Criminals are not hapless victims of disadvantaged circumstances who just need more understanding and resources. They rejected school, jobs, and the straight life long ago. People from all sorts of environments choose to commit crimes. The criminal is a victimizer who injures others in pursuit of excitement and his own ego gratification, not the victim he portrays himself to be. Most efforts to help criminals go straight overlook this inconvenient fact.
Rehabilitation is a misconception when applied to criminals.
The criminal cannot be restored to something he never was. Habilitation means changing the way the offender thinks, not tinkering with his social conditions. Habilitation does not dictate his decisions but helps him to change his thinking process so that he functions responsibly. To succeed, counselors and other professionals who work with criminals must adopt a stance at odds with their current training, says Samenow. Instead of trying to comfort the afflicted, they have the unpleasant task of getting the criminal to look in the mirror at himself and recognize his worst features.