prison time for crime offenders
topic: Some people think sending criminals to prison is not an effective way to deal with them. Education and training are better. To what extent do you agree or disagree?
It is often argued that governments should not force criminals to serve prison sentences due to the ineffectiveness, but rather be softer on crimes by applying education and training. I partly agree with this perspective.
On the one hand, there are reasons explaining why some people support the idea of using educational environment and training on deterring criminals. First, in terms of involuntary offenders, normally the law-abiding ones, long prison sentences would seem to be too ruthless and not socially widely accepted. Because they might have committed the crimes not on purposes, for example for self-defense or feeding their family when it comes to robbery, not for their own profit. That is why non-custodial verdicts such as community service orders, vocational education and probation orders would be handed out and act as a deterrent in these cases. Second, for serious crimes, even homicide,were they to not fully and properly educated to change their nature from a criminal into a good human, it would be a waste to send them to prison. Moreover, through education and training, the officials may gain more insights into motivation of criminal offenses, and thus to come up with more congruous solution to reduce crime rate.
However, as far as I am concerned, to culminate the effectiveness of dealing with crimes, governments should utilize more appropriate ways. Hardly could any solution be more practical than using rigorous supervision on crimes, alongside education and training. As I mentioned above, notorious crimes with unethical behavior basically need much time to change for the better. It means in the early stage of using education and training, there is a high possibility they could return to crime again, and may negatively affect their counterparts. In addition, in terms of cases that are too heinous and dangerous, the full weight of the law and the policy of zero-tolerance must be imposed in order to ensure social security.
In conclusion, governments should ponder using alternative ways to penalize offenses but in a way of flexibility. It means the leaders should combine education and training with strict policy before granting a certain summary judgement.