The Tragedy in Las Vegas

[El]

No way that wouldn't end up accidentally killing some prisoners, though.

And, they do give some prisoners headmeds.

Do know some prisoners get meds; mentioned that previously. Not sure why it would kill them. It's standard practice to medically treat people who are a danger to themselves; see no reason why it should be different for those who are a danger to others.

Give literally everyone in every large-enough group the same medication, and at least one of those people will have an adverse reaction to that medication.

The potential for adverse reaction is true for a lot of people conditions and medications. The adverse result of their violence seems clear enough. It wasn't a suggestion for a one stop answer for all dished out by a layman. It would be better to argue that criminal violence on its own doesn't qualify as a mental disorder and psychotropic drugs don't sit well with people who don't actually need them, than to suggest violent people shouldn't be routinely prescribed medications because someone might have an adverse reaction.

...Jack, why don't you just sit and argue both sides by yourself, then?

[Al Swearegen]

No way that wouldn't end up accidentally killing some prisoners, though.

And, they do give some prisoners headmeds.

Do know some prisoners get meds; mentioned that previously. Not sure why it would kill them. It's standard practice to medically treat people who are a danger to themselves; see no reason why it should be different for those who are a danger to others.

Give literally everyone in every large-enough group the same medication, and at least one of those people will have an adverse reaction to that medication.

The potential for adverse reaction is true for a lot of people conditions and medications. The adverse result of their violence seems clear enough. It wasn't a suggestion for a one stop answer for all dished out by a layman. It would be better to argue that criminal violence on its own doesn't qualify as a mental disorder and psychotropic drugs don't sit well with people who don't actually need them, than to suggest violent people shouldn't be routinely prescribed medications because someone might have an adverse reaction.

...Jack, why don't you just sit and argue both sides by yourself, then?

Hey PMSElle, why don't you answer the allegations you made about me,  that you were called out on rather than trying for unwarranted condescending snark at Jack? Just a thought.

[Fun With Matches]

I like Jack's open-mindedness and willingness to see both sides. You need that sort of mind to figure out answers, and decent ones.

[odeon]

She has a tendency to *argue* both sides, though.

[Fun With Matches]

That's the point.

[odeon]

Which always makes me want to say "yes, but what do yo REALLY think?"

[Jack]

No way that wouldn't end up accidentally killing some prisoners, though.

And, they do give some prisoners headmeds.

Do know some prisoners get meds; mentioned that previously. Not sure why it would kill them. It's standard practice to medically treat people who are a danger to themselves; see no reason why it should be different for those who are a danger to others.

Give literally everyone in every large-enough group the same medication, and at least one of those people will have an adverse reaction to that medication.

The potential for adverse reaction is true for a lot of people conditions and medications. The adverse result of their violence seems clear enough. It wasn't a suggestion for a one stop answer for all dished out by a layman. It would be better to argue that criminal violence on its own doesn't qualify as a mental disorder and psychotropic drugs don't sit well with people who don't actually need them, than to suggest violent people shouldn't be routinely prescribed medications because someone might have an adverse reaction.

...Jack, why don't you just sit and argue both sides by yourself, then?

Don't even really know how to respond to the suggestion people shouldn't be medicated because someone might have a bad reaction, nor Lestat suggesting neuroscience is too complicated for the medical establishment to move forward with what is known and what works. Maybe you're right and I just shouldn't have responded to it at all, like I didn't to him.

[Jack]

Which always makes me want to say "yes, but what do yo REALLY think?"

I really think there's a lot of things it simply doesn't matter what I think.

[Al Swearegen]

I like Jack's open-mindedness and willingness to see both sides. You need that sort of mind to figure out answers, and decent ones.

Critical thinking is a great skill

[Pyraxis]

I don't think the thought of greater good is necessarily a justification for drugging the violence out of prisoners. I'm not even convinced that the forced drugging that already routinely happens is a good idea.

[Jack]

I don't think the thought of greater good is necessarily a justification for drugging the violence out of prisoners. I'm not even convinced that the forced drugging that already routinely happens is a good idea.

Not certain it's about the idea of the greater good. People have the right to be protected from violent criminals, and not just short term. Half of the people in state prisons are violent offenders, and the five year repeat offender rate for violent criminals is seventy percent with about half of those reoffending within the first year of release. https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=4986 If they're really only bad people and not mentally disordered, then they shouldn't be let out. If violence is a mental problem then their addressing their need for treatment could be a stipulation to being a member of society.

A sixth (16.1%) of released prisoners were responsible for almost half (48.4%) of the nearly 1.2 million arrests that occurred in the 5-year follow-up period.

Think this is interesting. One sixth from one year, responsible for half over five years. It brings me back to a previous silly idea about the decline in violent crime since the 90's. Violent crime is declining but the recidivism rates suggest it's largely the same people stuck in a revolving door. Society may not be breeding many more violent criminals and violent crime may be on the decline because a lot of them are just dyeing off. Baby boomers.

[Pyraxis]

By people, do you mean the prison guards, during the incarceration? I don't see any viable way to enforce medication after the end of a sentence.

Maybe if I had more faith in medication as a long term and lasting solution to psychological issues, I could see it working, but the mind is more complex than that. Chemical imbalances are interwoven with conscious attitudes and patterns of experience and history. That's not the sort of thing you can make go away with a convenient little pill. Even mandated therapy, like anger management classes, is questionable. Do the people who are forced to attend actually have any lasting changes in behavior, or are they just being warm bodies in a room, learning to give the answers that people are looking for?

[Jack]

People means people, everyone. It does happen for criminals with mental illness to be mandated to maintain mental healthcare as a condition of parole or probation; though have only heard of it as condition of lifetime supervised release for certain sex offenders. It's true medication doesn't work for everyone but it does help a lot of people, and sometimes that means maintaining it long term. Locking them up for a few years so they can get out to injure or kill someone again isn't good enough. Placing violent people back into society with the idea their debt has been paid isn't good enough. They owe it to society to stop being violent, and society isn't meeting its own obligation to enforce that.

[odeon]

Which always makes me want to say "yes, but what do yo REALLY think?"

I really think there's a lot of things it simply doesn't matter what I think.

True for most of us. Doesn't stop us from arguing, though.

[Jack]

Which always makes me want to say "yes, but what do yo REALLY think?"

I really think there's a lot of things it simply doesn't matter what I think.

True for most of us. Doesn't stop us from arguing, though.

That's correct. Find it stimulating and healthy though. It's common in the learning of debate for people to simply be assigned a topic and a side. This challenges people to search for the validity of views which may be in opposition to their own. As a fundamentally black and white thinker and linear thinker, that personal challenge is probably often more important to fostering my own sense of tolerance than expressing my own personal bias, even though it probably makes my presence here come across as an argumentative cunt. That's more difficult to do in real life with people who don't really know me and therefore don't know what I really think, because there are situations where it is more important others don't get the impression I believe or support something I really don't.