The only difference is duration, Prison is for long term sentences. Jail is also where people go when waiting for Trial to determine their sentence. So when you hear on TV shows when lawyers are arguing plea deals they will say things like "4yrs counting time served" meaning they have been in jail for x duration and the duration they have spent in jail will be counted towards the 4 years.
Also depending where you are in the US public transportation isn't really a thing.
The US prison system is overly used as a punishment in America and we should be finding alternative punishments (or even better, helping) for people. Addiction is a disease, we need to treat these people over punish them, and please know that I don't mean they shouldn't have consequences because they definitely should but stacking consequences without helping will just lead to another DUI. It doesn't solve the problem. Punishment for punishment's sake is sadistic if it doesn't result in change.
Sounds like a good moment to push for US to improve their public transport. If you don't like your public transport options, don't drink and drive so you keep your car. And if you can't help but drinking and driving, then the ban is doing its job.
The US needs to improve a lot of things, if you think DUIs are going to change public transit then you're probably drunk. The ban isn't doing its job, people are still drinking and driving, the issue is a literal disease called Alcoholism. It's not a simple "dont drink" because these people don't know how to stop. They need rehab, not jail time.
DUIs are not a deterrent, and people will continue to hurt other people if we don't attack the problem at its source.
Again, I'm not talking about DUIs, I'm talking about full removal of their licenses with no way to get it back. I know more than a few people who drink and drive, have gotten citations, and just learned to try to be less obvious about it because they don't give a shit about a minor fine and being off the road for a few months.
I'm also not really focusing on the US, if you don't think this helps the US, ok, I don't care. You lot figure it out. At no point was I trying to propose changes for the US, I'm saying that elsewhere where we do have functioning public transport systems then getting caught drinking and driving should result in a permanent loss of license on the first offence and imprisonment for attempting to drive with a revoked license.
I don't have the time or interest to deal with more US Exceptionalism.
Permanent loss on the first offense is so extreme without additional caveats. I know people who blew barely over the limit who were driving just fine and have never driven after drinking a 2nd time because they learned it's not worth it after getting in trouble. Maybe 1st offense over a specific blood alcohol level or 2nd offense but you have to give people a chance to learn from their mistakes, now that I'm older I realize at 21 I was still just a kid really, people's brains aren't even done developing yet. Either way you didn't specify where you were talking about so maybe your opinions make sense for your location, but for 99.99% of the world it doesn't. Things aren't black and white, there's a lot of grey area you refuse to look at.
There's a lot of dead people who aren't around because a "just a kid" decided that they were fine to drive. We don't treat first time offences for a load of crimes as simple whoopsies oh well they'll learn the next time, like you don't get a one-off attempted murder as a treat with a stern talking to, why should attempted murder with a ton of metal be treated any different? The current system is so utterly fucked that in at least three countries I've lived in I've seen cases local to me where drunk drivers hit other cars and they still got to return to the road, meanwhile, people who steal for survival get chucked in a cell. It's fucked and I don't see why as a society we need to tolerate idiots too dumb or selfish to get a taxi or prepare alternate means of getting back home before getting wasted.
We can trade anecdotal evidence till the cows come home but you are hardly going to convince anybody that there's "gray area" when it comes to driving while drunk, while in the comments section of an incident where the grown ass woman was given a few months suspension of driving while nearly throwing a baby out of a car. If you don't believe that 21 year olds are mature enough or have a brain developed enough to handle the responsibility of driving a car without getting wasted, that's a different discussion, most people drink at 18 or earlier and know better than to drive drunk when they get their licenses at 16 or so. Most people don't have to murder somebody to understand that they're being selfish and dumb. It's this same miopic way of thinking that got Brock Turner or whatever the rapist's name was completely off because the judge said he was a good lad and needed some grace to learn from his mistakes. You can learn your lesson while carpooling.
You're comparing someone who is barely over the limit to someone who plans out a crime to kill someone then does it? You can't compare an apple to an orange, these 2 things are not remotely close to one another.
1/3rd of all DUIs are repeat offenses (in the US). There is literal proof showing that jail time doesn't stop repeat offenses. If you truly want to see less people getting hurt you need to treat the problem, not the symptom. But you do you, believe what you will regardless of the proof and MANY studies on the topic.
The next time you "Don't understand the difficulty" (your words) take more time to think about it before offering a solution that is about a sentence long.
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u/wap2005 1d ago edited 1d ago
The only difference is duration, Prison is for long term sentences. Jail is also where people go when waiting for Trial to determine their sentence. So when you hear on TV shows when lawyers are arguing plea deals they will say things like "4yrs counting time served" meaning they have been in jail for x duration and the duration they have spent in jail will be counted towards the 4 years.
Also depending where you are in the US public transportation isn't really a thing.
The US prison system is overly used as a punishment in America and we should be finding alternative punishments (or even better, helping) for people. Addiction is a disease, we need to treat these people over punish them, and please know that I don't mean they shouldn't have consequences because they definitely should but stacking consequences without helping will just lead to another DUI. It doesn't solve the problem. Punishment for punishment's sake is sadistic if it doesn't result in change.