American Prison System

It was a lucky coincidence that I heard an NPR story closely related to our reading this week: Marked: Race, Crime, and Finding Work in an Era of Mass Incarceration by Devah Pager. Listening to the story only takes four minutes and raises some interesting questions, so have a listen!

Just as we have seen in Marked, the racial disparity discussed in the article is outrageous. The part that struck me the most, however, is the following:

The new survey says more than 60 percent of juveniles locked up for life aren't enrolled in classes or educational programs in prison. Not because the inmates don't want to go, but because budget tightening and prison rules block many people with life sentences from taking part.

How does this make any sense? Is the logic that because they are locked up for the rest of their lives it doesn’t matter if they are educated? Are these teenagers not "worth" educating? If our country has decided to have a “war on crime” and imprison as many people as possible (as it clearly has) we must take responsibility for these actions. We cannot simply forget about the dignity of these people after we have decided to punish them for crimes.

Less than a year ago in the case Brown vs. Plata the Supreme Court ruled over an issue of prison overcrowding in California. The conditions in certain Californian prisons resulted in “prisoners being kept for 24 hours in “telephone booth sized cages” after the prison ran out of treatment beds for suicidal inmates, a prisoner being found in a pool of his own urine and a “nearly catatonic state,” prisoners being forced to wait up to 12 months for necessary mental health services, and prisoners dying from preventable diseases that could have been caught had the medical wards not been backlogged” reports Jessica Jackson.

Jackson responds to the ruling within the Harvard Law and Policy Review saying “Prisons should operate as a place for those in our society who have committed crimes to self reflect and rehabilitate themselves in order to become contributing members of society upon release.”

Justice Kennedy, writing the majority opinion, said “A prison that deprives prisoners of basic sustenance, including adequate medical care, is incompatible with the concept of human dignity and has no place in civilized society.” 

I think that this “basic sustenance” can be taken further. I feel that education should be an option for all inmates, regardless of the crime they committed. If we claim to live in a modern society then we cannot reserve education for those who “deserve” it. However, I say this with apprehension. If I have learned anything in our Cultivating Citizenship course, it is that this view of our society as just and equal is a myth perpetuated in order to “allay social unrest” (to quote Dr. Hobby again). How can inmates expect to become rehabilitated without the option of education? Is there truly a difference between life without parole and the death penalty if we do not acknowledge human dignity for all humans? While the prison system is a literal example of Freire oppressor-oppressed relationship, the efforts to dehumanize those deemed undesirable extend far beyond the prison walls.

Efforts to forget about those who are marginalized by society can be seen in every level of our society. Waiting for Superman showed us how our education system is failing on every level while The Shame of the Nation noted the use of segregation in inner-city public schools to only worsen future education and career prospects for minorities. So, rather than forget about them, those who are privileged (like almost everyone at UNCA) can work to help others gain human dignity. I know I have mentioned it previously, but our work at IHAD is a prefect example of direct work within the community to benefit the future of others.

I found a film that could be interesting for our class called Acts of Art: The Prison Creative Arts Project. This is a project that goes into prisons to offer art classes and instruction as a means of self-expression and empowerment. If programs like these are helpful to inmates there is no question in my mind that education can also be a means of rehabilitation. Here's the trailer for the documentary: 

All of my complaining, however, only relates to what happens within prisons. Pager examines the impact of a criminal record on efforts to reestablish a normal lifestyle once released from prison. This is another institutionalized example of the racism experienced within our society. Because these ex felons cannot find work (despite searching for over a year, according to Pager) our entire economy and thus society is negatively impacted.

As a side note, my search for a clever political cartoon about racism in the prison system resulted in much frustration. Most of the cartoon I found were pointing out the dramatic spending put into our prison systems. Is the only time the public is willing to acknowledge the existence of our huge prison population when discussing money? While the amount of money we spend on inmates is extreme, I feel like it is appropriate to the amount that we seem to be determined to lock people up. Once again, you can't simply forget that inmates exist. If the state wants to send juveniles away for life the state must pay for care of these young people. So I will end with the comic above because it illustrates the Revolving Door of the current prison system.