Most Americas have seen media reports on the practice of flogging as a punishment for criminal acts in other countries. And most American citizens express outrage over this cruel and barbaric custom. At least one American, a former Maryland police Officer, and now professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, has a different opinion of corporal punishment -- he thinks this practice should be an option. Peter Moskos suggests in his new book, “In Defense of Flogging,” that if given the opportunity, some individuals convicted of an offense would choose ten lashes over five years in prison.
Moskos states that criminals were once subjected to corporal punishment in the U.S. As the American criminal justice system evolved, rehabilitation was favored over physical abuse, except when the death penalty is imposed, and shooting, hanging, electrocuting, gassing, or injecting harsh chemicals into a prisoner’s vein is the state sanctioned method of punishment.
Moskos sees the U.S. criminal justice system as a failure. With over two million Americans behind bars, the U.S. leads the world in the mass incarceration of its citizens. The book opposes the Prison-Industrial Complex which the author asserts feeds off of incarceration, and which opposes any solution that would prevent more prisons from being built. Locking up more and more Americans, in Moskos view, is the goal of special interest groups, including correctional organizations, who stand to gain financially.
While arguing for the reinstatement of corporal punishment, Moskos insists two provisions must be met. First, he writes, corporal punishment is to be used “ as an alternative to incarceration, not an addition to it.” Secondly, the punishment must be consensual with the accused opting for it, rather than prison time.
Moskos makes his case that as cruel as a lashing can be, putting a person in prison is more cruel, when one considers the collateral consequences of incarceration. Physical pain diminishes after a time. The mental scars of having a parent in prison, or the shame of not being able to support one’s family because employers are loathe to hire formerly incarcerated persons, can last forever.
Source: San Francisco Chronicle 5/24/11
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