Years ago in 2020, a precursor to this Non-Violence publication pointed out the need to start thinking about what prisons on Mars and the Moon will look like. One year later in 2021, an influential leftwing space podcast called Celestial Citizen interviewed an indigenous, First Nation native (Canadian) woman named Dawn Marsden who basically came to the same conclusions about space prisons. The original Non-Violence publication article, though, goes into technical and concrete specifics about how to implement humanitarian prisons on other planets. Ultimately, what this article does is point out how there is no actual alternative to prison. In the year 2020, many do-gooder activists around the Anglosphere proclaimed campaigns against incarceration and the prison-industrial complex, advocating for systems that do not require police forces at all. What this indigenous scholar, Dawn Marsden, does is pour the cold water of reality on the fevered dreams of the George Floyd criminal-glorifying activists, even if the indigenous activist Dawn Marsden does not explicitly or directly say so. By going into concrete details, this Non-Violence publication advocates a fully honest treatment of the issue of what space prisons will look like. On the other hand, the indigenous interviewee pays merely cursory attention to the most difficult issues, preferring to remain in feel-goody vague admonitions to engage in “restorative justice”. AI-generated image of a prison on Mars. This article takes Dawn Marsden’s words, and shows how a sober, realistic perspective on these issues of interplanetary criminal justice requires addressing difficult issues that Dawn Marsden refuses to adequately provide solutions for. However, as a representative of indigenous wisdom, she does more to competently address this problem than a leftwing academic interviewed on the same podcast. _______________ Support Non-Violence writing by tipping me at Ko-Fi.com or by donating some Ethereum digital currency at this public address! 0x5ffe3e60a7f85a70147e800c37116b3ad97afd5e _______________ The interviewer, Britt Duffy Adkins with the Celestial Citizen podcast based in Pasadena, California, (the same city out of which NASA’s Mars missions are run) begins by asking the following critical question: “How do we handle issues as they arise in space? So when we talk about potentially serious crimes taking place in space in the future as we start to establish communities, how would future space societies attempt to implement restorative justice practices?” — Britt Duffy Adkins, host Well, that is a really good question. Rather than address the host’s question directly and head-on, the indigenous leader does not address the most serious crimes like murder or rape, but rather first discusses less serious crimes such as probably theft. “There’s already a model for restorative justice…You take the people who are having the disagreements, or injuries, discuss that. So the people who have done the actions and the people who have received the actions, and all their supporters, and anyone else who is involved, you bring all those issues to the table, and you talk about the damages that it’s done, and then you talk about how to repair the damages, if possible, provide restitution or reparations for the damages. I’m thinking back to the stories about how if a person couldn’t hold in their temper and they’re always beating people up and they might be restrained for that temporarily until they went through restorative justice process.” — Dawn Marsden, representative of indigenous wisdom This restorative justice framework does seem like a great idea. Notice, however, that at the end of discussing it, Dawn Marsden admits that sometimes wrongdoers will have to be “restrained”. No kidding. The topic of restorative justice deserves probably many articles and even books devoted to it. However, we should take this time to note on potentially grave problem with the concept: Restorative justice should not be forced on unwilling victims. Honestly, it does seem as if advocates for restorative justice do ignore victims’ rights. Victims should not be pressured, let alone forced, to participate in a process that they have not consented to, and do not feel comfortable in. Forcing victims to participate unwillingly would constitute abuse of a very serious kind. Now putting aside this grave concern for the moment, let us continue to observe how Dawn Marsden’s indigenous, communal and communitarian approach to criminal justice in space really does not differ from a generic non-indigenous, sober, libertarian approach to this same topic as articulated in this publication’s 2020 article on the topic. “And then if necessary people would volunteer to take care of that person [the offender] and say ‘I’ll help them to live and work without harm’. I think that’s a good system. If you think of probation, it’s not very similar, but if you had caring people who would step up and say ‘Okay, I’ll look out for this person’ and usually in a community situation in which you’ve spent decades with that person [the offender] there are going to be people who will step up.” — Dawn Marsden, representative of indigenous wisdom This, like restorative justice, is also a fantastic idea. Thankfully, Dawn Marsden the representative of indigenous wisdom does do more here to imply that consent (from the caretaker) is required, as opposed to doing nothing to acknowledge that consent from the victim is required to engage in restorative justice. AI-generated image of a prison on the Moon, with some trees inside of it. Also, it is questionable how uniquely “indigenous” this idea is. You can see a very good representation of this idea in action in the very non-indigenous 1970s Little House on the Prairie television show in Season 1 Episode 20 entitled “Child of Pain”. In that episode, the townsfolk become very worried about the extreme beatings an alcoholic single father inflicts on his pre-teen son. To reform the alcoholic, the main character father figure, Charles Ingalls, lives with the alcoholic father for a week or so to sober him up and set him on a straight path. _______________ Support Non-Violence writing by tipping me at Ko-Fi.com or by donating some Ethereum digital currency at this public address! 0x5ffe3e60a7f85a70147e800c37116b3ad97afd5e _______________ So, how uniquely “indigenous” is this idea? It is not so much “indigenous” as very spiritually wise in a way that multiple spiritual traditions, including Christianity, have clued in on. After floating this construct, Dawn Marsden finally gets to the tricky part. “I think you might be interested in the other part, where it’s kind of tricky, I had to work hard with my brain around the idea of expulsion, if they were murderous, or if they did heinous crimes, then they would be either killed or excluded. And in space, you could do the same thing, you could isolate people but you don’t have the space and resources to do that.” — Dawn Marsden, representative of indigenous wisdom This resource limitation in space is exactly what this Non-Violence publication’s previous article on the topic honed in on as the most difficult issue. To see where that discussion could go, envisioning the most humanitarian conditions for humanity’s future in space as possible, read that article in this Non-Violence publication. “So if you can at all do any sort of restorative justice and retraining over time, then that would be the ideal. The thing about self-determining communities, is that everyone is aware. Everyone knows, comes to know everybody’s idiosyncracies, and issues, you adjust your relationships with those people according. So if you have people who are really just nasty people, you avoid them. It’s a form of shunning in a way, but if there’s also encouragement on the other end for change, and how to change, then those people [offenders] can be re-integrated into society. There’re modern instances of that, where people are put in isolation on islands, they’re given resources, and elders to talk to, and re-integrated into society. So those are all possibilities.” — Dawn Marsden, representative of indigenous wisdom Huh, put the offender in isolation, given resources, allowed some communications with healer-types — That is exactly what this Non-Violence publication also recommended as the best course of action to deal with serious space crimes. Again, to see where that vision might go, read the earlier article in this Non-Violence publication. In reality, Dawn Marsden’s insights are not so much uniquely indigenous as they are reflective of innate human wisdom that we also see in the Bible. Take Matthew 18:15–17 in which Jesus instructs Christians to try to resolve conflicts first with the accused directly one on one, and then escalate to involving the community. “Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that ‘by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.’ And if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector.” — Jesus Now combine these instructions with St. Paul admonishing Christians not to use law courts against each other in 1 Corinthians 6:1. “Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?” — St. Paul Not going through the law courts sounds exactly like the intent of restorative justice, which is meant to minimize use of force and prisons. So we see that unfortunately, until we can all become nearly as perfect as Jesus, we will probably need to continue using prisons, even in space, and even if we endeavor to implement indigenous restorative justice principles as humanity settles the stars. Contrast Dawn Marsden’s sobriety with another, later guest on the Celestial Citizen podcast, Lucianne Walkowicz, who when posed with a similar question simply stated that the police ought to be abolished. Meaning: 100% abolished. To demonstrate just how naïve the views of white holier-than-thou academics like Walkowicz are, Walkowicz (correctly) accuses NASA of using police forces to clear the roads leading to observatories in the Hawai’ian mountains. What Walkowicz does not want to admit is that those native Hawai’ian protestors themselves were attempting to function as police forces, policing use of what they considered their land by preventing those whom they viewed as trespassers (NASA) from accessing the land. The native Hawai’ian “protestors” (really, dissident police forces) were using their physical presence to try to prevent others from accessing the land. Such an action is no different in character or type (only in degree) from a line of official riot control police. Back during the 2020 Summer of Lockdowns, activists revealed the same disingenuousness: They wanted official police to go away, but still wanted individuals using their physical presence, and even physical force, to enforce order. Because crime is everywhere. Every protest encampment will unfortunately experience some sexual harassment, and the individuals (usually men) who use their physical presence and strength to physically interact with offenders are in reality police even if no one wants to call them police. So, what Walkowicz is doing is mouthing the words of 100% police abolition, but in reality supporting the continued use of what are in reality police forces. Just because a different word is used does not mean that it is not police. “Policing” is an action that individuals of any status can engage in whatever their title, whether they are called “peace officers” or “protestors”. The degree to which a society can reduce the number of individuals actively engaged in physical activities to enforce order depends exactly on the degree to which each individual in a society voluntarily chooses to refrain from engaging in physical coercion his or herself. Walkowicz’s ideal to abolish the police is admirable, but the only way it can be done is by convincing each individual to voluntarily choose to refrain from using physical actions to promote their views. Walkowicz is treating the symptom, not the cause, trying to start with reducing the numbers of official police officers, not recognizing that this strategy puts the cart before the horse. And, in the end, there will always be sociopaths and psychopaths among us who use physical coercion regardless of cultural pressures to choose to refrain from engaging in physical manipulation to force one’s views on others. As a result, we will always need at least a few (ideally official) police officers to deal with them. Indigenous, native wisdom, and five years ago this Non-Violence publication, recognizes this reality. Naïve leftwing academics do not. _______________ Support Non-Violence writing by tipping me at Ko-Fi.com or by donating some Ethereum digital currency at this public address! 0x5ffe3e60a7f85a70147e800c37116b3ad97afd5e