Off With Their Heads.

This week's topic isn't one that I'd previously put a lot of thought into, but as I'm formulating the basic outline for this entry, I'm starting to pull my viewpoint together.  Here we go.

I think that, depending on the severity of the crime, I favor punishment over rehabilitation.  It depends on the severity of the crime committed, and my thought process lends itself toward punishing both the lesser and greater offenses, while rehabilitating the people in the middle.  Let's examine a more petty crime that could be committed - first-offense shoplifting, for example.  If a person goes into a store and steals... well, let's keep it along my "typical" lines, and say that they steal a video game.  I honestly don't think there's an effective way to rehabilitate someone on why they shouldn't steal.  In this instance, I think that the most effective tool at preventing a repeat offense would be to impose a harsh punishment on the offender - most likely in the form of restitution, or a fine, or something along those lines.  The argument could be made that putting a financial strain on someone, in that situation, might actually lead to more theft, in order to cover the financial burden, and that's debatable - but I would hope that having first-hand knowledge of the potential punishment would create hesitation in the person's mind about ever doing it again.

Let's go a bit more severe, in terms of the crime committed - possibly a drunken driver.  This person gets intoxicated at a bar, and while driving home, causes a collision that kills someone.  What to do, in this case?  This is one of the instances where I believe I'd favor rehabilitation over punishment - one could make the argument that the person has already been punished, just by having to live with the knowledge that they were responsible for the death of another person.  I believe that rehabilitating the person in this scenario would prove more beneficial to both that person - it could be possible that the person had something important to contribute to society, and just needed help in battling their problems along the way.  I'd question, also, what kind of punishment would be suitable for this situation.  The most logical punishment would seem to be preventing the person from ever driving again, or, at least, restricting it in some fashion.  But would those restrictions be enforceable, or cost-effective?  The most common thing that I've heard of is an in-car breathalyzer that won't allow the car to start if the user is impaired by alcohol.  But it's not a fail-proof system, and the lower-end cost of such a system seems to be about a thousand dollars a year - that's a hefty bill for anyone to support, whether it be the government or the person needing it.  Rehabilitation seems like it'd have better long-term results, for less cost.

Finally, let's look at a fairly heinous crime - something like a premeditated killing spree.  Let's assume that a person walks into a public area and starts shooting everyone in sight.  There's a lot of death and panicking, and eventually the police arrive and manage to subdue the person before they can do anything like shoot themselves.  Is rehabilitation potentially worthwhile, in this case?  The case could be made that, depending on the person (and their psyche), they have a problem that could be "fixed".  My main concern with this logic, however, is that I don't think there's really a way you can ensure that any sort of rehabilitation would be long-lasting.  If the person just snapped one day, how can you ever really be sure that they won't snap again?  Is a potential repeat of such a terrible incident worth the belief in someone's potential to change?  How can you ever really be sure of the effectiveness of rehabilitation, anyway?  Do we really have the ability to know how much of a hold it has on people, or how much of it might be falsified?

The same thing happens every single time Mario is let loose, despite his rehabilitation...

I'm all for giving people second chances, but some acts are just so heinous and abhorrent that I feel it's more important to prevent the person from being able to commit such an act again.  In a case such as the one I described above, I'd lean most toward life (or, at least, a very long) incarceration of the person who committed the act.  I don't know that I'd have anything against trying to rehabilitate the person, but if that decision was made, it should be done during the course of their punishment, not as a replacement for such.

So, generally speaking, I think that punishments work better as motivating factors than rehabilitation does, generally speaking.  I do believe that rehabilitation has its place in the system, but that it needs to happen in conjunction with punishments, in most instances.  I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the viewpoints for this week.