SWA #3

The U.S. Prison System

            One of the issues that future generations will condemn our current society for is the prison system in use in the United States.  The claims behind this are that about one percent of the adult population is incarcerated and that the U.S. has 25 percent of the world’s prisoners.  However, we only have about four percent of the world’s total population.  To add to the argument, many people equate the conditions within prisons to torture, saying the environment is abusive.  Many prisoners have even reported sexual abuse and rape while they were incarcerated.  The Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) reported that 4.5 percent of prisoners in state or federal prisons claimed they were sexually victimized within the past year, which means that this affected close to 70,000 inmates.  Many of these incidents are results of the guards not following procedures or taking action when notified of rape within the prison.

            This article says that future generations will look back on our prisons today with contempt because of the treatment of prisoners, especially first offenders or non-violent criminals.  It says that our prisons should and will be reformed because of the conditions that are reported in them. 

By making this claim, the article is bringing the terrible situations in prisons out into the public so that people know and understand what happens.  With this information, the article attempts to get more people’s attention and interest and hopefully spur action against the horrible treatment of prisoners.  This article also points out the huge population of prisoners in the United States of America.  It claims that the U.S. has a higher percentage of inmates than China does and that we have almost a quarter of the total world’s prison population.  By stating this, the article will also make citizens understand truly how many people are incarcerated and that many of them are being held for non-violent crimes or drug-related convictions.