Well, well, well. What have we got here? Another city slicker who thinks he can waltz into my town and start causin’ all sorts of trouble. I’d be careful if I was you, fella. Because however they do things where you’re from, ’round here we have our own way of dealin’ with criminals, and that’s through a rehabilitation-centered restorative justice process.
Let that be a warnin’ to all outsiders—you break the law in these parts, you’d best be ready to pay for what you’ve done through a correctional training method that benefits victims, offenders, ’n the community at large.
Out here, we prefer settlin’ disputes the old-fashioned way, by addressin’ the harmful impact of a crime head-on, then determinin’ what can be done to repair that harm while holdin’ the person who caused it accountable for their actions. Lemme tell ya, we don’t take kindly to strangers whose idea of restitution relies solely on dehumanizin’ punishment.
Mark my words, one wrong step in this town’ll land you in a whole heap of social services.
Hell, I’m fixin’ to roll up my sleeves ’n teach you a thing or two about harm reduction myself, but I’m thinkin’ you ain’t worth the trouble. How ’bout we let this here pamphlet outlinin’ three years’ worth of statistics on recidivism rates among local offenders do the talkin’? But I’d better warn ya—unlike the sheriff, I ain’t bound by the law when it comes to providin’ delinquent individuals the help they need to become productive members of society.
Think I’m bluffin’? Why don’t you ask the last guy who tried to argue that crime is a violation of the law and the state, rather’n a violation of people and relationships.
I tell you, we marched him right to the town library with pitchforks and torches. Then we handed him a shovel and made him dig his own plot in the community garden, givin’ him access to fresh produce and plenty of physical activity, all while learnin’ him an invaluable set of skills he’d never get from that there carceral state.
There’ll be no disenfranchisin’ of marginalized populations on my watch.
You see, me and the boys get a whole lot of pleasure out of educatin’ anyone who so much as looks at us funny. Big Earl here’s got a masters in sociology from Vanderbilt, and nothin’ makes Big Earl madder’n generational cycles of systemic violence.
If you don’t wanna end up in a free computer literacy class at the community center we built with funds diverted from the bloated po-lice budget, then I reckon you best be on your way.
Go on, git. Hightail it back to whatever shame-based legal system you wandered in from.
And don’t come back unless you’re lookin’ to join a weekly discussion group on The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander. You sure don’t want to be caught here after sundown without havin’ read the chapter on the devastating impact America’s war on drugs had on inner city neighborhoods, y’hear?
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: theonion.com
