In May of this year, prisoner Regan Clarine was given a C-section during which "[T]hey decided to use sugar" as an antibiotic (the way they did in the early 1900s, when they still used heroin to treat children's coughs). Clarine stated that "[t]hey would open it and pour it inside [the wound] and put gauze over and tape it up. And I had to do that for like three weeks." The head of the Arizona prison system responded by advising we "take [inmates' stories] with a grain of salt or in the case of the hospital, with maybe a grain of sugar."
In 2011, just under half of the 1.5 million drug arrests were for marijuana possession, and an FBI report estimated that one marijuana-related arrest was made every 42 seconds that year. While a National Household Survey on Drug Abuse and Health that spanned from 2001-2010 found that more whites than blacks have ever even used marijuana, arrest rates for marijuana possession were shown to be dramatically higher for blacks than whites. This, among other stories, is evidence of an inherently racist criminal justice system.
At the beginning of the 20th century, it was outlawed for private corporations to run prisons. However, many prisons are now run by private companies. A for-profit prison model is detrimental to any hope of fair treatment towards prisoners. Private prisons and the neglectful way they are run has resulted in maggots in prisoners' food, a baby girl being born into a toilet, and a lot of violent outbreak.
Prisons in the U.S have done very little that could be considered cutting-edge. Our capitalist mindset, as old as the nation itself, has infiltrated the prison system through privatization, reducing real people to their monetary cost (another familiar pattern of American economics). Prisons are not only treating prisoners unjustly, but their arrest rates have done very little in the way of even improving public safety. One cannot claim that America is challenging frontiers in prison management without facing a huge amount of evidence to the contrary.
This is astounding. This is kind of specific but are there any staggering differences in care (medical or other) for women in prison versus men?
ReplyDeleteDefinitely- of course, care overall for prisoners is pretty limited, but because women are such a small percentage of the prison population, women's care is often neglected. Sexual abuse and pregnancies are definitely two big issues.This is kind of dense- http://www.udel.edu/soc/tammya/pdfs/Issues%20in%20the%20Availability%20of%20Healthcare%20for%20Women%20in%20Prison.pdf- but this is a study about women's care in prisons. There are a lot of other good resources for learning more, too. A lighter article (http://www.alternet.org/story/66637/for_women_behind_bars,_%22health_care%22_can_be_deadly) covers what women can suffer medically in prison without proper care, and the Sentencing Project has a really thorough study of women in prisons.
ReplyDeleteHelen this is really good! I knew our prison systems weren't that great, but I didn't realize it was like this! Do you think the government should do anything about this?
ReplyDeleteI really liked your blog Helen!!! I had never really thought about the conditions in prison for men or women and this definitely made me think about it. Do you know if/think the conditions in the prisons differ based on the region of the country they are in?
ReplyDeleteRaveena- The government should absolutely do something about this. Prisons are meant to be government-run institutions, and the government is responsible for the wellbeing of all its citizens (criminal or not). Stricter regulations on prison management is definitely a must, and de-privatization of prisons is very important when it comes to being able to establish regulations.
ReplyDeleteJayna- I just read a list of Top 10 worst prisons according to Mother Jones and the majority of them (with one exception, in New York) were in the South. I think connections with that can probably be drawn from our usual assumptions/perception of the American South.
It's an embarrassment, for sure. Unfortunately, being the best at incarcerating people is not a sexy goal, but if the US wanted, it could try to be the best at creating fair laws with fair consequences.
ReplyDeleteIt could certainly try- unfortunately, that doesn't seem to quite be the case either.
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