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Essays on history of prisons
Essay on history of prison
Essay on history of prison
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Since the beginnings of society’s division into a hierarchy of man’s importance, the bottom of the social pyramid was always those seen as lacking morals. Whether immoral qualities were synonymous with skin color or occupation, a supposed lack of moral integrity allowed for those higher in stature to impose at times grueling oppression upon the degraded. As society evolved many advances pushed for equality among the masses so that each man or woman was allowed the freedom of bias or judgment. However, no matter how advanced the human race, there is still a hierarchy and at the lowest of its levels lies prisoners. Prisoners in modern times are often seen as morally deficit and depraved monsters that deserve the worst of punishments to repent for their crimes. Consequently, since prisoners occupied the lower levels of society’s class division history suggests that they are to be subject to the oppression of their proclaimed superiors, the unchained population. The use of prisoner’s for medical research has gone from something that has been considered adequate to something that is unacceptable and inhumane.
The use of prisoner’s for medical research is absolutely cold-hearted. To force anyone to be experimented for medical research without his or her informed consent is both illegal and immoral. Medical ethics requires doctors or pharmaceutical companies to conduct their experiments with the informed consent from patients or volunteers, meaning that an individual should be fully informed about the potential harms or benefits experiments would like to bring. There's no point that such a basic moral principle could be tramped, this should be applied equally to both general public and prisoners, for the latter group although being depr...
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...oners are unfairly lured into something that they may not want to do. Because prisoners are so easily accessible the benefits of research can be great and be better controlled. This is very tempting to government and companies that see huge potential profits in prison research. This can lead to laws being by-passed and, as has happened in the past, prisoners can very well be treated as experimental animals.
All in all, using prisoners as research subjects is one of the most immoral and unethical issues of our time. This issue began in the 1940s and when opposition to these actions began in the 1960s, new regulations came into place making this issue somewhat more, but not at all completely, acceptable. The use of prisoners in medical research is about exploitation and profit and this heinous activity contributes to the corruption of health care in our country.
Many ethical boundaries were crossed in the Stanford Prison Experiment. Abuse was not limited to physical, but also psychological (Burgemeester, 2011). In the movie The Stanford Prison Experiment, which depicts events that actually occurred, the guards played physiological tricks on the prisoners. The prisoners were lead to believe that they actually committed crimes and couldn’t leave the experiment. One main thing that the guards did to physically and psychologically harm the prisoners was to tamper with their sleeping schedules. They would wake the prisoners on the middle of the night and have them do exercises, and once they were done they were permitted to go back to sleep (Ratnesar, 2011). By doing this the prisoners lose sense of what
Southam’s practice, beginning with the Code’s number 1 rule, “The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential.” Other rules under the Nuremberg Code were broken as well, however all of these egregious behaviors of researchers, more so than just Southam, have influenced the tight research protocols in place today. As Dr. Hardy shared information on research protocols, she consistently referred back to a strict system of regulations that, at times, may seem a little extreme. The alternative, a system permitting researchers like Southam, would be a far harder bullet to bite. In the end, I am glad these systems are in place to try to ensure a trust between patients and
The “pains of imprisonment” can be divided into five main conditions that attack the inmate’s personality and his feeling of self-worth. The deprivations are as follows: The deprivation of liberty, of goods and services, of heterosexual relationships, autonomy and of security.
The 1970s in the United States was a time of incredible change, doubt, as well as reform. The many issues happening throughout the country helped to lead to the discomfort in many prisoners that eventually lead to their e...
Metzner, J. L., & Fellner, J. (2010). Solitary Confinement and Mental Illness in U.S. Prisons: A Challenge for Medical Ethics. The Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 38(1), 104-108.
Potential grave consequences that can result from irresponsible, or criminal, medical experiments. While we must be vigilant to protect innocent victims from such experimentation we cannot let that stifle our duty to continue making advances in healthcare and improving the lives of patients.
While some would argue that the small number of executed prisoners is not worth the legal trouble of forcing them to donate their organs their opposition would respond “That’s a fairly statistical approach that may be appropriate if we weren’t talking about lives. Even if the case were that only a single donor can save a single life it would still be worth it.” Overall this issue is under much scrutiny for the fact that it’s controversial for both the medical staff involved and the legal repercussions for those advocating for this procedure to be enacted. While ethical considerations should obviously be addressed, one must keep in mind the moral state of mind the convicted murderers have themselves. When one holds no regard for life, why put so much emphasis on their body’s state after they
In the essay "Prison "Reform" in America," Roger T. Pray points out the much attention that has been devoted to research to help prevent crimes. Showing criminals the errors of their ways not by brutal punishment, but by locking them up in the attempt to reform them. Robert Pray, who is a prison psychologist, is currently a researcher with the Utah Dept. of Corrections. He has seen what has become of our prison system and easily shows us that there is really no such thing as "Prison Reform"
You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. Everyone knows that you can’t help someone unless they want to help themselves. When the prison system was first established, the possibilities in rehabilitation were nothing like they are today. They could make prisoners go to daily consueling, have small groups, write in journals, plant flowers…maybe even go to yoga classes or have meditation time so that they could become one with their inner spirits and realize the error of their ways.
For instance, dying in prison, The Open University, (2009) Brings with it social inequalities with limited or no access to palliative care, although basic medical needs are met. No family surrounding them. For many, the option to leave the prison will be declined for safety reasons, but for the few that can leave to die often refuse to do so. The feeling of safety and familiarity that their prison cell brings them opposed to the outside world which views them negatively. Therefore, this indicates the power over prisoners resulting in a social disadvantage and inequality, removing away their rights in death.
The features of enhanced confinement that consistently draw the most profound condemnation revolve around: the often-brutal forms and compassionless deprivations in which these units or facilities operate, the harrowing living conditions that inmates are compelled to endure, the resulting physical and psychological damage to body and soul, and the questionable legality of such confinement. Leading human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are regularly outing the United States for operating torturous prisons that house convicted criminals in the most deplorable and extra-legal conditions. (Marion Experiment pgs.
Another problem with prisons are the terrible conditions and poor medical supervision that is provided. Diseases can be spread easily in highly populated prisons so it is highly recommended that prison facilities are clean and hold prisoners to their made capacity. These conditions can even affect prisoners long-term. Some prisoners have shown to have psychological problems because of the conditions they experienced in prisons. Prisons are created to reform prisoners, not harm them. Health care in prisons has been a problem for many years. It got so serious at one point, that in 1972, a Health Advisory Committee was set up to commend the matters affecting the health of prisoners. This committee gave prisons standards to follow, but prisons
The Stanford Prison Experiment is frequently cited as a prime example of unethical research. The experiment could not be replicated by researchers today because it fails to meet the standards established by numerous codes of ethics issued by the American Psychological Association (APA). Zimbardo acknowledges the ethical problems with the study by suggesting that "although we ended the study a week earlier than planned, we did not end it soon enough." The ethics surrounding the Stanford Prison Experiment could be deemed unsatisfactory, especially if held to the standards of today’s APA, even though a review board in 1973 failed to see any violations. The participants - both the guards and the prisoners - were put under a great deal of stress.
...inical professor at the University of Colorado. Unless the country develops a decent mental health care system, this issue will continue (Qtd. In “Prison Health Care, 3). More than 2 million inmates in U.S. prisons suffer from mental illness, addiction, infectious, or chronic diseases like HIV/AIDS and diabetes (“Prison Health Care”, 1). About a quarter suffer from severe depression and a fifth from psychosis (2). The majority of prisoners have no health problems at the time they became incarcerated; once imprisoned, they acquired a mental disorder (1). In 1976, the Supreme Court ruled that prisoners have the right to free health care due to the Eighth Amendment (4). Yet, prisons fail to provide health care of decent quality. Some prisons do not even have licensed physicians (5). Most doctors do not wish to work in a prison, therefore resources become substandard.
Experimentations on humans, even though essential for scientific progress, pose many ethical questions where we ask ourselves if we should continue disposing human bodies in the name of medicine. We hold the same old concern about a man’s obsession with knowledge where a discovery for the good of the majority might become a justifiable reason for exploiting one human being for the good of all.