[HPN] Mentally Il Entering Jails and Prisions

[Graeme Bacque]

At 07:20 PM 2/18/00 -0600, you wrote:
>Anyone have any comments for this nurse?
>
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Rose Vaisvilas" <Rvais@AOL.COM>
>Sent: Friday, February 18, 2000 4:15 PM
>Subject: Re: [H-D] Fwd: hosp downsize list
>
>
>You are right about mentally ill patients winding up in prisons and jails -
>as a nurse manager for a large prison, I've seen a dramatic increase in the
>number of mentally ill inmates coming into the system.  Even those who are
>too ill to be in prison when we have been successful in getting them
>committed to state or private hospitals (very few indeed) are coming back to
>us after the inpatient hospital closes.  I guess the good news is those of us
>working in corrections have gotten a lot better at managing mental illness
>including remodeling housing units to residential treatment units but how
>many crimes could have been prevented if effective services had been
>available?

As far as I'm concerned incarceration is incarceration, whether the pretext 
is supposed 'treatment' (for a set of human phenomena that to my mind 
aren't even medical issues to begin with) or an agenda of getting 'tough on 
crime'.

If someone poses no demonstrated (by overt, provable acts) potential for 
harm to others they are entitled to their liberty. Period. Full stop. If 
someone wishes assistance with their day-to-day lives, this should be 
offered, under terms defined by the person receiving it. Locking someone up 
and subjecting them to unhelpful and debilitating forced 
'treatments'  simply because they manifest belief systems, lifestyle 
choices or thought processes that violate the arbitrary standards of 
'normalcy' is a travesty of justice and can only be viewed as punitive - no 
matter what line the 'professionals' try to feed us.

How many people find themselves locked up in the prison-happy U.S. of A. 
not for any act of violence but merely because they have  no home to go to, 
or they may be acting a little weird where other people (usually well-off 
people) are able to see them? Are these the people you're talking about? I 
wonder if your government will ever clue in and start building affordable 
housing rather than prisons, or shed its totally superstitious obsession 
with rounding up anyone who's ever even touched 'illicit' drugs? (I might 
add that many of the chemicals forced upon people by psychiatrists are far 
more dangerous than anything you'll find on the street).

If someone commits a violent act it may well be required that they be 
separated from the rest of the community for a period of time - but the 
existing system of retributive 'justice' has to be rethought (and quickly) 
before the entire house of cards collapses around our heads.  And any 
'services' that are provided must first and foremost be completely 
voluntary in nature, and have as a focus the person's real, vital 
physical/emotional needs such as adequate housing, nutrition, income and 
the development of a strong and supportive community. Psychiatry's more 
typical agenda of incarceration and forced interventions just isn't cutting it.



--
<http://webhome.idirect.com/~gbacque/gbacque.html>
ICQ #45617216
__________________________________________
"A man needs a little madness, otherwise he never
dares cut the rope and be free"
--Nikos Kazantzakis, from 'Zorba the Greek'
__________________________________________