I was thinking about this the other night, I was watching a reality TV which has people watching TV shows combined with clips from the show and their reaction, they had a politician who does shows, he has previously focused on trains, like a lot of UK elite pundits or figures lately (or so I think), but this one was about huge abandoned buildings.
Anyway, he went into a huge abandoned prison, he did a lot of talking about how he had recurrent nightmares about being locked up in prison and the people viewing at home went wild laughing about that saying that there had to be guilt for something because people dont have recurrent dreams about things never likely to happen to them, like crashing a space rocket or something, as those things never occur to them.
The thing was the actual cell that he went into looked alright, it had a bunk, bathroom, it was for a single person, I've actually stayed (and not for a short time even) in accomodation which was about the same size or smaller and didnt have an en suite bathroom, it had a study desk and all too, it actually reminded me of some small purpose made student accomodation I've seen on the more cheap ass, poverty NI university campuses.
I actually watched it and thought to myself, wait, I could really make that work, its not too different to the existence the guy had in The Vault in LOST, which is one of my things actually as I'd like to live like that if I could, at least as an experiment.
It made me think about what the nature of freedom is and how it is valued, how much or how little deprivation of liberty in institutions resembles or does not resemble life in the everyday for some people. Especially for those people who are most likely to wind up in and out of prison. I heard about a prison in the UK that at a head count they discovered additional people as someone had put a ladder up against the wall and people had snuck in. Freedom could not have meant much to those people if they were sneaking into prison.
When I think of most people I know, if its ever come up in conversation, the free of prisons is not about the actual loss of freedom, to roam or anything else, its generally been about being landed in the constant and close company of a bunch of criminals liable to do criminal things to you, which is pretty different to any concern about freedom. Anyway, just some thoughts for the Freedom thread. Dont think its off topic.