A person who has committed serious crime may be subject to incarceration “for life” - usually a period of 20 years. They may even be charged with multiple counts of a grave offence and end up serving several “life sentences” that will see them locked away until the end of their days.

Naturally, because prisons are unisex institutions, one begs the question, are we then as a society negatively selecting those physical (biochemical) or psychologically traits that led this person to behave as a criminal?

If the “worst criminals” are prevented from producing offspring by separation and if such criminality is even partially genetic in basis then we could conclude that these genes would be eradicated or greatly reduced in the gene pool.

Secondly ex convicts may have a harder time financially, on a career level and socially which may lead to less likelihood of reproducing so perhaps the same applies to those with past convictions which are now free once again.

But we cannot reduced it to such simplicity. For one thing, if a convict is also more likely to be prototypical of their Gender in appearance or even hyper typical - that is to say more masculine or feminine, along with cultural influences in the nature of sexual appeal and danger, perhaps they are more attractive and have more offspring in less time therefore this would counteract the fact that they have been incarcerated for a long period of life.

unfortunately, we cannot ignore the fact that some criminal offences are also sexual in nature and therefore may lead to offspring regardless of later conviction.

Finally, if prisons are in fact slowly reducing the pool of “aggressive” “impulsive” or “Psychopathic” or “violent” genes in the general population what is to be said for social selective pressures within the prison.

If survival of the fittest is the case and these are all prisoners then one would imagine increased aggression and violence is likely to ensure you survive and intimidate the other inmates not to off you. This would generate a persistent culture of testing each other and threatening new prisoners to establish who is the most bat shit and propagating an alpha dominant hierarchy.

This is solely a sociological/ biological question based on the act of separating a species from itself based in dominant behaviours.

Thoughts?