About 5 years ago they banned smoking in a cdn prison and handed out nic gum. Some of the prisoners boiled the gum and tea leaves together (extracting the nic into the tea leaves) and smoked the tea leaves for their fix. Pretty sneaky...
Cruel and unusual punishment?
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Iown, when you have all that time on your hands, there is always time for innovation.
I still think most people, smokers included, would miss their freedom and their friends and families more than they miss cigarettes. I have a friend who spent about 10 months in a federal prison. He was a PAD+ smoker when he went in, as well as a chronic ......... smoker. He told me about all the things he missed when he was in there, and all the things he hated about prison, if mentioned at all, smoking both tobacco and ......... were at the bottom of his list. Foremost he missed his freedom and friends, beyond that he was worried about the gangs and not belonging. He started up both tobacco and pot shortly after getting out, then about two years later he managed to give up both cold turkey, after about 13-14 years addicted.
I know I would miss my wife and son more than I would miss nicotine. I would miss the internet and a comfortable bed more than nicotine.
The fact is, when you go to prison, you lose about 99.9% of the privileges you have if you are free. Smoking is one on a list of a million. I can't say that smoking should be allowed in prison. Maybe nic gum or patches, maybe not even those. If you let the smokers smoke, then you have to let the alcoholics have their "right" to drink. Then do you have to let the shopaholics out on weekends to go to Macy's?
I have been/am addicted to nicotine. Not as badly as most. Is it a right? As much as it is a right for the unincarcerated to do their grocery shopping at Walmart at 3 am. In prison, smoking isn't a right.
It would probably be in the prison's best interest to provide a nicotine replacement that doesn't pollute the indoor air like smoking does. Keeping violent criminals from having withdrawal induced meltdowns would likely make prisons safer and saner for everyone including the guards. Even then there are logistical problems. Patches and gum would become forms of currency in prisons like cigarettes were in the past and coffee and sugar are now. Inmates would have to have the funds to purchase them, and those replacements are more expensive than tobacco, making it even more difficult for inmates to afford.
jl....n, you bring up a good point about coffee and sugar. They're addicting products that you should withhold from inmates. Prisoners have no right to either of them and obviously they have market value inside the walls so they should be eliminated for the good of the general population.
I noticed that when rothenbj used your screen name in his post, the letters from "a" through "e" were censored out. Apparently "ar$e" must be some kind of swear word. I was just curious if I did a Reply With Quote whether the forum would censor out the same letters in the line "Originally Posted by jl....n."
Addendum:
Well, by golly, it does
your screen name. I just looked it up on Google, and the four letter word that was censored means what I thought it meant, British slang for buttocks.
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Testing...
Yet we can type "..." and it's not censored?
What's the difference?
I noticed that when rothenbj used your screen name in his post, the letters from "a" through "e" were censored out. Apparently "ar$e" must be some kind of swear word. I was just curious if I did a Reply With Quote whether the forum would censor out the same letters in the line "Originally Posted by jl....n."
Addendum:
Well, by golly, it does
Yet we can type "..." and it's not censored?
What's the difference?
The forum originated in England. You can type "pot" but not the "m" word. As all people from the US know, people over there talk funny and sometimes use the wrong words for things. We just need to be patient with their idiosyncracies.
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I agree, after reading all the posts I would like to say that there are quite a few people in prisons that do not belong there either. Mistaken identity, poor counsel, stupid juries. I see no reason to remove smoking from prisons. If they don't want them smoking inside, then let them take it outside. If they really want to take control of prisons, start by regulating the guards and what they allow to go on along w/shutting down the gangs. No, we take the nicotine away, but don't worry about the other awful things that go on there.
Are you just assuming that smoking in prison cost taxpayers money or have you researched it. In the general population smokers save the government money because they die younger. So I am a bit dubious.
I am not up on current prison situations, but my husband (retired several years) used to work in the US Federal correction system. From my understanding at the time, the prisoners had to purchase their own cigarettes from an account they had established and was controlled by the institution. That account was funded from any work program they were in or perhaps by small dollar amounts from other sources. I'm sure there were designated smoking areas. I'm going to guess that smoking is still probably allowed in the Federal system, but I'm not sure. If it were to be banned, I would guess the Feds (or maybe even state) would supply treatment for the addiction - patches, lozenges, gum, support groups, etc. This would be likened to any other addiction - ......, ......., etc.
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