Dutch prisons to be equipped with computers for inmates

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Justice minister Fred Teeven is seriously considering putting computers in prison cells to cut down on reintegration teachers and guards. The computers will have little or no Internet (a little Internet sounds a lot like being a little bit pregnant) and no e-mail.

Sitting in a cell for your crimes with a computer sounds so similar to sitting in a cubicle with a computer at work (with Facebook bans and all) that it barely qualifies as jail time. I can picture a hacker doing jail time this way and having a blast. The smart money is on how fast porn will get on those computers.

So if technically there’s no Internet and e-mail, what’s the point? Playing Minecraft?How is that supposed to help anybody reintgrate into society? It sounds like another big waste of money to me.

(Link: phys.org, Photo by Ken Mayer, some rights reserved)

2 Comments »

  1. Green_mantle says:

    Eventually (especially in the EU), most of these offenders will be released back into the population. “Sitting in a cell for your crimes with a computer sounds so similar to sitting in a cubicle with a computer at work” sounds like training for work after jail. And given how invasive corporations can be (employees must answer work emails/cell phones at any time, no bad mouthing the Corporation, etc.), prison security would be good training for that! And prison gangs? Please! Ever work someplace with office cliques?

  2. Orangemaster says:

    Cheers. This is a country that puts problem youth (not youth criminals) in jail cells because of a lack of space.

    It’s one thing to give adult prisoners a computer, but they could do better than shove innocent kids in jail cells out of convenience. I would take care of the kids first before pampering the recidivists.

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