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From: rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.misc,net.politics,net.religion,net.women
Subject: Re: Guilt and punishment
Message-ID: <440@pyuxn.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 3-Feb-84 20:59:13 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxn.440
Posted: Fri Feb  3 20:59:13 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 8-Feb-84 04:57:54 EST
References: <791@ssc-vax.UUCP>
Organization: Central Services Org., Piscataway N.J.
Lines: 51

I keep hearing in both net.religion and net.women about the notions
of guilt and punishment.  Net.religion is really the appropriate place
for discussion, but I am posting to net.women also because of part of
a tangential subdiscussion about punishment for rapists.

Upfront, I don't believe in this malarchy {n., government by very bad
people [?????]} about one's choices and actions.  We've got chemicals
in our bodies, and we take action based on those chemicals.  If the
actions a person takes are deemed detrimental to members of society, society
is given the right to take action against that person.

But what precisely is that action?  Is it punishment?  [YOU'VE BEEN A
NAUGHTY BOY/GIRL AND YOU'RE BEING PUNISHED BY BEING PUT IN A NASTY PLACE
SO YOU'LL NEVER DO THAT AGAIN!]  Is it simply stopping the person from
doing whatever they did again?  (Does incarceration help to accomplish this?)
Is it providing the victim with restitution/assistance in recovering from the
person's action?  (At the expense of the perpetrator?)

Our society's current viewpoint seems to be along the lines of "you did
something---it was wrong---you must be punished for it".  What does this
really accomplish?  If someone rapes, murders, or steals, and is
incarcerated as a result, what has been accomplished?  Keeping this
person "off the streets" for a few years?  Some people may get scared enough
by incarceration that their behavior does indeed change, but most would
simply continue in their old chemically ingrained behavior patterns when
they are released.  Since we are not really all that knowledgeable about
goal-directed behavior modification as A Clockwork Orange would have us
believe (realizing that even in that book the reality was that *they* weren't
all that knowledgeable), results in changing the behavior of incarcerated
criminals are limited, and there are those who believe that such techniques,
if used, would violate one's civil rights (despite the fact that such behavior
modification occurs continuously through mass media and societal
reinforcement).  And what about the victim?  Since it is beyond our abilities
(probably ever) to change the fact that a person has been raped or murdered
as a result of another person's violence, what should be done for the
victims and/or their survivors?

I don't have a lot of answers, but I have a few questions.  What is our
motivation for seeking punishment for the guilty?  If a person's violent
anti-social behavior that is caused by hormonal/chemical ibalances can be
altered and verified through therapy, chemo- or psycho-, then is "punishment"
still important to "teach that person a lesson"?  Why?  And does society do
its part for the victim?  What is that "part"?  To what extent are current
societal attitudes towards these things a result of religious indoctrination?

PLEASE feel free to limit the resulting discussion to a single newsgroup.  The
only reason for the multiple postings was because of the variety of sources
that sparked me to write this.
-- 
Pardon me for breathing...
	Rich Rosen    pyuxn!rlr