First, I don&#x27;t think you can make the distinction between whatever you are calling &quot;simple debt&quot; (care to at least define things that you make up?) and the various fees associated with the United States and particularly the Texas legal system.<p>Second, even if you grant there is a difference between the debt types, how can he be wrong about it being de facto &quot;debtors prison&quot;? Who cares what the debt type is, it would still be a debtors prison, and there are a myriad of very good reasons we got rid of such things!<p>Third, the legal system is extremely unfavourable to the middle-class and poor, to the extent that I would also argue with your claim that the fees are &quot;(probably) justified&quot;... Another thing to remember is that fees have become revenue generators, and to look at them as punitive damages to be payed to the public for offenses is a naive take on the ways fees have developed in the legal and justice systems.<p>For example, I (in Texas btw) who almost never gets tickets, got one last year. Normally I have a paralegal friend do the deferred adjudication, I take a class, and move on. Well this last ticket they missed the deadline, I forgot about it, and the original $160 fee ballooned eventually to $700! Not only that, but technically, until I payed it, there was a warrant out for my arrest!<p>Do you think that kind of percentage increase is warranted or the warrant for arrest for not paying a fee is justified, because I certainly don&#x27;t. I managed to pay it off, but for someone earning less would have had a very hard time paying that big of a fee, much less the financial impact of being fucking arrested...<p>&quot; It&#x27;s not the case that the police are extorting people that are behind on their rent&#x2F;credit card payments or something.&quot;<p>Please explain how this is correct now, because it seems obviously false. (aka, they <i>are</i> extorting people because they are behind on payments (just because you made the false distinction of credit cards&#x2F;rent and court fines does not make that fact magically go away...), and the police are even doing it for a third party!)<p>That&#x27;s not even getting into the privacy and other issues the eff raises. For example, my paralegal friend has access to the TLO system and can look up plates and their geo&#x2F;time data. While she wouldn&#x27;t abuse it, the barriers to entry for paralegals can be pretty low in some firms...