Talk:Penal colony

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[edit] Disambiguation

Disambiguation: "Penal Colony" is also a band: http://www.myspace.com/penalcolony

The band does not have a page on Wikipedia and therefore does not merit a notice at the top of the page, or I would have put one. Arawn 00:22, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lead section

The first paragraph of this article is rather cluttered with parentheses and long-winded sentences. Perhaps the biggest offender is the following line:

landless younger sons (who go "out into the wide world to seek their fortunes"), ne'er-do-wells and embarrassing eccentric uncles (remittance men)

I found this particularly difficult to look at. Can we replace the first line with maybe a famous example of such adventure seekers? In addition, I find the phrase "ne'er-do-wells" to be somewhat archaic. I don't know what a remittance man is, but maybe we should replace "embarrassing eccentric uncles" with "remittance men", and link it to a new article. --Misfit 12:21 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I added some explanation. - Patrick 13:12 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Indentured servitude as punishment?

I'm not saying this isn't true, but while I remember hearing about indentured servants in American history, I always thought that they CHOSE to come to the colonies; it was my understanding that these people became indentured servants as a way of paying for the trip. Does anyone know for sure?

If it is true, could someone post a link to more information about this? Thanks.

--- Some chose, some had authorities or sentencing judges choose for them. See for example http://home.clara.net/iainkerr/kerr/indenture.htm

Daniel Defoe gave, I believe, a fictional account of criminal servitude in Virginia in Moll Flanders.

I imagine that criminal transportation becomes a taboo subject for patriotic North Americans (compare Australians, who know of the practice too well to hide it). I recall an estimate that by 1776, approximately 75% of the population of the 13 colonies could claim an indentured ancestor of one sort or another. 219.88.205.91 11:41, 17 Aug 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Edits by Fastifex

Fastifex has repeatedly added material to this page that has been removed by other editors (see [1], [2], [3]). A link to search IMDB for "penal colony" is completely pointless; and what on Earth has a list of statesmen in Ecuador got to do with penal colonies?

He also keeps adding "slave-type" to penal labor in the paragraph about Russian penal colonies. As I commented last time that I removed this, if he wants to discuss penal labor as being slave-type, he should do so on penal labor.

This time around I spotted and removed the following phrase after "Norfolk Island":

which became the flogging hell meant to deter even the most hardened criminals- see cat o' nine tails)

This is yet another example of Fastifex adding unrelated BDSM content to articles (see for example the history of "wooden spoon"). -- Earle Martin [t/c] 14:17, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Disguised vandalism

Someone somewhere inserted a mention that all of the prisoners at the colony in Ghana died of priapism. This is obviously a joke - someone in a 'penal' colony dying of an engorged penis? Har har. Doesn't belong on Wiki. I also removed some parts that made no sense and added a citation tag for the bit about Irish prisoners. Someone who cares more than me can do the research and add the appropriate footnote. Wtbe7560 14:36, 20 August 2007 (UTC)