Stace said:Well, gee, if you're going to ask someone else what THEY know about Christianity, why don't you share with us what YOU know?
jamesrage said:Jesus did not come here to give everyone a free pass to keep sinning.Repentance and forgiveness go hand in hand.Saying I'm sorry because I got caught for commiting a crime and do not want the death penalty is not what Jesus ment by asking for forgiveness.
Scarecrow Akhbar said:Well, I've been exposed to at least four schools of thought on this.
There's the "Once Saved, Always Saved" notion, in which once you accept salvation from Jesus, you've got a get out of hell free card for life. Totally absurd, of course.
There's the "Saved On Your Last Dying Breath" notion, which argues that even Hitler would be forgiven by God, if Adolph had asked for it sometime between when he pulled the trigger and the bullet ripped through his brain. This is a perennial favorite on Death Rows around the country.
There's the Catholic "You're Not Saved if the Priest Doesn't Say You've Worked Hard Enough" route. Salvation on this road is apparently a function of how much money you die with. If you give a lot to the Church, you're in.
And there's the Protestant "You're Saved For Now, But You Gotta Keep Being Good Or You'll Burn in HELL!"
salvation, which also usually involves some monetary or labor payoff.
Then there's my school, which is the "I Ain't Guilty, So Screw It" school of emotional freedom.
Billo_Really said:If you want to reduce crime in America, stop making so many god-damn laws!
.
In addition, stop locking people up for victimless crimes
It's supposed to be a free country Jimmyboy. You want to put casual pot smokers in with hardened criminals. What kind of society is that going to create?Originally posted by Jamesrage:
Yeah I want more degenerates walking around,whole government offices ddicated to keeping these degenerates in control and not spreading some desease and junkies going around pretending to be vicitms.
Oh is it now. You act like all laws are good and noble. Kind of like the 'eminant domain' law. That's in our interest, isn't it?Originally posted by Jamesrage:
That is the most retarded thing I have ever heard, actually that is the second most retarded thing.The most retarded thing I have ever heard was"if we get more police then there would be more arrest of crimnals and our city's crime rate would go up" those words were utered by the mayor of my city.
Billo_Really said:It's supposed to be a free country Jimmyboy. You want to put casual pot smokers in with hardened criminals.
What kind of society is that going to create?
Billo_Really said:Oh is it now. You act like all laws are good and noble. Kind of like the 'eminant domain' law. That's in our interest, isn't it?
Oh yeah, I smoked pot every day for 20 straight years and I'm as sharp as a............uh........ give me a minute............... um............. oh, yes........... tack!Originally posted by Jamesrage:
They know it is illegal,Drugs damage the mind.
That's exactly right. Drugs is a medical problem, not a criminal one.Originally posted by Hornburger:
Bill's got a point...the primary reason rehabilitation is failing is because of how overcrowded the system is. Get rid of the people who aren't dangers to society and who shouldn't even be there in the first place (aka druggies). If you want to get stoned and kill yourself, be my guest. But don't waste my tax dollars imprisoning such people.
And better rehabilitation=less reoffenses=better prison system
Billo_Really said:That's exactly right. Drugs is a medical problem, not a criminal one.
I won't argue with you there.Originally posted by Jamesrage:
A medical problem that I did not create and nor do I want to pay for with my tax dollars.
Conflict said:Reform, never punishment.
Rehabilitation trumps vindication.
Let's count how many so called "christians" disagree with this.....
counter on
jamesrage said:A medical problem that I did not create and nor do I want to pay for with my tax dollars.
This article gets me so mad that I feel like going out and beating the sh!t out of people that think drugs should be outlawed!Originally posted by Timmyboy:
I would like to quote an author Alan Elsner from his book "Gates of Injustice":
"Robert, a Vietnam veteran with a drugs habit, was arrested in Washington, D.C., in a police sting in 1984 with marijuana and PCP in his pocket. At the time, he was working as a junior auditor for the IRS and supportinga son and daughter. He described himself as a recreational user. "I wasn't a junkie. I had it under control. I wasn't hurting no one." he said. The judge wasn't impressed. He sentenced Robert to 4 to 16 years in prison. If he had behaved himself behind bars and stayed clean after his release, Robert could have been done with his sentence relatively quickly and gone on with his life. That's not the way things turned out.
Behind bars, Robert did behave well. He was an education aide, helping fellow inmates to get their GED high school equivalency certificates and also worked as a control room cleark. After five years, he was released on parole. But Robert had not kicked his habit in prison and soon resumed using drugs. He found a job but failed to report regularly to his parole officer. In 1994, he was sent back to prison for violating the terms of his parole. Three years later, he was released again; this time he stayed out for seven months before failing a drugs test. Back he went. In November 1999, Robert emerged yet again but was free for less than two months before a dirty urine test sent him back once more. When I met him in March 2000, Robert was living at a halfway house in Washington D.C., where we was closely supervised and regularly tested for drugs. He had a clerical job that paid $8.75 an hour and was due to move in with his sister six weeks later. He was full of good intentions. "I'm 46 years old. I'm getting too old for this. I want to stay out this time. Since 1984, I have spent 11 years in prison and five years outside, all for one drugs conviction. I have lost my family. I have not been a father to my children. I want to get my own place and take care of myself. I call it regaining responsibility over my life," he told me.
I intended to write a series of article about Robert, hoping to follow his progress over the following months as he tried to reubild his life. But the series never materialized. Two weeks after I met him, Robert failed a drugs test yet again and he was sent back to prison. He broke off contact and refused to talk to me again. His story, which is all too typical, raised serious issues. Robert had committed one drugs possession offense, for which he had served 11 years in prison and counting. Yes, he was an addict with a harmful habit. But he had never committed a violent offense, he was never a big time or even a small time dealer, he was never connected to a gang. Who was he hurting other than himself? Did society get its money worth for the many thousands of dollars spent on his incarceration? Or might there have been a better way?
Robert's case illustrates the dilemma facing the 600,000 prisoners being released from the U.S. prisons every year. Many emerge angry and bitter and even less well equipped to lead an honest life than they were before. As we have seen, drugs are widely availabe behind bars. According to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, 70 to 85 percent of state prison inmates need substance abuse assistance, but only 13 percent receive treatment in prison. A California study found that half of those released from the state's prisons were functionally illiterate. Joan Petersilia, a criminologist with the University of California, Irvine, has studied the lives of parolees. 'They remain largely uneducated, unskilled, and usually without solid family support systems and now they bear the added burdens of a prison record and the distrust and fear that inevitably results. Not surprisingly, most parolees do not succeed, and failure occurs rather quickly: re-arrests are most common in the first six months after release.' she wrote."
Billo_Really said:This article gets me so mad that I feel like going out and beating the sh!t out of people that think drugs should be outlawed!
I think I just said something to that effect a couple of posts ago.Originally posted by Timmyboy:
Drug addiction should be treated as a social rather than criminal problem.
James, after reading this post, I'm be willing to accept that you have extensive firsthand knowledge about the negative impact of drugs on the mind.jamesrage said:They know it is illegal,Drugs damage the mind.Billo_Really said:It's supposed to be a free country Jimmyboy. You want to put casual pot smokers in with hardened criminals.A society were I and many other tax payers do not pay for health and finiancial problems that certian indivuals have caused themselves because they wanted to smoke weed.Billo_Really said:What kind of society is that going to create?
TimmyBoy said:I would like to quote an author Alan Elsner from his book "Gates of Injustice":
"Robert, a Vietnam veteran with a drugs habit, was arrested in Washington, D.C., in a police sting in 1984 with marijuana and PCP in his pocket. At the time, he was working as a junior auditor for the IRS and supportinga son and daughter. He described himself as a recreational user. "I wasn't a junkie. I had it under control. I wasn't hurting no one." he said. The judge wasn't impressed. He sentenced Robert to 4 to 16 years in prison. If he had behaved himself behind bars and stayed clean after his release, Robert could have been done with his sentence relatively quickly and gone on with his life. That's not the way things turned out.
Behind bars, Robert did behave well. He was an education aide, helping fellow inmates to get their GED high school equivalency certificates and also worked as a control room cleark. After five years, he was released on parole. But Robert had not kicked his habit in prison and soon resumed using drugs. He found a job but failed to report regularly to his parole officer. In 1994, he was sent back to prison for violating the terms of his parole. Three years later, he was released again; this time he stayed out for seven months before failing a drugs test. Back he went. In November 1999, Robert emerged yet again but was free for less than two months before a dirty urine test sent him back once more. When I met him in March 2000, Robert was living at a halfway house in Washington D.C., where we was closely supervised and regularly tested for drugs. He had a clerical job that paid $8.75 an hour and was due to move in with his sister six weeks later. He was full of good intentions. "I'm 46 years old. I'm getting too old for this. I want to stay out this time. Since 1984, I have spent 11 years in prison and five years outside, all for one drugs conviction. I have lost my family. I have not been a father to my children. I want to get my own place and take care of myself. I call it regaining responsibility over my life," he told me.
I intended to write a series of article about Robert, hoping to follow his progress over the following months as he tried to reubild his life. But the series never materialized. Two weeks after I met him, Robert failed a drugs test yet again and he was sent back to prison. He broke off contact and refused to talk to me again. His story, which is all too typical, raised serious issues. Robert had committed one drugs possession offense, for which he had served 11 years in prison and counting. Yes, he was an addict with a harmful habit. But he had never committed a violent offense, he was never a big time or even a small time dealer, he was never connected to a gang. Who was he hurting other than himself? Did society get its money worth for the many thousands of dollars spent on his incarceration? Or might there have been a better way?
Robert's case illustrates the dilemma facing the 600,000 prisoners being released from the U.S. prisons every year. Many emerge angry and bitter and even less well equipped to lead an honest life than they were before. As we have seen, drugs are widely availabe behind bars. According to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, 70 to 85 percent of state prison inmates need substance abuse assistance, but only 13 percent receive treatment in prison. A California study found that half of those released from the state's prisons were functionally illiterate. Joan Petersilia, a criminologist with the University of California, Irvine, has studied the lives of parolees.
'They remain largely uneducated, unskilled, and usually without solid family support systems and now they bear the added burdens of a prison record and the distrust and fear that inevitably results. .
jamesrage said:JUnkies should not be treated as though they are vicitms.They are scum they are low life peices of **** degenerate scum who only give two shits about themselves.THese vermin make their choice to do drugs,nobody sticks a gun to head and forces them to do their drugs.
Where the **** is the smilies playing the violin when you need them?They made that choice to become degenerate junkies themselves.You want me to feel sorry because some rat vermin decided they wanted to be junkies?Boo ****ing hoo a junkie belongs behind bars.If they want to stay out of prison and not become addicted to some substance then do not do drugs.You want to smoke pot all ****in day then go to one of those ****ed up European countries that allow their citizens to become degenerate junkies.
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