Prisons should focus on rehabilitating criminals

The crime rate is what it is because deterrence works. Why then would the crime rate EVER increase as clearly MORE people are being incarcerated? [1] Shouldn’t every single category of crime be consistently falling? I have already given reliable evidence for the effectiveness of deterrence, the Pro just refuses to acknowledge it. The same could be said. My opponent has completely ignored the fact that Norway’s crime rate per capita is 4.2 crimes per 100 000 citizens lower, and Norway’s prison system is completely rehabilitative. The Pro tries to rebut my arguments about how rehabilitation is an incentive to offend and how it violates justice. This is also flawed. If rehabilitation is an incentive to offend, why would Norway have a lower per capita crime rate than the United States? Furthermore, the majority of what is taught in rehabilitative systems are skills that are designed so when these people get out of prison, they contribute to society. Prison’s in Kenya are teaching prisoners making clothes, building furniture, and farming crops, valuable skills that will allow them to contribute to society. [2] The skills that are taught in prisons can be learned elsewhere, not only in prison. This is what I was talking about in my incentive to offend argument. Poorer people usually do not do as well in school and don’t always have the money for college. Even with student loans, college is expensive and not everyone has the money for it. If poorer people are not successful in school, why would they be successful in prison? In prison’s, they do not teach you math and science. This point on student loans is completely irrelevant. The main point is that you are rewarding the criminal after he commits a crime instead of punishing him for it. Prison is still punishment. Isolation from the outside world is the punishment. My opponent would rather these people be punished, then go out AND REOFFEND WITH A MORE SERIOUS CRIME rather than for them to offend ONCE, and then help society. He says that public opinion has no place in a justice system, because the United States is a democracy, public opinion always matters. In a democracy, the public votes for what they want and things they don’t want will not be likely to get anywhere. This is a completely ridiculous point. First, public opinion does not affect justice at all. Just because the majority of people think a man is guilty DOES NOT MAKE HIM GUILTY. Just because the majority of the population thinks that criminals will always be criminals does not make it so. Just because the majority of the population disagrees with rehabilitation DOES NOT MAKE IT INEFFECTIVE. Secondly, the public does not vote on every single aspect of life, so that is invalid. This shows that even after rehabilitation, not many people are willing to accept criminals. After checking my opponent’s source, it says LITERALLY NOTHING ABOUT PUBLIC OPINION. Source 3 of R2 merely states “What's the point of rehabilitation if society won't forgive and forget? As Britain debates the fate of Philip Lawrence's killer, Peter Stanford argues that anyone can turn their life around – with the right help. And one ex-offender tells his story. ” Nowhere in that is public opinion even mentioned with stats, plus this was about Britain, not the United States so it is COMPLETELY irrelevant. Furthermore, the source even goes on to support rehabilitation. As far as I know, you can’t have a negative recidivism rate, so these numbers cannot go together. The number is not negative. It is very simple: 2/3rds of people will reoffend. After rehabilitation, reoffending rates fell by 83%. That means instead of 66% of criminals reoffending, it is more like 12% of criminals reoffending. Also, the Pro’s evidence from Norway may sound nice, but they have a very different society from us. There are so many other variables that you cannot say that rehabilitation is the cause of their low crime rate. Rehabilitation is completely the cause of their low crime rate. I have proven that rehab reduces repeat offenses and turns criminals into working members of society. Both of these lead to a lower crime rate. Deterrence has been proven to stop 15 crimes for each criminal locked up, so taking away deterrence would increase the crime rate 15X. This stat is completely bogus. If the United States has a reported crime rate of 11 877 218 crimes [3], meaning that without the deterrence factor we would have 178 158 270 crimes, or roughly 1/3 people being criminals. Furthermore, if this was true we would have a steadily dropping crime rate as we are incarcerating more people, yet as I have shown this is not the case. FURTHERMORE, why would we have repeat crime then if prison deters so many people? My opponent also makes the mistake of ASSUMING THERE WILL BE NO MORE PUNISHMENT. Upon researching this case, I found a study titled “Prisons failing to deter repeat criminals in 41 states. ” Clearly my opponent is flawed in this point. All of my opponent’s points are extremely flawed with incorrect stats. All the facts point to rehabilitation decreasing crime and helping people help society. I look forward to my opponent’s response! Source: . http://www.foxnews.com... . http://www.guardian.co.uk... . http://www.mapsofworld.com... . http://usatoday30.usatoday.com...