NationStates Jolt Archive

Please take your time to read this proposal:
And a plea to all delegates to approve my proposal.

Gaols
A resolution to improve worldwide human and civil rights.


Category: Human Rights Strength: Strong Proposed by: Sozy
Description: To long many nations have been violating the human rights of those who are confined in a gaol. Therefore we suggest several laws which will be meant to improve the standard of living for the incarcerated.

I) "Special individuals" will not be placed into the same goals as adults. These include mentally weak prisoners or person below the age of 18.

II) No prisoner will be enforced to supply the state with labour, labour should be voluntarily and a minimum wage should be payed be the state to the prisoner in return.

III) Every prisoner is free to keep his personal belongs as long as these do not include weapons or any material which might be used for escape.

IV) When a prisoner is intimidate in any possible way by fellow inmates or a gaoler those quilty of that crime shall be punished and the victim deserves and will receive are free trial.

V) Every prisoner should have acces to good quality water and food, toilets and showers. And every prisoner has the right to get washed clothes at least one time a weak.

VI) Prison cells should be of a minimal size of 2 squared feet, per prisoner. Only a maximum of 4 prisoners per cell is allowed: to avoid tensions between them.

VII) Every prisoner should be allowed to do daily exercise of he wishes to.

VIII)Public executions of penalised ones are no longer allowed to be held.

IX) All old goals need to be either closed and rebuild or simply renewed to fix to all these laws.

X) Any nation violating these laws will be taken to a supreme court of justice for violating human rights.

Approvals: 0

Status: Lacking Support (requires 120 more approvals)

Voting Ends: Sat Nov 8 2003

Greetings, Daniel Karssenberg. President of Sozy.
Secretary of recruitment, IAN.

I don't like II or III. I see nothing wrong with labor amongst my prisoners. And I cannot see why I should let them bring personal belongings with them to prison.

This proposal (on page 11 at the moment) mostly sounds OK, but what does this mean:

IV) When a prisoner is intimidate in any possible way by fellow inmates or a gaoler those quilty of that crime shall be punished and the victim deserves and will receive are free trial.

Huh? I really have no clue what he's trying to say.
Also,
II) No prisoner will be enforced to supply the state with labour, labour should be voluntarily and a minimum wage should be payed be the state to the prisoner in return.

Most states (in US anyway) pay prisoners less because they consider the difference to be repayment for cost of imprisonment. Even if one agrees on this point, there is nothing here which requires the wage to be reasonable. The minimum could be set at $0.15 and still be in compliance.

I disagree with (II) to (IX) inclusive. No way could I support this. What do you mean by "good quality water, food etc.? The food I cook for my self would never be described as "good quality", so you want prisoners to be better fed than the citizens?

You can just cut to the chase by not taking prisoners. Shoot to kill.

Two square feet? That's barely room enough to stand up in!
We take care of many less serious offenses with publuc canings. The public loves them; they'll pay 5 talers for a good apectator seat, which helps our revenues. Political grafters and business monopolists are especially popular subjects.

Please take your time to read this proposal:
And a plea to all delegates to approve my proposal.

Gaols
A resolution to improve worldwide human and civil rights.


Category: Human Rights Strength: Strong Proposed by: Sozy
Description: To long many nations have been violating the human rights of those who are confined in a gaol. Therefore we suggest several laws which will be meant to improve the standard of living for the incarcerated.

I) "Special individuals" will not be placed into the same goals as adults. These include mentally weak prisoners or person below the age of 18.

II) No prisoner will be enforced to supply the state with labour, labour should be voluntarily and a minimum wage should be payed be the state to the prisoner in return.

III) Every prisoner is free to keep his personal belongs as long as these do not include weapons or any material which might be used for escape.

IV) When a prisoner is intimidate in any possible way by fellow inmates or a gaoler those quilty of that crime shall be punished and the victim deserves and will receive are free trial.

V) Every prisoner should have acces to good quality water and food, toilets and showers. And every prisoner has the right to get washed clothes at least one time a weak.

VI) Prison cells should be of a minimal size of 2 squared feet, per prisoner. Only a maximum of 4 prisoners per cell is allowed: to avoid tensions between them.

VII) Every prisoner should be allowed to do daily exercise of he wishes to.

VIII)Public executions of penalised ones are no longer allowed to be held.

IX) All old goals need to be either closed and rebuild or simply renewed to fix to all these laws.

X) Any nation violating these laws will be taken to a supreme court of justice for violating human rights.

Approvals: 0

Status: Lacking Support (requires 120 more approvals)

Voting Ends: Sat Nov 8 2003

Greetings, Daniel Karssenberg. President of Sozy.
Secretary of recruitment, IAN.

I like it, it is a serious proposal.
II is very resonable and is a strengthening of anti slave laws. I don't know if any resolution like that allready exists.

III is problematic, I should add those two anything that is forbidden for all citizens. (this to include drugs)

V. Might need to be changed to include the fact that sometimes that is not even available for non prisinors. Sometimes a economy can't cough that up. This would mean weak economies could not inprison people, neighter could desert dwellers. Though I understand that as state you have responsability, it might be discared because of that impossibility. ps. I am just talking hypothetically. In NS here anything gets through if it sounds good enough.

VI. Grin, only 2 square feet, that is not enough to sleep :P. I guess if you use it in mass rooms it is possible, but it sounds little to me.

VIII This should be handled as a seperate law, or not if you want to sneak it through ;). This is not only about prisoners but about capital punishment in general. Maybe you should bold the public or something. Because I think that is what it is about a lot.

Maybe you should add a time when the law goes in effect, to give time for rebuild.

I have some problems with bettering the conditions of those who have committed some pretty serious crimes. Nevertheless, a good point is made... regardless of their past, they are still rotting in dungeons. (Oh, and there are some who don't realize that gaol is just the British spelling for jail. That might need clarification.)

The problems that I have with this proposal:

Article 2: Do you realize that the homeless often will commit a petty crime so they can get arrested and spend the night in jail to get out of the cold. The unemployed would begin to do the same; except, in this case, they would go in to get a job and earn money, not get out of the elements. What kind of incentive does this create for rehabilitation purposes? They will just get dependant upon the jail system and it will become another form of welfare.

Article 3: Agree with NeoCommunists with the whole "must be legal for citizens to have" thing.

Article 4: What do you mean by the victim deserves a free trial? Why does he need the trial in the first place? Do you mean the one that did the intimidation?

Article 5: Define good quality food. There are many people in the real world who live off of canned foods and 33 cents ramen from grocery stores because they don't earn enough to get anything else to eat. And washed clothes once a week? Give me a break, they're in jail, not in a 5 star hotel. If they want clean clothes, they should wash it themselves [maybe change to, "provide facilities to encourage a high level of personal hygiene"].

Article 6: Everyone has been right about this point so far. 2 square feet is tiny, too small for a minimum. the minimum room dimensions would be
2 x 1, that would mean that the wall lengths are little wider than my little brother (and he's only four).

Article 8: The death penalty is something that each nation should choose, make sure that this article does not abolish that.


The Conclusion: This proposal needs a little work, it seems to be suggesting that we turn all prisons into motels, motels that also give you work. And you don't have to pay for any of it.... -_-;;

You can just cut to the chase by not taking prisoners. Shoot to kill.

That is, unless you have a bunch of policemen with horrible aim. Like those damn crossed eye hicks they call stormtroopers.

Yes, heaven forbid prison might actually be an unpleasant experience.

We in Gurthark approve of the spirit of this proposal. We would like to see a few amendments, however:


III) Every prisoner is free to keep his personal belongs as long as these do not include weapons or any material which might be used for escape.

Or anything else that it would be illegal for the prisoner to possess, were he or she not a prisoner.

IV) When a prisoner is intimidate in any possible way by fellow inmates or a gaoler those quilty of that crime shall be punished and the victim deserves and will receive are free trial.

This is too strong. The state cannot guarantee punishment of the guilty; the most the state can guarantee is a fair trial. We would rather see this amended to read something like:

Violence and extortion against prisoners will not be tolerated; prisoners will have the same rights as other complainants to have crimes against them investigated and prosecuted in good faith.

V) Every prisoner should have acces to good quality water and food, toilets and showers. And every prisoner has the right to get washed clothes at least one time a weak.

"Good quality" is very open to interpretation; we would not like to see prisoners start demanding that three-star Michelin chefs prepare their meals. We would prefer it to read "safe and nutritious."

VI) Prison cells should be of a minimal size of 2 squared feet, per prisoner. Only a maximum of 4 prisoners per cell is allowed: to avoid tensions between them.

This, on the other hand, doesn't go nearly far enough. *Two square feet per prisoner*!? There needs to be at least enough room for a prisoner to be able to lie down comfortably; a cell of these dimensions constitutes torture. 20 square feet per prisoner (a little over 6' x 3' for a single-occupancy cell) would be cutting it *awfully* close.

X) Any nation violating these laws will be taken to a supreme court of justice for violating human rights.

This may constitute a rule change; it's difficult so see how it would work otherwise.

Sincerely,
Miranda Googleplex
United Nations Ambassador
Community of Gurthark

Hmmmm. We have serious problems with the proposal as stated.

Against article IV:

This is ruinously expensive and nonsensical. According the to wording, if a guard threatened an unruly prisoner who was behaving out of line, the guard could be sued. Utter nonsense. Any and ALL prisoners shall simply use this an excuse to make frivolous lawsuits and our legal system would be more clogged than it already is.

Against Article VI:

I beleive the point against this has been made...2 square feet is nothing.

Against Article VII:

Unfortunately, not all prisons have the land area and facilities to guard prisoners out in open areas.

Against article VIII:

This is a blatant attempt to sneak in a clause banning the death penalty. This is a completely controversial issue in itself and should not even be in here really. Needless to say, even if we wanted to improve our prisoner's lives, we would never give up our right to impose the death penalty.

IN CONCLUSION...New Clarkhall stands against this proposal. It would not only be ruinously expensive, but is also full of impractical proposals.

The Conclusion: This proposal needs a little work, it seems to be suggesting that we turn all prisons into motels, motels that also give you work. And you don't have to pay for any of it.... -_-;;


Without rehashing all the points, I tend to think that Baron Porkonia has summed it up pretty well, it does sound as if this is proposal is suggesting we place prisoners in a hotel.

Prison is not supposed to be fun, pleasant or easy, it is supposed to be a deterrent to crime, it is supposed to be a terrible experience so people aren't in a particular rush to get back in once released. I wholeheartedly disagree with this proposal.

Prison inmates are not chosen by lottery. they are (or should be) incarcerated only because they have willfully harmed others. There is no reason to spare them from harm in prison.

Proposal 10 intervenes with a states right for soveriegnty, one of the most basic rights of the UN.

and as for the previous 9, well, lets face it, if we make all crime (as defined by our almight dictator) punishable by death not only would we solve the problem of crime (or over-population, it depends how long the country takes to learn that crime really doesn't pay, unless its authorised by the government).

just a point, VI - 2 feet? personally I agree with this, tho we might have to cremate the prisoners first, I meet, come on, who on earth is this small, well, cut off a head, an arm, a few legs and a bit of the torso and we might be fine I guess.

III - belongings, what about the fact they must pay for the crime? How about giving their belongings to the victims as adequate compenstation. But this is silly, since all crime is against the state, well, lets just give all their belongings to the state, and why just what they are wearing at this moment in time....

;)

You can just cut to the chase by not taking prisoners. Shoot to kill.

That is, unless you have a bunch of policemen with horrible aim. Like those damn crossed eye hicks they call stormtroopers.

Who said the police would be shooting guns? They could be shooting cannons at criminals where being just close counts.