• ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    Largest prison population both in absolute size AND per capita. Also, random fact, their constitution allows prisoners to be forced into slave labour. Also, another random fact, their prisons are run for profit. None of these facts are related of course!

    • cornbread@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Not to nitpick but not ALL prisons in the US are for-profit. They should be illegal though.

      Fun fact - other countries that have for-profit prisons include the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Chile, Jamaica, Japan, Mexico, Peru, South Africa, South Korea and Thailand.

      This won’t do much since most of these prisons operate under state jurisdiction, but in 2021, President Joe Biden issued an executive order to stop the United States Department of Justice from renewing further contracts with private prisons.

    • The Dark Lord ☑️@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      Next you’re going to tell me that these for-profit prisons lobby the government for harsher prison sentences for things like cannabis possession.

    • httpjames@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      And house arrest is being used for mass incarceration of people being ACCUSED before conviction. The punishment can be more severe before conviction.

      • 🐱TheCat@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Listen I live in the USA, but if thats your best pushback to all those facts - should tell you what a dire state we are in. And prisons that aren’t for profit still send out prisoners to for-profit industries to work, so it’s kind of a moot point.

      • bdonvr@thelemmy.club
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        1 year ago

        And how many of these other prisons offer up their prisoners as extremely cheap labor to businesses that ARE for profit?

    • Riaz@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      And yet still most Americans think everyone is trying to sneak into their country! You couldn’t pay me to live there.

      I’m surprised there is not more travel advisory warnings for travel to America 😮‍💨

      • jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Listen, a lot of people don’t understand the key to the living well in the United States. It’s really very simple. Just be rich. You’ll have the best life ever.

        If you’re too stupid to be rich (or you didn’t inherit a billion dollars from your parents), blame some poor brown dude for “stealing” a shitty job that you didn’t actually want anyways because it’s worse and pays less than your shitty job. It won’t make anything better at all but at least you’ll feel like you understand why everything sucks (even though you actually don’t) and you’ll have the benefit of living in poverty AND feeling smugly superior to someone else who also lives in poverty for stupid (racist) reasons.

        And if you think about it, that sense of superiority is nearly as good (it definitely isn’t) as being rich.

  • cheeseburgers@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    THEY’RE TRYING TO BUILD A PRISON THEY’RE TRYING TO BUILD A PRISON THEY’RE TRYING TO BUILD A PRISON FOR YOU AND ME

    • Hari Seldon@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Having to live in the US is already a punishment, being inmate is like being in a prison inside a prison.

      • Betty White In HD@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Look the US has a ton of issues and there are people actively trying to make it worse, but there are reasons why people are or are trying to immigrate here in droves. It’s, on average, pretty alright and I don’t and have never felt like a prisoner inside a prison. If that’s how you feel here, I’m sorry.

        But I get it AMERICA BAD and let’s continue the Leddit trend of taking every single opportunity to shit on everything at all times.

        • boonhet@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          I’ve given the US tons of shit and have even done so in this thread, but I’ll be the first to admit there’s plenty of reason to migrate. Much of the country is an unwalkable hellhole with mediocre salaries, but there are still at least a few cities that are 1) walkable or have good public transit, 2) have salaries that even western Europe can only dream of 3) aren’t all that bad with crime either.

          It just sucks to be poor in the US. But if you’ve got a great career, it’s one of the few places where hard work CAN technically result in becoming a millionaire, as a software engineer or doctor for an example. The country has a working population for 167 million and somehow has over 20 million millionaires.

          Also there’s so much variety of nature for one country, it’s nuts.

          If H1Bs weren’t so hard to come by, I’d probably move and work for that sweet US software engineer salary for 5 years, then move back to my homeland that has much cheaper property lol

        • MBM@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          there are reasons why people are or are trying to immigrate here in droves

          If you compare yourself to third-world countries you always come out looking good. “America Bad” can definitely get circlejerky though, no denying that

          • Betty White In HD@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            No, we have a lot of Germans, Canadians, French, Ukrainians, Australians, Brits, etc here. People from all over. I’m also an immigrant and a naturalized US citizen from a “first world” country. Now why would that be? Hmmm…

            Anyway happy 4th, gonna go blow up my fingers and eat like a dozen hot dogs with the fellas. Don’t stay online too long, it’s not good for the melon.

  • eltimablo@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    How can America have 25% of the world’s prison population of the entire country doesn’t make up even 10% of the world’s population?

    • ilikekeyboards@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      -be the “first in the world” -everywhere you go yell “USA! USA! USA!” -sparking people’s curiosity and they look into your garden -they find a dystopian horror show, a land where billionaires are kings, millions deprived of liberty, hundred millions depraved of healthcare, an ever increasing tumour of fascists group that wish for some women and minorities to have fewer rights

      -ohshit.jpg

      You can’t have the biggest running circus without everyone starring and complaining and debating.

  • S_H_K@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    They made it a business. How many places in the world have private incarceration facilities?

    • boonhet@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Sure. Definitely nothing to do with the fact that in your country, locking people up is SUPER profitable for prisons and a few other industries so certain institutions lobby to make sure more people keep getting locked up.

    • pancakes@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Ah yes, Germany and Sweden. The last bastions for criminals all around the world. Oh wait, I’m 6-7 times as likely to be murdered in the US then those two places (Source).

      • MostlyBirds@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        If you don’t want to hear about America being bad, don’t go to the same places as people who live in reality.

        • ElRompeCulo@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I don’t deny the problems with this country. I vote to try and make this country better. Seeing the same posts about how horrible this country is gets old after a while. A majority of Reddit and this site would agree with the flaws of the US. The people who really need to hear this stuff aren’t on here.

          • Yendor@reddthat.com
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            1 year ago

            The thing is, America (many Americans anyway) are continually screaming at everyone online about how America is the best country in the world and everywhere else is a shithole - despite very few measures supporting that.

            If you insist on telling everyone you’re the best, when you have so many serious flaws, people are going to mock you for it.

      • thisbenzingring@wirebase.org
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        1 year ago

        See most places are bad but America should be better. It presents itself as the better. It does not always live up to that better and so those people who want us to be better keep reminding us we have a lot of work to do. I can tell you personally how horrible America can be but I don’t think you want to hear that from a Lakota.

      • ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Hi. As a not American, I can say Americans get made fun of a lot by not Americans. We like to share these jokes with each other online, as not Americans also use the internet.

          • ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
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            1 year ago

            Canada. I’d appreciate any joke. Personal favourites include our Prime Minister’s blackface, or changing the words of the national anthem to be “our home on native land”, or suggesting that we have two official languages: English and Chinese.

              • boonhet@lemm.ee
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                1 year ago

                I thought it was the worst ones.

                Because literally the first one that comes to mind is Justin Bieber.

              • x4740N@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                That is such a poor attempt at a joke, it’s like an elderly frail person trying to have sex

                • Betty White In HD@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Sorry it hurt your feelies, bud. Happy 4th of July, go eat a hotdog, maybe have a coke and a smile and shut the fuck up.