Build More Prisons

Really?; is that the answer? We regularly hear politicians claim that their tough line on crime is making our streets and properties safer. It doesn’t matter so much that prison conditions are atrocious and inmates high as kites – legally or otherwise, that suicide rates are climbing, that prison populations are growing and that the main learning opportunities are about broadening offender’s repertoire of offending behaviour. It is a sad indictment on society that we choose to lock up and forget those ‘harder to help’ folk rather than to make the societal changes that would give them real hope and build in them a desire to contribute. I see this as a reflection of our overweight society. Very often weight loss efforts hit a plateau where the pounds cling on stubbornly despite many weeks of steady reduction. This is a protection mechanism used by the body to ensure that our detox pathways are functioning well before dangerous toxins are released from their fat cell storage. When the body is working normally the brain knows it’s safe to allow further weight reduction because the toxins we release from our fat ‘prisons’ can be swiftly removed. When there are no toxins coming into the body there is no need for the fat that held them and so the body will return to its healthy natural weight. When the source of the problem is removed we don’t need incarceration capacity.