idea behind crime punishment
<p>What is the idea behind putting people who commited a crime into prison?</p>
<p>What such a state does is an act, that if a person does to a different person, it is called limiting someone's freedom, which is a crime.</p>
<p>So the country basically applies a principle &quot;eye for an eye&quot; by sending people to prison. The idea &quot;eye for an eye&quot; is basically a revenge.</p>
<p>Isn't there a better principle to apply?</p>
<p>Thank you.</p>

<p><a href="/questions/tagged/canada" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;canada&#39;" aria-label="show questions tagged &#39;canada&#39;" rel="tag" aria-labelledby="canada-container">canada</a></p>
<h1>Principles of sentencing</h1>
<p>I question your premise that the country applies an &quot;eye for an eye&quot; principle to sentencing.</p>
<p>In Canada, for example, the declared purposes of sentencing do not include revenge. The purposes of sentencing is listed at <a href="https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/c-46/section-718.html" rel="noreferrer">s. 718 of the Criminal Code</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>718 The fundamental purpose of sentencing is to protect society and to contribute, along with crime prevention initiatives, to respect for the law and the maintenance of a just, peaceful and safe society by imposing just sanctions that have one or more of the following objectives:</p>
<p>(a) to denounce unlawful conduct and the harm done to victims or to the community that is caused by unlawful conduct;</p>
<p>(b) to deter the offender and other persons from committing offences;</p>
<p>(c) to separate offenders from society, where necessary;</p>
<p>(d) to assist in rehabilitating offenders;</p>
<p>(e) to provide reparations for harm done to victims or to the community; and</p>
<p>(f) to promote a sense of responsibility in offenders, and acknowledgment of the harm done to victims or to the community.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is described in more detail in this <a href="https://lop.parl.ca/sites/PublicWebsite/default/en_CA/ResearchPublications/202006E" rel="noreferrer">Parliamentary research paper</a>. It discusses the purposes of sentencing including non-custodial (out-of-prison) sentences.</p>
<h1>Prison abolition / decarceral options</h1>
<p>Regardless, many people are imagining and working towards a legal system with less imprisonment. This activism and research is characterized as &quot;decarceral&quot; or &quot;abolitionist.&quot; Here is some material about this (&quot;<a href="https://abolitionistfutures.com/intro-to-abolition" rel="noreferrer">Intro to Abolition</a>&quot;, <a href="https://noprisons.ca/abolition-syllabus-2022/" rel="noreferrer">noprisons.ca</a> and their <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1IUm3HUVmk4_EGPsuSuyk8WvV2aq7s5yyIUViQ_T_m9o/edit" rel="noreferrer">Syllabus: &quot;Abolition in So-Called Canada&quot;</a>).</p>

<p>The meaning of the biblical &quot;eye for an eye&quot; was, from very early times, not meant to call for revenge, even though it was (and is) sometimes read like that. It was meant to <em>restrict</em> the punishment of the offender and simply meant that the compensation for a lost eye is the (estimated) value of said eye. If somebody accidentally caused someone else to lose an eye, he had to pay a compensation for that. And only a monetary compensation. In other cultures, such an accident would have called for a bloody revenge towards the offender. Details are a lot more complicated and can be found <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_for_an_eye" rel="nofollow noreferrer">here</a>.</p>
<p>So even in biblical times, a punishment was not meant as revenge. Not even a death penalty was, as this was (in the Old Testament) meant to &quot;remove the evil from the people&quot;.</p>

prison crime