In support of flogging

It might surprise people to know there is still someone out there (me) who believes in the old-fashioned methods of criminal punishment (many of which are still in use in other civilized countries). I think that criminal penalties for felons should always involve public flogging, caning, and other types of painful punishment. I also believe U.S. prisons are far too nice and need to openly be made more unpleasant.

Why am I bringing up this subject? Because of the case of William Crutchfield, who two weeks ago shot his mail carrier seven times. Not because Crutchfield was upset at poor Earl Lazenby or at Lazenby's performance, or because Lazenby kept bringing him bills or because Lazenby had slept with his wife. Nope. Crutchfield was in debt up to his eyeballs and thought that being sent to federal prison for the rest of his life was a pretty square deal -- free food, shelter, and medical care for the rest of his life. And of course, one way to get thrown into federal prison is to kill a federal employee such as a mail carrier.

You know what this says to me? It says to me that our prisons are too damn nice. Or at least, our prisons are perceived as being too damn nice. Now, I know that prison life sucks. Anyone who's ever seen the HBO series "Oz," develops a profound and deep desire to stay the hell out of prison. But clearly, our prisons aren't scary enough to deter men like Mr. Crutchfield from thinking that it might be nice to go to prison.

So here's my idea: every prison sentence includes not an exercise room, or a library, or cable TV, but instead regular corporal punishments that are open to the public. I don't care if it's flogging, or caning, or branding or whatever. As long as it makes the criminal scream in pain and beg to be put to death, and as long as it makes spectators pale and vomit, it works for me.

But prison is a chance to rehabilitate the dregs of society, Drunken Pig, you say. They have no way of bettering themselves in the real world, and prison is a good opportunity to convince criminals to learn a trade, to get a GED, maybe even get a college degree.

Well, trust me, if you make prison unpleasant enough, a criminal will do whatever it takes when he gets out to better his life and make sure he never does anything to even make a cop glance his (or her) way.

Of course, the Eighth Amendment makes my idea completely illegal. Which is why this Amendment should be repealed. Sure, I hear the howls of outrage, but consider the general wording and you can already see why this is a stupid amendment:

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Let me ask you something. Isn't punishment, by definition, supposed to suck? A punishment is suppsed to cause hardship, to cause pain, to cause distress -- to provide instant negative feedback to a criminal. "Yo, dickwad," a punishment says. "See what happens when you try to pull that shit? Don't do it again!" A good punishment makes it so the criminal will never want to commit a crime again, and convinces people who hear what happened to him decide to do anything to avoid going to jail.

Since the definition of cruel is "to cause pain or suffering" I think that a punishment, by definition, will always be cruel. But so what? Is anyone out there actually going to tell me that we don't need to punish our criminals? Didn't think so.

And if the punishment is unusual, what of it? Einstein was unusual. So was Picasso, Amadeus, and Gandhi. There's nothing wrong with being unusual, and if we can provide someone out there an outlet for his somewhat alarming creative urges, I think that's just icing on the cake.

I mean, fuck me. I didn't say anything when it was clear that prison didn't necessarily strike fear into the hearts of all Americans. But damnit, when it starts looking like an attractive option, it's clear that our prison system is presenting far too nice of an image to the world.