What is the difference between an Atheist and a conservative Christian?
An Atheist will do the right thing because it is the right thing to do. A conservative Christian will do the right thing because if they don’t, they could end up burning forever in hell.
The Atheist acts on morality, the Christian on fear of punishment.
With or without some rule or law, the atheist will do what is right regardless, while the conservative Christian, arriving at the same place sees that a choice exists to either do right and get a reward, or do wrong and be punished for eternity, and will actually consider both of them. They will consider pros and cons and make a choice accordingly.
As a kid in Catholic elementary school I learned, although it was not the intended lesson to be learned, that when you wanted to do something wrong, go with a Venial Sin. It would only cost a few days in Purgatory and, if you didn’t want to tell anyone about it, it eliminated the need for Confession. If you were going to go big, you went Mortal Sin. That meant hell or Confession and Penance.
We were actually inadvertently taught the art of weighing the action against the choices of punishment, and acting accordingly.
Atheist do good deeds while no one watches. Conservative Christians, who claim a higher morality, do things knowing God, like Santa, is always watching.
At the Bristol County House of Corrections the sheriff, Thomas Hodgson, has ways to make money off of those under his care, and people in the community have a problem with that. He has the practice of overcharging for needed items and keeping the profits. He claims the extra money goes to other necessary things, but he is not too forthcoming when people from the county that employs him ask to see the receipts.
Among such practices is the artificially inflated price of inmate phone calls. Phone calls are important because they allow consultations between attorneys and their clients inside the jail, and they may be the only contact between an inmate and the family. And there is money to be made from this vital service needed by a captive audience without an option.
And, yes it affects the James Cagney tough guy types, but it also affects your uncle or aunt who is a really nice person, but was in the wrong place at the wrong time and can’t afford bail.
The sheriff has a contract with a private equity technology company that supplies communication services to prisons and jails, and at a cost to inmates of $3.16 for the first minute and $0.16 for each additional minute for in-state calls, a 15 minute phone call can cost $5.40, and there is money being made. If for some reason the call gets cut off, to resume the call, the inmate must begin at step one.
The contract doubled the cost of a phone call, and over the last decade has earned the sheriff $10 million.
This is the sheriff who was sued for charging inmates $5.00 for every day of their incarceration while constantly referring to their low socio-economic standing. At the end of a sentence, release would happen after the hotel bill was paid, and this was putting a financial and emotional burden on families. Upon losing the suit and having to stop the practice, the sheriff merely looked for a different revenue source, and settled on phones.
A lawsuit was filed against the sheriff alleging the phone contract was a scheme to get illegal kickbacks, but in June, US District Court Judge Indira Talwani found that the contract was legal under Massachusetts law saying, and this is important,
“Plaintiffs’ concern that the Sheriff is generating revenue through charges paid by inmates’ families and attorneys for phone service is timely as our communities consider how the criminal justice system may best achieve its stated goals. However, these policy questions are for the Legislature not the court.”
In other words, although it is clearly obvious that the action of the sheriff may not be moral, as it is not prevented by law, he can’t be sued as he is breaking no law.
Ignoring the complete picture, the sheriff was all in-your-face happy he can continue collecting kickbacks and burdening his inmates and their families.
“For years, we have had to defend ourselves from unmitigated attacks by political activists who have been non-stop accusing us of ‘illegal kickbacks’ and profiteering on inmate phone calls. Now, the federal court has unequivocally told us that our actions were proper.”
Um, no.
What the court decided was that, because it was not covered by a law that either allowed it, or one that banned it, the court could not make a ruling as the court deals with existing laws and their application.
I understand this. In my many years as the union’s shop steward, many people had legitimate complaints about wrongful treatment, but, because it was not something covered in the contract, rather than file a grievance, the employee had to be advised to seek legal help.
The action may not have violated the contract, but that did not make the action proper or legal.
The sheriff had also stated,
“As usual, I will not hold my breath waiting for any apologies for all the hateful and defamatory comments made about the Sheriff’s Office or myself. Rather, the BCSO will continue to provide top-notch care and custody to the inmates and the community it serves while insuring that every effort is made to minimize the burden on taxpayers.”
In a recent pod cast interview the sheriff actually mentioned that I drew cartoons about him, mentioned my book of collected blogs about him, said that he hoped I made lots of money with it, and ended by saying maybe he should get some royalties.
That would be a no in this case, and another to his hoping for an apology.
The sheriff would do the right thing if there was a threat of punishment, so to do the right thing for him, the legislature is considering An Act Relative to Inmate Telephone Calls (S.1372) that mandates no-cost phone calls in state prisons and county houses of correction.
And was not the clear win he wants people to accept it as.
And then there is this.
No matter what information is given to the local newspaper that might expose some of the many faults of the sheriff, (his price gauging, suicide and recidivism rates, poor medical and mental health care, involvement in white supremacist groups) the newspaper either challenges the information which delays or eliminates the facts getting out, or, if a letter to the editor or an op-ed piece critical of the sheriff is published, within days there will be a glowing press release from the sheriff’s office, a letter allegedly written by the sheriff himself, or some puff piece about the warm fuzzy sheriff published in the paper. It most likely doesn’t hurt that the sheriff’s spokesperson was a reporter at the local newspaper and is listed as a contributing writer.
In the article that announced this court decision, ignoring the real, clearly stated motivation of the plaintiffs, according to the newspaper article, the law suit was based on “the politically charged distortions of the prisoners’ rights groups and political activists claiming the receipt of “illegal kickbacks,” echoed in many cases by the media…..”
There were no quotation marks around these words in the article as published, which would mean that unlike the other sourced quotes, these are the words of the writer.
Why would the writer refer to the media as if it were something else with no connection to him or herself, an enemy?
The article also characterized the long process of investigating, gathering documentation, and taking the legal steps to file a lawsuit as simply and dismissively
“Two years ago, prisoners’ rights activists brought suit against Sheriff Hodgson and Securus, and ran to the media to publicize their filing.”
At the end of the paragraph containing the reporter’s list of the wonderful things the sheriff is supposed to have used the income for, are the words,
“utilized outside sources of revenue to relieve some of the burden on taxpayers”,
The article ends with a quote from the sheriff in which he mentions what he will continue to do with the money with no specificity, just general platitudes, in which he finishes with the words
“while insuring that every effort is made to minimize the burden on taxpayers.”
The paragraph written by the reporter and the quote from the sheriff are mirrors of each other in structure, content (one is specific, however, while the other general), and in the concluding words as if the directives for quotes and press releases is to end with words that project that BCSO is thinking only of the taxpayers, to distract them from the actual fleecing much the same way others may require ending with “In Jesus’s name”, or “God bless these Unitrd States
Makes a person wonder if the person writing the article made up the quotes, or if the person who issued the quotes, also wrote the article.