Criminal Justice System: A Personal Statement Analysis

Growing up in a family that has dealt with mental illness first hand, it is apparent that people who suffer from mental disorders are treated differently than people suffering from other illnesses. However, I became more aware of this issue when the criminal justice system and society mistreated my uncle. My uncle Patrick was diagnosed with sever bipolar disorder and showed some symptoms of schizophrenia when he was 30 years old. He found taking his pills difficult and would occasionally not take them. Unfortunately, taking his pills cause side effects in his body yet not taking them cause him make irrational choices. He suffered an episode and was incarcerated for a few months. While he was incarcerated, he was not given his medications and …show more content…
I believe that harsher punishments do not benefit the community or the person being punished. I believe in rehabilitate care rather than retributive. However, there are particular circumstances where certain crimes do not deserve rehabilitative care and that person will go to prison for the remaining of their lives. I believe my interest in the punitive system has slightly influenced my political ideology. I tend to fall more to the left side of the political spectrum, siding with the liberal government on several issues. However, I am very cautious of each political party, as I believe they promise many things in hope of winning the majority vote. I believe I tend to be more Liberal because we need the government to create rules in our society, I believe there are too many selfish people in this world that care too much for themselves and do not care about those who are suffering. More attention needs to be paid to the middle-class people and on the amount of taxes they pay each year. With the cost of post-secondary education continuing to rise, I think we need a government to concentrate on the youth in our country and to make sure they have the resources they need to exceed. Therefore, I find myself somewhere in the middle of the Liberal and Conservative parties at times. During the 2015 elections, both parties released where they stand on several campaign issues. This is where I began to decipher which party I would vote for. On issues I believe are important I sided with the Liberal government more than the Conservatives, especially regarding taxation. The Conservatives focused a lot on small businesses while the Liberals mentioned cutting the taxes for the middle-class and raising it for those who make more than $200,000 annually. This is important to me as I was raised in a middle-class