Born poor? More chance of jail (Glasgow Herald)

[McKenzie]

we've always known about the correlation between poverty and chances of succeeding in the world. Here's a study that analyses it properly. I heard the Justice Minister trying to do down the report on the radio this morning. Where would she have been most likely to end up if she had been born in a trailer park? I doubt if it would have been the Scottish Executive.

http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/32029.shtml

<snip1>

The problem is at its most acute amongst young men. Almost four in 100 of 23-year-olds in the most deprived areas of Scotland are in jail. This is a higher rate than among black men in the US, a group seen as having the world's highest rates of imprisonment.
In sharp contrast, a quarter of all wards in Scotland generate no prisoners at all.

<snip>

<snip2>

Just as it is a fact of life if you are born in the most deprived parts of the country that there is an increased probability that you will remain poor and will die young, so it is an analogous fact that you have an increased probability of spending time in prison."

<snip>

[Cronus Protagonist]

1. Ain't that a fact

I should know since I was born poor in Glasgow and I had to get the hell out of there to even have a chance of getting on in life.


http://brainbuttons.com/home.asp?stashid=13
Buttons for brainy people - educate your local freepers today!

[sweetheart]

2. And they don't tell the full story

What are these people being arrested for? Likely it is an outgrowth
of the war on drugs. I've encountered enough anecdotal evidence that
i would be willing to wager it. What happens is that someone gets
nicked for cannabis, and then can't get a job because the person gets
the stigma of being a criminal, and nobody will hire criminals... this
then keeps the person out of a career and on the public dole.

THe really pathetic part is that they treat the war on drugs as some
sort of sacred crusade, when it is really a horrible racist policy
imported from the american fascists to screw over the poor and deny
them political representation.

That and as well, alcohol and the associated violence, because the
culture pushes people on to a drug (alcohol) that is much much more
dangerous socially than cannabis. All this story does is make me
laugh at how stupid the people are in government who make such dumb
laws.... i've no respect for them at all.

[I_equals_PRT]

3. war on drugs sucks and it's all to protect the drug companies

so they can sell you vicodan, percocet, valium and zoloft. They want you medicated, they just don't want you self medicated. If drugs are bad for kids, going to jail is worse.

[sweetheart]

4. even more ironic

After being jailed for cannabis and not being able to get jobs,
those people are MORE likely to resort to the drugs trade as a way to
make a living. Criminalization begets crime, and the real criminals
are those people making laws that destroy so many people's lives.

I hope the mother of the next person who dies from a drugs overdose
punches jack maconnel in the nose for being such an asshole and helping
to kill their child... as much as tonly blair is responsible for any
deaths in the black watch... the drugs warriors are on a killing and
social disabling spree on the home front. There are no words for those
filthy tossers.

[McKenzie]

5. and look at what Prohibition achieved... a big fat "0"

Sorry, it did allow the Mob to grow massively and then corrupt the system using their ill-gotten gains.

I reckon the huge profits that the drug barons make buys them influence in government. Every time I hear a politician speak against legalisation I ask myself... "Is that your heartfelt view or is someone paying you to protect their interests?" The irony of it all is that alcohol is lethal but legal. Erm...know what "hypocrisy" means Senator?

Remove the profit motive and free up HUGE amounts of resources to treat the problem. The LEA are wasting their time; they won't stop the trade. Ever. It's too profitable. Were I a drug baron I'd be mighty pissed off at the prospect of legalisation.