The Butler County Prison might consider getting computer tablets for inmates.

On the surface that sounds like a downright stupid idea.

Warden Joe DeMore told the prison board on Tuesday that the company Securus Technologies leases the tablets for $20 per month. If the prison issues them to inmates and charges $25 per month, the prison could make $5 per inmate.

Securus, a Dallas-based prison technologies company, markets telephone and video conferencing services for inmates, their families and their attorneys. The tablets are a new venture. Only four county prisons nationwide are named as clients on a Securus website.

Securus calls the tablet “a month-to-month paid service that comes standard with a wireless outbound phone system, as well as services that can help a person overcome challenges, cope with incarceration in a healthy way, and get a start building a productive life on the outside.”

There’s no conventional Internet access — no search engine for surfing, no pornography, no conventional e-mail.

Instead the tablets would give inmates access to an a job search database, an electronic law library, self-help podcasts, education assistance, religious materials and online books.

Additionally, the tablets provide music and video games.

In short, these are many of the same cultural stimulations the inmates would find outside prison.

The impulsive retort is that it would make the prison experience too cushy. Intuition suggests that the music and video games would be the most popular features, by a long shot.

Does an inmate need or deserve all these distractions from the reasons why he or she is doing time?

Do the added conveniences encourage recidivism — former inmates returning to prison for similar offenses?

DeMore, a Slippery Rock University graduate with 15 years experience in corrections, is a new warden who comes to the job highly qualified. He has instituted fresh ideas and policies that are bound to enhance security, protect the county and cut costs. Recent changes include policies covering Taser use, gender classification and housing, “dry cell” searches and the prison’s CERT team.

These are all good changes.

But the introduction of tablets, not so much. Prisons should be humane, but without luxury. Deprivation is part of the punishment. Incarceration should always instill a desire to get out and never return. For at least a few of the imprisoned, sitting around playing video games and listening to music, when you add free meals and medicine, would be too much like home for them to ever want to leave.

This admittedly is a new concept and lacking in data to support or condemn it. It’s in use in only four county prisons.

At the very least, it would be a good idea to shelve the proposal for a time and let the technology as well as its vendor, Securus, to prove its value.