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Comment by mynameishere | Hacker News Reader

I always figured that if I had to go to prison, I would rather solitary. As long as you can get decent books and have a TV, which is typical in the US, it sounds vastly better than having to sleep in a common area with dozens of real criminals (also typical enough).

It doesn't surprise me that men who get solitary for violent infractions hate it. These are hyper-social people, who need continuous interaction with others, whether as a friend or a competitor or a predator. By contrast, I can go weeks without speaking to a person. It just doesn't sound that bad, relatively.

Obviously, I'm speculating. But a real test, taking ordinary people and subjecting them either to solitary or a confined population of thugs, and comparing the results, would be pretty unethical. At the same time, you can neither trust the personal account of a woman in extraordinary circumstances, nor those of the most violent, probably psychopathic, criminals.

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At the same time, you can neither trust the personal account of a woman in extraordinary circumstances, nor those of the most violent, probably psychopathic, criminals.

Fortunately (or perhaps, unfortunately), there are plenty of other sorts of people who've spent serious time in solitary who can corroborate the horror.

And even assuming everyone in prison is guilty of some offense, just because someone committed a crime doesn't justify inflicting psychological trauma on them.

Here it is everybody, this comment is the reason why we still have solitary confinement. People think it's just like having a lot of free time to yourself.

I think it's that people have a hypothetical difficult choice. In gen-pop you can get stabbed to death or raped or beaten because while there are a few social heroes fighting the system that wind up in prison there are also killers and thugs. So in a hypothetical you can take the risk of losing your mind to the crushing solitude or risk being killed by a gang member iniate. Either way, you're in a bad situation.

Solitary is worse. Sticks and stones will break your bones, but if your personality crumbles away, you will lose _you_.

Very true. And honestly I'd rather be stabbed to death (I think) than go nuts. Especially if I were aware of it. This is why I'm terrified of things like Alzheimer's.

Try to remember that while prison isn't pleasant by any stretch, life isn't like a tv series or movie either. As far as I can tell (from what I've read) some of the worst parts of the US prison system, are the mega-jails that you are sent to before sentencing.

I very, very much doubt that most people (even those that enjoy books etc) would prefer solitary confinement to some form of gen-pop. We are social creatures, and being completely alone, without being able to do anything about our situation (not by choice) is quite terrible when it stretches out over time.

That's not all an argument for mandatory solitary confinement.

That's an argument for a better prison system.

“It’s an awful thing, solitary,” John McCain wrote of his five and a half years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam—more than two years of it spent in isolation in a fifteen-by-fifteen-foot cell, unable to communicate with other P.O.W.s except by tap code, secreted notes, or by speaking into an enamel cup pressed against the wall. “It crushes your spirit and weakens your resistance more effectively than any other form of mistreatment.” And this comes from a man who was beaten regularly; denied adequate medical treatment for two broken arms, a broken leg, and chronic dysentery; and tortured to the point of having an arm broken again.

A U.S. military study of almost a hundred and fifty naval aviators returned from imprisonment in Vietnam, many of whom were treated even worse than McCain, reported that they found social isolation to be as torturous and agonizing as any physical abuse they suffered.

And what happened to them was physical. EEG studies going back to the nineteen-sixties have shown diffuse slowing of brain waves in prisoners after a week or more of solitary confinement. In 1992, fifty-seven prisoners of war, released after an average of six months in detention camps in the former Yugoslavia, were examined using EEG-like tests. The recordings revealed brain abnormalities months afterward; the most severe were found in prisoners who had endured either head trauma sufficient to render them unconscious or, yes, solitary confinement. Without sustained social interaction, the human brain may become as impaired as one that has incurred a traumatic injury.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/03/30/090330fa_fact_...

The jail guards usually won't let you have a nice time in prison. If they see that you're enjoying something, they feel it's their job to take it away from you.

> ordinary people

As compared to whom? People who like to tinker alone and read a lot? Those are ordinary, too.

> trust the personal account of a woman in extraordinary circumstances

I'd rather do that, than trust my own imagination, or the one of people on HN.

> As long as you can get decent books and have a TV

That won't protect you from being unable to focus attention and developing mental fixations.

I often think the same thing, I'd prefer to avoid the prison crowd as much as possible. I had runs of weeks without leaving my bedroom[0], which is not larger than a cell too.

But some words from the woman in the article are hitting me. I also feel that without knowing it I'm $something deprived by this lifestyle. My brain isn't clicking the way it was when I was having a lot more social interaction, even though it was a big weight on my mind (randomness/fluidity of people and social interaction doesn't fit well with the way my brain is structured[1]). And often I can read things but they don't reach deep in my brain. I thought it was just laziness and lack of motivation on my side, but maybe ... maybe ..

Also, right now I'm somehow(see [1]) isolated by my own will. But if held in jail by an external agent I'm not sure I would "enjoy" it as much.

[0] internet is very keen on providing you things to do all night long, which is very neat, the peace of the night is something I liked a lot at that time, and soon you live in the opposite timezone, sleeping the day etc etc

The difference is you have internet and a computer in your bedroom.

Inmates may be denied even a paper and pencil.

My computer is to read and listen music. She said she had books. No music though. And in the end it didn't matter because the lack of human interaction made her enable to enjoy or even understand anything. I agree that the automatic solitary => no object was unexpected to me. I read many times people could read and learn in prison. Too bad you can't blend both slight isolation and learning.

Do you use your computer to interact online?

Meta question detected, I must agree. But it's also very crude and shallow compared to physical interaction.

The point is that the inmates don't have even this. It may make a huge difference.

That's what I'm realizing slowly

What did you ate? Your bedroom was stack with food supplies for weeks? Or is it that someone cooked and you had some minimum amount of interaction with him?

Another difference is that you have seen difference between day and night. Once you have computer, you can get music or games or almost any kind of sensory you would need.

Another difference is that you had control over it. You could go out once it you started to be personally uncomfortable and you probably started because you felt a need for some solitude.

Anyway, when I had to work alone for long time, it had similar effects to my brain as it had on yours.

No it was in the kitchen fridge (fruits, veggies, pasta, a bit of meat, tea).

Interactions existed but are twisted, and I try to avoid them whenever I can. I agree that even bad interactions may be a little better than no interactions at all.

When living at night, I could see the sunlight around 5pm throught the curtains bottom.

It's true I do have control, that's what I tried to say above. I realize that even going to pee or shower is some kind of leasure time in that setting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/29/us/29jail.html?pagewanted=...

Someone down-vote this troll.

Eeek, I was replying to someone in the thread, whoops.

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