When
it comes to crime, or rather
punishment, a grim and determined
mood is in the air, and it is
tougher and harsher than we have
seen for a long time. Gone, it
seems, is any desire to prevent
crime before it happens, or to
reform and educate the criminal.
Instead convicts can expect more
in the way of straight forward
punishment, a hard time, a dose
of their own medicine.
The Home Secretary [Michael
Howard] has been told by his own officials that his
proposed Boot Camps for young offenders will not work. In
the United States, where the idea originated, they do little
to stop repeat offending, and they will do no better here.
What they will do is reassure those who feel the
need for visible revenge that the "bad guy is hurting,"
to use the American phrase. Sadly, the likely result is
that the bad guy will be more careful in future, or worse,
more vicious. Was this lesson not learned in the days of
Willie Whitelaw's Short Sharp Shock, when we had the worst
riots in living memory? What is it in the world that makes
us so keen to get tougher with criminals when all the available
evidence tells us this only makes things worse?
In his book Zen
and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,
Robert Pirsig discusses what
he calls "value rigidity" - the
term he uses to describe those
situations where we get into
trouble because we put too much
importance on one thing when
we could more profitably value
something else. The example he
gives in his book is the South
Indian Monkey Trap: take a coconut
with a small hole cut in it,
fill it with rice and and stake
it to the ground. The hole should
be just big enough for the monkey
to get his empty hand in, but
too small to withdraw his fist
from when it is full of rice.
A hungry monkey wanders up to
the coconut for his free lunch,
puts his hand in, and grabs a
handful of rice. At this point
the hunter runs towards the monkey,
who tries to run away but can't
because his fist is full of rice
thathe won't let
go of. He struggles to pull
his fist out, but fails. We can
see the frantic logic all too
clearly: he got his hand in,
therefore it ought to come out.
A few moments contemplation and
it might all be different, but
he's too busy yanking away in
terror. He is trapped by his
own value system. As long as
rice is more valuable than freedom,
he is doomed.
Poor Mr. Howard.
His fist is in the coconut and
he's clinging on for dear life
to the policies he values so
much. He can't get his hand out
and keep his precious
policies. What is he to do? He
tells us "Prison works!" He promised
the end of the "soft option"
for criminals. Citizens would
be "walking with a purpose,"
and goodness knows what else.
Yet we are still plagued by crime
[relatively speaking - worse
than much of Europe, but still
miles better than the US], and
the prospect of ever harsher
penalties not only goes ignored
by criminals, it encroaches on
the liberties of the rest of
us—who end up paying for
it all.
We are, as a society, missing something important.
Like Mr Howard and the monkey, we too are committed to a
set of ideas—about what is politically important—when it
might be wiser to start thinking about what we really need
to value. If a policy isn't working, surely we should look
around for ideas that show more promise—even if they
may seem antithetical at first blush. And here is the Home
Secretary's bind. He has invested heavily, and personally,
in traditional responses to crime, and adopting a new approach
would be tantamount to admitting failure—and there are very
few politicians brave enough to do that. His only hope,
he believes, is to get tougher and tougher, as he pulls
harder and harder, trying to free himself from his predicament.
To emphasize this
shift towards ever tougher policy,
some convicts serving life sentences
are now being told that they
will die in jail. How this choice
is made confounds many. It seems
far more political than rational.
No amount of reform or good works
will improve their plight. They
have no hope. No mercy will be
shown. Indeed, it seems mercy
has no further part to play in
our system of justice. We are
retreating to the atavistic position
of an eye for an eye, which is
surely a descent down a dangerous
slope. But then it is easier
to slide down a slope than to
struggle up one. The rights and
freedoms we hold so dear do not
come cheap. The question is,
are we still willing to pay for
them?
Winston Churchill
once remarked that the measure
of a civilised society is how
it treats its prisoners (Ref).
With this in mind, on what grounds
is Myra Hindley still in jail
after thirty years? Prudence?
Punishment? Or politics? What
would really be at risk
if she were released today? Most
likely her life, and the Government's
last hope of re-election.
Shakespeare wrote about the Quality of Mercy
in times rather crueler than ours, and Gandhi, amidst appalling
violence, said "The weak cannot forgive. Forgiveness is
the gift of the strong." Without forgiveness, he thought,
one is stuck in a cycle of bitterness, blame and revenge.
We should be thankful for the abundance of goodwill in the
new South Africa, where the predicted bloodbath has proved
largely chimerical.
The desire for revenge is quite natural
and understandable, but does exacting it actually
do any good? Is the world any better
for it? And is it not worse when the State exacts our revenge
for us? Do we not slip a little further down the long slope
of civility—the one we have spent so much time huffing and
puffing to get up?
