Mar 19, 2016 3 min read

In this country, there has been a growing consensus that the way we sentence people for crimes and the number of people we throw in prison needs to be changed.

And while a stretch behind bars should serve as a way for some offenders to rehabilitate themselves and prepare the ground for a more productive life, there can be no question that serving a prison sentence is a form of punishment – an individual is almost totally robbed of their autonomy, and their access to family and friends is severely restricted. The life of an inmate is confined, for the most part, to a small cell.

This is an entirely appropriate penalty, particularly for those who have committed the most egregious offenses. Take, for instance, Richard Poplawski, who killed three Pittsburgh police officers in 2009 when he was just a 22-year-old. He should molder in prison for decades and contemplate the lives he took and how he destroyed his own life. And then there’s surviving Boston Marathon bomber Dzokhar Tsarnaev – if he’s not executed, he will almost certainly live out his days in a tiny cell that, according to The Boston Globe, consists of a fixed bunk, shower, toilet, desk and stool.

Meanwhile, across the ocean in Norway, mass killer Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 77 people – no, that’s not a typo – during a 2011 binge of shooting and bombing, is enjoying a life in prison that, by most standards, is quite comfortable and serene. According to The New York Times, he inhabits a three-room suite at a prison in southern Norway complete with windows, a refrigerator, typewriter, treadmill, DVD player and a Sony PlayStation. Breivik is apparently allowed to prepare his own meals, watch television, read newspapers and magazines and partake of distance-learning courses at a Norwegian university.

But this is apparently not enough for Breivik. He has sued Norway, arguing the conditions in which he is being held amount to torture.

Yes, you read that right.

Breivik is upset he is kept away from other prisoners, which is only reasonable considering the notoriety of his crimes, and he has expressed an interest in recruiting followers to his own twisted brand of right-wing extremism. He compared himself to Nelson Mandela – ironic, given the racism he has openly espoused – and he has derived comfort by occasionally thumbing Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.”

He also has another bill of grievances, all of which, Breivik believes, amount to a violation his human rights: the sofa in his suite is not big enough; he wants a more up-to-date PlayStation, and to be provided with better video games; he has to eat with plastic cutlery, and has not been provided with a thermos to keep his coffee warm; the microwaveable prison dinners have not been tasty, and that he had been served the same meal two days in a row.

Such atrocities, Breivik complained, are comparable to waterboarding.

A survivor of Breivik’s rampage, 24-year-old Bjorn Ihler, told The New York Times he thought it was important that the killer be given a hearing, however absurd it may be. “It is a victory in itself for us, as a society, not for him. Even terrorists have human rights. We have to keep in mind, though, that even though he is just one man, he represents an idea that we need to combat.”

That’s far more magnanimity than Breivik deserves.