You often hear the term “debt to society.” As in, a convicted prisoner has paid his “debt to society” via his incarceration and now needs some societal “help” to adjust. Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts had a column on the subject recently.
Several points.
*People deserve a second chance.
*Society needs to help those who have served their sentences because it’s in society’s best interest to not enable likely recidivism by doing nothing.
*Paying a “debt to society” has innate limits. Nobody can unrape or unkill or untraumatize. Only so much criminal societal debt can be repaid.