2 mo. ago • 97%

World Incarceration Rates If Every U.S. State Were A Country (No other country even makes the first page)

From here: https://www.prisonpolicy.org/graphs/2021.html

68 comments

Guys, guys!

You're ignoring the real questions!

Are the companies running the prisons profitable and how much should you invest?!!????

66
- While private prisons are abhorrent and unconscionable, they aren't even close to the root cause of our prison problem. Hint: it's systemic racism and our militarized police culture.
  
  https://www.sentencingproject.org/reports/private-prisons-in-the-united-states/
  
  Louisiana, the #1 on the list supposedly had 0 private prison inmates in 2021. Blaming private prisons at this point almost feels like deflecting from the real issues.
  
  29
  
  Who ~~bribes~~ ~~funds~~ free speeches the politicians who wrote those laws?
  
  Edit: I think I should be explicit. The owners of the private prisons do.
  
  5
Do we have a dataishorrible community?

65
- The thumbnail screenshot doesn’t do it justice. Or maybe you meant USisHorrible.
  
  15
- Haha we need one.
  
  11
It is always depressing to read people all of a sudden worried about other countries like China or Russia, don't even giving a minuscule fuck about what is happening in their own country.

27
- ok, VLAD
  or +999999 social credit points /s (btw social credit isn't a real thing) https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/09/15/china-social-credit-system-authoritarian/
  
  4
Let's see.

South

South

South-adjacent

South

South

South

South

Not south, but borders Mexico

Northern

Kinda south, kinda not, boarders Mexico

South

South Dakota, doesn't count

South

Northern boarder

North
22
- The heat expands the brain and the raise of pressure against the skull induce criminal behavior. It's scientifically proven.
  
  3
  
  “If ya see here at these three dimples” aah science.
  
  1
Its been a few years since I checked, but as of 2015 at least the US, which is 5% of the world's population, give or take a few, had over 25% of the world's prison population. Total. Fucking. Insanity

19
Why can't my state be near the top of a good list for once.

19
- This is far from a good list.
  
  -9
  
  that's their point; it's clear that their state is one of the top ones
  
  25
land of the free, baby!! 🇺🇲🇺🇲🇺🇲🇺🇲

15
Is that really 1% of the population incarcerated? Wow

13
- In Louisiana, it seems so.. that’s insane!!!!
  
  7
  
  A lot of communists like W.E.B. Dubois dedicated a good amount of research to the 2nd phase of reconstruction after the US civil war, often called the counter-revolutionary phase, where a lot of the gains of the civil war were lost.
  
  Their belief is that slavery was allowed to be reinstituted in a limited form in the south (mainly in prisons), black leaders removed from their posts and replaced by confederates, white terrorist orgs like the KKK reformed and turned a blind eye to, and the harsh enforcement of miscegenation laws (many of which only got repealed in the 1960s).
  
  That campaign of terror is what drove black mass migration out of the south and into the US west coast, and north throughout the 20th century.
  
  Obviously the US hasn't really changed that policy, and still lets the south have slavery in limited forms.
  
  The books black reconstruction, and michelle alexander's the new jim crow are great ones abt this.
  
  13
And almost 50% of that is from drug offenses (according to a few stats I saw).

11
- Which is a plague that affects every country in the world - so isn't a reason for America being so keen to jail people.
  
  4
  
  Nixon caused this and Reagan perfected it.
  
  1
- Was it worth it, drug warriors? All the unnecessary deaths, at the hands of police and unregulated drugs of a unknown potency? Was it worth sacrificing all our civil liberties on the vain funeral pyre that is the United States of America?
  
  When humanity is victorious in the drug war and all drugs are legalized, will drug users criminalize sobriety?
  
  Will people high as fuck demand everyone to piss in a plastic cup to make sure they are high?
  
  Will drug users ruin sober people's lives with felonies and time in prison with hardened criminals?
  
  Will drug users dissolve civil liberties and prop up a bipartisan police state that gives cops a license to kill?
  
  NO!
  
  Who would want to do that to someone? To a fellow human for doing what they want with their own bodies? Prohibitionists... that's who. And we are not them
  
  Feel fortunate we want justice, not retribution.
  
  Nothing lasts forever drug warriors. Tick tock. We will be free one day, and you will wail and moan and your cries will fall on deaf ears.
  
  Now playing The War on Drugs - Red Eyes
  
  4
America has more prisoners than China.

11
- More reported prisoners.
  
  5
  
  exactly the real numbers for amerikkka are way higher when u take into account all the cia and military prisons across the world that we know next to nothing about.
  
  5
No surprise at the top 10 states.

6
Am I blind or oregon doesn't have prisoners?

3
- Below el salvador
  
  3
3
Why isn't California on the list? I must have missed it, right? But I looked three times.

3
- It's right below turkmenistan, in the link.
  
  5
are you the github dessalines??

2
Why don't I see California?

1
but china ?

1
- 121 per 100k
  
  9
- China is included in this.
  
  7
  
  "The numbers claimed by China" are included in this*
  
  -1
Half of Michigan wants to commit crimes against the other half, but they are fortunately separated by some really great lakes.

1
Full list

1
No other country even makes the first page

If every state in America were only 1% worse than every other country, then again the first 50 entries would be the American states. This is barely saying more than "America has the highest incarceration rate," so it shouldn't be a surprise.

0
Quick reminder this site lists 0 mentions of how they gain data for other countries outside the United States, including bad faith reporters such as China, Iran, Russia, and possibly India and other countries. Though it should be noted China does not consider certain prisoners like Uyghur Muslims in reeducation camps as part of its justice system, Russia does not count conscripted prisoners in its system, and many others will attempt to hide or obscure true reports.

0
- /c/alwaysthesamemap
  
  2
I don’t get this graph. So all of US has a smaller incarceration rate than just Louisiana? What?

-1
- Yes, look up what per capita means.
  
  10
- i have 4 boxes labeled A to D, and 10 rocks.
  
  i put 1 rock in A, 2 in B, 3 in C and 4 in D.
  
  A[⚪] B[⚪⚪] C[⚪⚪⚪] D[⚪⚪⚪⚪]
  
  i then paint 1 rock in B, 2 rocks in C and 1 rock in D.
  
  A[⚪] B[⚪🔴] C[⚪🔴🔴] D[⚪⚪⚪🔴]
  
  then i put the boxes in a bigger box called the united boxes.
  
  here's the rate of painted rocks:
  
  C 66% (2/3)
  
  B 50% (1/2)
  
  United boxes 40% (4/10)
  
  D 25% (1/4)
  
  A 0% (0/1)
  
  9
- Thats how averages work, unlike eg maximums.
  
  But Im sure reversing that chart would correlate with math test scores.
  
  8
- The US average falls in the middle of the list of states, yes. This is a chart of per capita rates.
  
  6
- The entire US would have the average of all the states' incarceration rates.
  
  2
What about the counties where you end up dead well before you can be put behind bars.

-2
- You mean because of the death penalty like in the US or because a cop decided to execute you, like the US?
  
  15
- You mean countries that run star chambers like Obama’s Disposition Matrix?
  
  6
  
  It's crazy how many times obama pushed the kill button.
  
  6
- They're the same places with the high incarceration rates. They don't really care what they're doing to minorities, as long as it's cruel
  
  6
- Such as?
  
  3
  
  China, Russia, Iran, etc.
  
  0
Cool now do USSR

-9
- Bringing out the whataboutism for a country that doesn't even exist anymore?
  
  28
  
  Ha, that is fair. I was just poking fun at dessalines's habit of giving a free pass to any country that is openly mauling and torturing its citizens as long as they wear the right color hat. But yes, it is fully accurate that the US's prison system is an authoritarian nightmare that preys on its minority population without rest or mercy. And, comparing the US against countries which don't even make the claim of being "democratic" and finding it competitive with the worst of the open tyrannies is maybe fair.
  
  Also, I just looked, and I don't think these numbers are accurate. I think they're straight-up ignoring some countries with millions of people, and I think the numbers are about 8 years out of date. The US incarceration rate has been falling back down to merely horrifying levels after the Stalinist peak it rose to after Reagan+Clinton teamed up to ruin the world.
  
  US Incarceration Rate
  
  List of Countries by Incarceration Rate
  
  The majority of states in our land of wonderful freedoms are newly competitive with such beacons of hope as El Salvador, Rwanda, and Turkmenistan. The march of progress!
  
  4
- 329 per 100k
  
  8
  
  The Gulag at the peak housed about ~~7,500~~ (edit: 1,340) per 100k of the Soviet population.
  
  (And yes, the US's 531 is still also an atrocity.)
  
  Where did you get 329? I actually couldn't find any post-Kruschev numbers, but I know after privatization, Russia was pretty competitive with the US's dystopian nightmare.
  
  Edit: I was way wrong about the size of the Gulag
  
  -2

You've viewed 68 comments.