cosmic justice.
In these almost seven years of parenting that I have been entwined I have
often felt that our methods of correction, discipline, punishment or however
you want to term it is almost completely ineffective. I have come to
believe that neuroevolution and developmental changes that my children are
going through will do more to change their approach to any given situation.
It can be quite the mind warp, on the one hand one can't ignore when the
seven year old pops his sister in the face but getting all bent out of shape about
doesn't seem to have much of an affect. Quite the quandary...”
How about that!
Karma and neurodevelopment!
I love those words, but somehow I’m not sure any of my childhood
preachers or teachers would understand!
Before getting to the final lady’s comment, I can’t resist
the following observation. The
most frustrating part of sharing my idea with you isn’t the disagreements or
even the spiritual criticism. The
hardest thing for me to understand is why so many respondents have trouble
discerning between punishment and justice. Hence a story an empathetic friend related to me just the
other day. I fear it could be
apocryphal, but I hope not because it so powerfully makes my point.
One day an attorney, while making his closing argument
before the United States Supreme Court, asserted: “All we’re asking for, your
Honors, in this case is pure and simple justice!" Before he could move far enough away
from the bar to sit down, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes leaned over and
whispered, “Sir, remember that you’re in a court of law, not a court of
justice.”
Finally, after reading of my unhappiness with punishment as
a way of dealing with human misdeeds, a new resident of Hawaii wrote:
“Woe is you, Sir Edwin!”
I wonder if she’s right! Please, let me back in the box. It’s hot down here!
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
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