A Death-but-they-were-crims-so-they-deserved-it-camp? 
Brixton Prison to make way for luxury housing?
- Thread starter lang rabbie
- Start date
SlazengerMoss
New Member
I would also beg to differ. A death camp! You've lost it.
What absolute f***king rubbish.
What absolute f***king rubbish.
lang rabbie
Je ne regrette les gazebos
death camp = a concentration camp where prisoners are likely to die or be killed.
concentration camp = a penal camp where political prisoners or prisoners of war are confined (usually under harsh conditions)
Whatever your views on the status of IRA and other Republican prisoners held in Brixton during the 20th century, it cannot be said that the British state managed that.
Brixton Prison was inhumane and for most of the 1980s the psychiatric wing was what a former Governor calls a "modern bedlam", but to call it a death camp is just intellectual laziness.
BTW - I was aghast that the first site I googled to get their definition generated an absolutely dumb advertising side bar: "Buy and sell death camp on eBay"
concentration camp = a penal camp where political prisoners or prisoners of war are confined (usually under harsh conditions)
Whatever your views on the status of IRA and other Republican prisoners held in Brixton during the 20th century, it cannot be said that the British state managed that.
Brixton Prison was inhumane and for most of the 1980s the psychiatric wing was what a former Governor calls a "modern bedlam", but to call it a death camp is just intellectual laziness.
BTW - I was aghast that the first site I googled to get their definition generated an absolutely dumb advertising side bar: "Buy and sell death camp on eBay"
Brixton prison has a most lamentable record in violence, racism, torture and prisoner deaths.
No one disputes that, even the authorities.
But to deliberately compare it favourably to a place designed for mechanised industrial murder on an immense scale like Auschwitz is risible, and a little dishonest too from someone who knows the real difference like you Anna Key!
(edited for spelling)
No one disputes that, even the authorities.
But to deliberately compare it favourably to a place designed for mechanised industrial murder on an immense scale like Auschwitz is risible, and a little dishonest too from someone who knows the real difference like you Anna Key!
(edited for spelling)
I find this comparison of prisons with death camps etc worrying.
While there are some laws that I disagree with, most people end up in prison for:
hurting people
or
robbing other people's stuff
Things which are always wrong.
Do people really feel that prisons for criminals are so unjust as to be considered the same as actual death camps, whether in Germany or Rwanda etc?
Because I don't.
Giles..
While there are some laws that I disagree with, most people end up in prison for:
hurting people
or
robbing other people's stuff
Things which are always wrong.
Do people really feel that prisons for criminals are so unjust as to be considered the same as actual death camps, whether in Germany or Rwanda etc?
Because I don't.
Giles..
On the contrary, it's intellectually limited to insist that all statements in a debate must be absolutely literal. So presumably you would argue that Pinochet, for example, wasn't a mass murderer because he didn't personally dispatch the victims of his regime?
There's an important issue here about innocence/guilt/what punishmment people are perceived as deserving.
If the suffering caused to prisoners (and even death) is far out of proportion to the crime they are supposed to have committed -- and especially if they are suffering from a mental illness, as has been the case with so many prisoners at Brixton -- then that is clearly an atrocity.
Unfortunately, many people only care about ''victims'' whom they percieve as being free from any blame.
That is appalling.BTW - I was aghast that the first site I googled to get their definition generated an absolutely dumb advertising side bar: "Buy and sell death camp on eBay"
I suggest you get a screen grab and send it to Private Eye.You've upset fanta and a property developer. I'd say you were doing pretty well.
<oops, wrong button>
Ol Nick
beer in Brixton
I think this argument could be defused, and the desired effect retained, by ensuring that a couple of pages of the estate agent's brochure for the luxury flats-sorry-apartments are devoted to an angry dicsussion as to whether or not Brixton Prison can or should be referred to as a "death camp".
And I'm sorry, I don't know the scale of the historic killing spree at Brixton.
Anna Key -- we are more liberal than the liberals. Shome mishtake shurely?
I'd forgoten Giles is a property developer. And fanta's always upset.Originally posted by IntoStella
You've upset fanta and a property developer. I'd say you were doing pretty well.
Yes. If that's what historically happens there, as seems to be the case with Brixton Prison.
But no one knows the figures. And (some) become hysterical when a polite enquiry's made.
lang rabbie
Je ne regrette les gazebos
Any redevelopment of Brixton Prison is an extreme example of the tensions caused by redevelopment of a wide range of supposedly "redundant" public buildings - barracks, hospitals, schools. Is it more important to preserve the architectural "heritage" or to meet community objectives through future public use of the site?
I have to admit that the prospect of the former Governor's House being preserved in splendid isolation, no doubt with some tastefully Clapham floristy window boxes and with "offers in excess of £1million", in the midst of a new development of apartments makes even a heritage freak like me uneasy. I think it must be reserved for community use.
From EH Images of England listed buildings database:
JEBB AVENUE SW2 (south side)
5023 Octagonal central office
TQ 3074 22/485 building at HM Prison
[Listed Grade II]
2. Circa 1820 small 2-storey octagonal building in dull red brick. Low-pitched slated roof with rebuilt central octagonal chimney. On north face a square clock tower with low pyramidal roof and bracketed eaves. Later stock brick buttreses at alternate angles. Sash windows with glazing bars in stucco-lined reveals under segmental arches of bricks on end. This was the former governor's house from whose windows could be seen prisoners working the treadmills which were first used in Brixton prison. The treadmill buildings have been replaced by a one-storey pentice all around the building. Included mainly for historical interest.
I have to admit that the prospect of the former Governor's House being preserved in splendid isolation, no doubt with some tastefully Clapham floristy window boxes and with "offers in excess of £1million", in the midst of a new development of apartments makes even a heritage freak like me uneasy. I think it must be reserved for community use.
From EH Images of England listed buildings database:
JEBB AVENUE SW2 (south side)
5023 Octagonal central office
TQ 3074 22/485 building at HM Prison
[Listed Grade II]
2. Circa 1820 small 2-storey octagonal building in dull red brick. Low-pitched slated roof with rebuilt central octagonal chimney. On north face a square clock tower with low pyramidal roof and bracketed eaves. Later stock brick buttreses at alternate angles. Sash windows with glazing bars in stucco-lined reveals under segmental arches of bricks on end. This was the former governor's house from whose windows could be seen prisoners working the treadmills which were first used in Brixton prison. The treadmill buildings have been replaced by a one-storey pentice all around the building. Included mainly for historical interest.
The Daily AnnaKey
Go on fanta. Sink a bit lower. Maybe publish a picture of dead bodies being bulldozed into mass graves?Originally posted by fanta
Evil Plan Exposed
Inmates in Brixton Prison learn to their chagrin
that their cells are to become luxury flats.
(Published in association with the Dave Spart Alternative Voice)
I'm not hysterical or angry or upset (it is Friday after all) just a tad amused by it all.
Originally, you were not making a mere 'polite enquiry' like you're trying to represent now.
Rather, you were deliberately comparing a rotten crumbling cramped Victorian prison in Brixton with a 'Death Camp'. A 'Death Camp' is the vast majority of people would associate with gas chambers, cattle trucks and mass murder.
You realise now that this was a fatuous thing to do as does everyone else (despite your lovely cheerleader stella gallantly leaping to your defence
Bless) hence your silly wriggling about a 'polite enquiry'!Give over! Discussing how many people have died in Brixton prison is more owrthwhile and interesting than this Dave Spart sillyness!
lang rabbie
Je ne regrette les gazebos
fanta
I'm not sure frivolous use of that image is in the best of possible taste and terribly helpful to my argument.
I'm not sure frivolous use of that image is in the best of possible taste and terribly helpful to my argument.
SlazengerMoss
New Member
Re: The Daily AnnaKey
I think you'll find it was you who sank the lowest. I think Fanta is merely pointing that out very well.
I think you'll find it was you who sank the lowest. I think Fanta is merely pointing that out very well.
AK - I also think you've sunk the lowest on this. I think calling Brixton Prison a death camp (even considering the racism and deaths that have occured there) is very inappropriate and actually insulting to relatives of inmates who have lost their lives there.
I'm sure you don't want that do you? You are being Daily Mailish with your exaggeration. And perversly by being so inaccurate you actually trivialise what's happened in Brixton Prison.
I'm sure you don't want that do you? You are being Daily Mailish with your exaggeration. And perversly by being so inaccurate you actually trivialise what's happened in Brixton Prison.
Never mind.
Let us all forget it and just move on!
Anna, several years ago I walked round the remains of Auschwitz where one is still confronted with the physical evidence of the crimes that took place there. Upsetting isn't the word.
I just don't think you would have made that flippant comparison if you had walked round it.
That's all.
Let us all forget it and just move on!
Anna, several years ago I walked round the remains of Auschwitz where one is still confronted with the physical evidence of the crimes that took place there. Upsetting isn't the word.
I just don't think you would have made that flippant comparison if you had walked round it.
That's all.
