So I am re-watching Dragonball Z,and something really got my attention.In the series Goku & the others are merciful to everyone,and I mean EVERYONE in hope of them become good guys. So do you think we should be merciful to people ,so we can hope that they change? Also do you think that we should be merciful to everyone,no matter what horrible things the person did?
Too many people leave prison and re-offend. I don't think that someone should have an unlimited amount of chances, nor should they be given a life sentence for a first time offense. It's finding the balance between giving the benefit of the doubt and deeming them safe for society. Some people do change, but many don't. Give em' a chance, they fuck it up and it's back to the slammer, for a long time.
Mercy is like a fine wine. You drink it when it is appropriate and let it lie in the dark for years in hope it will get better if you just don't feel like drinking it at that time.
But then there is rehabilitation. Should we spend time and money trying to get criminals to understand and regret what they have done? Or is it their responsibility to become a better person. The question is, should we make the effort?
Depends on the crime. The vast majority of them will still end up the same way when they come out: struggling to find work on account of their criminal record. Smaller, lesser crimes like petty theft probably don't require rehabilitation in the first place or don't need a professional to do it. These individuals still have a chance, but rehabilitation would just be a waste as it probably isn't needed. For other, more serious cases such as sexual assault or murder (though murder may depend based on the context in which the act was committed), the person will probably have next to zero chance of becoming successful or useful to the society other than an example of the path not to go down. Rehabilitation has about as much merit as killing them when it comes to helping anyone of significance. Helping them understand their crime doesn't really help anyone. Depends on the circumstances and the crime. Should a teenager who is caught pocketing chapsticks three times be put away for 25-40 years or life? Probably not. One of the problems with the three-strikes law is that the accumulated punishment may not fit the crime committed the third time or even the second one or even the first or even the three together.
Like anyone is going to feel great about society after they're locked up in a small room for 20 years. Sometimes for a crime they didn't even commit. The reason why there's no rehabilitation in America is because we make no attempt to rehabilitate people. We throw them in for-profit prisons expect them to be singing Kumbaya by the end of their sentence. And we don't even have a good excuse for doing it, it just happens to cost less.
The marines(guys who were above the showers) in the movie mutinied, raided a marine base for some sort of fictional chemical weapon and took hostages at Alcatraz(promising to launch the chemical weapons at cities unless their demands were met) because the leader(Ed Harris), was tired of the Pentagon and the US government not honoring the soldiers sacrifices properly and often lying about the fates they had suffered. Most of the other m=Marines were motivated by the promise of one million dollars each. The Navy Seals(guys in the ground level) were sent in to disarm the rockets and rescue the hostages(along with Nicolas Cage, a chemical weapons expert and Sean Connery a former convict on the Island) , but they set off a motion sensor letting the marines know where they were. The Marines then surrounded the Seals and Ed Harris demanded their surrender, and Seal Leader tried to reason with him until one of the marines knocked bricks into the shower room causing one of the seals to open fire. The Seals all die, except Sean Connery and Nicolas Cage who were in the sewer, who the proceed to go on with the mission and eventually succeed. Edit: Imperial beat me.
Good Summary. Except that thermite (though not the plasma in the film) and VX poison gas are by no means fictional. Thermite burns extremely hot and is used to dispose of things as well as in jobs that include welding things together. Last I checked (I will have to check again), it is still legal for US civilians to have it in small quantities. VX poison gas is classified as a Weapon of Mass Destruction. They are very real and very scary.
