Thursday, July 20, 2006

None saith, Restore - prison "rehab" - why it doesn't work

“… And none saith, Restore”
© Copyright 2002, 2006 – David Todeschini – all rights reserved

Posted by: WebPastor David Todeschini
Other Blogs: www.Net4TruthUSA.com/blogs.htm

One hears of injustices all the time, and for as long as there is no justice, there will be no peace, and this inevitably leads to the question, “Who is the final arbiter[1] of justice – or truth for that matter?” It leads to the concept of Restorative Justice, forgiveness, and reconciliation, for only if one seeks to save his fellow man, does one find the key to his own salvation. Often, unwittingly, unintentionally, and unknowingly, we set in motion something that gets out of hand quickly, and shortly thereafter goes completely beyond our ability to control.

We often call it “bad karma”, “poetic justice”, “reaping what one has sown”, or any of a number of other things, but that is irrelevant; the point is that even a seemingly deminimus [2] offense can lead one onto the path to destruction. Because our society, and indeed all societies with rare exception, have sanctioned vengeance and called it “justice”, is precisely why we have the problems we have. It is time to move away from being liberal or permissive, and towards loving confrontation, reconcilement, and peace.

The best way to illustrate some of the continuing damage done to offenders, victims, and the society-at-large, is by examining some of these situations, and see the effect of so-called “rehabilitation” – which is in actuality, no such thing. Today, “rehabilitation” of a young juvenile, is to throw him in jail where he is repeatedly raped – an old man is beaten to death for a pack of cigarettes, and the list of abuses and outright atrocities are endless. These things go on with the tacit[3] consent of, or in many cases actually initiated by the prison guards or “corrections officers” themselves, who are then often more dangerous than the prisoners they are guarding. The Bible speaks of prison in many places in the text; but it is doubtful that their problems were as complex as they are in our time:

“… this is a people robbed and spoiled; they are all of them snared in holes, and they are hid in prison houses: they are for a prey, and none delivereth; for a spoil, and none saith, Restore”. – Isaiah 42:22 KJV

“… that make a man an offender for a word, and lay a snare for him that reproveth in the gate, and turn aside the just for a thing of nought”. – Isaiah 29:21 KJV

I selected these two Bible verses because they relate to the constant, unseen travesties that lead to tragedies such as this one, which I found recorded in a book titled “We’re All Doing Time” by Bo Lozoff[4]. The following is an excerpt from a letter sent to Bo Lozoff of The Human Kindness Foundation[5]:

“Dear Bo,

Since as far as I know… you and your family are the only people on Earth who sincerely care… it is to you, I wish to pour out “some” of my pent-up feelings concerning society in general.

I stole $25 in an unarmed robbery. I was later apprehended and sentenced to 25 years in a rusted-out cage… simply to “rehabilitate” me (according to prison authorities)… I have a friend in here who got drunk one night, thrown in a jail cage, and ended up kicking the toilet off the wall. The courts sentenced him to 12 years in a cage… to “rehabilitate him”… you see, in Oklahoma, a toilet is held in higher esteem than 12 years of a man’s life!

I was a robber when I entered prison, and now after only four years of being “rehabilitated” in a cage, I am contemplating becoming a sniper when released. Society has gotten its revenge on me… they’ve shown me [that] revenge is the righteous, holy way… that the only way to “rehabilitate” people is to punish!, punish!, punish! So… after completing a four-year course in “rehabilitation”, I want to spread this “Divine rehabilitation” to our wonderful society! Yes… just as the authorities have attempted to ameliorate me by punishment… so in like manner, I do wish to ameliorate[6] society by punishment… they must be exterminated… I can only afford a high-powered rifle with a scope. I will simply blow the tops of their skulls off… it will be quick and efficient, and it will have an auspicious deterrent effect on all aspiring lawyers, DAs, and politicians… the authorities “blew” $40,000 to convert a small-time robber into a big-time sniper! (me). I’m soooo very grateful for all the :rehabilitation”.

Luv, Maury”

As the book (“We’re All Doing Time”) went to press, the author received word that in April 1985, Maury was set upon by two other inmates and stabbed to death while taking a shower. The man’s “instant offense” – a $25 unarmed robbery – led to the travesty that sentenced him to 25 years, and ultimately resulted in his murder. This sort of thing is not uncommon, and the State of Oklahoma, as far as I am concerned, murdered him. His hope for the future was destroyed, and since he mentions his “mental asylum records” in a subsequent letter before he was killed [not included here], we know the kind of “rehabilitation” he was subjected to (I should say, “inflicted upon him”). This, as is all too-often the case, even today. It is just one example of punishment that is way out of proportion to the offense. Moreover, coincidently, as I write this (10-03-2002), a sniper in the Washington, DC area is killing people at random with a high-powered rifle in Montgomery County, Maryland. Schools are closed, and the entire area is on “lock-down”. No justice, no peace.

If our “enlightened” society still believes that we are doing to stop crime in this country is the right approach towards a safe society, they should take heed of Maury’s letter. The statistics should tell us that the cause of the more heinous crimes is a failure – no, an outright refusal to even attempt to reconcile an offender to society. Both victim and offender suffer needlessly because of legislators and politicians taking advantage of the public’s shortsighted thirst for revenge, instead of doing what they know is the right thing to do.

Criminology, and the thousands of practitioners with their Ph. Ds, cannot claim to have much of a valid technology, because if what the field of criminology holds to be true were valid, it would work predictably when applied. We see that we have total failure, and the primary reason for that failure is because criminology is based on psychology, and the practice of psychology is directly responsible for literally millions of deaths by war, genocide, abortion, and atrocities throughout history too numerous to mention. The field of psychology and psychiatry believes that “man is an animal, there is no soul”. Psychiatrists (by their own admission) cannot cure any of the 347 “disorders” listed in their “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual” (DSM), [because most of the “disorders” are bogus to begin with]. Since they are grossly incompetent because of their core beliefs about the spirituality of Man, they rely on an ever-increasing cornucopia[7] of experimental psychotropic pharmacology that is highly addictive, and only suppresses the symptoms temporarily, turning “patients” into violent, unpredictable time bombs or worse – maniacs without consciences.

The concept of Restorative Justice may seem to be “soft on crime”, but it is nothing of the sort. The more “the law” seeks to suppress crime by “tougher laws”, the tougher and more cunning the criminally intent become; it is cause and effect, and it works in that order; we have crime first, then a (new) law that increases the penalty for that particular crime. Then we observe that the number of incidents (initially) decrease, but the severity of the incidents that do occur, increases dramatically. This is followed by a gradual increase in the number of incidents to the previous level, but at the new level of severity. The laws then get tougher still, and the crimes eventually worsen in response. The analysis in not complex, and it should be obvious; it is not “logical”, and that is the problem. I challenge anyone to run the statistics on any crime over the last 200 years, then come back and read this again.

Crime, like it or not, is a spiritual problem. It is a spiritual issue whether one believes it to be or not, and any penological effort or legislation enacted that attempts to address it by suppression, by harsh sanctions out of proportion to the offense, by State-sanctioned vengeance, “breaking the spirit”, by “therapy”, drugs, psychology, or by any other methodology that does not recognize and work with a man’s spirituality; any non-pastoral approach is doomed to fail – and we see the failures in our courts and prisons today.

The “psychological approach” has failed utterly; it has failed miserably and consistently, leading “expert” criminologists and psychiatrists to blame the “intractability” of drug addiction, violent behavior, and all manner of criminality on “incorrigible” criminals, instead of admitting the incompetence of their profession’s technology.

Many people confuse spirituality with religion. Some will deny their own nature in order not to be accountable to the Creator, which they also ignore, or deny, exists. This mentality is directly responsible for the crime problem in this country, and for a great majority of the world’s political and racial troubles.

A valid technology works consistently well when applied to the problem at hand. We have such a technology at our disposal, and even though it is time-tested and proven almost miraculously efficable in over 30 countries; even though it has achieved unheard of results everywhere it has been applied, we hardly hear of it, and incorporation of this technology into our prison system is actively resisted by the politicians and the “powers-that-be”. Why? That is not an easy question to answer, and society-at-large would benefit immeasurably on all accounts, should this methodology be adopted as the standard rehabilitation program in all U.S. prisons. Instead of sniper wannabes, we could restore fellow human beings to their self-respect and their God-given ethics; allowing them – instead of forcing them – to make amends and thereafter lead productive lives. It is possible, and it has been tried, tested, and proven time and time again.

An efficable rehabilitation technology would go hand-in-hand with the concept of Restorative Justice; I is spiritual technology applied to spiritual beings that achieves the results, and Restorative Justice that provides the means by which to heal the offender and reconcile him to those who were hurt. What we are presently doing; the path we have taken is not working, and walking farther down that path won’t make it work, or make it work any better. We are now literally standing at the gates of Hell, knocking. It is time to turn around and run the other way – run, before the butler greets us and invites us in. Yes, it will get much worse if we wait any longer.

I am by no means, anyone who would condone unmerited leniency towards “hardened criminals”. I’ve been on both sides of the fence, so-to-speak. I’ve had both technologies (actually, one is a technology, and the other is criminal quackery) applied to me, and I can vouch for the one that works. If a man becomes “a hardened criminal”, is it not the “rehabilitation” that is inflicted upon him the thing that “hardens” him? How many Maurys are there “behind the wall” who, after years of abuse, violence, and “rehabilitation”; whose lives are destroyed, and who carry the guilt of having hurt others; who are not being helped, are waiting for their turn to “rehabilitate” society? The very least that any therapeutic technology should be able to claim, is that it does not further aberrate the individual, for if it does so, then one is, in the absence of any other means, better off to leave the “incorrigible, hardened criminal” alone in his “rusted-out cage” to do his time in peace.

As statistics for the last fifty years or more indicate, the application of psychology and criminology-based “rehabilitation”, not to mention the brutality and criminal acts committed by prison staff, and by other inmates with the tacit consent of staff, results in aberration instead of rehabilitation, and in crime that is not only out of control, but is absolutely senseless and insane. Similarly, the introduction of social workers, psychologists, and psychotropic drugs – legal and very dangerous pharmacology – into our schools within the last 30 years, has resulted in almost routine acts of what can only be called “insanity”; the re-enactment of the My-Lai massacre in the schoolyard, ten year-old boys running in “wolf packs”, beating people to death, and snipers hiding in bushes waiting for a victim to wander into the crosshairs.

The common denominator in all of this, is the application of “psychology” to otherwise normal, well-adjusted, albeit exuberant (not “Hyper-active) children, and others who, having relatively minor problems to begin with, could have been completely healed by a bit of competent counseling. In so many cases, the “therapy” is worse than the problem, and since it doesn’t help – and indeed makes things worse, “It must be”, it is reasoned, “that more therapy is needed”. This is like a bloodletting that was supposed to cure a common cold not working, and making the patient weaker. It is then reasoned that “more bloodletting is needed”[8]. It is time to stop this insanity, and we can stop it by outlawing the practice of psychology and psychiatry – professions whose philosophy, methodology, and pharmacology is literally driving this country – and indeed the world – insane!

Psychology and psychiatry are in an “unholy alliance” with large drug companies. Some of these “mother’s little helper” drugs such as Paxil™ and Prozak™ are nationally advertised, and a prescription awaits the asking – so why not get yours? Your medical insurance will pay for it, and you can “feel like yourself again”. And just in case that neat “feeling like myself” déjà vu from your Woodstock days wears off as your incredibly stressful day wears on, now there is new and improved Paxil-CR™ (Controlled Release), so you can have that lovely psyche-med “buzz” all day long! Avoid operating heavy machinery and unexpected pregnancy, and don’t leave any high-powered automatic weapons lying around – if you don’t want to be responsible for another Columbine[9] incident.

All kidding aside (it ain’t too far from the truth), any type of mind-altering drug – legal or illegal – is inherently dangerous, addictive, and very unpredictable, as numerous cases of senseless violence – especially by children who are given drugs for “learning disorders” or for bogus “Attention Deficit Disorder” (ADD/AHDD) illustrate. Shools and prisons – that is where psychology and psychiatry thrive. Children and prisoners can’t resist, and are literally “a captive audience”.

You can help by becoming better informed, adding your voice and your vote in opposition to the status quo, and your support for what does work and has proven itself to work. Support the various prison ministries that operate in your State’s prisons, support Christian prison ministries, and the Narconon™, Criminon™ [10]and The Way To Happiness™ programs in your community, and let the politicians know that you want these programs introduced into your State’s prisons.

(See: www.Net4TruthUSA.com/linksministries.htm for a list of prison ministries). Print out some of the materials on my web site and send it to a prisoner at random – in other words – commit a random act of kindness. Oppose anyone who would advocate giving schoolchildren psychotropic drugs for bogus “disorders”, and lobby to remove social workers and psychologists from the public schools entirely. Act to enact restorative Justice, and let’s work together to forever end the type of “rehabilitation” that creates sniper wannabes out of petty thieves. Together, we can be the united voice that saith, “Restore”.

NOTICE

This material is conditionally copyrighted by Net4TruthUSA Ministries, and WebPastor David Todeschini. You may use and distribute this material in its entirety for non-profit use only. You may copy and distribute as many copies of this article as you wish, e-mail it to your friends, or post this PDF file on your web site for downloading. You may not modify this PDF document in any way, and it must be posted in its entirety, including this notice. If you have any questions, please see: www.Net4TruthUSA.com/condcopyright.htm

This and other sermons and articles by WebPastor David Todeschini can be found on:
www.Net4TruthUSA.com/netsermons.htm and www.Net4TruthUSA.com/page57.htm


See:
www.Net4TruthUSA.com/restorativejustice.htm
FOOTNOTES:

[1] Arbiter – A mediator or a judge who makes a decision to settle a dispute.
[2] Deminimus – (Latin) – small, insignificant, minor, and of no consequence.
[3] Tacit – unspoken, understood, implicit, inferred, implied.
[4] “We’re All Doing Time” - Bo Lozoff – Human Kindness Foundation – ISBN # 0-9614444-0-1 (free to prisoners).
[5] Human Kindness Foundation, PO Box 61619, Durham, NC, 27715 www.HumanKindness.org (Mauray’s letter quoted with permission)
[6] Ameliorate – Improve, restructure, restore.
[7] Cornucopia –abundance, profusion, excess.
[8] George Washington died by an excess of “bloodletting”.
[9] Columbine – refers to the shootings at Columbine High School, in Littleton, Colorado.
[10] Criminon / Narconon – rehabilitation technology based on Dianetics. A non-religious counseling program which achieves better than 80% success rates, even with “hardened criminals”, and “hopeless” drug addicts. Criminon sponsors programs in many prisons, and offers correspondence courses free of cost to prisoners. 7060 Hollywood Blvd., Suite 220, Los Angeles, CA, 90028

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