PRISONS FOR PROFIT - "EVERYBODY! GO TO YOUR CELLS!"

Image on bing from wagingnonviolence.org, CC license

Aren't you tired of hearing bad ideas justified because they seem to be profitable? The latest such idea is corporate prisons for profit. So I've got a great idea. Since privatized prisons are so profitable, and since they make more money for the stockholders the more "beds" they fill, and since the corporate owners are having to waste much of their precious time lobbying to to have more activities declared to be felonies so there will be more people to arrest [yes, this is actually happening] ... 

... then let's just jail everyone in America. Sure, the stockholders and CEO's will be prisoners like all the rest of us, but think how rich they'll be. Think how strong our economy will be. So let's put razor wire around the entire continental United States, razor wire around Alaska, and razor wire around every island in Hawaii. Too expensive, you say? Why, no! The labor will be free. Get the prisoners to do it! How to grow the business? Simple - conjugal visits. Make more babies and put them in juvenile detention centers until they are old enough for the imprisoned judges to declare them legal adults. When we run out of space in America, we can make the entire world a privatized prison, and the world economy will boom like never in history.


"PRISONS FOR PROFIT - 'EVERYBODY! GO TO YOUR CELLS!'" is owned by Mark Mercer. Permission is granted to republish or redistribute so long as attribution is given to Mark Mercer, Einstein Idiot and http://MarkMercer.blogspot.com

POKE THE MONKEY

There's a game that many couples play with each other. I call it "Poke the Monkey." It may be that the man is the game's actual initiator, but it usually has the appearance of being initiated by the woman. She starts with a gradual escalation of increasingly insane provocations until the man starts jumping around, arguing loudly, hissing, slamming his fist into the wall, and throwing coconuts. At that point, the woman wins. There is little point to this game other than the entertainment value for the woman.

The game gets its power from the fact that it's entirely unconscious with both parties. It loses its power when either the man or the woman becomes conscious of it, realizes they are both making fools of themselves and getting nowhere, and one of them decides to stop playing. That may not end the conflict, but it ends "Poke the Monkey," and sometimes a heated but productive dialogue can begin.

"POKE THE MONKEY" is owned by Mark Mercer. Permission is granted to republish or redistribute so long as attribution is given to Mark Mercer, Einstein Idiot and http://MarkMercer.blogspot.com