Reading Time magazine here at work and they have a section on U.S. prisons, I'll just post the bullet points:

-- $29,000 annual cost to incarcerate an inmate.
-- $533 million revenue from products and services provides by U.S. federal inmates
-- $1.15 average hourly wage paid to them
-- 47% of black transgender Americans who've been incarcerated

and my favorite:

-- 0.07% who identify as atheist.

Now, I have a few thoughts immediately, the first is that the atheists in prison simply don't want to admit they are atheist because it puts them in an extreme minority and presents obvious problems as a result, the second is perhaps they simply don't participate in whatever poll this is, the third is perhaps they've "converted" during their time in prison ("found Jesus", etc) and finally maybe atheists just don't commit as many crimes.

What could be the reason for this? How is it that atheists find themselves so grossly misrepresented in prison populations?

It's hard to commit crime when you don't leave your parents' basement.

Most people in jail are poor and many are there to make profit for the their privately owned masters.

I say masters because our prison system today is the Third Middle Passage of black slavery in America.

This post was edited by Skinned on Sep 11 2014 09:08am

Probably because being an atheist requires a certain amount of critical thinking ability, and most people in prison tend to be either incapable of that level of thought, or are simply too focused on their own lives to consider the questions of the universe.

This post was edited by IceMage on Sep 11 2014 09:32am

Love the new sig

I will also say, many of these folks probably found religion in prison, and probably weren't religious when they were more free.

This post was edited by Skinned on Sep 11 2014 09:22am

I work at one and most of them claim they have found Jesus and it actually cost a little over 40k a year for year inmate.



Edit: although most claim they have found them that come back lol.

This post was edited by gary22 on Sep 11 2014 09:23am

..prison must be a time of some soul searching and many who had turned their backs on childhood faith now have time for reflection . They are now beyond all hope but Gods' .

I'm sure the OP was going off national average while your state may be a little higher.

I've been working in an asylum, and while technically not a prison, we get much of our revenue the same way. The trick for us to have enough crazy people and invalids who worked enough to draw SSI and social security and such to cover the rest of the people who didn't.

One of the facilities under our umbrella just closed because they had too many junkies and younger people and the balance was upset.

I know that in no way are we a prison, but our residents compare it as such sometimes.

What is worse is that we in Ohio get all the people from Kentucky and Indiana because neither of those states has built a facility in a few decades and they're all full. Many of our residents are discharged and come straight from Louisville or Indianapolis state hospitals, which is infinitely shitty for us because it should be their problem. Also this underlines the necessity of a federal response to the care of the elderly, the insane, and the invalids.

Sorry, I don't mean to derail. Prisons don't have these problems, they are essentially institutions that take money hand over fist by the government and stuff them into private pockets while the inmates themselves make enough money in labor to live there without the need for private ownership.

this may be true but they spend most of there time smuggling in contraband making shanks and having consensual sex.

Yea because our society spits on the poor. The rich seldom experience prison time for crimes they commit.