True Casualties: The Children of Prisoners

When Joe’s dad went to prison, Joe went to prison too—a prison of shame and anger. Responding to his father’s incarceration, Joe fought, drank, and smoked dope. And while Joe’s prison was figurative, he was on a path leading to a real prison with bars and barbed wire.

Joe is not a unique case. As a recent article in the National Journal claimed, “The next generation of prisoners is going to come from the current generation of prisoners.”

Sadly, society stands idly by as the children of prisoners become the unintentional casualties of the “war on crime.” With more than 2.3 million individuals currently behind bars in America, our incarceration rate quadruples that of previous decades. And the children of these prisoners are five to seven times more likely than the average child to end up in prison one day. Even more shocking, the American Correctional Association concluded that 52 percent of female juvenile offenders had an incarcerated parent.

On a recent trip to Bolivia, I had the opportunity to visit San Pedro prison in La Paz. As I watched throngs of prisoners shove each other out of the way for their daily bowl of gruel, I noticed a little girl with matted hair and grubby face lift up her own bowl among the ranks of hardened criminals. Although innocent of any crime, she had no other choice but to join her parents behind bars.

She doesn’t deserve prison. And neither do the 2 million American children with an incarcerated parent. But that’s exactly where we will send them one day if we do not begin to reform the criminal justice system.

We must reevaluate who we lock up, why we lock them up, and how we lock them up. Prisons are for people we are afraid of, not mad at. In other words, prisons are for dangerous offenders who pose a threat to society. We need to challenge “three-strikes-and-you’re-out” laws and mandatory minimum sentencing, responsible for filling 60 percent of our federal prisons with drug offenders, many of whom have no prior criminal record for a violent offense and many of whom are not drug dealers. On top of that, we need to consider the ramifications of separating families by incarcerating prisoners far from their homes.

But we can do more than influence public policy. Jesus said in Matthew 18:5 that “whoever welcomes a little child like this in My name welcomes Me.” The Church has always heeded the call to care for at-risk children—forgotten children. And these children are the most at-risk and forgotten children in America. God has a bias toward those who do not have advocates. As His followers, we should too.

Thanks to a caring Prison Fellowship mentor and a local church, Joe has embraced Christ and now spends his free time participating in mission trips and playing football with friends from the church youth group. Through Prison Fellowship’s Angel Tree program, we have watched thousands of children of prisoners like Joe escape the vicious cycle of crime and come to Christ.

Would you consider helping us reach the unintended casualties of the war on crime? Help us by mentoring a prisoner’s child or buying a child a Christmas gift on behalf of their incarcerated parent. Help us to send a child to a week of Christian summer camping. Call us at BreakPoint (1-877-322-5527), and we’ll tell you how you can help and make a difference.

And your using "bigot" as a conjunction in your previous posts was what, flattery?

It's not an insult, it's a statement of truth. Words have meanings - which you now know since I posted the definition. Whether I call you one or not doesn't change the fact of your being so, unless you stop being one. It's fundamentally different from my calling you a puppy, swatting your own vomit around, as you did me.

Is there any level of harm (to nondrug users), if definitively shown to be a result of drug use by YOUR OWN standards, that would dissuade you?

Yes. If there is some level of absolutely unavoidable harm to others engendered by drug use, then a discussion of the harms to others vs. the merits to the one can enter, and then regulation or prohibition can be discussed. (E.g. nerve gas, and plutonium whose use have very high probability of very grave harm to others.) However, I happen to know that with the exception of PCP, using drugs brings only a vanishing probability of unavoidable harm to others, and for PCP I don't know whether the probability is very low, low, or moderate, but I do know it is less than the majority, because PCP is used by thousands each year, and there are only a few stories of someone on a PCP rampage. Alcohol, which kills ~50,000 / year, most of them the drinkers, but many of them innocents, is worse than any illegal drug - including PCP at least on a numbers level if not in probability, and yet remains legal - and so should serve as a guideline for what sort of level of harm is tolerable. Speaking of PCP, I believe that if other less hazardous drugs were legally available, demand for PCP could be brought nearly to zero.

Assuming from previous attempts that there is zero chance of your actually answering my question,

Wrong again.

You need to start a Constitutional Amendment process. I'm sure you don't think it should be necessary, but given our history with slavery, etc. you'll just have to accept it. If I understand your positions correctly it needs to say:

All behaviors and actions are hereby legal despite any probability of resulting harm, danger, or bodily injury. Only actions that actually result in direct harm will be punishable.

That should cover it. No more regulations of any kind, no traffic laws (against recklessness), no more building codes, no limits on anything of any kind (that are designed to prevent harm).

Of course this is a groteque straw man argument - once again. (What is it with you and logical fallacies?) I have already stated I support laws against negligence and recklessness, and I have already stated I support regulation of nerve gas and plutonium. I have also made the distinction between harm to innocent others, and harm to oneself, which you fail to make above. So you grossly misrepresent my position in the above.

I predict you will fail miserably, at which point you will have to decide whether to undertake an insurrection, or accept curbs in a republican democracy.

LOL! This is a Constitutional Republic, not a "republican democracy." But you knew that right, and are just attempting satire, right? You do know that this country was not set up as a democracy, right? Right?

Now could you afford me the courtesy of answering my questions, posed in my last post?

Just a side note on the above. As it is you that wants to massively change the laws, and I'm presenting the majority position,

You're just chock full of logical fallacies, aren't you! That's known as the fallacy, the "appeal to the majority." A majority of Southerners supported Jim Crow laws in the past, a majority of residents of Kali, New York, Taxachussetts, Chicago, and other places support gun prohibitions, and a majority of US voters (but, fortunately, not Electoral College voters) supported Al Gore for president in 2000. That doesn't make any of them right, and it doesn't make you right either.

you might want to try to disprove it yourself.

Since you are the one who wants to violently deprive others of rights, the burden of proof for the necessity of doing so rests on you. Here's the Presumption Of Tyranny again, coming from you: All laws, however tyrannical they might be, are assumed valid unless people can PROVE they should be repealed. A situation that is much closer to the founding father's intent is that all laws should sunset, unless there is a clear and convincing argument to continue some of them. How would you argue against those supporting Jim Crow laws, again? You have never answered that question. In your answer, remember your support for majority positions, the presumtion that laws are valid, and the significance of statistical relationships between crime and the subjects of laws in question. (This is going to be good!)

You can hold out on me doing days of research, but I frankly don't need to, to win this argument, and I don't think any statistic on this is capable of changing your mind.

On the other hand, if you had statistics from a non-interested party, with solid research, showing that only 3% (for instance) of crack users ever committed crimes to pay for their drugs, then I would find that very compelling toward legalization,

Well, how about this for a statistic:

Why do you suppose the murder rate dropped after Prohibition ended? If alcohol leads people to the path of criminality and violence, as the Prohibitionists did claim, then allowing "easy access to alcohol" (as the gun grabbers would say) should lead to escalation of murder rates at the end of Prohibition. But that isn't what happened, is it?

even though I still wouldn't consider it a right.

Yes, it's obvious that consideration of rights plays a miniscule role in your thought process, e.g. the right to keep and bear arms, which you would revoke if, as the gun grabbers claim, guns lead people to commit crimes!

If nothing else, I have to applaud the shear volume of your posts. You definitely have me beat in the free time arena. At least right now.

I'm not even sure where to start with your last posts, other than to first thank you for finally answering a question. You asked me about 30 questions, most of which I've already given a position on, plus you've made about 30 more assumptive statements of fact with shaky documentation at best. So in a way your voluminous regurgitation is a victory for you. I simply don't have the time or interest to rehash and re-answer all the areas we've already been. I will try to pick a few that I think are most likely to lead somewhere, and not concentrate on the head scratchers like your continued non-comparison / comparison of alcohol to drugs, and your use of semantics with the word "democracy" (I'll concede I should have said democratic).

The question you answered indicated that you are not for legalizing all substances (even all drugs) based on the premise that some substances pose too great a risk of harm. Because you look at drugs on a case by case basis, I find it hard to understand your assertions that private drug use is an absolute right. But perhaps that's just me being picky. The major point is that you want to legalize certain drugs, but possibly control others based on their harm. I'm OK with that, as a matter of fact, we do that now. We just disagree on the level of acceptable harm.

So in this we are in agreement. Correct?

Would it be too much to ask what percentage of correlation you would find worthy of action?

To me it would be more about the level of damage being done in society than the percentage of people who cause problems. To use your simplified example of a drug that alters brain function and causes violent behavior, if 2% of users killed someone every time the drug was taken, then I'd be for banning it. For a different drug, that led to say 5% of users stealing in order to pay for it and no other harm, I would not be for banning it. For something specific, let's say crack, I would want to know how many users commit a serious crime (I'm excluding possession as a crime) and compare that to the same demographic of non-users. Then we could have a public discussion of the pros, cons, and costs of both criminalization and decriminalization.

To me this is reasonable, but that calls on society (voting democratically) for representatives to decide where to draw the lines in the gray area. You may wish to have it decided by a judge interpreting the Constitution, but I don't think judges do a very good job of making fine distinctions in application. Instead you just get the judge's morals foisted on you. Judges making law strikes me as far more prone to tyranny than representative government.

I have said before, and I will say again, that the above is my sole reason for backing the current laws against unregulated use of drugs.

If the WOD were shown to be more harmful to society than drug users, I would certainly change my mind.

The problem with all of this for you appears to be that you must be willing to accept that the majority may have a different level of acceptable harm than you, without immediately crying that they are all bigots and tyrants. This is why I say it is YOUR obligation to change their views, not the majority's to change yours.

My new suggestion to you is to stop lumping all "recreational" drugs together in your legalization bid (you do seperate them but only after being pushed), and to stop crying things like "bigot". It just makes people want to ignore you as a crank. That's not intended as an insult, just an observation. I guess I had more free time than I thought. Now I can blame you for my lack of productivity as well (just a joke).

You graph is interesting.

The jump in homicides occurred in 1905 and increased about 580% (up 5.8) before Prohibition began. Was that due to alcohol, which brought on Prohibition? During about the same period of time during Prohibition, the curve flattens and only increases 50% (up 3). That would indicate other variables at play, would it not? It could also be argued that your statistics show that Prohibition saved lives (I wouldn't say that though)?

There is absolutely a big drop at the end of Prohibition (too much not to believe there is some correlation), but that decline also coincides with the Great Depression (did tracking and recording change?) and WW II. Removing 3 million young men from the population could be expected to have just such an effect. Notice how it spiked again when they came home? In any event, ending Prohibition in itself doesn't explain why the rate would decrease well below preprohibition numbers.

After bottoming out in the 50's (not known for substance excesses) the curve takes off again at the beginning of the Great Society and the expanded use of recreational drugs, before the WOD. Slightly flattening, when the WOD was instituted. There is a peak and dip coinciding with stronger enforcement and then a massive current decline that coincides with another round of strict enforcement.

Having said that, the numbers are really pointless to your argument and mine. There are way too many unknown variables.

Do you have a graph on alcohol related and drug related homicides? That would be far more compelling. It would also be helpful to break out the homicides between those involved in distribution versus those killed by users, as I don't question that legalization would make life safer for smugglers and pushers.

I hope you will agree that all of these variables matter. The communication age alone could be expected to increase the recorded rate, through better reporting and tracking.

... police spend a large fraction of their time committing violence on drug users, ...

This is what I mean by being careful not to just be dismissed as a crank.

I offered up front that these statistics in themselves (just like the ones you offered, thus the purpose) don't really mean anything definitive in themselves. But instead of concurring, or stating that it is a chicken and egg argument, you take off on a knee jerk rant about how its the police officers at fault for being assaulted. What percentage of the calls began with a call to the police about a crime or violence? The police very rarely stop anyone (who isn't driving) on suspicion of being high. Just a tip, but paranoia never endears confidence.

I offered up front that these statistics in themselves (just like the ones you offered, thus the purpose) don't really mean anything definitive in themselves.

That's right, they don't, although you find statistical arguments more persuasive than I do. Having gotten them from the DEA itself, you can be sure they are represented in a context that sheds the least light on the question. (Sort of like getting "gun violence" facts from the Brady Campaign, or "Black facts" from the KKK.) The DEA has a vested interest in making sure people are afraid of drug use and drug users, because they're all out of a job if the policies go away. Incidentally, the statistics you cited contain the same fallacy as "100% of firearms homicides are committed by gun owners" - a fallacy that you haven't admitted to committing, though I have explained it in a previous post. Once again, the question shouldn't be, what fraction of people who assault police officers use drugs, but rather, of those who use drugs, how many assault police officers?

To draw a sharper point on it, what fraction of people who assault cops are black, are drunk, or have ever drunk alcohol in their lives (~100%)? What fraction who shoot at cops are gun owners? The answers to these questions are misleading, because of the fallacy, but there's the trusty DEA, banging the same drum. (And there's you, citing it even though I acknowledged and explained the fallacy, after YOU correctly identified the "non-sensical" comparison, as you put it, in a different context.)

But instead of concurring, or stating that it is a chicken and egg argument, you take off on a knee jerk rant about how its the police officers at fault for being assaulted.

I beg your pardon (again), but I made no such claim. Straw man. I said it was neither surprising nor revealing that drug users disproportionately assault police officers, nothing more, nothing less. I did not claim it was the police officers "fault" as you falsely represent. I'll give you an example since you fail to see that this is true: Suppose it were illegal to speak Spanish in America - that it was prohibited, and that there was a War On Spanish, aggressively being fought. Clearly, a lot of police would be spending their time looking for such people, and arresting them, and clearly, there will be a lot of assaults on officers just because that's what sometimes happens. I will not, and do not, claim that it is the officer's "fault" that such assaults occur, although I would oppose such a war as you might expect, and I might expect a certain amount of resentment coming from the recipients of this war, irrespective of the objective harm that being able to speak Spanish brings (namely zero).

What percentage of the calls began with a call to the police about a crime or violence?

Circular argument. If using drugs is a crime, then the call might about someone using drugs, in which case, the fraction of calls that involve drugs is expectedly higher.

Just a tip, but paranoia never endears confidence.

Considering your use of logical fallacies in your posts to me, I don't think you're in much of a position to be dispensing tips.

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