Abnormal Addiction: Australia's Overcrowded Prisons

Australia’s Abnormal Addiction

Prisons overcrowded to the bursting point and we still can’t beat our unhealthy addiction to incarceration writes Shelby Lacey.

Australia rhymes with failure. And rightfully so.

The overcrowding of prisons is a predominant failure of Australia which is detrimentally impacting the effectiveness of prisons serving their intended purposes of deterring and rehabilitating criminals.

In primary school we were all taught of Australia’s penal heritage, right? The convicts, petty thieves who’d been exiled to Australia to solve Britain’s overcrowded prison systems. “Thieves, robbers and villains, they’ll send ’em away, to become a new people at Botany Bay.” Our nation was the cell and its blue abyss of ocean the cell

Neither have I yet, at the thought of prison inmates we immediately conjure up images of hardened criminals.

The media has been sensationalizing imprisonment since 1979 with the release of Australian crime and drama soap opera, “Prisoner”. It sparked our initial interest with imprisonment but as time went on, delighting in the well-deserved suffering of criminals became a global obsession.

Shows such “Wentworth”, “Law and Order” and “Orange Is the New Black”, just to name a few, expertly portray the glorified version of prison lifestyle.

Unrealistic media representations of prison systems influence Australia’s attitudes towards common crimes and furthermore affects our understanding of the contributing factors of overcrowded prisons. Image: inmate behind bars. Credit: Alarmy

True or false, crime in Australia is decreasing? Surprisingly, it’s true. In fact, since 2001, Australian homicide rate fell by 32%, and theft by 43%. It’s rather the incarceration rates that are increasing at unprecedented levels with reports by the Australian Bureau of Statistics showing over 33,000 inmates are causing the overflowing of every jail in

It is unmistakably clear through this evidence that the overcrowding of prisons impacts not only the effectiveness of prisons but also risks the safety of non-violent prisoners that don’t deserve their lives abruptly stolen from them.

Unfortunately, reforming such a failed system isn’t as simple as snapping your fingers. But it is manageable.

Over 46% of prisoners are incarcerated for non-violent crimes that pose little risk to the safety of our communities. That’s over 15, 180 prisoners unnecessarily imprisoned with severe impacts on both their own and other prisoner’s rehabilitation when alternatives would be much more effective.

Shock incarceration programs, also known as boot-camp prisons, are currently implemented in Australia in aim to reduce reoffending criminals, prison population and costs. The Australian Law Reform Commission claims they are “designed to break down individualism and impose rigid conformity to inoculate behavioural and attitudinal