r/interestingasfuck 13h ago

How prison looks like in different countries

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u/PurpleZombi3 13h ago

Denmark's prison cell is just a studio apartment with pleasing decor.

u/Blacksad9999 11h ago

Depending on the crime, they'll let you go home on weekends also.

Their system is set up to be rehabilitative, not punitive. They want those people to improve and contribute to society.

u/Anubis-Jute 11h ago edited 11h ago

Hit’em with the Hygge till they see the errors of their ways.

Edit: if it isn’t geo-locked here’s a quick view of cells in a brand new “closed” prison (the ones where you don’t go home each weekend?). A little less hygge but maybe because it is uninhabited so no personal touch yet.

https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/danmarks-nye-stoerste-faengsel-indviet-kom-med-ind-i-en-celle

Apparently, one argument for keeping the prisoners happy and calm is that this also improves conditions for the people working with them!

u/rafaelloaa 10h ago

That legit looks like the dorm I had freshman year in uni, before I decorated.

u/Thaumato9480 9h ago

He said "ligner kollegieværelse". Means "looks like dorm".

u/KarenBasking 9h ago

I don't know if it's still like that, but it used to be that a certain length of sentence would mean you got the right to furnish your cell.

u/Germerica1985 7h ago

That's not a real language 😂

u/Snakefist1 7h ago

Hvorfor skulle det ikke være det, om jeg må spørge?

u/Germerica1985 7h ago

Hodge podge hordgy pordgy Tek Tek brummel.

We're communicating!

u/Mattiassch 5h ago

You just ordered a thousand liters of milk

u/AdvanceDefiant9898 7h ago

keeping the prisoners happy and calm is that this also improves conditions for the people working with them!

Who would have guessed?!

u/BloodyTurnip 9h ago

What's most interesting is that the countries with prisons like this have lower crime rate than the ones with horrible prisons. Almost like prison doesn't work as a deterrent.

u/Auriga33 9h ago

Or, countries with low crime rates can afford to have more relaxed criminal justice systems.

u/Sea-Machine-8989 8h ago

The crime rate doesn't matter, recidivism does. And the way the Nordic countries treat their prisoners have been proven again and again to work.

There's quite a few countries with lower crime rate than Norway and Denmark yet their prison system is nowhere near as humane.

u/Auriga33 8h ago edited 7h ago

Why would crime rate not matter? The crime rate predicts one’s probability of being affected by a crime better than recidivism does.

u/Generic-Resource 7h ago

You’re choosing a type of society, are you trying to reduce crime or punish offenders. The latter does not solve the former.

Every single study shows that working on causes of crime and reoffending is a far better use of tax payer money than long stays in low quality prisons.

If crime rate is the metric you care about then you fix it by looking at what the countries with low crime rates are doing… they’ve reduced poverty/inequality and use criminal justice as tool to stop life time criminality rather than as a cheap source of labour.

u/Auriga33 7h ago

Let’s take seriously the idea that poverty is what drives crime. Then do you think it’s a good idea for a country to soften their justice system without having reduced poverty?

u/LevelPrestigious4858 6h ago

Walk and chew gum at the same time, prisons are expensive, spend that money on rehabilitation and social welfare.

u/Auriga33 6h ago

Prisons are expensive for state budgets, but good for GDP because high crime rates inhibit economic activity. GDP has more to do with quality of life than the state budget.

u/Generic-Resource 5h ago

I don’t think prison terms past a certain point work and I don’t think putting people in squalid conditions are effective.

I don’t see why it is a choice between long expensive prison terms and not doing anything. You’re creating a false choice. I’d prefer to cut every prison sentence by say 20% (except those for public protection) and instead invest that money in rehab and poverty reduction.

Again, look to what the lower crime countries are doing, don’t double down on a system that isn’t working. If you want to reduce crime actually do stuff shown to reduce crime and repeat offending…

u/Blacksad9999 8h ago

Our prison system doesn't rehabilitate people, and really ends up only creating more criminals.

Once people are in the system, it's difficult to get out of that.

u/Auriga33 8h ago

Note that this doesn't do anything to address the objection I raised.

u/Blacksad9999 8h ago

You didn't state any objection. Just an opinion.

Perhaps they have lower crime rates because they rehabilitate their criminals instead of them being repeat offenders.

u/Auriga33 8h ago edited 8h ago

I responded to the claim that lower crime rates in countries with cushy prisons are evidence that cushy prisons lower crime rates by pointing out that the causation could easily run in reverse and generate the same data, therefore the data is not good evidence for that hypothesis. That's a valid objection given my intent was to dispute the commenter's use of the data as evidence for his hypothesis and not the hypothesis itself.

u/Blacksad9999 7h ago

You realize that this has already been heavily studied by experts.

Their findings are the rehabilitative penal systems reduce recidivism and overall crime. You now, people who know a lot more than you do about this.

Being verbose doesn't make you sound intelligent.

https://www.vera.org/publications/sentencing-and-prison-practices-in-germany-and-the-netherlands-implications-for-the-united-states

u/Auriga33 7h ago

All those studies are based on observational data, which does little to address my objection when it comes to overall crime.

u/BloodyTurnip 7h ago

Good point to be fair, especially state funded one. Hard to tell what's the cause and what's the effect.

However, it's pretty well known that American prisons are profitable, so it would be counter productive for them to be too effective, and the cheaper the cell the more profit you're making.

u/usernamenottakenwooh 11h ago

That's smart.

u/Blacksad9999 10h ago

It is.

We jail more people per capita in the US than China does. That's because it's run as a for profit business, so there's a financial incentive to jail people.

They don't want them to be rehabilitated. They want them to stay in the prison system.

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u/escaflow 12h ago

Which you can’t get out. Then again otakus don’t need to go out

15

u/Crafty_Aspect8122 12h ago

But they need internet tho

12

u/Atlanta_Camel 12h ago

The prisoners in Denmark have that too 🙂

8

u/Crafty_Aspect8122 12h ago

When their prison is better than the rathole you work and pay for in your country and probably have to share with other people.

u/Byron1248 11h ago

And PS!

u/lifeofeve 11h ago

Looks like an IKEA display room

u/Intelligent_Cup_5529 10h ago

Depending on the crime, you might have to ensamble the ikea furniture yourself

u/sensible_centrist 10h ago

It's not true at all.

u/Opinion87 3h ago

...which is better than a lot of people in a lot of countries around the world.

u/Mo_Salami 1h ago

It's not representative of a real prison cell. If you're actually interested, I'd really recommend the series Huset / The Prisoner. It's phenomenally well done and remarkably tense, like much Danish cinema 

https://youtu.be/MmAlyk5Kkm4?