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I recently read an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education called “In Defense of Flogging” by Peter Moskos, a former police officer and now a criminologist at the City University of New York (specifically at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice).
The article seems to have been written to gin up interest in a book he has coming out in June called, well, In Defense of Flogging.
Without further ado, an excerpt:
For most of the past two centuries, at least in so-called civilized societies, the ideal of punishment has been replaced by the hope of rehabilitation. The American penitentiary system was invented to replace punishment with “cure.” Prisons were built around the noble ideas of rehabilitation. In society, at least in liberal society, we’re supposed to be above punishment, as if punishment were somehow beneath us. The fact that prisons proved both inhumane and miserably ineffective did little to deter the utopian enthusiasm of those reformers who wished to abolish punishment.
Incarceration, for adults as well as children, does little but make people more criminal. Alas, so successful were the “progressive” reformers of the past two centuries that today we don’t have a system designed for punishment. Certainly released prisoners need help with life—jobs, housing, health care—but what they don’t need is a failed concept of “rehabilitation.” Prisons today have all but abandoned rehabilitative ideals—which isn’t such a bad thing if one sees the notion as nothing more than paternalistic hogwash. All that is left is punishment, and we certainly could punish in a way that is much cheaper, honest, and even more humane. We could flog.
Yes. He just argued for flogging as a more enlightened view than imprisonment.
Pause for a moment to let your brain adjust to that.
Troubled? Get ready — he’s about to own you.
The opening gambit of the book is surprisingly simple: If you were sentenced to five years in prison but had the option of receiving lashes instead, what would you choose? You would probably pick flogging. Wouldn’t we all?
I propose we give convicts the choice of the lash at the rate of two lashes per year of incarceration. One cannot reasonably argue that merely offering this choice is somehow cruel, especially when the status quo of incarceration remains an option. Prison means losing a part of your life and everything you care for. Compared with this, flogging is just a few very painful strokes on the backside. And it’s over in a few minutes. Often, and often very quickly, those who said flogging is too cruel to even consider suddenly say that flogging isn’t cruel enough.
I found the article fascinating and have been telling people about it since I read it. And I’ve asked them if they would personally prefer flogging to prison. Everyone I have posed the question to has opted for excruciating physical pain.
I’ve long been fascinated by the different notions of justice. I remember hearing Jim Railey argue quite convincingly in seminary that the proper Christian notion of justice is primarily retributive (punishment-oriented) rather than rehabilitative. Not that Christians are opposed to rehabilitation — but we ought to think of rehabilitation as a function of mercy and not of justice. Perhaps sometimes we should pursue mercy instead of justice, and other times we should offer mercy following justice. But we shouldn’t pretend that they are identical.
Incidentally, if you conceive of justice in purely rehabilitative terms then you probably can’t believe in hell or in capital punishment. If, on the other hand, you believe that justice is essentially retributive then both are viable intellectual options for you.
Agree with Dr. Moskos or not, you should at least read the whole article. There’s way more than I’ve quoted here. I should also note that he doesn’t seem to be seriously arguing for flogging itself so much as he is arguing for fixing our broken criminal justice system. Consider his conclusion:
…how can offering criminals the choice of the lash in lieu of incarceration be so bad? If flogging were really worse than prison, nobody would choose it. Of course most people would choose the rattan cane over the prison cell. And that’s my point. Faced with the choice between hard time and the lash, the lash is better. What does that say about prison?
All in all, a phenomenal essay.
On a related note, you should read my thoughts on the pervasive insanity of professors.
This is very thought-provoking. It reminds me of the time when Ross was in Africa working at a seminary in Cape Town, where the policing system is much different. He told me about how the local hired police force would beat up captured criminals. Some that tried to break into the seminary were beat there on the spot (they were caught in the act). I could not work this around in my brain. The Christians there approved of it and said it was the way to get other potential criminals in the area to know “you don’t try and mess around with those people.” I at the time could not fathom how this was okay–to just beat someone up. My more recent thoughts on the subject have changed, and so this article you posted is really beneficial. It’s hard for us to rethink such ‘basic’ American beliefs as the rehabilitation system, but looking at other options used in human history and abroad and further analyzing them could serve us well in coming up with a better system.
I have for some time now wondered if re-introducing public shaming for petty crimes might not be in the best interest of our society. I ponder such musings partly in response to a perceived (some might argue, real) loss of shame in our culture, which is surely to our benefit in some ways, but unequivocally to our detriment in others. I just can’t help but think that stocks in the public square for shoplifting or marijuana possession could do as much or more toward addressing those issues as anything else we might attempt.
On my own related note, I once asked a friend to cane me across the back. He did so, relatively firmly, but not with all his strength. It hurt, but not too badly, so I declared, “I bet I can take ten of those as hard as you can give them!”
So we tried.
By the second swing the pain was so excruciating I crumpled to the ground involuntarily.
Laughter ensued as I reflected on my body’s unwillingness to cope with the pain, but had I been held up and forced to endure the rest, I’m guessing neither laughter nor a desire to do the deed that precipitated the punishment would have survived in me.
I come from a culture which routinely canes sex offenders (Singapore). It works, period. While short in duration, caning is so excruciating that a doctor must first declare the person medically fit for caning. This might or might not play into the consideration of “prison or flogging.”
However, I do agree with Brian (hey! Aloha!) that the shame factor (although it’s used for ‘big’ crimes too–Singapore routinely posts photos of sex offenders in the national newspapers) PLUS the rapid course of justice (court cases do not get dragged out unlike in the U.S.) AND the fear of flogging seem to all play into the general sense of safety that most women there will tell you they enjoy. I never feared walking around at 1 or 2 AM alone in Singapore, but I would never do that here in the U.S.
Last, because the prison system is punishment-oriented (not rehabilitative), no one in Singapore wants to go to prison (or be caned). I don’t think that’s a bad thing.
First of all, I laughed out loud when I read the “Get ready — he’s about to own you.” Too funny. I am a school teacher and I have long felt that getting rid of swatting kids was a big mistake. It is now looked at as abuse, as if it is going to affect a student’s self esteem for life. If you ask me, these kids have plenty of self-esteem.…they think pretty highly of themselves. But just the contrary seems true…most people I know that are adults who endured a good whooping at school seem to chuckle about it and say, “Yeah, I deserved it.” They don’t seem to harbor wounds or bitterness with authority. But my dad was a teacher who got to swat lots of kids in the 60s and 70s, so maybe I am just upset that it is a skill in my genes that I (at age 35) have never gotten to use.
On a lighter note: Brian, you are a beast, man. Letting yourself get cained? That is awesome. I love being a guy. You make me proud.