yeah, pretty gross violation of separation of church and state. should be shot down soon enough. The supreme court has long held the opinion of striking down any government affiliation with religion, even if it doesn't support one religion vs. another.
this spoiler below is not my writing, but stolen from a lawyer on another forum I go to. Pretty much good thoughts that I agree with, and it also is a response to OP's statement of overcrowding prisons--this policy doesn't actually do anything to combat overcrowding. It just strips away normal secular ways such as traditional community service (cnn article, and others, say that it's "go to jail, pay fine, or church" indicating stripping secular community service). + Show Spoiler +
"...virtually every other court at this level (municipal court, where the offenses generally range from parking offenses to minor trespassing) in the country try to not overcrowd jails on minor, non-violent offenses.They do this by fines and conventional community service. This judge is just taking away conventional community service as an alternative to jail and substituting in religious attendance. Its not like he is coming up with an alternative to jail (everyone else already has) - he is coming up with a religious twist to community service, stripping away the secular alternatives offered everywhere else that is not Southern Alabammy.
Plus, most conventional alternatives to jail are generally a lump sum community service that does not keep you on the hook for 52 consecutive weeks (offering a great opportunity to fail), but rather you work off hours as you have time to fulfill them, getting off the hook in a few weeks or months rather than 52 chances to fail and either end up in jail or on the hook for however much church this judge wants to tack on."
On September 28 2011 22:23 Aelip wrote: For people talking about community service, this is for crimes "above" that. Thinks that serve a bigger punishment.
but its not. it's misdemeanors and minor nonviolent crimes.
Sounds like people are afraid it might work better than jail. I mean, is America, as a whole, really that encouraged by the numbers we see concerning jail? Why are we so afraid to try this out?
Some of you are acting like people can just abuse this forever. I really doubt that will be the case. It's most probably like community service instead of a speeding ticket. It only works the first time.
On September 28 2011 20:05 KwarK wrote: As long as you can do it for every religion (atheism included)
I know this was not your point, but it's a bit oxymoronic to call atheism a religion. "Belief system", maybe.
On topic: hmm, it may or not be a good idea, but about the whole "this doesn't violate the principle of separation of church and state because it's optional", this seems like a slippery slope. It raises the interesting philosophical question of what the distinction really is between "optional" and "involuntary". After all, from one point of view, when I hold a gun to your head, I'm just presenting you with alternatives. Here the alternative is jail, rather than death, but at what point have you crossed the line into coercion?
The Federal government plays similar games with its mandate when it uses the Commerce Clause to circumvent restrictions on its power. Again, no opinion about whether the actual things it does with that are good or bad, but the fence that guards that slippery slope has been breached.
On September 28 2011 22:41 couches wrote: Are people missing the whole optional part of it?
The thread title even implies it.
optional has nothing to do with it. the supreme court has long held in other cases that options do not mean anything. When cases about prayer/religion come up, it doesn't matter if you have a "choice" to not participate in the prayer/religion. The state is still supporting a religious endeavor.
I could be a judge and say you could go to one christian church or serve in prison, and you'd still have a "choice" in the matter. Now this ruling is the same principle, just extending the "choice" to be multiple places of worship (and we get into a whole hassle of what a place of worship would be; could I claim to go to a pastafarian church every week, where I eat spaghetti, and that passes?).
Choice has nothing to do with it. The bottom line is that someone of the state (a judge in the judicial system) is promoting religious activities, and that is unconstitutional.
edit- public school relevant since that is a state entity. The analogy is the state (by which I mean government) even semi-endorsing religion in any form. So a judge is a part of the state as well, and a judge's actions reflect the state supporting religious attendance (even i it is a "choice" or "voluntary").
For some people this may be a better alternative to jail, as they can be "fixed" by the church/find religion/whatever, but for those who dont believe in religion or just ignore the help the church offers, They could end up back on the streets in the same state they were in before being arrested.
Pretty much completely depends on how religious the people of that small city are.
I don't like it, but only time will tell if it is truly effective.
I'd far prefer they used community service instead of church, but since it's 'just' a small town, could be a good experiment for the next few years/decades. I may be playing to a false stereotype, if so sorry, but a lot of America seems to be religious in one way or another, so if this works anywhere I guess it would be there
For minor crimes I see no reason to put people behind bars where they will be surrounded by other people involved in crime for however long. I'd rather they worked and perhaps gained some new skills helping out around the city under close supervision
On September 28 2011 20:05 KwarK wrote: As long as you can do it for every religion (atheism included) then sure, whatever works for them. If you can only do it for Christianity then it's giving Christians preferential penal treatment which is obviously unfair.
eh.. atheism is not a religion. you might want to edit that out.
On September 28 2011 20:05 KwarK wrote: As long as you can do it for every religion (atheism included) then sure, whatever works for them. If you can only do it for Christianity then it's giving Christians preferential penal treatment which is obviously unfair.
eh.. atheism is not a religion. you might want to edit that out.
Lets just not get into this argument, it usually ends up in a lot of mad people and a lot of temp bans.
On September 28 2011 22:54 ilovelings wrote: If I recall correctly, during vietnam, you were given the option to serve in the war instead of going to jail.
Besides going against precedent, I'm pretty sure the alabama judge doesn't want someone to be able to claim going to a pastafarian church service every week would count as "church" attendance. The "choice" of exercising the religion of your choice gets severely restricted, i.e. isn't actually a real "choice". The military example shows that even if you want to make one choice, the possibility can be shut off to you, forcing you to go to jail.
again, I stress this ruling doesn't actually solve anything about overcrowding or costs. According to news articles, it's being presented as jail vs fine vs church, while by far most court systems already have secular community service options in place.
It's not even saving cost for the police by delegating keeping track of whether the criminal attends or not to the churches--the article says how a person would have to check in with a police officer. You may as well just have the criminal do work for X organisation, like salvation army or something, and then check in with a police officer to confirm he did his community service.
I understand the principle behind it. The idea is that many non-violent criminals simply need rehabilitation rather than punishment. Our prison system in Canada tends to take this approach (we'll see how long that lasts with the idiot running the country right now)
However, I don't see the church as a legitimate viable option for rehabilitation. Yes, in theory, it teaches many of the same « life lessons »/values that the criminals need to learn, but I don't think it's quite on the same level as government-structured rehabilitation could be.
I get it though, it's just a way to save a buck on these facilities by using infrastructure that is already in place.
It's difficult for me to say in words how straight up horrible of an idea this is - even as an "alternative".
In the majority of cases, given the alternatives, convicts will pick the "easier" way out, given the choice. Do you want to spend a month in jail, or go back to your normal life immediately and just hang out at church once a week for a brief period of time? Unless you're very serious about sticking to your principles, obviously the latter is the more convenient solution. This is the same problem as with the flogging-or-jail thing from that other thread - just because it's optional, it doesn't make it ethical, especially if the system encourages you to pick that option by making it objectively more convenient and appealing. This is an active encouragement for people who find themselves in that situation to get involved with religion.
Secondly, what is the reasoning behind this anyway? People do not contribute to society in any meaningful way by attending church, nor is church a valid correctional and rehabilitation facility.
Finally, while the crimes may be nonviolent (which doesn't necessarily mean it's any less harmful), these people have still committed them. If I were stuck living in that town, I would certainly not feel very comfortable about these people essentially being given a free pass and being submitted to religious indoctrination on top.
EPT
