prison

The latest controversy in criminal justice revolves around the defense of 16-year-old Ethan Couch, who killed four people when he hit them with his car, driving at double the speed limit and double the legal blood alcohol level (as an underage drinker, actually, there is no acceptable limit, but let’s stick with the charges). Couch’s defense argued that he suffered from “affluenza”—a condition under which he had lived such a privileged and entitled life, with so few consequences for bad behavior, that he could not now be held suddenly responsible for his actions. Bizarrely, the judge accepted this defense and sentenced Couch to ten years of probation and a stay in a rehab facility known for its hippotherapy (affectionately, if a bit dismissively, known as “having a therapy pony”). Had affluenza not been accepted as a defense, the usual sentence for Couch’s crimes would have been 10-20 years of prison time.

In an article for Forbes, Dr. Dale Archer reminds us that the lack of consequences that accompanies privilege isn’t anything new:

Economist and sociologist Thorstein Veblen introduced the term ‘conspicuous consumption’ in the 19^th century to explain the behavior of […] families who spent their accumulated wealth in ostentatious ways to show off their newfound prestige and power.

Archer goes on to stress that the real worry is how common the modern trend of affluenza seems to be. He worries that the Keeping Up With the Kardashians era may be breeding a generation of narcissists, if not sociopaths who not only don’t understand punishment but also balk at the idea that they have anything to be punished for. He cites social psychologist Sara Konrath of the University of Michigan:

Her study of 13,737 college students found that there was a 40% decrease in empathy currently, when compared with 20 or 30 years ago.

In the end, it may be the application of the cute name “affluenza” that proves most offensive: personal responsibility is all the rage when it comes to the poor and people of color, but wealthy whites’ privilege appears to have found yet another way to keep them above the fray.

See more on “Affluenza” at: https://thesocietypages.org/sociologylens/2013/12/20/catching-affluenza-the-role-of-money-in-criminal-justice/

Over the past few years, Oklahoma has locked up its place as the state with the highest rates of female incarceration. In a recent article for The Oklahoman, Andrew Knittle interviewed University of Oklahoma sociologist Susan Sharp about the state’s “mean” laws that lead to this trend.

Sharp explains that Oklahoma has tough-on-crime sentencing guidelines that cause offenders to serve abnormally lengthy terms in prison. Sharp points specifically to overly punitive drug laws for these high incarceration rates. Possession of small amounts of drugs, which in most states would have little to no punishment, can lead to some serious jail time in Oklahoma. Sharp argues against

drug traffickers being forced to serve 85 percent of their sentences when drug rehabilitation would do more good at a lower cost to the state. “It’s the way we define drug trafficking (in Oklahoma) … if you’re arrested with five grams of crack cocaine, you can be charged with trafficking,” Sharp said.

Sharp also explained that women generally enter into a criminal lifestyle after going through one of three “pathways”:

coming from a poverty-stricken background, being in relationships with men who engage in criminal behavior, and suffering from a long history of abuse.

On a side note, the prison mentioned in this article is the same one featured in the documentary, “Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo.” Links to the film can be found at the TSP documentary page at https://thesocietypages.org/specials/documentaries/ !

The United States has a greater share of its population behind bars than any other nation. Yet this captive audience is almost never captured by large national surveys used to study the U.S. population. This might distort what we think we know about black progress in recent decades, the Wall Street Journal reports, because a large enough swath of the young African American male population is incarcerated and unaccounted for by these surveys.

Among the generally accepted ideas about African-American young-male progress over the last three decades that Becky Pettit, a University of Washington sociologist, questions in her book “Invisible Men“: that the high-school dropout rate has dropped precipitously; that employment rates for young high-school dropouts have stopped falling; and that the voter-turnout rate has gone up.

For example, without adjusting for prisoners, the high-school completion gap between white and black men has fallen by more than 50% since 1980, says Prof. Pettit. After adjusting, she says, the gap has barely closed and has been constant since the late 1980s. “Given the data available, I’m very confident that if we include inmates” in more surveys, “the trends are quite different than we would otherwise have known,” she says.

Voter turnout is another example, especially in light of this year’s presidential election.

…commonly accepted numbers show that the turnout rate among black male high-school dropouts age 20 to 34 surged between 1980 and 2008, to the point where about one in three were voting in presidential races. Prof. Pettit says her research indicates that instead the rate was flat, at around one in five, even after the surge in interest in voting among many young black Americans with Barack Obama in the 2008 race.

“I think that’s kind of stunning,” Prof. Pettit said.

Experts debate the feasibility of including prisoners in such surveys, as well as how to make the best use of available data. Even Pettit admits, “These are really, really tricky things.”

As California grapples with a recent Supreme Court decision that mandates the state to reduce its prison population, sociologist Joshua Page examines an alliance that speaks out against prison reform.

This alliance, between Crime Victims United and the California Correctional Peace Officers Association, has existed for over two decades, as both organizations have lobbied for harsher sentences and other “tough on crime” policies.

The union had a strong personal interest in developing the victims group, which it realized could be an effective ally in achieving the guards’ policy objectives: enhancing members’ pay and benefits, keeping private prisons out of California and promoting “tough on crime” sentencing laws. Crime Victims United shares the union’s commitment to lengthy, harsh mandatory sentencing laws such as “three strikes.” The alliance has been good for both partners.

And the two groups have become a powerful force.

But their success has had a downside. When Crime Victims United turns complicated criminal justice matters into simple choices between helping and hurting victims, reasoned debate and thoughtful policymaking are necessarily constricted. Lawmakers are reluctant to oppose advocates. . .for fear that they will be tarred in the media and targeted in future elections. No politician wants to stand against a woman whose daughter was murdered and be deemed soft on crime. With financing from the guards, the victims group has the resources to seriously help or damage a politician’s image and career.

So while Crime Victims United provides support to people who suffer crimes, their actions may also cause harm.

By claiming pride of place as “the voice of victims,” the group marginalizes alternative victims’ voices. Some victims’ rights groups in the state maintain that vengeful, ultra-tough penal policies do not help victims of crime but simply create more suffering and resentment. These groups say that challenging offenders to take responsibility for the harm their crimes cause through restorative justice practices and helping prisoners develop the tools necessary to live crime-free lives help prevent future victims. These alternative voices reject zero-sum logic; they do not reflexively pit offenders against victims — or, in Nina Salarno Ashford’s words, the “bad people” against the “good citizens.”

According to Page, both groups will likely ensure their voices continue to be heard.  “If policymakers continue to follow the voices of expressly punitive victims rights advocates and ignore the opinions of those who promote alternative, less punitive conceptions of justice, California will not shrink its $9-billion prison system or alleviate its correctional crisis. The status quo will prevail.”

Check out the entire Op-Ed in the Los Angeles Times.