You're mostly on target, except for one little thing :

Are you living in the same world I am? The same one where people who profess strong beliefs step over homeless people on a daily basis, where materialism and consumerism are the new opiate of the masses, and Kitty Genovese getting stabbed to death was a passing interest? While rats might have a strong moral/social instinct, human beings do not. I should know...I've raised many rats, and I've been a member of the human race for quite a while. Rats are caring, social animals - human beings are more concerned about whether being a witness might get their ass in a sling (or even just inconvenience them) than whether they're doing right or wrong.

And no, I don't have a study to back it up. But I've seen a lot, all over the world, and most people will steal, cheat, and kill if given the chance to get away with it. The only thing stopping them is that they don't have the guts. They don't want to get their hands dirty, even for the best of causes. Deeply spiritual people seem to be the exception to this, in my experience.

Well, part of that reason is because religion is a valid force in the penal system. You declare yourself atheist, and you get no special privileges to go with that. Call yourself Jewish, and you get different food. Call yourself Christian, non-denominational, and you get to go to any church group you want (a welcome reprieve from long boring hours of doing nothing but reading and pumping iron). Declare yourself Catholic in a very Baptist area, and you'll eventually get to see a priest. Etcetera.

Of course, looking at life in prison or possible execution is a very sobering thing. Makes you reconsider all sorts of things, and when you budge enough that you pray at least for the people you'll be leaving behind, and then you walk free a week later (when you had two murder charges, organized crime, arson, aggravated assault w/ a deadly weapon, aggravated robbery, a pistol case, a dope case, and even a hate crime charge thrown in for shits and giggles), one starts to realize that there actually is something to this whole God and prayer thing.

True story (replace s/([Yy]ou|one)/I/g and that happened in 2006, no shit). Turned my 18 years of non-belief (rabid non-belief, I might add - a quick way to get me to spit on you was to say anything religious) right around on it's head. Been seeing things that are beyond coincidence ever since. YMMV, do as thou wilt still is the whole of the law, but I know what I believe and what I'm doing.

Sure, I believe in a God that both created human beings with free will and the ability to use science and other tools to better our lives, and also sent his only begotten son to die for our sins so that even the worst among us may ask forgiveness and enter into the kingdom of Heaven. Do I know what Heaven is? No. Do I think I have the right to tell you what to believe or do (as long as it isn't messing with my life)? No. So obviously I have some sorts of "magical" beliefs in my life, or I wouldn't bother praying or reading my Bible. And I've studied almost every major religion before having a serious spiritual experience (one that saved my life and completely changed the way I view the world - literally saved my life, not just "saved me from myself" or whatever...I was looking at spending the next 40-50 years in prison for something that I did do, but was taken completely out of context [it was self-defense, but race and all kinds of other bullshit was thrown into it and the DA wanted to nail my ass to the wall]).

On the other hand, I have nights like tonight, where no amount of prayer or whatever can lift my spirits or do much more than keeping me from going completely off the deep end. I just got turned down for a job that I had invested a lot of time and effort into pursuing (including a nightmarish trip across the U.S. on a shitty airline that made my life hell by completely screwing up every flight, changeover, and whatnot - and then making me pay for a hotel stay overnight, and having to find another way home from Philly because they overbooked a flight and then left me and about a dozen people stranded), my on-and-off girlfriend (who just got out of prison for a drug charge) pulled another disappearing act despite knowing that tonight is about the worst time she can just wander off to get high for a few hours and then expect me to come pick her up, and a variety of other things have my spirits so low that the only thing that's keeping me from doing something that would ultimately lead to my death (as well as quite a few other peoples') is the fact that I don't want to give any satisfaction to all those fucks in high school or my asshole family who all said that I would never amount to anything and be a complete failure. I know it has to get better as some point, since it can't really get any worse (or not by much), but the struggle to keep going is hellish right now.

So I live in a world with magical characteristics but a very realistic set of beliefs and consequences. And I'm venting. Feel free to ignore this bit of bullshit.

Speaking as someone who has lived, worked, and been imprisoned in Orleans Parish (that's New Orleans for anyone who hasn't lived in the only state that is more or less the same as when it was French, at least in terms of government), I could give a fuck about that city. The best thing they could have done is just blockade the place and require three references from people who aren't named Shaniquefa and have a job in order to be let out, and then leave the rest of those bastards to kill each other for bread crumbs and wide-screen TVs that they couldn't use anyways. As soon as it was all over (meaning all the scum that have since poisoned my city (seriously, I was living w/ my ex-wife in some apartments after Katrina, and all the "refugees" moved in and started stealing everything that wasn't bolted down - my neighbor put some frozen hamburger on a plate on his porch to defrost and it was gone 5 minutes later...they even took the paper plate!) and all the surrounding states would have been dead), just bulldoze some levees, let the bodies drain out into the gulf, and then start the cleanup. Bye-bye Chocolate City! Hello to a cleaner and safer New Orleans!

Don't speak on that place until you've eaten grits three times a day (with a lump of cold cheese in it if you were lucky), had to carry a shank everywhere you went, and all the White prisoners pooled their blankets to tie their cells shut at night (because most of the cells wouldn't shut and you can't stay awake all the time, and you can't fight back when someone holds a wet towel around your head while five of his homies beat the shit out of you and take your food or whatever else they feel like (remember, Louisiana is under the Napoleonic code, so some poor schmuck who got drunk and pissed off a cop is in there with guys who raped and killed little old ladies). I felt sorry as hell for the middle-class Whites in there. The rest of us Whites had to practically hold their hands and explain to them that they weren't going to see a judge for at least three days, they'd be lucky if they just got a fine (I got 10 days just because I was standing there while the cops jacked up my friends and searched them...to this day, I have no clue what I was charged with, I just know that not only did I have to sit out bullshit time in a hellhole [and I've done real time in Texas prisons, which are supposed to be some of the worst in the country], I also had to pay a fine or sit another 20 days just because I asked the judge what I was being charged with), there was no way they could get a bond before they saw a judge, and crying on the phone to their wife was just going to make them a mark.

Fuck that city and fuck that state.

I've signed marriage certificates (in Texas) for myself and my ex-wife, a lesbian couple (no shit - they actually claimed some benefits and didn't get challenged...I suppose that because the amount of benefits they received was very small, the IRS decided that it wasn't worth challenging or finding out what state they were married in; as a side note, the marriage certificates here [at least at the time I performed the wedding] don't even ask the sex of the people getting married, though you have to show ID when filing certificates, I don't know how they filed the certificate, so they might have done something when they filed it, so YMMV), as well as more traditional marriages. None of these have been challenged by the government, and have been accepted in all cases as legally binding/valid.

So yes, while I'm helping destroy the "sacred institution" of marriage, I could give a fuck. I'm generally a gun-toting freedom nut, which people associate w/ right-wing, but really I'm just pro-freedom and pro-responsibility (which makes me very anti-big-government and anti-socialist in general), but to me I'm okay w/ gay people as long as they respect me. Plus, after seeing what my parents and their generation did w/ marriage, I don't think there's anything inherently sacred in the institution. In love and commitment, yes. In marriage by itself? No.

Though it might work in some of the city and county jails. But the state prisons here are all run off gear that is non-networked. Sure, some of the newer facilities might have VOIP phones or IP-based cameras in some areas, but you're still not going anywhere or getting much done in a TX state prison without a ring of keys. About the best you could hope for might be to shut off a camera. Which might work if you're coordinating a hit, but you're better off doing that during a medical transfer or something similar anyways. It'd be easier to bribe a guard to look the other way than any electronic attack.

That's all I can really speak from experience, because the only Federal facility I've been in was just a detainment center that was run by the local cops anyways, so it had the same methodology. The Harris County jail has a lot of unpatched, unprotected Windows PCs, but even the ones that are networked only go to the LAN and have no Internet access (I should know, I've gotten disciplinary action for getting a local sheriff's login [via shoulder-surfing] and using it while I was doing time in 1200 Baker Street, Houston, TX). And all movements and release are coordinated via an armband system that has a hard-copy of your picture (which almost all cops check, especially on prisoners like myself who are deemed "security threats" and "aggravated" - they're pretty serious about that shit, since apparently they've had some escapes by other high-security prisoners who managed to get ahold of another prisoner's armband and get released under that name; if you don't know one bit of information [like who bailed you out, or what all of your charges are - I kid you not, they quiz you fairly extensively on that before buzzing you into the steel cage that surrounds the magnetically-locked steel door that leads downstairs ATW exit - then they'll detain you and run all kinds of checks before letting you out...between that and their general laziness, it's no wonder that it takes up to 48 hours from when your bond or other release papers go through and when you actually walk onto the city street). You're not getting out of Harris County without inside help, period. You're far more likely to be able to escape from a state prison than a county jail in Texas, at least without some sort of serious injury or illness (and who wants to be on the run with a Hep C attack or after stabbing yourself? That kind of defeats the purpose of the word "run", eh?). Other than Harris County, all of the other city and county jails I've been in both in Texas and other states were dirt-primitive compared to modern technology. And the only state prison system I've been in has been in Texas, and I wasn't in that many units since my stay was only a few years and I was in administrative segregation for most of that time. And of course my time as a juvenile doesn't count, since that was back in the days when BBSes were high-tech communications and modems were almost priceless.

Anyways, I just thought I'd share some first-hand experience with computer systems and penology. Oh, though it is pretty funny that the county I live in right now (Fort Bend, which is right outside of Houston and much more pleasant, not to mention much more affordable as long as you don't mind getting up early to make the commute, but since I work long hours anyways that would happen regardless) uses their network closet (which is seriously stone-age) as temporary storage for prisoners getting visits (at least on the 2nd and 6th floors, which are the only ones I've been on since they're the high-security floors). I've been left alone before in the network closet (since my visit was relatively brief - I'm not one of those people that likes a lot of contact with the outside world when I'm doing time, plus that go-round I wasn't in for very long), where I was sitting there thinking about rewiring their LAN and their video system, but finally decided that they'd figure it out eventually and just add more time so it wasn't worth the short-term laughs. If I'd been in there for months or years instead of just a few weeks, I'd have decided differently, but I wasn't.

I'm going to the bar to get laid and stop discussing people that are vain idiots...

Maybe the people complaining about cybercrime just need to get laid.

Yeah, and to top it off that chick I had the torch for is about to get her PhD in Psychology. When we attempted to get back together after all those years, she immediately said "You're just like every other vet/prisoner/whatever I counsel - you have PTSD". I don't care what anyone calls it, I just cope. What else can I do?

I once walked into an acupuncture clinic, for my back and insomnia. They told me to go to a regular doctor. I dunno...

But I've actually been through a lot or relationships. Everything from one-night stands to one-week stands to three-month torrid affairs to engagement to even one marriage. And I've had a lot of injuries (two shootings, about a dozen stab wounds, gone face-first through 2 windshields, caught on fire twice, etc. ; I've been in a lot of fights [including the knife fights, whether I had a knife or not...and, yes, I came out on top in all of those or I'd be dead], not all of which I won [but the majority of them I did, but when I lost, I lost pretty badly...most real fights are over in less than 10 seconds, regardless of what Hollywood would have you believe], combat, you name it).

And while a one-night or one-week stand going bad isn't a big deal, finding out that the women that you've fallen in love with over the past 3 months to 3 years is either (a) leaving or (b) done something so off-the-reservation that you can't stand to have her around anymore, love or no love, is more painful than any injury I've ever sustained. Hell, I carried a torch for 12 years for one woman (and even got back together with her when we met up again after about 11 or those years), and it almost drove me insane when I broke up with her for the second time. Something that no amount of physical pain has ever driven me to, that experience almost did. It took me about 10 months to get to the point where I realized that everything bad I saw coming out in her (self-centered, inconsiderate, unwillingness to concede that she might be wrong no matter what evidence was stacked against her, unreasonable demands, etc.) that caused me to break up with her 12 years ago had changed from simple flaws to dominant personality traits in the intervening time. Until I realized that, I dreamed about her, wrote about her (one of my hobbies is writing), and she was never far from my thoughts (except for the rare times that I was with someone else who ensnared my heart the way she had, and none of those lasted longer than a few years).

I would most definitely say that (and other similar events) that is far more painful to me than getting shot, stabbed, or caught on fire. Physical pain is nothing compared to the hell that one's emotions and attachments can put one through. Think about it - when torturing someone, it's often far more effective to work on their emotions and mind than it is to cause them physical injury. Ask any vet whether waiting for something bad to happen (pre-battle jitters, being in a precarious position, walking into a potential ambush) is worse than anything that happens to you when the shoe drops. Everyone I know (and I can't think of a single man in my family that I know of that hasn't served in the military at one time or another, and in every single war of the past 100 years in many cases) that's been in those situations will tell you that your mind can do worse things to you than anything else.

I have no problem with this...it just means less 419 scammers in the future (and since I get bombarded w/ "I'm a loving, God-fearing woman...blah-blah...stuck in Nigeria due...some bullshit" whenever I get on a dating site, I say kill them all, harvest their organs, and get some use out of the motherfuckers; of course, it's debatable whether the organs would work, since they are from Nigerians).

It comes already pickled.