So, to sum up, from 2005 to 2012, the UK had a scheme (always love that word, neutral in most British dialects but delightfully menacing in American English) for certain repeat offenders where you would be sentenced to a minimum with no designated end date, just when the parole board thought you were sufficiently rehabilitated, though you remained on parole indefinitely as well.
When it was revoked, because “life but with the possibility of parole after two years” is a pretty bizarre idea and a palpably insane sentence for anything short of various homicide sexual assault charges, it was only going forward. They didn’t retroactively cap the prisoners’ sentences.
Official figures published last week show 2,796 people given IPPs remain in prison today. Of those, 1,179 have never been released and 705 are more than 10 years beyond their original sentence.
I’m an American. Our system is, on the whole, obviously much worse, tragically worse, but this seems like an oddly Dickensian nightmare in a country that’s generally much more humane, though still struggling with a weird sort of muscularly classist paternalism.
[…] an oddly Dickensian nightmare in a country that’s generally much more humane, though still struggling with a weird sort of muscularly classist paternalism
You can add to that a very unhealthy admiration for the USA
I’ve lived in a couple of countries in Europe including the UK and the idea that the system in Britain is generally humane is pretty naive.
The Justice System in Britain is to a very large extent a tool to Keep People In Their Proper Place and like the Political system and other Power systems over there, the end result of uninterrupted centuries of maybe the most classist mindset in the whole of Europe and one of the lowest levels of social mobility in the continent.
Absolutelly, if you are wealthy or well connected the system will be very “humane” for you and if you’re Middle Class you’ll probably be alright. Poor people … well … as long as they only harm other poor people (or foreigners) they might be alright (hence the phenomenon of Hooliganism), otherwise the book will be thrown at them.
There really is quite the extraordinary “some people are inherently superior to other people” mindset going on in there and that’s reflected in the uneveness of the treatment given to people by the Justice System and the exceedingly cold and extremelly punitive sentencing reserved for “lesser” people.
The style of violence of the various British Power Systems reflects the style of violence of the Posh Elites: nothing so crude as physical violence involving guns, rather complex rule structures design with enough flexibility to on one side let the “right people” through and on the other crush the “wrong people” in their machinery and a goon-like police force compose of people from a working class background who see themselves as above the common working class and can thus often behave with that very special kind of cruelty and obedience found in those who both think they’re now better than the place from where they came, yet fear they might fall back if they don’t do execute their orders with gusto.
So, to sum up, from 2005 to 2012, the UK had a scheme (always love that word, neutral in most British dialects but delightfully menacing in American English) for certain repeat offenders where you would be sentenced to a minimum with no designated end date, just when the parole board thought you were sufficiently rehabilitated, though you remained on parole indefinitely as well.
When it was revoked, because “life but with the possibility of parole after two years” is a pretty bizarre idea and a palpably insane sentence for anything short of various homicide sexual assault charges, it was only going forward. They didn’t retroactively cap the prisoners’ sentences.
I’m an American. Our system is, on the whole, obviously much worse, tragically worse, but this seems like an oddly Dickensian nightmare in a country that’s generally much more humane, though still struggling with a weird sort of muscularly classist paternalism.
You can add to that a very unhealthy admiration for the USA
I’ve lived in a couple of countries in Europe including the UK and the idea that the system in Britain is generally humane is pretty naive.
The Justice System in Britain is to a very large extent a tool to Keep People In Their Proper Place and like the Political system and other Power systems over there, the end result of uninterrupted centuries of maybe the most classist mindset in the whole of Europe and one of the lowest levels of social mobility in the continent.
Absolutelly, if you are wealthy or well connected the system will be very “humane” for you and if you’re Middle Class you’ll probably be alright. Poor people … well … as long as they only harm other poor people (or foreigners) they might be alright (hence the phenomenon of Hooliganism), otherwise the book will be thrown at them.
There really is quite the extraordinary “some people are inherently superior to other people” mindset going on in there and that’s reflected in the uneveness of the treatment given to people by the Justice System and the exceedingly cold and extremelly punitive sentencing reserved for “lesser” people.
The style of violence of the various British Power Systems reflects the style of violence of the Posh Elites: nothing so crude as physical violence involving guns, rather complex rule structures design with enough flexibility to on one side let the “right people” through and on the other crush the “wrong people” in their machinery and a goon-like police force compose of people from a working class background who see themselves as above the common working class and can thus often behave with that very special kind of cruelty and obedience found in those who both think they’re now better than the place from where they came, yet fear they might fall back if they don’t do execute their orders with gusto.
You do understand that’s not what he wrote. Right?
Like, do you get that it was a nightmare system in contrast with a society a little more humane than America? (A bit of a low bar)