Posted by: pire July 16, 2010
A Nepali Kills 3 in Housotn
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Pire Ji
"Recidivism" is an act of human nature. It has nothing to do with culture, countries and race. 
More than 50% of drunk driver will repeat the offense again, some will do it again and again. 
It has been studied and documented.

Just to be rigorous: What is the source for this statement?


"Sex Offenders, pedophiles"-- their recidivism is proven by facts that they will repeat it again and again. 

Again, who proved it and which facts are we talking about? I am not countering what you said, I just want to point out that we need to be more rigorous to build our claim on any issues.

If you are trying to claim that offenders, (drunk drivers, sex offenders, pedophiles), are never going to improve and will forever remain the problem for the society, then why not we shoot them? Why should society pay for their incarceration? Afterall, California has been famous for spending more money in keeping prison than in universities (see the link:http://www.newsweek.com/2010/06/28/classrooms-or-prison-cells.html.) Would you agree with such punishment?


In a perfect world, they should never be let loose, yet the law in the US allows them to get back to normal except to register with the city. How's that NOT a good deed from the part of the judicial system?

How is that a perfect world? What kind of world would it be where everybody (drunk drivers like you, as you admitted, sexual molesters etc) is kept in jail forever? Who will feed them? 

Guess what....Nepali people will do the same in those cases. The only thing that separated us from them---we do not have any data.

It is not true.

You know before Muluki Ein was introduced by Jung Bahadur, there was a penal system where they would, for example, chop off the hand of a thief and capital punishment was rampant. Our ancestors thought it was cruel. Until Maoist insurgency came, Nepali people have always preferred less severe system, and pretty much all media report lauded the abolishment of capital punishment.


Same thing with murders and other serious crime. Some will stop and some won't. One of the most important thing that you're forgetting in this whole mess is- punishment is NOT only to reform but also as a payment (physical,metal or spiritual) to the victim for their loss. Put yourself in their shoes. How's 2 years in jail going to justify if your father was killed by your neighbor? Will you be fine with that
?

Murder is a serious crime. And I don't know what I would do if my neighbor kills my father, but I know this for sure, I won't ask for capital punishment.

I am not sure punishments are meant for payment either. What payment can bring my father back?

Penal systems are not easy to determine. Only history and our judgement evolved over history help us determine it. For example, I always believe that only god has the right to take away our life. So, if a murderer kills a man, even me or my father, I wouldn't want him to be killed by state because the state is not the god. That's my belief.


"
I wondered if there exists any study about recidivism in Nepal 
and whether there is significantly higher instances of recidivism in 
Nepal because we send people to shorter jail sentence"

So it is all base don "I wonder"

That's the key point. It has always been so. It's not like I changed my position. I cast doubt that American penal system is effective in what it purports to be doing.

"
Getting raw data and processing them is different matter"

To study about anything in the real world it starts with raw data (simple science), at least they have plenty in the US. Comparative analysis also brings biased view to reflect on the person's belief who is doing the study. It should be thoroughly investigated by people of the both nation for more accuracy. I do not rely on some guy's PhD paper, I need more than, few atleast.

Yes. This is always the case. It is not like there are no raw data in Nepal ; it is hard to collect them because they are in missil filing system and are not centralized as of yet. But the good news, as I read yesterday in Kantipur, is that our court system is going electronic and all records will be available easily soon. 

So all and all, you're admitting there is no data to back your statement.

Not only that, I made statement that my statement doesn't need data. I made the argument that I like the fact that we have no capital punishment, and shorter incarceration period (max 20 years for murder, I think). What data do you need to verify it? I wondered if we are doing better at addressing the issue of recidivism than the USA. I haven't made any statement regarding that all.

 You have your rights to disagree (thank God for the Western Democracy) and I'll not fight with you over it (unlike in Nepal).

What do you mean, you would fight with me over it in Nepal? In Nepal, the problem is more democracy , not less, don't you think so? Anyone can say anything. Except perhaps against Maoists. But we have been discounting them anyway.

But since most people posting here are on my side and you have no real world data to present, you should at-least be saying "I don't know, I COULD be wrong", at-least and NOT be so stubborn about it. Think about it.

I hope you are wise enough to know that voting isn't a right way to decide things like this. As they say, voting would , in this same country, probably vote down Darwin! (It happened in some counties in Penn, Kansas , right?)
 
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