During the 18th and 19th centuries, England had a few issues with overcrowding in their prison system and set about ways to rectify the problem. Among a number of inventive practices, of which deportation to the colonies was a favourite, the idea of coverting old ships to floating jails became fashionable. This was a period in which the concept of crime and punishment was being explored. A popular topic of conversation among the highly educated, dramatic changes were starting to occur as it became evident that imprisonment was as much a punishment in itself as flogging, banishment, torture or any of the ways criminals were dealt with in the past. Jeremy Bentham, a prominent British philosopher developed the concept of the Panopticon , a new type of prison in which inmates would be housed in separate booths, unable to see each other, but under constant supervision by prison staff. Hulks were a response to this new form punishment as prisons became overcrowded. Their masts lopped o...
I know!
ReplyDeletewho is going to say LIBARIAN now???
Ha!
ReplyDeleteI wonder who we'll get now. Pretty-boy in budgie smugglers Thwaitesy? or lego-haired straight man Brumby-y?
I'm pretty sure it was all a cunning Labor scheme to distract people from John Howard's housing plan.
It will without doubt be Brumby, I fancy. Bracksy practically anointed him in his press conference.
ReplyDeleteHis nickname, my public service colleagues assure me, is JB.
Yeah, I think Bracksy sealed Thwaitesy's fate when he said, "And Brumby's really awesome I'll totes be voting for him". So Thwaitesy went to himself, "Today is a good day to die (politically)."
ReplyDelete