As far as I know it's always been there. It has always been considered wrong to force a religious person to either starve or eat something that their religion forbids, even in jails.

I can't see how the $2,000 is going to help. Is that their way of paying them off to shut their mouths?

Mate thats flamin stupid. If i had my way, criminals would be living in rooms no bigger than an average bathroom,eat  3 standard meals per day consisting of for example- porridge and tea for breakfast,
sandwich for lunch with water, vegetable mush and grissly meat for dinner........ All of the cheapest quality and with NO RELIGEOUS SENTIMENT. No television, no library, no gym. Prison is supposed to be a punishment not a place filled with creature comforts! Its stupid to have gymnasiums in prisons,the criminal comes out stronger and harder to stop! There should be no entertainment whatsoever, that way, the ex convict will always remember his or her stay and NEVER want to go back. Result....
Criminal activity down 90%!
And of course capital punishment for murder,rape,peadophilia,habitual criminals and- traitors.(hicks)
The hangmans noose is the way to go!!!

You can get sick of lobster very quickly. If it was a genuine religion then they would be eating lobster on the outside every day as well. Not going to happen.

Aussie Nationalist, have you ever been to prison? You make it sound like a holiday camp.

An aquaintance of mine works for corrective services and seems to take great pride in ensuring their stay is not a comfortable one. However, he does seem to take pity on many of them - mainly those convicted for 'crimes of passion,' ie stupid violent stuff they did in the heat of the moment. I haven't asked him directly whether he thinks they are treated too well, but I will next time I see him. It is not the lack of TV sets or other mod cons that gets to them, it is the lack of freedom, which is not something you can see. You have to live it.

Remember, you have to let them out eventually, and it's no good turning a drooling nutcase onto the streets who has forgotten how to talk to people and doesn't know how the world works any more.

Having been to a GEO Prison as a 'Just Visiting' on the Monopoly Board,

I am impressed with the way they put a lot of effort into 'Rehabilitating' the Prisoners so as not to become a 'repeat offender' and something of a benefit to society.

This kinda goes against what I and probably most people around the world think a Prison should be.

Sure it shirks me that I could be on the 'outside' and struggle to get given stuff that these Inmates receive on their stainless steel platter.

But hey, Australia is a Prison in a 'cultural' sense, even for the Aboriginals for 40,000 odd years.

I guess there is more than just one right answer to a problem.

...oh, and its good to blow some dust off this topic from way back when on page 420-something.

One of the few things I liked about working in the Private Hospitals...
...is how 'Freedom of Choice' (of the Hospital) was put before the Governmentally pushed 'Anti-Discrimination'.

So when a Religious person presents their 'Holy Book' on how the Doctors are not allowed to speak during their operation - the Doctor just throws their 'book' out the door and says "My way or the highway!?"

So when a Religious person tells me how I should be doing my job as a Medic, I can say - "This isn't a Holy Place sorry, so you just have to do as we 'medically' say and I say that you are 'free to leave' if you don't agree!?"

It was a luxury to have such, whereas in the Public Hospital, it seems 'Laws, Religion, Military, etc' all have a priority over Medicine. It was amazing how many times you can't put a Band-Aid on someone as it was against the law.