Ok, being the law and order "true believer" I am - these stuck out and got my attention:
"Yet she is one of the minority who manage to stay out. Reoffending rates have been soaring - 64 per cent of those released in 2004 were reconvicted within two years. "
------ Oh, so they are habitual criminals .... well, that's different. Let's coddle them and show them that no true punishment will be administered. THAT should really scare them straight. (not)
"She suggests closing 13 women's prisons and replacing them with a network of 150 custodial family units in city centres."
--- Ahhhh, let these
criminals live in group homes and go out into the unsuspecting community. I mean the
horror and indignity of communal living will certainly cause these women to change their ways.
"It's hard to imagine another arena of public life where the difference between men and women is as marked as it among prisoners. Women are not, on the whole, members of the criminal classes. They are basically law-abiding."
----- This is just idiotic. Most women, oh, and men, are basically law abiding. But we judge individual people (both men and women) on their individual crimes and assign individual punishment. This is just a sentence to get law abiding women to feel empathy towards these CRIMINALS.
"The criminal justice system, developed in Victorian times, modelled the idea of women's prisons on the male institution, without enough thought about the differences between the sexes."
----- Ahhh, but during Victorian times the "
socially constructed" differences between women were
staggering to overcome. Now, since we have equality, we should treat women better than men. ---- Further since Victorian women were treated better than Victorian men, shouldn't that mean that now, with gains in equality, we should make the sentences HARSHER?
"The passionate attachment to a mother, even if she is a thief or a fraudster, is a basic determinant of a young person's wellbeing."
---- 2 Things:
1) Then MOMMY should care enough for her kids not to commit crimes.
2) And DADDY should be given equal concern for access and involvement to his children.
But, hey, why let equal consideration or concern for the moral compass of who is raising these children get in the way of a liberal feminist agenda?
I could go on - but why bother.
Sheesh.
Steven