Quote from: Werekoala;357717Maybe, maybe not. We've trended towards the "rehab not punishment" theories of imprisonment for almost a century now - how's that crime and recidivisim rate working out for ya?

Quite well where it's practiced, actually. You Yanks ought to try it sometime, instead of half-heartedly pretending to.

Quote from: Werekoala;357717Maybe, maybe not. We've trended towards the "rehab not punishment" theories of imprisonment for almost a century now - how's that crime and recidivisim rate working out for ya?

I don't see much in the way of rehab going on myself. The ex-cons I've known sure didn't mention any.

Is it so wrong that I want to write the prison system a long letter about D&D's utter failure to promote roleplaying and indeed it's strong tendancy to squelch it?  I mean if their first premise is so wrong how right can what follows be?

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;357719Quite well where it's practiced, actually. You Yanks ought to try it sometime, instead of half-heartedly pretending to.

Bah.  We want to retain our position as #1.  We have more prisoners per capita than any other country in the world, and we're not about to relinquish our title.  Our high recidivism rate is necessary to keep this.

Quote from: J Arcane;357594Piff.  Fuck the Forge.  O'Sullivan was playing a game while hiking with a stopwatch and little pieces of paper when Ron Edwards was just some whiny cunt on a Usenet feed.

Boy, that hike was long...

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;357665it can't be stopped by any serious gamer anyway.  Chits and a lot of memorized rules will do just fine.

Quote from: ggroy;357639If inmates are allowed to have d6 dice, then it wouldn't be too hard to replicate a version of basic D&D with 3d6 replacing a d20 for the to-hit rolls, and damage rolls using only d6's.

Quote from: jhkim;357634However, instead they have banned D&D - and may ban all fantasy games - as a general prison policy.

They already did. From the OP:

Singer was told by prison officials that he could not keep the materials because Dungeons & Dragons "promotes fantasy role playing, competitive
hostility, violence, addictive escape behaviors, and possible gambling," according to the ruling. The prison later developed a more comprehensive policy against all types of fantasy games, the court said.

Quote from: GrimJesta;357660But I am on board with the bullshit reasons the "Man" gave for banning it. It does hearken back to the 1980's.

Quote from: Drohem;357622I am definitely not saying that prison life should be marshmallows and unicorns, but the reason given for denying this request does hearken back to the 1980s D&D hysteria.

Quote from: The_Shadow;357704The annoying thing is the ridiculous characterisations of D&D in the judgement.

Of course it is ridiculous and of course the image of D&D (and RPing in general) suffers from bad press like that but did anyone try to imagine what this D&D thing might look like from an outside perspective (say, a jailer), in the confined and heavily regulated space of a prison?

A bunch of tough guys sit regularly around a table and brood over maps, discussing things like combat strategies, the breaking & entering, or fleeing from, buildings (that could or could not be veiled abstractions of the very prison they are in), and the most effective way of killing the opposition that is there.

What would a Cyberpunk game look like to prison personnel? Traveller's "Prison Planet"? The planning stage of a typical run in Shadowrun?

I can perfectly see that persons in the correction system could be freaked out by that, no matter how harmless the actual game might be. They have no way of evaluating the content of the game.



And, yet another perspective:

Californian gamer Christian blogs about his mail exchange with a prisoner who has found his RPG fanzine, Iridia.

Quote from: David Johansen;357732Is it so wrong that I want to write the prison system a long letter about D&D's utter failure to promote roleplaying and indeed it's strong tendancy to squelch it?  I mean if their first premise is so wrong how right can what follows be?

Winnar.


I would also posit that there are more heated arguments and fights over games of dominos (seen more than one, heard of more) than D&D, so I wonder if they've banned those too.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;357707Actually, some of us are concerned about both. It's because of the dehumanisation of prisoners in the American judicial and penal system that this sort of ridiculous restriction is even considered.

The prisoner being referred to is in there for life.
That means there is likely no chance for rehabilitation.

Whether or not he gets to play D&D is not a big issue.

He lost his rights when he committed a viloent crime against a fellow human being.

- Ed C.

Quote from: Koltar;357802The prisoner being referred to is in there for life.
That means there is likely no chance for rehabilitation.

Whether or not he gets to play D&D is not a big issue.

He lost his rights when he committed a viloent crime against a fellow human being.

- Ed C.

Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are inalienable rights, Ed. The prisoner is almost certainly in jail for life because of minimum sentencing guidelines set by the legislature of the relevant territory, not because he is likely or unlikely to be rehabilitated. Nor should his ability to be rehabilitated affect his treatment in a controlled situation like prison (except insofar as it causes the penal authorities to divert him to programs in the prison that would rehabilitate him).

Oh god..

Ed - PLEASE - change your picture. The coquettish come-hither pose isn't really working.

Quote from: Dirk Remmecke;357745They already did. From the OP:

Singer was told by prison officials that he could not keep the materials because Dungeons & Dragons "promotes fantasy role playing, competitive
hostility, violence, addictive escape behaviors, and possible gambling," according to the ruling. The prison later developed a more comprehensive policy against all types of fantasy games, the court said.

That won't stop a committed gamer.  Memorized rules and substitute randomizers (or diceless play) always circumvent any such policy.  I speak from first-hand experience, having been hospitalized as a minor and subject to such stupidity by the same sorts of stupid shit as this prison's management.

Quote from: Werekoala;357812Oh god..

Ed - PLEASE - change your picture. The coquettish come-hither pose isn't really working.

OOPS, Didn't realize it would look like that - you don't know what its cropped from.

- Ed C.

Quote from: Koltar;357818OOPS, Didn't realize it would look like that - you don't know what its cropped from.

EEEWW!!  Eew-eew-eew! :eek:

!i!

You using conditioner, Ed?