MovieChat Forums > 13th (2016) Discussion > Don't misunderstand the point of this mo...

Don't misunderstand the point of this movie

posted 8 years ago by airborne_trooper
4 replies | jump to latest

While I'll digress that some people took it upon themeselves to discuss this movie while merely only watching the trailer understand this- This movie isn't about suggesting that people shouldn't be held accountable for their crimes. To continue to look at issues like this with such a sophomoric lens is to continue to be willfully reluctant to understanding.

Profitable incarceration is wrong all around. It's sheer exsistance is based on maintaining a quota whether people are commiting crimes or not. When you piece profit for incarceration with next to free labor, you have new age slavery. This documentary is about politicians and big businesses working hand in hand to make money off of actual, hypoerbolized and manufactured criminalization; and the ramifications for doing so like racial tension.

So again if you're gonna watch this, don't be obtuse upon doing so.

[–] joelgibbo7 8 years ago

97% of inmates on plea deals.

Now either that's a success rate for catching the right person that would put a Sherlock Holmes/ columbo love child to shame, or you have a HUGE amount of people sat in prison who are not only not guilty, but are being mentally and physically destroyed and no doubt criminalised.

The idea that even say 5% (a low estimation) of 2 million prisoners have just taken the plea as they were coerced/threatened/fooled/scared into thinking I don't want to spend the rest of my life in prison, so I'm taking 5 years. That would equate to 100,000 people, serving 500,000 years of prison time for no reason.

That for me shows that this is insane. It inhuman, it's immoral and surely despite the maggots, pricey phone calls and refused hernia ops, insanely expensive. Just imagine if for one year, the USA spent its budget for prisons on the generations its about to fill the prisons up with. This criminalising of children in particular in America is sickening. I'm sure being a cop in a country where you can buy guns a bullets in the local supermarket isn't easy. But the militarisation and dehumanising of the police force has resulted in the beginnings of a movement that will bring about change. I just hope it's for the better, for once.

[–] JGandB 8 years ago

Well-stated...I agree with you completely

[–] Bob_Loblaw_Lobs_Law_Bombs 8 years ago

very well stated op. I think we in this country, and this election is a perfect example of this, have a tremendous aversion to nuanced thinking. I thought the documentary, while biased (but what documentary isn't), did a great job of simply trying to get people to look at this issue from a couple of different perspectives.

Where did you get those clothes, the toilet store?

[–] PhillyRayne 8 years ago

With the exception of murderers and rapist, im a big fan of rehabilitation, its simply not enough of that. and i agree with the stigma of convicted felons that once they get out of prison, they cant find a job so they have no choice but to turn to crime again. something needs to be done with that.

im amazed at that william horton story though, weekend passes? for murderers? crazy.

"The Truth may Hurt but to Lie is Agony"