Amerikan dungeons release two anti-imperialist wimmin.

Mumia Abu Jamal condemns Black politicians for selling out Black 
revolutionary  Assata Shakur.

A new york prisoner explains life in a prison cell.


VOICE ONE 

Amerikan dungeons release two anti-imperialist wimmin.

Anti-imperialist Laura Whitehorn was released from prison in 
August. And Silvia Baraldini was transferred to her native Italy 
later in the month. These wimmin, along with hundreds of other 
revolutionaries still incarcerated, were imprisoned for their 
political opposition to Amerika's imperialist rampaging. These 
wimmin were punished for their participation in the struggle for 
justice. While Amerika attempts to push public attention toward 
the violation of human rights in other countries, Amerika 
continues to assassinate, incarcerate and brutalize people who 
oppose oppression within the belly of the beast.

Laura Whitehorn was initially arrested in 1985 and was sentenced 
to 23 years. Whitehorn was one of the defendants in the Resistance 
Conspiracy Case, charged with [quote] "conspiracy to oppose, 
protest and change the policies and practices of the United States 
government in domestic and international matters by violence and 
illegal means." [end quote]

Silvia Baraldini, also a revolutionary anti-imperialist 
incarcerated for her political beliefs and alleged roles in 
political actions has finally been returned to Italy. Among the 
things Silvia is accused of is aiding in the escape of Black 
Liberation Army leader Assata Shakur, who now lives in exile in 
Cuba. Amerika's incarceration and inhumane treatment of Silvia is 
due to her involvement with revolutionary struggle rather than the 
crimes she was convicted of.  In fact, Silvia was never convicted 
of carrying out any violent acts or harming other people.

Many of our readers may be familiar with Silvia from the video 
"Through the Wire" about the first control unit prison for wimmin 
in Lexington, Kentucky. MIM has held several events at which the 
video was shown to raise awareness regarding the treatment of 
incarcerated revolutionaries. Silvia Baraldini was incarcerated 
along with Puerto Rican revolutionary Alejandrina Torres and anti- 
imperialist Susan Rosenberg at the Lexington control unit 
explicitly to break their political will. The wimmin were 
subjected to small group isolation, sensory deprivation, and other 
control tactics such as constant video surveillance, unnecessary 
strip searches, cavity probes and constant fluorescent lighting in 
the basement dungeon for nearly two years. The wimmin also were 
denied adequate medical care that resulted in Baraldini's health 
declining severely as cancer developed. The control unit was 
eventually closed down as a result of consistent outside 
opposition to the inhumane, Nazi-like experiment.

Silvia has been imprisoned since 1983. Five times since 1989, 
Silvia and the Italian government had requested she be returned to 
Italy under a treaty that allows prisoners convicted abroad to 
serve their sentences at home. Each time Amerika said no, fearing 
that this leader of the people would not be adequately tortured by 
the Italian prison system.

But Italian anger toward Amerika grew after a u.$. Marine jet 
killed 20 people as it sliced through a gondala cable at an 
Italian ski resort in February 1998. Increased Italian protest 
helped to pressure the United Snakes to allow Silvia to return 
home.

Baraldini's transfer will not bring back the 20 Italians murdered 
by the U.$. Marines and it does not absolve Amerika from its 
imperialist crimes. However, taking advantage of the mistakes of 
our enemies, the revolutionary forces can sometimes win small 
victories while building strength to take on the larger battles.

In an amazing violation of Italian sovereignty, the United Snakes 
has the right to determine Silvia's prison conditions in Italy 
until her sentence ends in 2008. The agreement also denies Silvia 
the right to medical care outside of the prison, despite her 
struggles against cancer.

MIM has long called all prisoners political prisoners in 
recognition of the political system that chooses who goes to 
prison and who does not. But we also recognize the importance of 
the fight for freedom of political leaders incarcerated explicitly 
for their political beliefs and actions. Their incarceration 
weakens the movement as a whole by taking them off the streets as 
well as institutionalizing the punishment of people for their 
ideas alone. We celebrate the release of Whitehorn and the 
transfer of Baraldini. We urge readers to become active to 
continue to fight for the release of politically active prisoners, 
justice for all prisoners, and ultimately for proletarian 
revolution. Proletarian revolution must continue to be our longer- 
term objective. It is the only means through which law making and 
enforcement are conducted in the interests of the oppressed for 
justice.

VOICE 2

This is an essay by Mumia Abu Jamal entitled "Selling out Assata". 
With Mumia's access to the media limited, this essay is read by 
the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist League. See for yourself why 
the United Snakes wants to silence revolutionary leader Mumia Abu 
Jamal.

[Mumia Essays CD, Vol 1, Track 9 6:46]



VOICE 3

In a prison cell
By a New York Prisoner

We live in a nation that promotes incarceration in order to purge 
its conscience of its incapability to provide adequate social 
services to its inhabitants. America is guilty of destroying the 
cognitive abilities, skills, and talents of those incarcerated 
because of its inability to find an alternative to incarceration. 
Those who remain silent participants in the enslavement of others, 
for convenience sake, are just as guilty as those spear-heading 
this social tragedy.

What is prison? Is it merely a place for the lawless? Or is it a 
product of the ultimate backlash of minority suppression-
suppression of the weak, the helpless, the disfranchised, or those 
simply needing a helping hand. 

It seems everywhere we look we see people being sent to prison as 
a form of corrective surgery for the ills that plague society. 
Prison has become the panacea for society's woes. There are about 
two million men and women confined in America. This number exceeds 
the populations of many third world countries. Strangely enough, a 
large percentage of this number are children. Children are forced 
to go through a rite of passage  - in a prison cell. 

Also, there's an inordinate amount of drug users in prison-- 
people trying to find relief from unfulfilling, alienating, or 
repressive realities in the tranquilizing affect of a euphoric 
high. Now they too are in a prison cell.

Prison has become a nursery for the young, a retirement home for 
the old, a drug center for the addicted, a psychiatric ward for 
the mentally ill, a concentration camp for illegal aliens, a group 
home for adolescents, a brothel for the guards, a trophy for the 
politicians, a beacon of hope for the unemployed and a massive 
industrial complex for the entrepreneur. For those trapped, within 
its walls, prison is a catatonic form of schizophrenia which 
reduces its inhabitants to a zombie-like state.

Prison is the only solution to every problem this society is 
afraid to confront. 

In truth, prison is the new plantation. A new form of social 
genocide. A new form of ethnic cleansing. A quick glimpse of the 
prison cell is really a look at the residence of today's neo-
slave.

The prison cell is as small as a bathroom. There's usually one man 
or woman permitted to a cell. A row of cells that makes up a tier. 
Usually four tiers are stacked upon each other for maximum 
occupancy (like a slave ship). The cell is constructed of steel. 
There's steel walls, steel toilets, steel sinks and steel bars 
with a sliding steel gate. 

You live in this steel cage and experience a host of emotions that 
has nothing to do with rehabilitation. In truth, you feel raped, 
violated, victimized and confused. These moments of emotional 
disorder add up, months and months turn into years until you 
suffocate and slowly decay - in a prison cell. 

The cell is too small for physical exercise. How can you exercise 
in a coffin? How can you exercise your mind while listening to the 
sounds of agony and despair from others like yourself? Time 
becomes your enemy and your friend. You await the recreational 
period, the sliding of the coffin lid, signifying a pseudo escape 
from the trauma of being caged. Only to return, three hours later, 
to once again endure hell - in a prison cell. 

The bed in the cell is constructed of five pieces of cotton 
enclosed in a coarse cover. This piece of board is placed on a 
steel frame deemed fit, by politicians, for posture-pedic comfort. 

In the cell you sleep, you listen to music and sometimes you eat. 
You read, you write, you cry and occasionally you laugh....

Something happens to the person in the cell. He loses himself. He 
slowly becomes Frankenstein looking for an opportunity to destroy 
his creator. Survival becomes paramount. Survival of the fittest 
is taken to the extreme - in a prison cell.

--by a New York prisoner.