I was in prison years ago and I still occasionally get treated like a leper on account of it. I wonder if that's on account of some latent underclass prejudice. I've thought about starting a thread on it, but I'm not sure where to begin.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underclass

Why not plain old ordinary underclass prejudice instead of latent?

How would we differentiate between prejudice based on underclass vs judgement based on a bit of data about someone having a criminal history?

That depends on the crime, of course.

I was convicted of conspiracy to commit criminal damage against and burgle a non-dwelling property. What is a reasonable period of atonement for that?

It depends on the conspiracy, the type of property and the risk involved in principle to innocent humans (even if not supposed to be living there) as a result of the operation, the age of the person, overall conditions etc . It can vary from 1 day and some proper community service or depending also on age and conditions under which it took place up to several years of some effort to give back to the world.

Given your service to the greater community through posting all these years and hints of personal improvement in your life there is no need for any atonement anymore even if one can consider to be true a rather negative sub-sector of the above potential cases spectrum imagined (as worse case i mean). Educational engagement is atonement enough. I wonder what my own atonement is for what has been given for me in my life by others (in terms of potential sacrifice of their own well being or lifestyle choices) ...I will keep wondering until i die and any success if ever belongs to them not me.

If it were up to me a person that has experience in prison and then devoted effort to improve their education and service to the community is not only under-class but top type upper-class as example for many and motivation for the privileged to not have experienced such adversity to question what they do with their own lives. I would tend to reduce that evaluation if it was shown the person in question had a privileged prior life and went for trouble for sport showing very poor judgement but still its a motivating example.

This is why Les Miserables is a motivating must read work for all teenagers preferably even for kids younger than 12. The messages are ageless...They can only increase in number and range with age as you understand the world further. This is why in general Hugo's work needs to be read at very young age. It will get better with time and keep haunting your thoughts. It may even affect a physicist's concepts of free will.


Scientific society would refuse to define a person by half a page of a stupid resume, credit history or other non descriptive criminal past and imprisonment. I am also a strong advocate for redemption opportunities and reduction of sentences within prison even for very serious offenses (even life or death penalty). When special effort is evident to be genuine and results in the greater good it must not be ignored even if any alteration comes still with some permanent conditions for safety.

Not in law, it doesn't. That's pretty much verbatim what it says on my record as to the nature of the crime. Along with that I spent eight months in prison for it.

As for innocent humans: yes, some unfortunate security guard might have got hurt that day. Possible but improbable. Nobody did get hurt.

Only one law matters however in personal judgements that unavoidably are what decide how such things impact future interactions (unless one is technically bound by official policy and then it goes all to who affects such policy). The higher form of law your own ethical system respects and that is often very different than human law of the current society you live.

I was young, stupid, unfortunate and from a dysfunctional family.

And this is why we read Les Miserables when very young, which corrupts us permanently against official law and high authority and defines a higher law that is only evolving as we age and hopefully gets more consistent and ready to bypass Godel problems with additional axioms lol.


Then we watch later some movies that cannot come close but are probably the last hope for minimal impact of a society lost in the hands of politicians...




Consider yourself lucky it wasnt nowhere as dramatic as for some people that can truly relate to the above scene.

And then suddenly one realizes the movie is not talking to long term past convicts. No, instead it is talking to all of us because the real prison and crime is the life behind us...and you can hopefully still talk to whatever is left from that kid.

You mean that certain crimes indicate that you be placed in the underclass, or certain crimes indicate that you come from the underclass? (I am sure that other "ors" exist)

"Upper class transvestite crack whore" doesn't get mentioned in the press very often.

Well, proper atonement can be attained by everyone having a hearty laugh about you being horrible at being such a criminal for having to be convicted of "conspiracy to commit." Or prison time. Well, both, I guess.

It really isn't hard to actually damage or burgle a building, but I am sure there were good reasons why you felt the need to conspire. Of course, if you have a tendency towards trying such things, it isn't really that bad to be incompetent, so long as you quickly learn that it is outside of your capabilities. Would be quite the shame if you led a life of almost committing profitable crimes.

So, atonement has been attained.

I don't think that atonement is the issue. When someone does something rare (almost, but not quite, damaging and burgling a non-dwelling) it sticks out as an important fact about them and such things are generally thought to be worthy of taking care should they do so again (past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior).

This probably explains why the U.S. won't admit you. We have loads of non-dwellings here. Quite obviously you have paid for your previous crimes, but we just don't feel like we can trust you.

(Found out that one of my good friends got out of jail a couple of days ago for his second felony breaking and entering. He had "and burglary" the first time and "attempted burglary" the second time. He is getting worse at it.)

(I've never been convicted. "Always the accused, never the convicted" as the saying goes.)

I highly suggest getting a monocle, black tall silk hat and a nice cane. It will give you just the right air of superiority that the upper class has. Err, I might have the upper class and Mr. Peanut confused again.

Whoa! Me too!!!

I mean, ya know, you can't hang around any non-dwellings I might have, but I feel like we are brothers.

I mean that some potential employers treat me like a leper even though I have served a period of atonement that any reasonable person (including you, I suspect) would consider long enough.

Why is that?

(Be glad you aren't a job seeker in the USA.)

I would accept payment in kind for any slight. Even Stevens. I am extremely liberal on payment terms (I was somewhat serious about you being really horrible at crime and some people laughing at your expense as sufficient atonement).

It isn't about atonement at all. It is about trust and what is at risk.

I was a job seeker in the USA. I had about six months' worth of work arranged in New York by bona fide math professors, and in your post 911 Bush administration you wouldn't let me in.

Just fly to Mexico and walk across the border. It's the in thing to do.

That's what I should have done, for sure. The US penal system scares the crap out of me, however.

I dislike the idea wholesale of holding a person's reputation hostage indefinitely after they have done their time. It seems fair a person should have a recourse here.

My alma mater:

I like Newcastle... The beer that is.

Thank you for sharing. A definite treasure of an occasion.

This whole discussion is well worth a separate thread. Thanks for doing this and I have no problem with you. It's not that you served the time but that you are no longer the sort of person who would do that sort of thing.

As for why you have a problem with potential employers - I'm afraid that's nothing to do with you and it sucks. There used to be a phrase 'no-one gets sacked for buying IBM" - IT Managers used to chose IBM knowing it was overpriced and worse than the competitions because if there were problems with the computers they wouldn't be blamed. You have the reverse problem.

and you were from Enfield! What chance did you have?

Seriously, forget the rest young people do stupid things. Don't think for a moment that many people who didn't end up in jail didn't also do some very stupid things. Not me obviously, I was an angel.

It takes a while to develop the understanding that underpins respect for other people and we get there at different times.

What's there to respect? Should black people respect those that discriminate against them in the job market?

I was talking about you as a young man. Now you wouldn't do what you did then because you have developed a greater understanding that other people matter which underpins a respect for their wellbeing.

If for example someone suggested the same caper you would be far more concerned that some security guard might get hurt which would be enough to stop you doing it.

The main reason I wouldn't do it is because it was ineffective.

There are all kinds of demonstrations where security guards lose Sklansky wellbeing.

To give it some more context, about 250 people were there that day, over 40 of whom were arrested and charged.

Oh. You should have researched our culture before applying. We don't do second chances here.

Ineffective in what way?

If you mean ineffective because of personal risk reward with no concern for others then why would anyone prefer to trust you over those who also wouldn't do it because of concern for others.

250 others so was it some form of protest which would be a very different proposition.