Meditation and martial arts... for prison inmates
IT was an impressive display of a Buddhist martial art practised by Chinese monks for over 1,000 years.
But those learning the ancient Shaolin discipline were not taking part in an evening class at a leisure centre.
Instead, they were prison inmates participating in bizarre project designed to let them ‘experience other cultures’.
Some inmates enjoyed a meditation session at Inverness Prison, and even witnessed a daring martial arts demonstration involving a bed of nails.
Meanwhile criminals at Saughton Prison in Edinburgh were ‘treated to an afternoon of tranquillity’ when they meditated with a Zen expert.
But David Hines of the National Victims’ Association said: ‘Victims don’t get any help, funding or recognition whatsoever. I find it abhorrent and outrageous that this sort of thing is allowed to go on in prisons – it is about as far away from punishment as you can get.’ An organisation called Shaolin Scotland recently visited Inverness Prison to ‘demonstrate what can be achieved through the training of mind and body’. Inmates were taught about Qi Gong, a system of body posture and movement used to improve health and spirituality.
Shaolin Buddhist disciple Paul Nicol and his students led several prisoners in a training session involving meditation.
According to an account in prison magazine The Gallery, ‘the highlight for many was seeing two people sandwiched between a bed of nails, a concrete block laid over the top person and then smashed with a sledge hammer’.
The magazine also discloses that criminals at Saughton jail were ‘treated to an afternoon of tranquillity when Dr David Brazier came to visit’.
The president of the International Zen Therapy Institute spent time meditating with ten prisoners and gave them a talk on Buddhism.
Prison official Brian Martin, who organised the gathering, said: ‘The whole day was a success and we got some good feedback from the prisoners, so we’d consider doing something similar in the future.’
Last night, anti-knives campaigner John Muir, whose son Damian was stabbed to death in 2007, said: ‘This is completely bonkers. It has nothing to do with rehabilitation and has nothing to do with punishment.’
The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) said ‘some individuals took part in a meditation and Qi Gong training session’, and added: ‘No prisoners were involved in the [bed of nails] demonstration. This event came at nil cost to the SPS.’
An SPS spokesman said: ‘This was a partnership event between Fife College and SPS to allow those in our care to experience other cultures.’