Prison Politics a serious worker issue in the States....

[RadioRaheem84]

I consider the issue of crime a political onee in the States, so I am one that takes prisoner issues seriously and think that our criminal justice system is incredibly flawed so as to imprison huge swathes of lower income people for economic socio-political reasons.

I cannot believe that the US has had at one point 3 million people in Prison! That is almost the entire population of Austin, Boston and San Francisco combined! More than any other country in the world!

I've read stats that suggest that at least 5-10 percent of that population could be innocent due to a combination of over zealous prosecutors, forensics, bad DNA tests, "expert" witnesses, inadequate representation, etc.

Michael Parenti's Democracy for the Few details prisoner abuse in the nation's biggest correctional facilities and the methods in which it is easier for lower income people of color to wind up in jail along with rapists and murderers.

Not to mention the huge contracts dished out to private prison contractors that need people to fill their prisons to get more public funds.

Since I am still new to this issue, does anyone have any links to sites that deal with the prison population issue in the States, prisoner abuse and other things related to the shoddy criminal justice system we have in the States?

Was the Chinese report on Human Rights in the States really legit, or was it more of a diplomatic stunt or at least both to merit a gander?

Thanks

[The Fighting_Crusnik]

A lot of people, primarily liberals, have associated the low restriction of guns and other weapons to the high prison rates. They cite how other countries that restrict their weapons have lower prison rates. BUT... they fail to realize that those countries usually have less of a class divide like the United States and they fail to recognize the fact that so very few people in this country actually give a fuck about helping the poor people. Instead, most people, through the media spew the perceived "image" of what a poor person is... and when they do this, the poor fight the images that are thrown out... but because because expect them to be like this and don't give them any chance to prove themselves, they become the image... It's a long ass cycle, and fact is, if rather than sticking a lot of prisoners together who can learn off of each other, we sought social programs and other means of punishment, the crime rate and prison rate would decrease substantially.

And relating back the the image thing: prison abuse and authoritarian abuse occur because of these images which are perceptions within the minds of the middle and high class... The divide that this has caused is disgusting because it result in different people getting different treatments. For example, if a black man is at a gas station just as it is being robbed, and the police barge in and think he is apart of it, they'll probably start yelling at him and throw him to the ground while cuffing him and if he does something that seems "threatening", they'll taze him. But if some white business owner is caught in a large business scam that has lasted for 20 years and has lead to the financial destruction of hundreds of people, the cops will just talk smoothly with him, cuff (sometimes not even do this), and treat him like he royalty even though he is guilty for sure of a crime and is responsible for far more misery than what a gas station burglar could ever hope to cause.

[Amphictyonis]

I consider the issue of crime a political onee in the States, so I am one that takes prisoner issues seriously and think that our criminal justice system is incredibly flawed so as to imprison huge swathes of lower income people for economic socio-political reasons.

I cannot believe that the US has had at one point 3 million people in Prison! That is almost the entire population of Austin, Boston and San Francisco combined! More than any other country in the world!

I've read stats that suggest that at least 5-10 percent of that population could be innocent due to a combination of over zealous prosecutors, forensics, bad DNA tests, "expert" witnesses, inadequate representation, etc.

Michael Parenti's Democracy for the Few details prisoner abuse in the nation's biggest correctional facilities and the methods in which it is easier for lower income people of color to wind up in jail along with rapists and murderers.

Not to mention the huge contracts dished out to private prison contractors that need people to fill their prisons to get more public funds.

Since I am still new to this issue, does anyone have any links to sites that deal with the prison population issue in the States, prisoner abuse and other things related to the shoddy criminal justice system we have in the States?

Was the Chinese report on Human Rights in the States really legit, or was it more of a diplomatic stunt or at least both to merit a gander?

Thanks

The innocence project has done GREAT things. Some of the stories make me want to start non stop campaigns against the DA's involved until they're out of a job. Well, all of their cases do. Another big problem in California is the state mandated segregation in state prisons. This is creating a huge culture of abject racism as most of these people are going in and out of the state system as is the nature of the system. You can see the effects this has had in LA (orange County) as Nazi skinhead gangs are popping up left and right. It was once the NLR or Nazi Low Riders but now I think the prevalent gang in LA is PENI (public Enemy No 1). This is spreading to the county jails and juvenile halls as well. Hopefully it's just happening in CA?

http://www.innocenceproject.org/

[The Fighting_Crusnik]

The innocence project seems pretty interesting... and I have thought about the possibility that there may be people pleading guilty for the sake of avoiding some harsh punishment... but considering what just happened in that one state where several innocent people may have been executed because of continued evidence tampering... change needs to be put into motion so that shit like this never happens again...

[Reznov]

You can see the effects this has had in LA (orange County) as Nazi skinhead gangs are popping up left and right. It was once the NLR or Nazi Low Riders but now I think the prevalent gang in LA is PENI (public Enemy No 1). This is spreading to the county jails and juvenile halls as well. Hopefully it's just happening in CA?

http://www.innocenceproject.org/

You realize that this not only produces White Power gangs, but also Black power and Hispanic Power gangs as well. (Big gang wars bewteen Hispanic and Black gangs were in LA I think that I was reading.)

Just saying, Racism can go both ways, which makes it so effective for the bourgeoisie to split us and keep us more angry at each others race than the actual problems facing the working class. This does not just go for Whites either, as you see many segregated gangs for blacks, Hispanics etc...

I believe the real Revolutionary solution won't be complaining and crying about some racist white people, but instead figuring a way out to combine a large working class force together from Prison.

[Amphictyonis]

You realize that this not only produces White Power gangs, but also Black power and Hispanic Power gangs as well. (Big gang wars bewteen Hispanic and Black gangs were in LA I think that I was reading.)

Just saying, Racism can go both ways, which makes it so effective for the bourgeoisie to split us and keep us more angry at each others race than the actual problems facing the working class. This does not just go for Whites either, as you see many segregated gangs for blacks, Hispanics etc...

I believe the real Revolutionary solution won't be complaining and crying about some racist white people, but instead figuring a way out to combine a large working class force together from Prison.

I remember the "southern Hispanics war" in some LA neighborhoods against certain people of color. It was short lived. Most 'minority' street gangs target other gangs of their own 'race'. There's a difference between their silly ideology and the Nazi ideology. Most 'minority' street gangs are born out of poverty and frustration with an economic system that doesn't offer them the same avenues of self respect and pride it does their white suburban counterparts.

The white suburban skinhead gangs, on the other hand, form out of hatred. There's a difference. The LA attacks by southerners against African Americans was a spill over from prison culture though. It's a mess.

The state/concentrated wealth, in one way or another is responsible for most of the problems. Look what happens when people try to band together for positive action-


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People don't matter to them, only profits. This is why our prisons are so full. It's a profit making industry in and of itself.

[Red Commissar]

The Prison-Industrial Complex doesn't get the attention it deserves. Even with out looking at that I think people can see that prison populations exploded starting in the 1980s and continues going in that direction. Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi have the highest ratios per 100,000 (816, 694, 669 respectively).

It's easy pickings for private contractors, always waiting for governments to privatize their functions (to cut red tape and increase efficiency, of course :rolleyes:), and it has encouraged the development of a prison-industrial complex.

[Animal Farm Pig]

Christian Parenti has written a book called Lockdown America (http://books.google.com/books?id=a46BJOHmq_gC&lpg=PP1&ots=BSqu2a35pY&dq=christian%20parenti%20prisons&pg=PR7#v=onepage&q&f=false) that seems worthwhile. I haven't read it, but I've heard him give lectures on the subject in the past.

[syndicat]

big increases in the prison population began in '80s with the "War on Drugs." a large proportion of prison population are nonviolent drug users or people selling small amounts. marijuana or crack.

countries in southern Europen generally have a rate of incarceration about 50 percent higher than northern Europe, but the rate in the U.S. is five times the rate of incarceration in Spain.

gun ownership isn't related to imprisonment. Canada and Switzerland also have high gun ownership but much lower imprisonment of population....also much lower homicide rates.

[Amphictyonis]

big increases in the prison population began in '80s with the "War on Drugs." a large proportion of prison population are nonviolent drug users or people selling small amounts. marijuana or crack.

countries in southern Europen generally have a rate of incarceration about 50 percent higher than northern Europe, but the rate in the U.S. is five times the rate of incarceration in Spain.

gun ownership isn't related to imprisonment. Canada and Switzerland also have high gun ownership but much lower imprisonment of population....also much lower homicide rates.

Thank Obama's VP for some of the highest incarceration rates ever. Joe Biden and his mandatory crack sentencing laws in the1980's filled our prisons and institutionalized millions of people. This has done generational damage. The man is a bastard, one of many.

[meow]

i see no criminals, i see before me political prisoners.
all people in prison are political prisoners. because laws are political. property is political. whether or not i can do what i want to my body is political.

and no. unfortunatly i dont have the information you look for.

[Manic Impressive]

A friend posted this on another forum which he found on a totally different forum it is an account of a guy's time spent in prison in the USA

I'm still not allowed to post links on this forum so I have left out the first w

ww.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=136858

[apawllo]

Angela Davis is definitely the place to start when it comes to the prison-industrial complex. Check out "Are Prisons Obsolete?" and "Abolition Democracy." The former is a critical analysis of the system, while the latter is a series of interviews; both informative.

This is a pretty good article as well:

http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/davisprison.html

Also, found this interesting:

http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/03/greening-the-prison-industrial-complex/

[Amphictyonis]

A friend posted this on another forum which he found on a totally different forum it is an account of a guy's time spent in prison in the USA

I'm still not allowed to post links on this forum so I have left out the first w



www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=136858 Here ya go.

[Amphictyonis]

Here's something I know of that was happening in 2004 - I'm sure Terry wouldn't mind me mentioning, she's the history/economics teacher in this programs (and another public school in SF) and is also a communist :) I viewed her curriculum and it was pretty powerful. She lay's it all out for the guys as it happened, colonialism, how capitalism works, the effects of racism on our society/person etc.

If people do have to be in jails/prisons we need more people like her around. I can't comment on the rest of the program but Terry here has given hundreds, maybe thousands of inmates a proper education outside of the normal propaganda we/they all received in grade/high school.


@12:30 mark

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[Eastside Revolt]

I would tend to place anti-prison struggles in higher importance than workplace struggles as a way to radicalize working class folks, being that an anti-prison struggle in harder for the state to co-opt.

here's some good anti-prison stuff:

http://325.nostate.net/library/acab4finalweb.pdf

http://325.nostate.net/library/dark-nights-8.pdf

http://againstprison.wordpress.com/

[noble brown]

Thank you for the youtube post. its an excellent example of how our perceptions or self-images have been manipulated by the status quo and their social impacts. not only that but it also enightens us to solutions.

i have been to prison multiple times in multiple states. from armed robbery to drugs. it was only at the point that i began to challenge my sefl-image that was socialized upon me by the capitalist structure that i began to understand what and why i was doing these things. this began w/ reading non-comfromist histories and social philosophies. i was completely infected w the extreme individualism indicative of capitalism and the idea that i was somehow more entitled then the rest of the world which is an extention of patriotism and statism. once i realised how my psyche had been systematically manipulated to bring out these characteristics did i become willing to change my views (and it pissed me off to no end). we have to get w the program. we arent inherently greedy violent creatures. its just not fucking true. i used to be that but only cause of the images i was manipulated into accepting as the norm. this isnt a problem for the state. its not a problem for the prisons or even for only certain nieghborhoods. this is a social issue and it needs to be addressed by all of us as a whole. all our struggles are just different spreads of the same underlying root problem. Capitalism.

[RadioRaheem84]

I've always known just how powerful social consciousness and awareness can be to a person who has been extremely indoctrinated into the capitalist world. Especially lower income people who are the main products of capitalism, driven to violence to survive as they lack any real property.

I do not want to make it sound like it's Marxism is an enlightenment revelatory religion or anything like that but can you guys not see the impact a class analysis of one's situation can do to someone who has little to know knowledge of the world except kill or be killed.

I know this wasn't a Marxist program but imagine if it was. It was obviously liberal progressive but it was amazing, imagine what a Marxist program can do too.

[noble brown]

for me it was like a religious experience. not just the marxism but the whole awakening to the real picture. the revelation that not only i but the whole population is being maliciously manipulated to the benefit of the few. i think there are a lot of useful parallels to the matrix movies. its like i took the red (think it was red) pill and suddenly BAM! a huge veil was lifted.

the ones in prison are the most fully indoctrinated. we're the ones willing to put our lives and freedom on the line for capitalist ideals. so we have to sell ourselves to the idea or we could never justify it internally. but on the flip side of that coin is the fact that we are the ones most abused by the system. there is a lot to gain from enlightening the prison population but its also the most reluctant.

[RadioRaheem84]

If we take a materialist perspective, all awareness of our social constructs is "religious". It just depends on the specifics of that type of awareness. There is nothing different about religion and Marxism in that both take two vastly different approaches to understanding our world. The idealist gives too much credence to religion and thus elevates it to a place where it's then somehow separate from all other beliefs.

There is nothing wrong with saying that Marxism is enlightening.

[Ol' Dirty]

The prison system is de facto segregation. By locking away the majority of men of color, those communites are destroyed: wives can't find supportive husbands; children don't have fathers; young black and Latin men can't get an education; their neighboorhoods don't generate enough revenue to compete in this viscious capitalist economy; the women and children resort to hustling, leaving their children to the same fate; the awful cycle repeats itself indefinately, to the chagrin of working people of color and the tacit delight of the wealthiest 10% of Yankees.

It's disgusting. I'm incredibly privaleged to be a person of color with a fully employed, well-educated father. :crying:

Now that people of color are "enfranchized," we're ghettoized and encarcerated, then put under state supervision and disenfranchized again. :mad: This whole country is based on racism... forget that we have a token houseslave in the Awful Office. I feel guilty that I'm largely exempt because of my lower middle-class background and light skin, and the only thing that keeps me going is the hope that this society can change for the better... soon.:bored:

[thriller]

The innocence project has done GREAT things. Some of the stories make me want to start non stop campaigns against the DA's involved until they're out of a job. Well, all of their cases do. Another big problem in California is the state mandated segregation in state prisons. This is creating a huge culture of abject racism as most of these people are going in and out of the state system as is the nature of the system. You can see the effects this has had in LA (orange County) as Nazi skinhead gangs are popping up left and right. It was once the NLR or Nazi Low Riders but now I think the prevalent gang in LA is PENI (public Enemy No 1). This is spreading to the county jails and juvenile halls as well. Hopefully it's just happening in CA?


Yeah it's funny how Cali mandates segregation in prison. I guess there logic behind it is to segregate the races to FIGHT racism, assholes.
I knew a few people that were in locked up in California, and most all of them, being white, ended up as white power freaks. It's obvious prisons breed hatred and racism, and it seems to be that's exactly their purpose.

[brigadista]

she has been there -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yh8ZrGhzJIM

he is in there -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37u3sPHjrro&feature=related

and on immigration detention centres

http://www.impre.com/eldiariony/opinion/editorial/2010/3/17/the-immigration-prison-complex-178485-1.html#commentsBlock

[Amphictyonis]

she has been there -

Yh8ZrGhzJIM

he is in there -

37u3sPHjrro

and on immigration detention centres

http://www.impre.com/eldiariony/opinion/editorial/2010/3/17/the-immigration-prison-complex-178485-1.html#commentsBlock

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reserve_army_of_labour

Capitalism, at all times, creates a population of unemployed. Profits cannot be made under FULL employment. At any given time there are millions of people out of work, mostly of a certain color. Prison is where they end up. It all has to do with our relation to the means of production, some people don't even have access to the means of production/sustenance let alone democratic control. Those left to 'fend for themselves' have a very different road ahead of them. Under capitalism there will always be that population but again, racism has placed certain people in the 4% of perpetually unemployed which capitalism necessitates for profits to be made.

[ckaihatsu]

If we take a materialist perspective,


Oh, *shit* -- don't *get* me started...(!)


= D





all awareness of our social constructs is "religious".


Time for me to expound here...!

I've come to view religion as proto-science -- in former times it served as rudimentary accomplishments at describing all facets of the world, natural and social. At times it *may* be better-generalized than our contemporary, overly reductionistic institutions of science.

A person's *own* conception / adoption of a 'social construct' might be termed a 'worldview' -- and this is where I jump in.... I've created a number of diagrams, three of which I've attached to this posting since I think they're relevant here:


Worldview Diagram

http://i45.tinypic.com/111to46.jpg


Worldview diagram

http://i45.tinypic.com/1olg8y.jpg


Consciousness, A Material Definition

http://i46.tinypic.com/24fwswi.jpg





It just depends on the specifics of that type of awareness. There is nothing different about religion and Marxism in that both take two vastly different approaches to understanding our world. The idealist gives too much credence to religion and thus elevates it to a place where it's then somehow separate from all other beliefs.

There is nothing wrong with saying that Marxism is enlightening.


The *shortcoming* of religion is that it's had to rely on a *placeholder* for attempts to "reach higher" / generalize from the experience of many -- that 'placeholder', of course, would be the fictitious entities / entity that provide a 'grand narrative' through which we may transcend our own, limited life experiences. Both fiction and/or narratives are inherently limited, though -- thus their correct categorization as being 'idealism', since they *have to* rely on an artificial abstraction, or placeholder, of some sort that *will* fall short of being comprehensive / all-inclusive in its descriptions of the entire reality that it addresses.

A materialist / scientific approach allows us to generalize on an *objective* basis, entirely independent of any person's / persons' own, limited experience.

[Apoi_Viitor]

This thread needs more Foucault...

“...It would be hypocritical or naive to believe that the law was made for all in the name of all; that it would be more prudent to recognize that it was made for the few and that it was brought to bear upon others; that in principle it applies to all citizens, but that it is addressed principally to the most numerous and least enlightened classes...” (Foucault, 1975: 276).

“For the observation that prison fails to eliminate crime, one should perhaps substitute the hypothesis that prison has succeeded extremely well introducing delinquency, a specific type, a politically or economically less dangerous -and on occasion, usable- form of illegality; in producing delinquents, in an apparently marginal, but in fact centrally supervised milieu; in producing the delinquent as a pathologized subject” (Foucault, 1975: 277).

[Die Neue Zeit]

As much substantive discussion about prison politics, both here and in the UK private factories thread, would be greatly appreciated.

I've written about "managed democracy," so now I need some brainstorming about openly authoritarian capitalist states and authoritarianism in the prison system (the "managed democracy" was the progressive flipside to the authoritarianism).

[Amphictyonis]

I've written about "managed democracy," so now I need some brainstorming about openly authoritarian capitalist states and authoritarianism in the prison system (the "managed democracy" was the progressive flipside to the authoritarianism).

Well, if you want to understand the authoritarianism within the actual prison structure I'd check out The Stanford Prison Experiment

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The system as a whole isnt designed to reform or rehabilitate anyone as Foucault argues here-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discipline_and_Punish

If you want to see it through the eyes of the imprisoned I'd check out Animal Factory and Education Of A Felon by Edward Bunker. Hell, even Alexander Berkmans writing from prison holds up to this day. What exactly do you mean when you say "authoritarianism in the prison system"?

[Amphictyonis]

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As we saw industry be outsourced to further exploited third/second world labor in the 1970's stiff drug laws were created to house this domestic work force who found themselves with no access to the means of production. This amounts to straight up CONTROL over the most revolutionary segment of our advanced capitalist society- dispossessed workers.

An entire culture has been created to combat the radicalization of the dispossessed class (by crafting some hyper selfish capitalist mind frame in poor neighborhoods) and has even been turned into a profit making machine. Corrections Corporation of America stock prices depend on how many human beings they lock up. They lock up both the domestic dispossessed work force and the capitalists treasured 'illegal' work force-

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Also, read this for some quick insight to structural unemployment-

http://www.alternet.org/story/9278/seeing_the_system%3A_alan_greenspan_and_intentiona l_unemployment/?page=entire


When there will be (at any given time in order for capitalists to profit) millions of people without jobs what are these millions to do? Where do you think they end up? So not only do capitalists create structural unemployment in order to make profits but they also directly profit by exploiting/imprisoning this dispossessed population in private for profit prisons. If thats not enough to make you made then....:(

[Die Neue Zeit]

I've come to view religion as proto-science -- in former times it served as rudimentary accomplishments at describing all facets of the world, natural and social. At times it *may* be better-generalized than our contemporary, overly reductionistic institutions of science.

A person's *own* conception / adoption of a 'social construct' might be termed a 'worldview' -- and this is where I jump in.... I've created a number of diagrams, three of which I've attached to this posting since I think they're relevant here

Spirituality is the potential proto-science, not religion (you know, dogmas and that kind of shit).