America leads the world with a rate of 500 incarcerated persons for every 100,000 population. Compare Japan (45 per 100,000) or England (97 per 100,000). Our prison population has increased from 330,000 in 1980 to over 1,000,000 in 1994 with predictions of 6,000,000 by the year 2015. The cost to operate this nation's prisons is $30 billion a year (of the taxpayers money). Just imagine the increase in cost by 2015.

In 1962 the American Law Institute endorsed a Model Penal Code. The most significant portion of that code is Section 7.01, which provides that punishment other than prisons should be used unless imprisonment is necessary for the protection of the public. Public safety rather than punishment was proclaimed to be goal of sentencing. In no way do I mean to suggest that there aren't many crimes that should be punished by imprisonment and there are certainly many criminals who belong in prison. I only mean to suggest that if "taxpayers" are truly concerned with where their money goes that they should speak out to demand alternative methods of punishment (i.e, community service, house arrest, probation, work release, etc) for the many petty, non-violent criminals that make up the largest portion of our nations prison population. Reserve prisons for violent offenders and for individuals who repeat offenses despite the compassion of the court. Long-term counseling can offer offenders, and society, some hope for change, whereas long-term imprisonment of society's dysfunctional will only lead to dysfunction, without exception.

Contrary to the beliefs of some, prison is not some sort of resort. Prison is a place where young heterosexual boys are raped by other men on a nightly. It is a cesspool of misery, hatred, loss, condemnation and despair. It is the type of place that can turn a small-time forger into a murderer overnight just to survive. It is where criminals from all types of criminal backgrounds get together to make alliances to do more, and sometimes more sophisticated, crime. Prison means that mothers and fathers are taken out of the home and it is our nation's children who pay a huge price for this separation. In the long-run though, we will suffer as a nation when these children grow (dysfunctional, embittered and without direction) to pay society back.

America is overdue for some serious soul searching. When will we learn that ignorance and neglect begets ignorance and neglect, and that this type of mistreatment will come back to haunt us over time......