# No Prisons, No Death Penalty: How would they deal with serious crime?



## Rosemary Tea (Feb 28, 2021)

Opening up this discussion to see what people think, in a world building context. I'm moving toward working this into my own world building, but feel free to apply it to your own, even if different from mine.

I'm imagining a world where there's no such thing as a prison system, and the death penalty is either nonexistent or extremely rare. That doesn't mean no punishment for crime, but most of the people in this world live in fairly close knit villages or small cities (of a size that would be a small town by our standards). The nature of daily life means people are almost always where they'll be seen by others, and the little bit of time when they're not is usually not enough to commit a crime and have any chance of getting away with it. So, there isn't much crime to deal with.

That doesn't mean no crime at all. People sometimes commit infractions, like digging a well without following proper procedure (there are land use and building codes, for reasons having to do with ecological balance and how they're maintaining it). Those draw fines. And some people are foolish enough to try something like theft or vandalism. That kind of crime, which makes up almost all of the actual crimes committed, is typically punished with a public flogging and financial restitution. 

The role of the law is to punish more than to rehabilitate, although punishment is designed to leave a lot of room for rehabilitation. When a convict has taken their licks and paid what they owe, they're free and clear. There will be some social stigma following them around after that, but it probably won't prevent them from getting their life back on track. It's not quite the barrier a criminal record in our society is.

The way I'm imagining it for now, there's a death penalty on the books, but only for premeditated murder. That virtually never happens, so in practice, there is no death penalty. But that leaves the question of what to do with people who commit crimes that are very serious but not capital offenses: rape, non-premeditated murder, assault, things like that. Those crimes may be rare, but they aren't non-existent.

With no prisons, they can't be locked up. With no death penalty (for all practical purposes) they can't be removed once and for all. So what's to prevent them from doing it again? What would adequately punish their crime (maybe or maybe not with any eye to rehabilitation) while keeping society safe from them?


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## joshua mcdermott (Feb 28, 2021)

exile is pretty common.  removal from clan/family and given no resources.  often that is basically a death penalty but.


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## Rosemary Tea (Feb 28, 2021)

joshua mcdermott said:


> exile is pretty common.  removal from clan/family and given no resources.  often that is basically a death penalty but.


But if they were exiled, they'd just go cause the same trouble somewhere else. This isn't a society out in the wilderness. It's a very populated world. Exiling someone in that world would be like deporting them from your country in our world. It's not impossible for them to come back, they very well may, and even if they don't, they're still surrounded by people they could harm.


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## Queshire (Feb 28, 2021)

Ahahaha, this could be a dangerous topic for me. Too easy to get too political. @[email protected]

Hm, hmm, well, the first question that occurs to me is whether you want to portray it as some place "good" or somewhat idyllic, as some place that's primarily functional, or as someplace rather crappy.

Exile, as Joshua mentioned, could work with an option, but there's a different vibe to Dick Dasterdly getting kicked out of the town thanks to our heroes and having him go on a sad wander while he reflects on his actions vs feeding a criminal to the post apocalyptic zombie hordes outside the town.

Other options might come across as darker.

If people feel that the law isn't adequately protecting them. Imagine walled family compounds, duels which aren't... always lethal, and blood feuds going back generations.

Or maybe things are going as intended? The rich and powerful can afford the fines. They can basically do whatever they want. The poor? Whelp, sucks to be them.

Now, if you want some idyllic then I suggest looking into magical options. Perhaps geas are employed to magically ensure they won't repeat the same behavior?


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## joshua mcdermott (Feb 28, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> But if they were exiled, they'd just go cause the same trouble somewhere else. This isn't a society out in the wilderness. It's a very populated world. Exiling someone in that world would be like deporting them from your country in our world. It's not impossible for them to come back, they very well may, and even if they don't, they're still surrounded by people they could harm.


branding so every one knows they are a rapist- and shuns them no matter where they go.  if people will not give you food, shelter etc... you wont last long.    or removal of a hand etc.  usually works.


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## Rosemary Tea (Feb 28, 2021)

I'm going for primarily functional. In some ways, this society is better than ours. In other ways, it's probably worse. Overall, the effect is probably similar, it's just that what's good about it and what's bad about it may land in different places.

I'm not envisioning a very wide gulf between rich and poor, for the most part. Some have more than others, and there are the far distant royals who we never see (the real governing happens at the local level, all royals are good for is tabloid-style gossip at their exploits, as far as the common people are concerned--think Kardashians), but pretty much everyone considers themselves part of the wide middle class. 

And social mores take care of a lot of it. Dig a well without following procedure? You're probably not going to do it again after being fined for it, but the fine's not going to ruin you, either. There's only so much you can flout the law before your neighbors start giving you hell for it, and that's what really counts.

Dick Dastardly getting kicked out of town thanks to the heroes is more the kind of vibe I'm going for, only the Dick Dastardlys in my imagined world can't be counted on to just go on a sad wander. More likely, Dick is going to go be dastardly in another town. And if all the Dick Dastardlys are getting kicked out of their towns to wander, they're probably going to meet up, band together, and cause real trouble. I'm looking for a system that's going to more or less stop them from doing that. But not feed them to the zombies, that would be capital punishment, which they didn't incur.


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## Rosemary Tea (Feb 28, 2021)

joshua mcdermott said:


> branding so every one knows they are a rapist- and shuns them no matter where they go.  if people will not give you food, shelter etc... you wont last long.    or removal of a hand etc.  usually works.


I thought of that. It would work in some kinds of world building, but I'm not sure if that's what they'd do in the one I'm building. Still thinking....


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## Rosemary Tea (Feb 28, 2021)

One of my ideas is that they have a form of penal servitude. Serious but non-capital crimes draw a sentence of x many years as a slave. (Other than that, slavery is illegal. Once it existed in more forms, but there were reforms a few centuries back...)

I suppose if the convicts were sent to do dangerous jobs, like mining or rowing a galley, that would keep them out of trouble (or would it? History is full of slave rebellions), and if it were a case of, too bad the law won't let us kill him, he deserves it... then sentence him to ten years someplace where conditions are so harsh that chances are slim he'll live five.

Now the other question I'm kicking around is, what would that really mean for justice? Deeper question.


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## Saigonnus (Feb 28, 2021)

Perhaps a sort of "commune"... they are sent to a farm/community, where they must contribute to society for a period of time as determined by the judge/magistrate or whoever. If there is magic, you could use a sort of "anchor" to keep them from leaving the commune until their time is over. It could be designed that the people overseeing the place teach new skills to the "criminals" in hopes that they will find something other than criminal activity to make money. In effect it is a "prison", but without the whole walls/bars/guards thing. The more a person contributes, the more time gets taken off their sentence for good behavior.


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## ShadeZ (Mar 1, 2021)

Lobotomy to remove the insurgent part of the brain so the individual cant rebel or disobey?


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## Chasejxyz (Mar 1, 2021)

What, exactly, is the individual's relationship with society? In America we are very "hell yeah PERSONAL FREEDOM," so sitting in jail for the rest of your life is the ultimate punishment, as all those freedoms are taken away (slavery is still legal if you're incarcerated, for example, and even if you're released from prison you can still lose the right to vote, to own a gun, to have most types of jobs etc). Meanwhile in Japan, being shamed in front of society as a whole keeps a lot of crimes from even ever happening. The average Japanese person will never touch cannabis because drug use is seen so poorly by society, while the average American is googling if they can buy weed gummies on Amazon. Also, what is their relationship with the world around them? In New Zealand they hold protecting the environment and the native species so highly that they kill feral cats....meanwhile, Americans have made it illegal to kill feral horses (because horses have "souls" and have more rights as a living thing than, say, a cow), even though they are destroying the environment and also cost the government millions a year to keep thousands of unadoptable horses in horse jail. "Living history" is more important than the environment, I guess.

So in your society, what do people hold dear? If the safety of others is incredibly important, than breaking building codes, driving drunk etc would be unthinkable to the average person. Being shamed and ejected from their community (though not litterally, but from social relationships, like spiritual communities, their job, their friends etc) can do a lot to punish ne'er-do-wells, and the government does'nt even need to get involved! You can also look at ye olden punishments, various "scarlet letters" or pillories people were put through to be embarassed or made a laughing stock. What are the most important rights and freedoms in your society? Is it possible for them to be taken away? Driving isn't a right, its a privilege, and you can lose it from driving unsafely. Freedom of movement, however, is a right, so you could always just walk anywhere, but depending on where you live life is pretty much impossible without a car (so many people drive without a license because they don't have a choice, which creates a terrible feedback loop, but America is very PERSONAL FREEDOM and a car is the pinnnacle of that).


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## Toby Johnson (Mar 1, 2021)

Manual labor, if you're forced to work in somewhere like the farm, Is that prison? or just manual labor as a punishment.


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## Prince of Spires (Mar 1, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> But if they were exiled, they'd just go cause the same trouble somewhere else. This isn't a society out in the wilderness. It's a very populated world. Exiling someone in that world would be like deporting them from your country in our world. It's not impossible for them to come back, they very well may, and even if they don't, they're still surrounded by people they could harm.


I think you underestimate the effect of exiling. Especially in the world you describe of close communities and small cities. The exiled person will have no money, no food and no clothes other than what he's wearing. If he shows up in another village people will recognize him for what he is, someone exiled. And with no money, what are you going to do? I've once had the experience to be stuck in a city where I knew no one without any money and I can tell you it's not a pretty place to be in. Unless you're a hardened career criminal you will have worries about how you will feed yourself, where you will sleep and so on. In your world you'll probably end up begging for people to help you. It's not pretty. Especially in small towns and communities where everyone knows everyone else. I would personally consider it one of the worsts punishments you can hand out after a death sentence (when prison is out of the picture). 

Other punishments. The forced labor is a good one. As is eye-for-and-eye type of punishments. You hurt someone illegally? They can beat you. You steal from someone? They can take twice the amount from you. Or punishments like the cutting off of hands for stealing, that sort of thing. Branding is another one, and is similar to exile. You visibly mark someone as a criminal and they will have a hard time in their life because few people will trust them. I think a modern equivalent is people with visible gang tatoo's. They often have a harder time finding jobs for instance because people judge them based on their appearance. It's also very permanent.


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## Miles Lacey (Mar 1, 2021)

For murder the killer could be forced to work for the family of their victims for whatever number of years is the difference between the victim's life expectancy and their age.  In other words, if a victim is a 25 year old peasant farmer who would have a life expectancy of 60 years the killer would be forced to work for the farmer's family for 35 years.  This was common practice in traditional Samoan culture.

Castration for sex offenders, exile into remote areas for other serious criminal offenders and branding of minor offenders would also be effective.


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## Mad Swede (Mar 1, 2021)

Close knit communities? Hmm. What is likely to happen to the criminal  is social shunning, some form of physical punishment or in really nasty cases a lynch mob. The really big risk in communities like that is that those who don't fit in (for whatever reason) may get accused of something they didn't do. In my experience from various places around the world, close knit communities can be some of the worst places for bullying, informal justice and lack of forgiveness. In that sense, exile might be a very welcome option for a convicted criminal.


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## Saigonnus (Mar 1, 2021)

The problem with exile is if there are enough people, then eventually they could form their own group that subsist on the fringes of civilization by raiding the "law-abiding" communities. With a strong enough leader, this group might even sack whole villages for the resources, take over using the survivors as slave labor.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 1, 2021)

Miles Lacey said:


> For murder the killer could be forced to work for the family of their victims for whatever number of years is the difference between the victim's life expectancy and their age.  In other words, if a victim is a 25 year old peasant farmer who would have a life expectancy of 60 years the killer would be forced to work for the farmer's family for 35 years.  This was common practice in traditional Samoan culture.


That's where I got the idea of penal servitude from. I'd read something about a similar practice, not sure it was Samoa, maybe somewhere else, but that's definitely an idea that's been tried before. My thought is maybe once in the distant past, this was a culture where servitude to the victim, or their family, was a common form of punishment/restitution, but they've moved toward a more centralized and codified justice system, and it's no longer the norm for anyone to have personal servants in any way, shape, or form. So, this servitude would be less personal, maybe in the hands of the state, so to speak. 



Miles Lacey said:


> Castration for sex offenders, exile into remote areas for other serious criminal offenders and branding of minor offenders would also be effective.


I've toyed with the idea that sex offenders would be castrated. Also an idea that's been tried in history.

Minor offenders in this world would not receive permanent punishment (except loss of face socially), so it doesn't make sense to brand them. Maybe major offenders would get branded.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 1, 2021)

Saigonnus said:


> The problem with exile is if there are enough people, then eventually they could form their own group that subsist on the fringes of civilization by raiding the "law-abiding" communities. With a strong enough leader, this group might even sack whole villages for the resources, take over using the survivors as slave labor.


Exactly. That's why I think exile is probably not such a good idea. Especially considering that the people who would be punished this way are those who've already committed violent acts. What stops them from doing it again? We know they're willing to.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 1, 2021)

Prince of Spires said:


> I think you underestimate the effect of exiling. Especially in the world you describe of close communities and small cities. The exiled person will have no money, no food and no clothes other than what he's wearing. If he shows up in another village people will recognize him for what he is, someone exiled. And with no money, what are you going to do? I've once had the experience to be stuck in a city where I knew no one without any money and I can tell you it's not a pretty place to be in. *Unless you're a hardened career criminal* you will have worries about how you will feed yourself, where you will sleep and so on. In your world you'll probably end up begging for people to help you. It's not pretty. Especially in small towns and communities where everyone knows everyone else. I would personally consider it one of the worsts punishments you can hand out after a death sentence (when prison is out of the picture).


 But this level of punishment would only be dealt to someone who's committed a beyond the pale kind of crime, most likely a violent one. Chances are they have a hardened career criminal mentality. Lesser crimes wouldn't draw that kind of sentence.



Prince of Spires said:


> Other punishments. The forced labor is a good one. As is eye-for-and-eye type of punishments. You hurt someone illegally? They can beat you. You steal from someone? They can take twice the amount from you. Or punishments like the cutting off of hands for stealing, that sort of thing. Branding is another one, and is similar to exile. You visibly mark someone as a criminal and they will have a hard time in their life because few people will trust them. I think a modern equivalent is people with visible gang tatoo's. They often have a harder time finding jobs for instance because people judge them based on their appearance. It's also very permanent.


 The original "eye for an eye" was actually tort law. It wasn't about cutting out someone's eye in retribution, it was about the restitution owed to the victim: offender must pay them the value of an eye. Literally tit for tat isn't really that common in justice systems, I don't think. With the possible exception of cutting off a hand for stealing (although even that has very limited use, in practice), but in my world building, theft isn't considered a kind of offense that requires such permanent punishment. Thieves get whipped, and in a close knit community, everyone's going to remember that, but if the former thief decides to move on, they don't have to show their scars in public.


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## joshua mcdermott (Mar 1, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> Exactly. That's why I think exile is probably not such a good idea. Especially considering that the people who would be punished this way are those who've already committed violent acts. What stops them from doing it again? We know they're willing to.



well you need some conflict in your story right?    Basically every version of a "punishment" code for bad behavior has negative long term consequences-  Just pick the consequence that works best for your world and story.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 1, 2021)

joshua mcdermott said:


> well you need some conflict in your story right?    Basically every version of a "punishment" code for bad behavior has negative long term consequences-  Just pick the consequence that works best for your world and story.


Yes, but I'm not going for the kind of conflict that marauding bands of exiles would cause. That doesn't fit with the story.

The kind of conflict that would fit with the story is, character has had a crime committed against them or a loved one, gives evidence against the perpetrator, and has mixed feelings, to say the least, about what ends up happening to the perp. On the one hand, there's a good case that perp deserves their sentence. On the other hand, it's pretty nasty. If you're a decent person, and character is, you probably don't like seeing people suffer, and any kind of punishment sufficient for the crime will mean some heavy suffering. On still another hand, if they made you suffer, you might be getting some satisfaction even if you don't really like it.


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## joshua mcdermott (Mar 1, 2021)

Your alternative seems to be having the penal system that you said was not part of the world in the first post.    Forced labor/slavery etc-  that  IS a penal system.  Shipping them off to a mine for hard labor is basically the definition of it–


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 1, 2021)

joshua mcdermott said:


> Your alternative seems to be having the penal system that you said was not part of the world in the first post.    Forced labor/slavery etc-  that  IS a penal system.  Shipping them off to a mine for hard labor is basically the definition of it–


I said there was no prison system, not that there was no penal system.

And it's not necessarily going to mean shipping them off to the mines. That was just one thought. Maybe the slaves are dispersed more: a few go to serve in one place, a few go to another. These would be places/institutions with a need for laborers and perhaps not enough willing free people to take on the task.

But then, that raises the question of how to quell violent impulses in people who've already acted on them. What keeps the places where slave laborers are employed from falling into chaos?


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## LAG (Mar 1, 2021)

Send criminals to a far-off island filled with dangerous fauna.


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## TWErvin2 (Mar 1, 2021)

Some years back I had a short story published called "Accelerated Justice."

In that story, convicted criminals were injected with a serum that degraded their DNA, aging them over a short period of time (40 times faster). The serum injected would be enough to reflect the sentence they earned. So a 10 year sentence, a person would age 10 years in a matter of months. There was prison for the very violent. But the aging would represent the years that would've been spent in prison, and it happens in public, so people see it happening. My story focused on a man wrongly convicted and caught up in the amoral justice system.

Maybe something along those lines would work.


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## skip.knox (Mar 1, 2021)

Penal colony. Siberian labor camps. Devil's Island. Australia. There are lots of examples of this.

Mere exile can create problems. One need only look at 15thc Italy for examples of exiled (important, powerful) people exiled only to form factions in a neighboring city. Or Napoleon on Elba. Then again, Napoleon on St Helena. 

For something non-historical, you might consider a hex. A state-sponsored wizard does some sort of magical branding. Maybe the victim must always state their crime when meeting anyone new. Or there's a magical version of a GPS anklet. Or really whatever will serve your story. The spell works for a certain number of days, after while it vanishes.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 1, 2021)

Chasejxyz said:


> What, exactly, is the individual's relationship with society? In America we are very "hell yeah PERSONAL FREEDOM," so sitting in jail for the rest of your life is the ultimate punishment, as all those freedoms are taken away (slavery is still legal if you're incarcerated, for example, and even if you're released from prison you can still lose the right to vote, to own a gun, to have most types of jobs etc). Meanwhile in Japan, being shamed in front of society as a whole keeps a lot of crimes from even ever happening. The average Japanese person will never touch cannabis because drug use is seen so poorly by society, while the average American is googling if they can buy weed gummies on Amazon. Also, what is their relationship with the world around them? In New Zealand they hold protecting the environment and the native species so highly that they kill feral cats....meanwhile, Americans have made it illegal to kill feral horses (because horses have "souls" and have more rights as a living thing than, say, a cow), even though they are destroying the environment and also cost the government millions a year to keep thousands of unadoptable horses in horse jail. "Living history" is more important than the environment, I guess.
> 
> So in your society, what do people hold dear? If the safety of others is incredibly important, than breaking building codes, driving drunk etc would be unthinkable to the average person. Being shamed and ejected from their community (though not litterally, but from social relationships, like spiritual communities, their job, their friends etc) can do a lot to punish ne'er-do-wells, and the government does'nt even need to get involved! You can also look at ye olden punishments, various "scarlet letters" or pillories people were put through to be embarassed or made a laughing stock. What are the most important rights and freedoms in your society? Is it possible for them to be taken away? Driving isn't a right, its a privilege, and you can lose it from driving unsafely. Freedom of movement, however, is a right, so you could always just walk anywhere, but depending on where you live life is pretty much impossible without a car (so many people drive without a license because they don't have a choice, which creates a terrible feedback loop, but America is very PERSONAL FREEDOM and a car is the pinnnacle of that).


Those are excellent questions, and I've really been thinking that one over!

Ecological balance is considered important in this society, and no one disputes that. The main reason building code violations happen sometimes is because some people disagree on where the lines should really be drawn. (The codes are not so onerous and arcane that they'd be reasonably difficult to follow; if you're not following them, it's not that you couldn't, and it's not that you didn't understand, it's that you chose not to.) But even those people don't think there's no need at all for maintaining ecological balance, they just don't see why what they want to do would upset it. 

In some segments of society, there's a little bit of the "don't tread on me" attitude, but overall, they don't really have an American view of personal freedom. That's not to say freedom isn't valued, but it isn't seen in such a thoroughly individualistic way. People tend to be very keenly aware of how their personal freedom depends on circumstances, choices made by others, choices made by themselves, the needs of others, the duties they owe, all of that. 

Rights, I think, would be addressed in a way similar to Jewish law: it's people without power who have rights. Jewish law lays out rights for women, children, and slaves, because they're considered to be under someone else's control. Free men have responsibilities instead: they're not in much danger of having their rights infringed upon, what they need is to handle the power they have, relative to others, responsibly.

In my imagined society, adults of both sexes have more or less equal rights and responsibilities. Exactly what responsibilities they have may vary a bit, but the overall effect is fairly egalitarian. Children get certain protections--rights--because of their more vulnerable status. The same would be considered in relationships involving an imbalance of power. Apprentices have certain rights, for example, and the master/teacher of an apprentice has their duties and responsibilities towards the apprentice spelled out. That's a case of a relationship that is unequal because of relative status, one is largely under the control of the other (although the goal of apprenticeship is to ultimately make the apprentice a master in their own right; it's not permanent inequality).

Employer/employee relations, similar, although if the status difference isn't as great, there isn't as much difference in rights and responsibilities. Legislators, law enforcers, magistrates, etc. have the greatest responsibilities, and would be held to somewhat higher standards than everyone else, because they have the greatest power.

The most heinous crimes are those involving violence against people. Property crimes are lesser offenses. Even something like breaking building codes isn't nearly as serious an offense as hurting another person. So, that says they value human life and bodily integrity especially highly.

Abuse of power is also something that would be treated very seriously. If you're in a position of power and you abuse it, you've broken one of the highest laws there is.

So, I think what's really valued here is right relationships. Interpersonal balance. Responsibility.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 1, 2021)

skip.knox said:


> Penal colony. Siberian labor camps. Devil's Island. Australia. There are lots of examples of this.


Indeed there are. But there are some key differences with those historical examples. They were used against political dissidents and petty criminals at least as often, and in some cases more often, than against violent criminals who had really hurt someone. Almost all of the convicts sent to Australia were desperately poor folks convicted of survival crimes. Sure, a society could have that punishment and reserve it for people convicted of violent crimes, while being more lenient with petty criminals, but then what would happen in a penal colony where everyone is there because they were willing to use violence in the first place? 



skip.knox said:


> Mere exile can create problems. One need only look at 15thc Italy for examples of exiled (important, powerful) people exiled only to form factions in a neighboring city. Or Napoleon on Elba. Then again, Napoleon on St Helena.


 Exactly. That's why I don't want to use it here.



skip.knox said:


> For something non-historical, you might consider a hex. A state-sponsored wizard does some sort of magical branding. Maybe the victim must always state their crime when meeting anyone new. Or there's a magical version of a GPS anklet. Or really whatever will serve your story. The spell works for a certain number of days, after while it vanishes.


Magic isn't completely out of the question, but I'm not envisioning it as a primary method of punishment (except for magic users, but that's not what I'm playing with at the moment). The majority of the population would not be magic users; if they committed crimes, those crimes would not involve use of magic, and so magic would likely not be a factor in their punishment. (Magic users have a high standard of conduct for themselves and handle disciplinary matters internally; they could face harsher punishments than civilians, but that would be under their own law, not mundane law. Similar to the military: soldiers can be subject to court martial and internal military discipline, but civilians can't.)


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## skip.knox (Mar 3, 2021)

>what would happen in a penal colony where everyone is there because they were willing to use violence in the first place?
There's a higher incidence of violence. The only question there is, what would be the implications for your story.

It's worth noting that even in places of exile (except for exiling an individual), prisons still pop up. Whether it's the box (Cool Hand Luke) or an actual prison, there is, in every case I can think of, some place of confinement in the place of exile. Used for discipline and punishment. 

I'm not sure we really get away from confinement, though one could posit a society without a prison *system*.  Various SF stories come to mind there, where people are exiled to the wastelands. Nobody gets shut in, they get shut out.

Ooh, not for this story, but in a world with place-based magic, exiling a wizard could make for a good story. The wizard can't use magic until they can get back to a magical place.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 3, 2021)

skip.knox said:


> >what would happen in a penal colony where everyone is there because they were willing to use violence in the first place?
> There's a higher incidence of violence. The only question there is, what would be the implications for your story.


 Probably not much, because it doesn't include any inside views of penal colonies (if I decide to use them). The viewpoint characters don't get enslaved or exiled. They do deal, on a couple of occasions, with serious crimes by others and the decision as to what to do with them. At most, they might witness a judicial flogging or give evidence at a trial knowing it's probably going to result in the defendant getting the harshest non-capital punishment. 

But I think these characters really would grapple with the implications of what's going to happen to the defendant in the long run, and what's going to ensue from that. If he's going to a violent penal colony, there's little if any hope that he'll reform (although it was never guaranteed he'd reform in the first place) and an excellent chance that he'll emerge from it a more hardened criminal (if he doesn't die there).

That could simply be one of the conflicts the story is built on, of course.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 3, 2021)

skip.knox said:


> I'm not sure we really get away from confinement, though one could posit a society without a prison *system*.  Various SF stories come to mind there, where people are exiled to the wastelands. Nobody gets shut in, they get shut out.


 The Roman Empire didn't really have a prison system. They did have a few prisons, but those were just for holding the accused until trial and the convicted until their punishments could be carried out. Prison was not a punishment in and of itself, at least not officially. They sometimes did make convicts slaves and send them to dangerous places like the mines.



skip.knox said:


> Ooh, not for this story, but in a world with place-based magic, exiling a wizard could make for a good story. The wizard can't use magic until they can get back to a magical place.


I love that idea! But it's for another story.


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## Malik (Mar 3, 2021)

Outlawry was a thing for a long, long time. When someone was sentenced to outlawry, the laws of the land no longer covered them. No one would be punished for robbing, assaulting, murdering, or--depending on how your society works--even enslaving them. This was a _huge_ deal. We don't think about it today in our world where We Hold These Truths to be Self-Evident and all that, but back then? Pretty much a death sentence. They couldn't own property, not so much as a horse or a set of clothes. They'd be forced to flee their town or city, and if any other outlaws found them when they were out there, the sky was the limit of what they'd endure. They'd have no recourse in the legal system, either, once other outlaws got hold of them. The outlaws wouldn't technically be breaking any laws by doing any of it.


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## joshua mcdermott (Mar 3, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> The Roman Empire didn't really have a prison system. They did have a few prisons, but those were just for holding the accused until trial and the convicted until their punishments could be carried out. Prison was not a punishment in and of itself, at least not officially. They sometimes did make convicts slaves and send them to dangerous places like the mines.
> 
> I love that idea! But it's for another story.



But they also executed tons of people which you say your world would not.    You could simply say that people in the fantasy world don't commit many crimes.. perhaps more inherently 'good' than humans we know and are.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 3, 2021)

joshua mcdermott said:


> But they also executed tons of people which you say your world would not.    You could simply say that people in the fantasy world don't commit many crimes.. perhaps more inherently 'good' than humans we know and are.


I don't think they're inherently better than us. Way I see it, the reason there's so little crime is the same reason small towns have much less crime than big cities: there's no getting away with it when you're virtually guaranteed to be seen by someone who knows who you are.

The Roman Empire executed people mainly for things like treason and insurrection. Those are problems any big empire faces when they've conquered a bunch of different peoples and they're trying to keep everyone under control. And they had issues like, you know, some faction or other always wanting to kill the emperor and put their guy on the throne.

My story deals with people who are not being colonized and have no involvement in the politics of building and maintaining an empire. No motive for insurrection, no dealings with treason. Any crime that happens is personal crime. It's not at all unrealistic that there wouldn't be much of it in a world where communities tend to be small and close knit, and what social systems there are more or less work (not much of a wealth disparity, which has also been known in a number of societies), but it probably is unrealistic to think it would never happen at all. Because people are not inherently more good than the humans we know and are.


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## Darkfantasy (Mar 4, 2021)

It could be a DIY punishment. AS in people may decide to become their own law enforcement. There are usually authorities, even if not offical ones. A lynch mob could hang you, stone you or beat you. Just because there is no prison as we know it doesn't mean each secrion of a city or town doesn't have it's own confinement. Here an old well system was used to throw criminals down. If they survived the fall they normally broke something. They'd either be left to die and the body removed when they were or be left down a certain number of days. We have records of this in our city museum.


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## skip.knox (Mar 5, 2021)

>Any crime that happens is personal crime
In many ways this is the most difficult to handle, for it leads readily to vendetta. As you probably know, self-help was fundamental to Roman society (and to many others). This can work if all in the society share pretty much the same values, but starts to come apart at the seams in a more heterogeneous society.

I'd say you have plenty of room to innovate.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 5, 2021)

skip.knox said:


> >Any crime that happens is personal crime
> In many ways this is the most difficult to handle, for it leads readily to vendetta. As you probably know, self-help was fundamental to Roman society (and to many others). This can work if all in the society share pretty much the same values, but starts to come apart at the seams in a more heterogeneous society.
> 
> I'd say you have plenty of room to innovate.


Indeed, I'm playing with that, too. Particularly the kind of vendetta that could ensue from law and order justice while staying just on the right side of the law. As in, Person 1 commits a serious crime and gets sent up for it (whatever sent up means). Person 2 and Person 3 testified against Person 1. Now Person 1's relatives have it in for Person 2 and Person 3, and probably for their relatives, too. But they're going to go about it more sneakily, keeping it legal. Nasty gossip, hounding people out, retaliation in kind... and next thing you know, most of the other people in town are taking sides. Even if all they do is participate in the gossip, they're still supporting one faction or the other.

Or, the whole town is shocked and horrified at what Person 1 did and reacts by shaming and hounding their remaining family out of town. Which is probably what would happen more often, if the villages are pretty cohesive. The shamed family members could potentially make a new start somewhere else, if they go far enough, but they're essentially branded in their own community. Or maybe they can recover some face by very publicly denouncing and disowning Person 1.


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## Saigonnus (Mar 5, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> Indeed, I'm playing with that, too. Particularly the kind of vendetta that could ensue from law and order justice while staying just on the right side of the law. As in, Person 1 commits a serious crime and gets sent up for it (whatever sent up means). Person 2 and Person 3 testified against Person 1. Now Person 1's relatives have it in for Person 2 and Person 3, and probably for their relatives, too. But they're going to go about it more sneakily, keeping it legal. Nasty gossip, hounding people out, retaliation in kind... and next thing you know, most of the other people in town are taking sides. Even if all they do is participate in the gossip, they're still supporting one faction or the other.



That's kind of how it works in many countries that still follow the "Roman" Law. Person 2 and 3 must offer testimony against person 1 for the crime to be punished.If you combine that with a sort of relaxed constabulary, the normal person wouldn't be affected too much by their presence, since they would only be needed when a crime is commited or if they see it happen first-hand.


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## D. Gray Warrior (Mar 10, 2021)

Don't quote me on this, since it's been awhile since I researched it, but I think the Icelandic Commonwealth had a form of exile as punishment.

Maybe as a variation of that, the criminal gets kicked out of the village, and can only be allowed back if he successfully reforms and makes some reparations. If he does it a second time, the he's exiled permanently.


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## Saigonnus (Mar 11, 2021)

Magical Binding... a la "A Clockwork Orange"... the person is bound magically so they cannot commit violence, even in defense of their own life.


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## The Dark One (Mar 18, 2021)

As per Chasejxyz's response - to make your penal system effective for the reader it must reflect the values and psychology of the society in which it is generated. Otherwise readers will be picking holes in your logic.

If you want to use the penal system suggested (which sounds pretty permissive by our standards - both now and historically) then maybe you need to make a strong point about the naturally forgiving nature of the citizens? Turning the other cheek is a major virtue in your society?


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 18, 2021)

The Dark One said:


> As per Chasejxyz's response - to make your penal system effective for the reader it must reflect the values and psychology of the society in which it is generated. Otherwise readers will be picking holes in your logic.
> 
> If you want to use the penal system suggested (which sounds pretty permissive by our standards - both now and historically) then maybe you need to make a strong point about the naturally forgiving nature of the citizens? Turning the other cheek is a major virtue in your society?


Which penal system suggested? Several people have made different suggestions. Most of them don't sound like turning the other cheek.

I don't think of this as a society where people are naturally more forgiving than we would expect. I'm exploring that as I write. I think they would be forgiving up to a point, but that doesn't mean wrongdoers go unpunished. Rather, they get punished and then, over time, reintegrated. Unless they've committed a beyond the pale crime, which might not end with any forgiveness at all.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 18, 2021)

D. Gray Warrior said:


> Don't quote me on this, since it's been awhile since I researched it, but I think the Icelandic Commonwealth had a form of exile as punishment.
> 
> Maybe as a variation of that, the criminal gets kicked out of the village, and can only be allowed back if he successfully reforms and makes some reparations. If he does it a second time, the he's exiled permanently.


That sounds like a possible punishment for not so major crime, but not a risk worth taking if the crime was something like rape or assault. What community would want to risk the criminal doing it again? Or have him roaming around outside the village, knowing what he's capable of?


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 18, 2021)

Saigonnus said:


> Magical Binding... a la "A Clockwork Orange"... the person is bound magically so they cannot commit violence, even in defense of their own life.


I think I just wrote that in, unintentionally. Not that magical binding is an official punishment for the crime, but there's a situation in my story where a serious crime has been committed, the mage knows whodunnit but actual punishment of the crime (since it did not involve magic users) is up to the law, and there are complications with getting the law involved. It can't happen right away. The mage doesn't have the authority to punish the crime, but is permitted to do anything to keep the victim (and others) safe, so what the mage does is cast a binding spell on the perps, to keep them from doing any further harm.

Somehow I don't think the mage is going to remove the binding spell, even when the law finally does get involved and the criminals are dealt with accordingly. So, in practice, not being able to commit violence even in their own defense might come of it.


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## The Dark One (Mar 18, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> Which penal system suggested? Several people have made different suggestions. Most of them don't sound like turning the other cheek.
> 
> I don't think of this as a society where people are naturally more forgiving than we would expect. I'm exploring that as I write. I think they would be forgiving up to a point, but that doesn't mean wrongdoers go unpunished. Rather, they get punished and then, over time, reintegrated. Unless they've committed a beyond the pale crime, which might not end with any forgiveness at all.


The gentle penal system proposed in your opening post.

In order for readers to accept something like that when bad crimes do occur, there needs (I think) to be a quirk of their psychology that makes it realistic.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 18, 2021)

The Dark One said:


> The gentle penal system proposed in your opening post.
> 
> In order for readers to accept something like that when bad crimes do occur, there needs (I think) to be a quirk of their psychology that makes it realistic.


I don't think of it as a gentle system. There's nothing gentle about a flogging. And keep in mind, that's the punishment for less serious crimes. It doesn't cover the very bad kind of crime that would make any reasonable person think the culprit is a menace to society.

All I'm looking for here is a way that could be escalated without using the death penalty and without prison sentences as an option. Right now, what I'm playing with most is the penal slavery idea. That would be a kind of confinement, but wouldn't necessarily require a specific institution for it.


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## Mad Swede (Mar 18, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> I don't think of it as a gentle system. There's nothing gentle about a flogging. And keep in mind, that's the punishment for less serious crimes. It doesn't cover the very bad kind of crime that would make any reasonable person think the culprit is a menace to society.
> 
> All I'm looking for here is a way that could be escalated without using the death penalty and without prison sentences as an option. Right now, what I'm playing with most is the penal slavery idea. That would be a kind of confinement, but wouldn't necessarily require a specific institution for it.


I think you also need to consider who decides when a crime has been committed. That will to a degree determine what sort of punishment is seen as neccessary. Don't underestimate the power of social disgrace as a way of keeping people in line. In some cases, the fear of social disgrace will be enough for the family of the suspected (they need never be accused) to "deal" with the person concerned. Sadly, as can be seen in places like the Middle East or parts of Africa, that can mean that just being suspected of doing something that might bring the family into disgrace is enough to get the person killed. In a society like that, rumour and gossip can be very unpleasant weapons indeed. 

I can still remember the feeling of failure I got when I and my troop turned up in a village too late to prevent an innocent young woman being burnt alive by her parents, just because she was thought to be too friendly with a young man they and their neighbours thought was unsuitable. Arresting the parents had no effect, they were seen as having preserved the family honour. 

When you build your world you need to think through your society, its mores, morals and social structures, before you work out your system for meeting out justice.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 18, 2021)

Mad Swede said:


> I think you also need to consider who decides when a crime has been committed. That will to a degree determine what sort of punishment is seen as neccessary.


 Legally, the courts do. There is a legal code that lists what kinds of actions are not permitted and what punishments should be used in case of transgression. That's the kind of justice I'm looking at here.

Socially, of course, things may work a little differently. Certain things that are not technically illegal may be disapproved of. Certain people who have committed actual crimes, in the legal sense, may have so much social support in their community that many are unwilling to believe they're actual criminals (communities can get divided over a thing like that). And those kids who went out and damaged some neighbors' property last summer, but weren't hauled into court, just disciplined by their parents, because they're only kids? Now everyone's talking about what bad kids they are, such disgrace to their families, they'll end up real criminals some day... and they might live down to that expectation.

But to get anyone punished legally, their guilt has to be proved beyond reasonable doubt (and they have to be an adult), and to add some disincentive to just trumping up charges, false witness (knowingly accusing someone of a crime they didn't commit) is a crime in itself. A difficult to prove crime that rarely results in convictions; in most cases where the accused is found innocent, there's reasonable doubt that the accusers might just be mistaken. Still, if someone's making an accusation of a crime, and it gets as far as trial, it's a pretty good bet that they at least believe what they're saying.



Mad Swede said:


> When you build your world you need to think through your society, its mores, morals and social structures, before you work out your system for meeting out justice.


 I find that taking shape along with the meting out justice portion of the story. Keeping in mind that I'm not going to write out a whole long legal code for the reader, just let them catch a glimpse of it here and there. Most of the story is from the point of view of a teenager, who, while she's grown up in this world and has a basic sense of how it all works, doesn't really have personal experience with the working of justice... until she witnesses a crime, has to give evidence, and gets a much closer view of how it all unfolds. So the reader, and I, get to learn along with her how it really works.


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## Mad Swede (Mar 19, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> Legally, the courts do. There is a legal code that lists what kinds of actions are not permitted and what punishments should be used in case of transgression. That's the kind of justice I'm looking at here.
> 
> Socially, of course, things may work a little differently. Certain things that are not technically illegal may be disapproved of. Certain people who have committed actual crimes, in the legal sense, may have so much social support in their community that many are unwilling to believe they're actual criminals (communities can get divided over a thing like that). And those kids who went out and damaged some neighbors' property last summer, but weren't hauled into court, just disciplined by their parents, because they're only kids? Now everyone's talking about what bad kids they are, such disgrace to their families, they'll end up real criminals some day... and they might live down to that expectation.
> 
> ...


Um. Maybe. The thing is, what the law and legal code say and the way they are interpreted and implemented aren't always the same thing. In the example from life which I mentioned, we arrested those who'd done the murder and handed them over to the authorities. Being the cynical sort I wasn't especially surprised when they were found guilty of a lesser charge and given a small fine. Why wasn't I surprised? Because the way the law was interpreted meant the judges (who shared the social mores and conventions of the parents and neighbours) took the view that it wasn't murder, more a sort of mild punishment which had gone wrong. And the locals saw this as justice...

Justice, and especially whats seen as justice by the locals, is more than the letter of the law and may not be the same as the letter of the law. You might want to explore that through the eyes of your teenage character.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 19, 2021)

Mad Swede said:


> Um. Maybe. The thing is, what the law and legal code say and the way they are interpreted and implemented aren't always the same thing. In the example from life which I mentioned, we arrested those who'd done the murder and handed them over to the authorities. Being the cynical sort I wasn't especially surprised when they were found guilty of a lesser charge and given a small fine. Why wasn't I surprised? Because the way the law was interpreted meant the judges (who shared the social mores and conventions of the parents and neighbours) took the view that it wasn't murder, more a sort of mild punishment which had gone wrong. And the locals saw this as justice...


 Was that a case where the official law of the land was what had been imposed by colonizers upon the indigenous? That's a whole other level of clash between what the law says and what the people believe. If the lawmakers are as indigenous as the villagers, there may still be some variation between how the locals see it and what the law officially says, but it wouldn't be as great a conflict.



Mad Swede said:


> Justice, and especially whats seen as justice by the locals, is more than the letter of the law and may not be the same as the letter of the law. You might want to explore that through the eyes of your teenage character.


I've already seen a few hints creeping in that it might not be exactly what it's cracked up to be. Some of them emerged unplanned as I was writing. Follow it and see where it goes.....


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## Mad Swede (Mar 19, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> Was that a case where the official law of the land was what had been imposed by colonizers upon the indigenous? That's a whole other level of clash between what the law says and what the people believe. If the lawmakers are as indigenous as the villagers, there may still be some variation between how the locals see it and what the law officially says, but it wouldn't be as great a conflict


I won't get into the discussion on whether the concept of universal human rights applicable to everyone is colonial in nature or not, its way outside the boundaries for this web site.

But, what that particular case does illustrate is what can happen when the rulers, living in towns and cities with more outside contact and exposure to new ideas, start to create laws before those living in the countryside (who don't have as much exposure to new ideas and concepts) are ready to accept the changes. Its something your character might want to reflect on.


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## Carol (Mar 19, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> That's where I got the idea of penal servitude from. I'd read something about a similar practice, not sure it was Samoa, maybe somewhere else, but that's definitely an idea that's been tried before. My thought is maybe once in the distant past, this was a culture where servitude to the victim, or their family, was a common form of punishment/restitution, but they've moved toward a more centralized and codified justice system, and it's no longer the norm for anyone to have personal servants in any way, shape, or form. So, this servitude would be less personal, maybe in the hands of the state, so to speak.
> 
> 
> I've toyed with the idea that sex offenders would be castrated. Also an idea that's been tried in history.
> ...




Castrating rapists either physically or chemically does not do anything to alter the fact that rape is about power and control. If there is magic in your world, then for sexual offences, maybe that is what can be used to alter the mind set of the offender.
On another aspect, do people never leave their communities, go adventuring, seek a different life elsewhere? If not, then your small communities will become big communities. Or do people go and start a new small community elsewhere? 
If people do move about, then being exiled to wander won't work. If they 'wander' far enough away, who would know their terrible deeds?
I do not like the idea of branding or limb removal, it leaves no room for remorse and rehabilitation. 
I'm world-building myself at the moment, and these issues (and more) are very much in the front of my mind.
What to do? What to do?


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## Carol (Mar 19, 2021)

The darker side of my nature loves the idea of Azkaban with Dementor guards. 
However, I'm working on this issue myself. I rather like the idea of an island community where everyone has to work to provide everything - from shelter, to food, to clothing - _everything_. The main thrust is on rehabilitation, and generally segregated male/female - I considered rapists and sexual offenders but may put those types of criminals in their own prison community. 
My world is British medieval in look and feel, *but* with many societal and cultural modifications and not tied to _actual_ history. So I can play with the set up on all aspects.
Are guards harsh soldier types? Or are they specially tested to reveal their darker natures and so not employed? I'm leaning heavily on the later otherwise its just a repeat of the brutality of the past. I'm also considering some limited form and use of magic. 
Would love to know what people think.


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## Rosemary Tea (Mar 19, 2021)

Carol said:


> Castrating rapists either physically or chemically does not do anything to alter the fact that rape is about power and control. If there is magic in your world, then for sexual offences, maybe that is what can be used to alter the mind set of the offender.


 Perhaps. Or perhaps they buy into the idea that castration is an appropriate punishment for rape. Plenty of legal codes in history, including some current ones, include that, never mind that it isn't really effective. 



Carol said:


> On another aspect, do people never leave their communities, go adventuring, seek a different life elsewhere? If not, then your small communities will become big communities. Or do people go and start a new small community elsewhere?


People move around some. It's not too uncommon (though not universal, either) to be apprenticed in a different town from where you grew up, or marry someone from another town and move there, or to move during your adult life for professional or personal reasons. Some people stay put all their lives, and most families have some continuous line in at least one village--at least one of each generation stays, even if they have siblings who move elsewhere--so communities shift but still have some continuity.


Carol said:


> If people do move about, then being exiled to wander won't work. If they 'wander' far enough away, who would know their terrible deeds?


 I've already used that concept, though not in reference to a crime. People who've run afoul of vicious gossip and harsh judgment in their own villages (not because they were criminals, but because they, or their families, got on the wrong side of the wrong people) can move to a larger city and not have that village reputation follow them. Criminals would have the same option if they're not too notorious (and possibly even if they are).  So I agree, exile won't work that well.


Carol said:


> I do not like the idea of branding or limb removal, it leaves no room for remorse and rehabilitation.
> I'm world-building myself at the moment, and these issues (and more) are very much in the front of my mind.
> What to do? What to do?


I don't like those ideas for the same reason. I suppose branding would work if it's intended to be a life sentence. If the sentence is temporary slavery, maybe they'd put a collar on the slave, that they couldn't remove on their own, and it would be removed at the end of the sentence. Or a bracelet, or something. (I did a little bit of research on historical slave collars. The American ones were pretty extreme, I don't think anyone could wear one for weeks on end, let alone months or years, but the Romans had slave collars that were lighter, more like jewelry, they just marked the wearer as a slave.)


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## Carol (Mar 19, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> Perhaps. Or perhaps they buy into the idea that castration is an appropriate punishment for rape. Plenty of legal codes in history, including some current ones, include that, never mind that it isn't really effective.
> 
> 
> People move around some. It's not too uncommon (though not universal, either) to be apprenticed in a different town from where you grew up, or marry someone from another town and move there, or to move during your adult life for professional or personal reasons. Some people stay put all their lives, and most families have some continuous line in at least one village--at least one of each generation stays, even if they have siblings who move elsewhere--so communities shift but still have some continuity.
> ...



Lots for me to think about. Thank you.


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## berkeleyjake (Mar 23, 2021)

Why not go with a self-punishment system? Like some kind of mechanical or magical implant that triggers pain or some other reaction based on the guilt, people feel for your actions. Obviously, sociopaths would be a huge problem, but those would be a minority of issues. People would generally avoid actions where their own guilt would cause them discomfort.


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## Eztlirald Clarinda (May 31, 2021)

Ok so what about magic? If this is a magical realm could there be curses that are placed on them? Each one could be specifically tailored for the individual based on their personality and the crime they committed.


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## Rosemary Tea (Jun 1, 2021)

Eztlirald Clarinda said:


> Ok so what about magic? If this is a magical realm could there be curses that are placed on them? Each one could be specifically tailored for the individual based on their personality and the crime they committed.


This both is and isn't a magical realm. Magic exists, but only the mages, who are a very small portion of the population, can use it to any great extent. (Priests have some magical abilities, but mages are the real specialists in it.) The vast majority of the population is made up of non-magic users. 

The mages are, to some extent, a law unto themselves. They are required to follow the civil laws that apply to everyone, but the primary authority a mage answers to is the mages' guild, which has an even stricter code of conduct than civil law. Mages who break that code of conduct are punished by the guild, and since the guild's law is stricter--it covers everything that civil law would consider a crime and more--in practice, mages never face criminal charges in court. The guild deals with them much sooner than the courts would, and no less severely. Magic would figure into their punishments, but the guild doesn't deal justice to non-magic users. That is handled by the courts, which don't have magic at their disposal. So, the punishment of an ordinary citizen who's committed a crime would not involve magic.


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## Rosemary Tea (Jun 1, 2021)

berkeleyjake said:


> Why not go with a self-punishment system? Like some kind of mechanical or magical implant that triggers pain or some other reaction based on the guilt, people feel for your actions. Obviously, sociopaths would be a huge problem, but those would be a minority of issues. *People would generally avoid actions where their own guilt would cause them discomfort.*


In reality, the majority of people are not criminals for that reason. No implants needed. The same is true in this fictional world. So who's going to commit serious crimes? People who are not deterred by guilt, at least not in the moment when they commit the crime. Either they find a way justify it to themselves, or they're blinded by rage when they do it, or, quite possibly, they're sociopaths. 

Perhaps they'll feel guilty after (except the sociopaths), but this is a world with a criminal justice system that, like the criminal justice systems we have in our world, demands some concrete form of punishment. The convicted must be deprived of something, and/or have pain inflicted on them, and/or labor to atone for the deed, and/or suffer in some other way. That's usually how justice systems work, and no different in this fictional world.


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## Rosemary Tea (Jun 1, 2021)

Orin Conor said:


> I think that this shame and social pressure that relatives receive is social violence that has no justification. And she is one of the most terrible problems. Much worse than the death penalty.


In the case Mad Swede was referring to, the relatives were pressured into inflicting the death penalty themselves. It's not that there was no death penalty, it's that there was an especially nasty version of it, and for something that wasn't even really a crime.

Some of my wip does deal with shaming and social pressuring, kind of along those lines, though it doesn't get anywhere near that extreme. Nobody would kill a family member because of that kind of pressure (and they would be considered a murderer if they did), but getting stigmatized because of what a family member did, or perhaps was rumored to have done, can certainly happen.


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## Cheong_cool12 (Aug 3, 2021)

I think that you can have the offender face things like they have to become guards and protect the village for a time as punishment. Basically doing work that no one else wants to do.


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## Rosemary Tea (Aug 9, 2021)

Cheong_cool12 said:


> I think that you can have the offender face things like they have to become guards and protect the village for a time as punishment. Basically doing work that no one else wants to do.


Guard is a job for a person who can be trusted. These offenders can't be trusted. Making them guards would be, almost literally, the fox guarding the chicken coop.

Making them do nasty jobs could be a part of their punishment, but it would have to come with a very low status, lowest of low, and they would have to be under guard when they're doing it, or otherwise prevented from running away or causing more trouble. The penal slavery idea discussed up thread would fit the bill. I've been working with that one more.


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## pmmg (Aug 9, 2021)

I think, lacking a central authority that would take care of this, the people in the villages would take care of this on their own. If someone needed killin, I suspect they would end up getting killed, and who has to know? Maybe it could be some huge dark secret that spawns new stories.


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## Saigonnus (Aug 9, 2021)

pmmg said:


> I think, lacking a central authority that would take care of this, the people in the villages would take care of this on their own. If someone needed killin, I suspect they would end up getting killed, and who has to know? Maybe it could be some huge dark secret that spawns new stories.



Yeah like that whole "Your grandfather stole my grandfather's land" (when it was really debt paid by a handshake deal that was forgotten about) type of situation... guy wants to reclaim what was "stolen" and the grandson is unwilling... so he disappears.


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## Rosemary Tea (Aug 9, 2021)

pmmg said:


> I think, lacking a central authority that would take care of this, the people in the villages would take care of this on their own. If someone needed killin, I suspect they would end up getting killed, and who has to know? Maybe it could be some huge dark secret that spawns new stories.


Feel free to write that story. I've gone in a different direction with mine: there is a central authority, although it's only as central as the limits of pre-modern transportation and communication technologies allow. A village might need to bring in provincial officials to hold a full trial, but they would be waited for and their judgment deferred to. If someone were killed because they "needed killin," it wouldn't fly. The killer would be held for murder.

But if someone committed a particularly heinous crime and got sentenced by the law, they might never be allowed to return to the village, even if their sentence in itself didn't take them away forever. And if someone committed a heinous crime and didn't get sentenced? Methinks the disgruntled would be looking for a willing curse caster.


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## Rosemary Tea (Aug 9, 2021)

Saigonnus said:


> Yeah like that whole "Your grandfather stole my grandfather's land" (when it was really debt paid by a handshake deal that was forgotten about) type of situation... guy wants to reclaim what was "stolen" and the grandson is unwilling... so he disappears.


I do have that kind of stuff in my story, although it doesn't get as drastic as a literal blood feud. It stays at the level of nasty backbiting. And maybe someone threatening to have a curse put on someone (actually doing it is usually too prohibitively difficult, but threats are cheap).


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## S J Lee (Aug 10, 2021)

What about public flogging (scarring damage depends on how many and what type of whip) / a night in the stocks /  "minor" mutilation (ear, finger, nose)? Might form a major deterrent...?

You might make  a decision as to what people think the purpose of the "penal system" is...revenge? rehabilitiation? simply "to see that crime doesn't pay, but no more than that"? That system can stray from its original goal...I see huge sentences given to prisoners in orange wearing the letters "D O C" which I am told means "Department of Corrections", which implies improvement/rehabilitation...but I do not think a 100+ year sentence is intended to "correct" a person so he/she can function in society....

No punishment is a deterrent if people think A) they will not be caught B) their victim will not dare accuse them C) no jury/judge will convict them D) They simply were not thinking rationally at the time they committed the crime ... sort of Cleon's argument (at least part A)

Mytilenean Debate - Wikipedia


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## pmmg (Aug 10, 2021)

I did not quite say feud. That implies some type of longevity or expansion to the problem. More along the lines of, some dude raped my sister, no one in authority seems to care, and one day dude does not come back from a hunting trip. Stuff happens.


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## Rosemary Tea (Aug 10, 2021)

pmmg said:


> I did not quite say feud. That implies some type of longevity or expansion to the problem. More along the lines of, some dude raped my sister, no one in authority seems to care, and one day dude does not come back from a hunting trip. Stuff happens.


My blood feud comment was a response to Saigonnus's post. "Your grandfather stole my grandfather's land," as the motive for violence generations down the line, does fall into the blood feud category.

"Some dude raped my sister, no one in authority seems to care" - yep, I expect that could bring on that kind of retribution. The way I'm framing this culture, they would treat rape as a very serious crime, but if it weren't believed... well, then that could happen. And then, probably, the victim or someone close to them would be seeking a magical remedy. A malicious curse would be hard to get away with, but simple protection that could also get the perp out of the picture... that's perfectly legit and wouldn't carry the stigma of murder.


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## Rosemary Tea (Aug 10, 2021)

S J Lee said:


> What about public flogging (scarring damage depends on how many and what type of whip) / a night in the stocks /  "minor" mutilation (ear, finger, nose)? Might form a major deterrent...?
> 
> You might make  a decision as to what people think the purpose of the "penal system" is...revenge? rehabilitiation? simply "to see that crime doesn't pay, but no more than that"? That system can stray from its original goal...I see huge sentences given to prisoners in orange wearing the letters "D O C" which I am told means "Department of Corrections", which implies improvement/rehabilitation...but I do not think a 100+ year sentence is intended to "correct" a person so he/she can function in society....
> 
> ...


That's already been discussed up thread. 

Public flogging would be given for a lesser crime. I'm talking about major ones here.


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## pmmg (Aug 10, 2021)

My mistake, the site said you quoted me and the link took me there. Did not notice it was quoting the other member.

While there are many ways I can imagine individual people reacting in the face of heinous crimes, I find it would hurt my disbelief to have it depicted that such things never happened. It is not without precedent that people were held and jailed waiting for authorities to appear and have a trial—and often for very long periods of time. But, seems you want something different.

From the OP, you propose a world with no prisons and almost no death penalty. And that the close-knit nature of villages would act as such a deterrent that it would become rare. I will go with that for a story, but I find that very unlikely. Crimes of all sorts have happened in many different village circumstances, and imprisonment (and even things leading to death), are low hanging fruit when figuring out how to handle them. I think given a wide set of villages, some would have said--you know what, having a place to hold these people seems like something we should have.

If I was in a world where curses certainly worked, I could see enjoying ways I might want one used. But then...I wonder at what curses would be placed on me 

If I could not imprison someone, or kill them, and they were definitely bad and likely to be bad again, cutting off their hands might make repeating crimes hard. Shipping off to the wild lands might also remove them forever from being a local problem. Slavery, or methods to remove aggression such as a lobotomy or castration are other things that I could think of.

I dont think you can escape that when bad things happen, bad things happen back. Its gonna have to be something. When you say any crime that happens is a personal crime, that leads me more along the view that those involved would take care of it themselves--results may vary. If they suck at it, they may start looking for a better system of crime and punishment.

Maybe the perp should be made to pay 2 pigs and a chicken and call everything even.

(And I have no interest in writing such a story.)


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## Qvadrater (Aug 14, 2021)

Tabula Rasa.
Or, in simpler terms: mind wipe.
You could have a philosophical discussion over whether this sort of identity/memory "death" consitutes death (I would argue it does), but it would make for an interesting punishment.
Maybe you could just remove the memories of a certain period, equivalent to a prison sentence of some length.

I'm not sold on the idea of penal slavery/servitude, it seems like it'd be fraught with corruption: if a person could frame someone for a serious crime and get ten years of free work out of them, that'd be a powerful incentive to do so.



skip.knox said:


> Ooh, not for this story, but in a world with place-based magic, exiling a wizard could make for a good story. The wizard can't use magic until they can get back to a magical place.


Something akin to this exists in Trudi Canavan's Millennium's Rule series: mages can hop between worlds, but only if the world they're on has enough magic for it, so mages sometimes get stuck on worlds without enough magic and have to wait for more magic to accumulate; this sort of magical stranding is also one of the primary tactics used in fights between mages.


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## Rosemary Tea (Aug 14, 2021)

Qvadrater said:


> I'm not sold on the idea of penal slavery/servitude, it seems like it'd be fraught with corruption: if a person could frame someone for a serious crime and get ten years of free work out of them, that'd be a powerful incentive to do so.


It would be if the person sentenced to penal slavery had to serve their victim/accuser. In the direction I've taken the story, all penal slaves are property of the state, similar to the Roman Empire's municipal slaves. Individuals cannot own slaves, penal or otherwise. So nobody's getting free work out of the person who hurt them or their family members. Chances are that if that person is enslaved, the victim won't even get sufficient restitution to really compensate what was done to them, unless the offender had significant resources that could be taken for that. 

Now, that could motivate a corrupt state, I suppose, to get free labor, but that's a whole other topic. I suppose I could dodge it by saying the state isn't that corrupt (how realistic is that?) or, more in keeping with the story line, that there are laws in place intended to prevent such an abuse: penal slaves have to be paid wages, say, comparable to what a free person doing the same work would be paid, but their wages are sent to their victim(s), after withholding some to cover the slave's living expenses. The slaves themselves are effectively not paid for their work, since they never see any of it.

This fictional world does, in fact, have a relatively recent (as in last two hundred years) history of reforms being enacted to stop abuses in many of their systems, and it gets talked up a decent amount. One of those reforms was the abolition of all forms of slavery except penal slavery. It makes sense that they'd also put a few checks on the penal slavery system.


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## Qvadrater (Aug 14, 2021)

Rosemary Tea said:


> [. . .] there are laws in place intended to prevent such an abuse: penal slaves have to be paid wages, say, comparable to what a free person doing the same work would be paid, but their wages are sent to their victim(s), after withholding some to cover the slave's living expenses.


This still has the problem of the victim benefitting from the slave's work. Personally I think it would be better to handle corruption on a state level, where more control can be exerted, than on a citizen level (maybe relevant officials have anti-corruption magic cast on them?); Personally I'd be fine with the potential corruption of officials being handwaved away as not being a thing due to a very rigorous selection process ensuring only just people get into those positions, or something along those lines.

I think a fair system for penal slavery could be a portion of the slave's wages going to the victim, but just enough to cover whatever damage they caused, and the rest being divided by the state and the slave. This way the victim gets some restitution and the slave gets punishment in the form of lower wages; and when the slave is released they will have some money to start a new life and not have to resort to more illegal activities just to get by.

Although to some degree the system would still be vulnerable to people committing just the right severity of crime to be guaranteed shelter, food, and a (low-paying) job; but this may be too cynical a take for the kind of fantasy you're going for.

I feel like I might be overthinking this.


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## Rosemary Tea (Aug 14, 2021)

Qvadrater said:


> This still has the problem of the victim benefitting from the slave's work. Personally I think it would be better to handle corruption on a state level, where more control can be exerted, than on a citizen level (maybe relevant officials have anti-corruption magic cast on them?); Personally I'd be fine with the potential corruption of officials being handwaved away as not being a thing due to a very rigorous selection process ensuring only just people get into those positions, or something along those lines.
> 
> I think a fair system for penal slavery could be a portion of the slave's wages going to the victim, but just enough to cover whatever damage they caused, and the rest being divided by the state and the slave. This way the victim gets some restitution and the slave gets punishment in the form of lower wages; and when the slave is released they will have some money to start a new life and not have to resort to more illegal activities just to get by.


 My thought is that in practice, any wages a slave is paid are so low that the victim sees very little compensation. Considering that the crime has to involve very seriously hurting someone in order for penal servitude to be a possible sentence, probably most victims would never see enough restitution to even begin to compensate for the harm done to them. (Maybe slaves are supposed to be paid what free people doing the same labor would be paid, but in practice, it doesn't happen. Or maybe their wages legally can be lower - like prisoners making license plates for pennies per hour.)



Qvadrater said:


> Although to some degree the system would still be vulnerable to people committing just the right severity of crime to be guaranteed shelter, food, and a (low-paying) job; but this may be too cynical a take for the kind of fantasy you're going for.
> 
> I feel like I might be overthinking this.


Free people would have those needs met too. Most have land or a trade that provides them a living, or, barring that, can get jobs as laborers. In case of real hardship, when even that isn't enough, the temple steps in. They have a tithe/redistribute system, similar to the medieval Church or the Muslim system of zakat.

To be convicted of any crime, let alone anything serious enough to draw a slavery sentence, would mean extreme loss of face and social status. I suppose that wouldn't be a deterrent to someone who really felt they had nothing left to lose, but it doesn't seem likely, as I explore this system, that that would be a very common problem. Loss of face is the last thing anyone wants, worse than pretty much anything else.


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## Suli (Apr 24, 2022)

As I read through all this I keep returning to those who do the crime should directly repay those they stole from, perhaps with interest or double. So it is a sort of temporary slavery only if they do not have enough to immediately repay. The crime and repayment should be totally public so all know what happened and the criminal should be marked in some way that others can see, so if they move on others know when a repeat offender is around. Repeat offenders will of course need to be dealt with in a more vigorous manner and demoted in society as an example to others. A state gaining prisoners and paying them crap wages does not repay the victim, victims need to know the wrong is addressed and be recompensed in order for a system to be just.

Violence is another beast entirely, it cannot really be undone and doing violence to violent people serves only as a show of force that might deter others. A person who beats their child does not deserve that child, but the child still deserves parents - just better ones. If there is a place that the violent people cannot leave, say an island, then exile to that place can work. 

The main thing I see is a need for Truth-sayers, ones who can see what really happened so no one can take advantage of the system.

Good luck and I hope we can see what you come up with!


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## Rosemary Tea (Apr 26, 2022)

Suli said:


> As I read through all this I keep returning to those who do the crime should directly repay those they stole from, perhaps with interest or double. So it is a sort of temporary slavery* only if they do not have enough to immediately repay*.


 If you're aiming for a just system, this isn't it. That setup would punish people for not having money more than for the crime. Think about it: people who do have enough to immediately repay can just throw the money at the problem and not have to serve any kind of sentence. But people who don't have enough to immediately repay get the actual punishment.

I am envisioning fines and financial restitution as part of this justice system, but if it's anywhere close to being just (or trying to be), then people can't be allowed to buy their way out just because they can, and people who can't buy their way out can't receive harsher sentences for not being able to buy their way out.



Suli said:


> Violence is another beast entirely, it cannot really be undone and doing violence to violent people serves only as a show of force that might deter others.


 Show of force that might deter others is exactly what penal systems tend to run on. Penal systems that have had reformers tinker with them may tone down the show of force, but it's still there.

I worked judicial flogging into this world building because historically, that was the practice in most places before prison sentences became the main go-to. It seems logical that a society with no real prison system would use corporal punishment. Would that have a detrimental impact overall? Possibly. But so do prisons. 

I also have a couple of characters who are very bothered by judicial flogging, if not exactly for the reasons you mentioned (because they're from a different culture, so they don't think quite the same way), but because they just hate the suffering it causes, they can't stand to see that. Just because it exists, doesn't mean everyone's on board with it.

My intention here isn't to create an ideal system, just one that works for the purpose of the story. The story isn't about a utopia, but it isn't dystopian either, so what works for the purpose of the story would be neither.



Suli said:


> A person who beats their child does not deserve that child, but the child still deserves parents - just better ones.


 Not quite sure what this has to do with it. This topic here is about how adult criminals are punished, not children. 



Suli said:


> If there is a place that the violent people cannot leave, say an island, then exile to that place can work.


 There isn't.


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## skip.knox (Apr 27, 2022)

Is this still in progress for you, or did you get it all worked out? 

I haven't Re-read the thread, but what about maiming and branding as options?


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## pmmg (Apr 27, 2022)

Just reading through this again, and having new thoughts on it, but if the problem is already solved, by all means, ignore.

Suppose the opposite of exile. They are marked and not allowed to leave their own village. The mark being a way for other villages to know 'if found in your village, dispose of or send back to us." That would prevent wandering and banding together (somewhat).

Another measures might be, he becomes suitable for military service. If the far away king has something going on somewhere else, maybe these are volunteered for military service. Thus, if they are bad apples, they are bad apples in a way that hurts the enemy and not the locals, and if they did not come back...kind of just fate I guess.

I cant say about everywhere, but underpinning western judicial systems is the basis of reason. We have laws, but we also have courts and the courts are supposed to apply a layer of reason to the procedures that maybe the law cant cover.  In your system, you may have the same thing. Maybe less defined than 'the punishment for X is Y' instead...there are a number of crimes we did not code for, but if they come up, we leave it to the Judge to apply his reason and find a suitable punishment. So heinous crimes are left to a trusted authority to find a suitable method for punishing. Which can run the gamut of slaps on the wrist to death. Maybe a three judge panel if you want to add extra safety measures. And if the judge says magical curse...well...wizards may get involved.


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## Rosemary Tea (Apr 27, 2022)

skip.knox said:


> Is this still in progress for you, or did you get it all worked out?


I got it worked out, as far as I need it to be for now.


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## Rosemary Tea (Apr 27, 2022)

pmmg said:


> Another measures might be, he becomes suitable for military service. If the far away king has something going on somewhere else, maybe these are volunteered for military service. Thus, if they are bad apples, they are bad apples in a way that hurts the enemy and not the locals, and if they did not come back...kind of just fate I guess.


That could be one use of penal slaves. If they're physically fit enough for military service (which probably most of them would be) and soldiers are needed, soldiers they would be. 

That has real world counterparts, too. Convicts have been allowed to work off their sentences by fighting in war, in some countries, or young men having a brush with the law might be offered charges dropped if they go into the military.


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## pmmg (Apr 27, 2022)

So, you say you have this solved. What did you come up with?


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## Rosemary Tea (Apr 27, 2022)

They use penal slavery for very serious crimes. I don't have every last little detail worked out, and I may still revise, but that's the premise I'm working with.

They would not use permanent marking such as branding, tattooing, or maiming if it's not intended to be a life sentence. But I am playing with the idea that they might be able to imprint a mark by magic, same in appearance as a brand or tattoo, and remove it by magic at the end of the sentence. It makes sense that they'd have a way to mark a slave as a slave, and that system would work best if it's impossible (or at least prohibitively difficult) for the slave to remove the marking before the end of their sentence. In extreme cases, the slavery sentence might be for life, in which case a permanent mark would fit, but that would probably not be most cases.

I'm also toying with the idea that it might be the religious establishment, more than the state, that handles slaves. Perhaps a penitent order of some kind. But that detail isn't solidified, and at the point I'm at, I don't need it to be.


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## pmmg (Apr 27, 2022)

You began in the opening post that all of this was very rare to have occurred at all. Something must have happened to bring this to the front. Could it be something you don't really have to answer?

With tattooing, they could tattoo, and then cross it out later with another tattoo, like a red circle with a line through it as showing time served.

So far, I have no sticky wickets like that in my own story. Nailing down all the details can be like wresting with a pile of eels. There really is no one size fits all.


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## Rosemary Tea (Apr 27, 2022)

The rare occurrence occurs, basically.

I have two parts to the story (or maybe two separate stories set in the same world, haven't decided yet) in which a serious crime occurs. One takes place in a village, and it's that once in a very blue moon sort of situation. The other happens in the city, which, as bigger cities do, sees more crime. Still not as much as modern metropolises, but it's less rare there than in the villages.

Knowing what's going to happen to the criminals, or what could happen, helps me plot it out. It's also something I can foreshadow. If penal slaves exist, it makes sense to work in a glimpse of one, or at least a mention, sometime before the question of a character getting sentenced arises. If there were marauding bands of outlaws, that would be something the characters would think about.


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## pmmg (Apr 27, 2022)

Do you outline?

Knowing me, I would just write through to the end whether I had an answer for this or not, and fix it in the rewrite. While writing the rest, the answer my show itself? For me, the rough kind of become the outline after its done.


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## Rosemary Tea (Apr 27, 2022)

pmmg said:


> Do you outline?


 Very loosely.



pmmg said:


> Knowing me, I would just write through to the end whether I had an answer for this or not, and fix it in the rewrite. While writing the rest, the answer my show itself? For me, the rough kind of become the outline after its done.


I tend to take so many twists and turns when writing the rough that I find myself thinking, "Wait a minute, if I've put such-and-such in here, I need to set the stage for it back there, but I forgot to do that." 

Sometimes the answers to the questions do show themselves for me. At least as often what I've written raises more questions.


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## pmmg (Apr 27, 2022)

That is my biggest fear. Something I established way back in book 1 needs to be changed cause in book 3 I thought of how it really should be. I dont feel an outline could really help with that, cause scenes take on a life of their own and I like that.  But once written in, its not always so easy to go back and change. I suppose that may be what a second edition is for


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## Cambosaurus (May 1, 2022)

joshua mcdermott said:


> branding so every one knows they are a rapist- and shuns them no matter where they go.  if people will not give you food, shelter etc... you wont last long.    or removal of a hand etc.  usually works.


Mabey serious crimes could give something more painful or obvious, I think something along the lines of Negan's iron from the walking dead could work.


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