Federal Prisons

We are in a paper battle with the new wave guards that are being shipped into Texa$ system now. As I sit in pre-hearing detention (PHD) for "assaulting a guard with a weapon that resulted in a non-serious injury."

I took a broken fan body from the trash can because I needed a part off of it. This guard shows up at the cell door and screams "give it back!!" So I hand it to him and walk off, go on to breakfast, eat, and come back. Then the Sergeant and Lieutenant show up on the block. The guard walks up to me and says I assaulted him with a weapon. He looked mad when I laughed in his face, I thought he was going to cry. He looked sick because I didn't react like he though I would. So I sit in PHD, for the past 18 days, with no court date as of yet.

Anyone that's housed on A-1 block (medium custody) has a target on their back ever since a dude beat up the Assistant Warden in the church house. And ever since then it's been a scorched earth policy towards anyone assigned to A-1 block. Send me a copy of the Texas pack that you put out. I feel it will be needed real soon.

These new guards read about how Texas prison system used to be ran pre-Ruiz and they think the system will back them in the post-Ruiz system. But they got laws in place now to stop all the old ways that TDC was ran. Texas went so far as to change their name to get away from their past. TDC to TDCJ.

I've been hammered on, a lot of cases in my 30+ years so far, but none as bad as the last 6 months! Since the dude beat up the Assistant Warden A-1 has been on the state's hit list for anything. Two Latinos jumped on a European dude and got A-1 put on lockdown to control racial tension between the races. Dude blew up the Latino radio and says "oh well," so he got flat weeded. That ain't got nothin to do with race. But it's A-1 block so screw the thumb screws tighter!

Texas is attempting to force you to be a snitch. If your cellie is doing something wrong, if you do not tell on him and he gets a case, you get the same case for not telling on him. So some dude that got cases from their cellies are filing on it using the Texas Criminal Code 500.001 and are starting to get the guards and ranking authorities in hot water, by attempting to put in place a soft form of building tender's by using the snitch or disciplinary case method to find out what's going on the block.

Well I'll close it out for now. My broken knuckle is starting to bang and ibuprofen 600 does not work too good, you know. Remain in the struggle.

I'm in the Violent Control Unit (VCU) in Florence, Arizona at ASPC Eyman - SMU I, locked away in deplorable conditions far worse than regular isolation. This unit was customarily reserved for the severely mentally ill or for prisoners with unpopular views. "The unmanageable." The cell fronts are covered with a Plexiglas shield. There is no form of human contact in isolation. No window to the outside world. Recreation consists of four concrete (twenty foot high walls), which begins by being strip searched and then shackles are placed behind our back. Visits are non-contact for two hours that are separated by Plexiglas window, no hole in the middle to speak through or phones only a mesh screen about an inch wide along the edges of the window.

One of the many repressive tactics ADC continues to use against me is deliberately placing me in the treacherous shadows of the severely mentally ill who require serious psychiatric care. Their intended purpose is to cause psychological torture. Each prisoner is placed in direct ear shot of each other in small eight man clusters where the mentally ill bang, scream, cry, mutilate and kill themselves. Paranoia, delusions and homicidal rage begins to consume a person's mind. Prisoners are stripped of all personal property and 24 hour illumination is endless. Stripped of all humanity except the right to remain alive.

During my second day in VCU I was food poisoned by ADC staff. The extended days, freezing nights, constant loud noises, cell walls smeared with feces, tasers, sadistic guards and K-9 dogs during this vicious era provided me with a fierce desire to stand up and speak out against inhumane conditions. I was no longer innocent, yet I discovered a deep-seated purpose to survive. For years ADC denied that such unit existed until a seasoned jailhouse lawyer — Mr. James Skinner — magically appeared and dismantled it by using a 1983 civil rights action in 2007.

I've spent the previous fourteen years of my life in prison learning to read, write, survive and acquire enough legal skills to navigate myself and others through the state and federal court system. Most prisoners in state prison can't afford to hire a lawyer and are usually ill-equipped to enforce their own constitutional rights in court. The systemic deficiencies in our court system is designed to deprive us of the very thing it portrays — justice. It instead serves as a smoke screen to legitimize our mass incarceration epidemic. The hyper-technicalities and court rules makes it virtually impossible to overcome this oppressive scheme. Nonetheless, I've made significant progress in locating the barriers that prevents our voices from being heard and I've articulated a path toward reaching equality, to overcome the impediment that has kept us voiceless and faceless. Solitary confinement either brings out the best or the worse in us.

In 2012, I became involved as a class action representative contesting ADC's unconstitutional practice of housing prisoners with pre-existing mental illnesses in isolation. Despite extensive research from several human right organizations and highly qualified mental health experts into my social history and the psychological effect my confinement has had on me including stipulations between the ACLU and ADC condemning the use of long-term isolation, ADC officials continue to profit from this unpredictable choice of rehabilitation. Holding prisoners in long-term isolation is more than inhumane — it's detrimental to our physical health.

The eighth amendment prohibits the use of chemical agents on prisoners taking psychotropic medication because it effects the bodies ability to regulate heat and greatly increases the risk of heat related illnesses. Yet, ADC continues to use chemical agents against me as a form of a sporting event. My day to day regimen depends largely on the uncertainty of suicide. You slowly lose your grip on your willingness to survive, it's uncontrollable!

Just so we're clear, the law says the punishment for being convicted of a crime is the prison sentence, but the law enforcement community see the prison as a place to inflict terror and abuse upon its prisoners until all hope for humanity is lost. Prison is an unrelenting machine turning societies under-privileged around and around, faster and faster in a vicious cycle of misery, brutality, frame-ups and assassinations. It is well-documented in my institutional file that my name and number have appeared on a multitude of New Mexican Mafia "kill lists." Despite knowledge of this information ADC has knowingly placed me on the same tier with known enemies, I've been involved in multiple stabbings and vicious assaults.

It's clear as day prison only serves as a basis for recidivism and is designed to encourage violence, drug abuse, to disproportionately imprison people from low-income communities and with time has shown the "war on drugs" rhetoric was in fact propagated to thwart the civilization of a less popular class. State law prohibits educational programs for prisoners housed in solitary confinement, transitional programs from solitary to society or from isolation to a less-restrictive environment are crucial in reducing the recidivism rate, yet they're non-existent. Why? We're deprived of our strongest source of liberation. Lawmakers have an inherited process of discrediting and demoralizing the integrity of the elementary rights of prisoners all across the county. The target of this false premise is not only us but the U.S. Constitution itself.

I would like to bring to the attention of all comrades one of the more subtle ways the Texas department of criminal injustice subjugates its slaves. Yes we are slaves. The Texas prison system has a little tool it uses to affect the minds of the slaves. It's called The Echo. This is a monthly publication put out by TDCinJ (Texas Department of Criminal inJustice). It has about as much journalistic integrity as a house of cards has stability. TDCJ is forever finding ways to save a nickel, such as starving the slaves on the weekend. So it is a wonder that something like The Echo should not be cut from the budget. But it remains as it is: an insidious but very effective weapon for keeping the slaves compliant.

All comrades, understand The Echo is a propaganda publication funded by TDCinJ for the sole purpose of aiding in your continued submission. I would like to point out a particular feature that is popular among the slaves and that is a section called "DARBY," wherein slaves send complaints and the like. The response from Darby is always the same. He warns the slaves to stop sniveling and whining. He warns us that we are in prison and should expect to just accept every indignity and injustice that we are subjected to. He preys upon the slaves' masculinity, as if to file a grievance is for girls and lesser men. Even in the middle of the columns will appear a little baby in diapers with tears falling from his eyes as if to imply that if you make a complaint or speak a word about an issue you are a sniveling baby. That is just one of the subtle ways The Echo manipulates the minds of the slaves.

Another point is what you will not find in The Echo and that is anything that actually benefits or improves your quality of life on the plantation, such as, about 18 months ago in the Midland paper on the front page was an article about the heat issue in TDCinJ. Recent federal court cases have been won regarding people dying in custody, and TDCinJ has been ordered to address the issue. The article showed Holiday Unit being equipped with some portable swamp coolers for trial testing. For the last 18 months I have been waiting for The Echo to report on this issue and not a peep, zip zero zilch nada.

Comrades, The Echo is a dangerous rag that should be avoided at all times. A journalistic publication that purports to publish information of importance to inmates should do that and The Echo is nothing more than a tool of oppression. Do not read The Echo. It is only for the advantage of the prisoncrats and not us slaves. Use your grievances and fuck Darby.

MIM(Prisons) responds: We have seen a few issues of The Echo, and we echo this writer's criticism that it is just intended for distraction and to cultivate an attitude of complacency among its readers. All media outlets reflect the interests of the group that funds and edits it. If we want to hear news and information that will build up the oppressed peoples of the world, including U.$. prisoners, we need media outlets that reflect those interests. For example, this newsletter is written mostly by oppressed nation prisoners of the United $tates, and is specifically intended to reflect the interests of the most oppressed people in the world.

MIM(Prisons) not only publishes Under Lock & Key, it also compiles and distributes the exact information that the author of this article is talking about: how to file grievances, how to get your needs and rights addressed within TDCinJ. At about $2.50 a pop, we send in hundreds of these Texas Activist Packs each year. While our projects address a dire need, which is created by TDCinJ itself, we are not funded by the bourgeoisie and so have very limited financial support. If you want to see this newsletter continue, you need to support it with your political and financial contributions.

We also want to address this writer's framing of prisoners as slaves. MIM(Prisons) disagrees with the use of the economic classification of "slavery" for U.$. prisoners, which we've addressed at length elsewhere. We also question the intent of organizing around the line that prisoners are slaves. Many people who push this line are pushing for economic integration of prisoners into the U.$. economic sphere. They advocate for an exploiter-level minimum wage for prisoners, ignoring the fact that this wage is earned by U.$. military aggression abroad. This amounts to demanding privilege for prisoners at the expense of the international proletariat. We have to always be cautious about how we frame demands to ensure they are in the interests of the world's oppressed, and not just favoring one group over another.

Instead MIM(Prisons) sees prisons as a tool of social control, much like The Echo itself, to keep the oppressed internal semi-colonies under the boot of U.$. imperialism. Instead of asking for more integration into Amerikkka, we push prisoners to take up their respective nation's liberation struggle for self-determination, with the goal of a future without imperialism, slavery or any form of oppression.

As of 22 August 2016 I have begun a peaceful protest (Hunger Strike). If my death would be the price for oversight on the New York State Department of Correctional and Community Supervision (DOCCS) and a complete stop of abuse racism, intimidation, inhumane treatment of solitary confinement and most of all staff brutality so be it!

On 10 August 2016, I was beaten and called racial names and threatened by correctional officers Horvey, T. Erbach and three others whose names are unknown, in the presence of an area supervisor, Sergeant Keith McFall. Sergeant McFall was the individual who made the threats to plant a weapon, two in fact. NYS DOCCS haven't begun an investigation, and when they do the conclusion will be biased as the COs try to justify their actions by filing and submitting false documents (use of force and misbehavior report) stating I attempted to strike the officer, which is a complete lie.

Furthermore, I have no personal property because Attica Correctional Facility refuses to ship my property as a retaliation to a situation that transpired at that facility because of the correctional officers not feeding individuals. Prisoners, including myself, began an uprising which was the cause of the transfer to Southport CF. Anyhow, I refuse to eat until a full investigation is done and I receive my property. These correctional officers must/should be charged with gang assault in the 1st degree Penal Law 175.35.

I'm an administrative segregation offender who's being harassed food contamination in daily food and purchased commissary goods due to being a defiant litigated/grievance filer whom has challenged the medical co-payment outside of this control unit. I have used the grievance petition campaign a Texas prisoner put together that MIM(Prisons) distributed to me, and filed numerous civil actions against several administrative segregation unit administration due to their disgusting good old boy system (abuse, torture, and corrupt tactic). So know I'm experiencing and living the daily reprisals that comes with exposing and trying to prove something against a diabolical system that indoctrinates her state employees. The Cesntral Administrative Classification Committee - State Classification Committee (SCC) and the Administrative Segregation Committee (ASC) here on High Security Gib Lewis has to continue in remaining me in (AD-SEG) to isolate, subjugate, repress and keep a micro-manage eye on me due to my activism against this establishment. If I'm released back into general population these hierarchical officials know that if I get up around them brothers that know civil law in population they will have a provable action on hand.

They have successfully manipulated their inmate lackeys against me including the assigned lumpen STG organizations and to further the onslaught the captains and major has the courtroom to keep a mentally ill, or what we call "psych patient." This administration is putting a mentally ill assigned inmate on each side of me as neighbors so I guess to get a "he's a psych patient reaction too," out the rest of the so called stable inmates assigned in (AD-SEG). Yes these officials is complicit in every good old boy system break tactic at me. Then here comes the psychiatrist department trying to intervene as I'm paranoid, schizophrenic and need their assessments and mental evaluation all of a sudden. No Mr. Fuller I don't need your toxic drugs as the green light justifying these officials actions as if there is something mentally unstable about any of my complaints against the (Super Seg) Lewis Administration.

[Need to insert url below. for some reason prisoncensorship.info wasn't loading for me so couldn't pull it up.

I'm not sure this adequately addresses the writer's complaints but re-reading the lumpen class article I don't really get what they are criticizing because we never say that we defined the lumpen using the poverty line. Mostly they seem upset that we don't recognize that some full time workers who earn around $10k really have it hard and that's not enough to pay for their basic necessities. i.e. not exploited, but also life in amerika is so expensive they can't really afford it. I think this is a reasonable premise: there may be a small percentage of these folks in the U.S. who don't spend money on luxuries, work full time, and really can't pay for the basics. They aren't prol, but they also aren't lumpen.

Wia: Yes we do, we say: "Summing up the income data for defining the lumpen population, we can conservatively use the cut off of $10k/year for family income to say that 16% of New Afrikan families are lumpen and 10% of Latin@ families are lumpen or migrant proletarian." But maybe they're missing that we are using it to estimate the people not working full time or working below minimum wage, and not to measure their living conditions.

It seems this would be best written as a letter response to get clarity than an article. I started pulling some (possibly) relevant stuff on incomes, and just tacked it at the end when it seemed this was not really worth publishing. ]

In ULK51 in the article Defining and Measuring the Lumpen Class in the U.$, I found the part of "Lumpen Defined by Income" a bit archaic, and may need to be re-analyzed to give a clearer perspective of the income to standard of living ratio.

Even though unskilled and semi-skilled labor, paid at minimum wage, would seem to be overvalued in comparison to the pay of oppressed nations, from the perspective that minimum wage could buy more and go further within those countries, from the perspective of receiving such pay within the United $nakes it is still not enough to pay for all the basic necessities, such as food, shelter, clothing, medical and education for one humyn, let alone a further humyn.

In 1990 the U.$. tax government declared that under $12,000 a year to be living "At poverty level." In the base pay values of $3 to $5 an hour at 40 hours a week. $5 seems to meet your criteria of the $10,000 cut off point, by being at $10,400 for a 52 week year (no vacations) but would still be considered living under the "poverty line" in 1990, over twenty years ago. I am not sure what the U.$. tax government considers the "poverty level" now, and even though it would be "luxurious" compared to third world standards, at this level within the U.$., to make ends meet, these poverty level humyns would still be considered living parasitically off the wasted excess of the First World, in such commodities as food, shelter, and water that they often obtained in ways other than the trade of government currency.

I just think that the section should be re-evaluated.

MIM(Prisons) responds: In the Defining and Measuring the Lumpen Class article we addressed a few important points. First, we need to understand what the term lumpen means. By definition, those engaged in full time work for pay are not part of the lumpen. The lumpen are unemployed or underemployed. Even people working full time and hustling on the side for extra cash are not part of the lumpen, though they may be more likely sympathetic to lumpen ideas and sentiments. Whether or not someone lives below the poverty line is irrelevant to defining the lumpen. There are some lumpen who earn more than full time working people. We just used income calculations to try to determine what percentage of the population is outside of the traditional workforce.

We're not sure what this comrade would propose for a re-evaluation of that section of defining lumpen by income since we didn't use poverty as a metric for lumpen class status, but rather for full time workers we need to look at income as a metric for proletarian vs. labor aristocracy status (based on whether or not someone earns more than the value of their labor).

We did address this question of the "poverty line" in the lead up to our analysis of lumpen defined by income in that same article: "Yet, even in the recent recession, government-defined poverty rates have not yet reached the levels they were at prior to 1965 when they were around 20%, give or take. In 2011 the poverty rate was recorded as 15%. Even this rate is inflated since assistance in the form of tax credits and food stamps is not counted as taxable income. If this income was included in their calculations it would pull 9.6 million people above the poverty line and bring the percent below the poverty rate to less than 12%. So it is only a small group at the margins that may be seeing a shift in their material conditions such that they could arguably be seen as not largely benefiting from imperialism."

It is true that many full time workers in the U.$. fall below the government-defined poverty line. As this writer says, we can see that many of these folks are living parasitically off of the excess stolen from the Third World. The most interesting point here is that some full time workers need to hustle on the side to survive. That might reasonably expand the group who, while not technically lumpen, is sympathetic to the lumpen and potentially revolutionary.

The Poverty Guideline for 2016 for the 48 contiguous states was $11,880 for an individual, increasing at increments of $4,160 for each additional family member. Many people claim that the cost of living is higher in the United $tates so we deserve to get paid more. This critique is why "purchasing power parity" (PPP) was developed as a way to measure Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita. What purchasing power parity measures is not how many dollars the average persyn earns, but the average amount of value in real goods they can purchase with their income. The United $tates ranks #10 in this measurement, with most places ranking higher than it being industrial cities in Asia and small oil-producing entities. (http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.CD?year_high_desc=true) The U.$. GDP(PPP) is $55,836 per persyn in 2015, approaching 6 times that of the global average of $15,470. In other words, the "high cost of living" does not justify the high income levels in the United $tates.

Of course, those GDP per capita figures are averages and tell us nothing about the lowest rungs of those populations.

I am a Missouri Prisoner in Jefferson City. I have been in the SHU for over a year and the COs here, staff, caseworkers, nurses, etc are illegally keeping inmates in the SHU longer than necessary, refusing inmates medical attention, refusing inmates meals, harassing and assaulting inmates. I could list about a hundred more ways these capitalists are breaking the law.

I came to the hole for an alleged "guard assault." I got charged with 1st degree assault on law enforcement and convicted with 20 years ran in with my current sentence.

When I first got thrown in the hole for this I was placed in a highly air conditioned cell in nothing but my boxers and shirt. No mattress, blanket or anything; save my toilet. I was like this for a month. Correctional Officers (COs) repeatedly maced me. When maced I was given nothing but a rag to clean it up with. COs refused me my meals and constantly made threats to "get rid of" me. When I finally got a mattress it was covered in piss from its previous user. The same day I got pulled out and my mattress taken. The pigs said I tore it up and wrote me up for destruction of state property charging me $68. My mail from my family was constantly coming up missing and the mail I sent out wasn't getting to my family/friends. I was on a box called SSO (Safety Security Observation) for 5 months where I couldn't get haircuts, use nail clippers, or get visits.

When I finally got written up for this so-called "incident" I was written up for 1.1 murder. The only thing is at the very bottom of the violation "attempt" was in parenthesis. This was done to keep me in solitary for as long as they want. According to their 1.1 policy, it says nowhere in policy that there is an attempt. It's either 1.1 Murder or 2.1 Serious damage to an offender or correctional officer. I challenged this and was denied. I have been over their "90 day" violation free bullshit, yet they will not promote me to Phase 1. They have a Step up Program: Phase 0-3. 0 is solitary, 1-2 is double man if you're not "single cell mandate" (get to that in a minute) and 2 you get food (nothing but fatty junk food) and 3 is double man with all your canteen, you can walk to chow, and go to gym.

I am thankfully not on single cell mandate, yet they continue to hold me illegally in solitary depriving me of contact visits.

Single cell mandate is where inmates cannot have a celly and either have to rot in Jefferson City hole or do a program in Potosi where you sit in solitary 5-10 years and get harassed by police and assaulted sometimes ending in death.

Since being in solitary here I have looked out my window and seen stretchers carrying inmates dead or extremely injured off the yard. Mainly coming from medical. The pigs here fuck with inmates so bad here (no joke) inmates are cutting their nutsacks out and nothing is done to help these mental health inmates, but a big help of maze.

I've been to quite a few Missouri penitentiaries, but I have never seen anything like I've seen here. Torture, harassment, and completely sadistic brutality, like 5 pigs running in a prisoner's cell with helmets and riot shields beating the shit out of inmates breaking their bones. The phase system is a SHU trap. I'll probably get fucked up for this letter if you receive it. Please spread the news of this so-called respectable prison.

In the People's Republic:
An American's First Hand View of Living and Working in China
by Orville Schell
1977

The author's trip was arranged in the 1970s by the Hinton's, an Amerikan family. The group was composed of men and womyn between the ages of 18 and 60. As I read 'In the Peoples Republic' I came to see each subchapter as a beautiful blueprint of Maoism in practice It was very informative on how people can transform all their daily habits to better the people as a whole. For instance, Mao's China seemed what some today would call "green" friendly, Schell explains how hotels in the city that obviously generate much trash, separated the trash for organic garbage, which was sent to pig farms and used for slop. This was done nationwide. Even human waste was collected in what they called "honey trucks" and taken to special ponds where thy would turn to fertilizer. This recycling and notion of wasting nothing is an advancement that even 30+ years later has not reached the U$ on a nationwide level. The Chinese people's ability to use all material was remarkable, wasting nothing was common practice.

On the passing of Chiang Kai Shek Schell notes that hardly a mention was given in the People's Daily publication, and there was no rejoycing or anger shown in the streets or otherwise and that the people hated what he stood for, but not him as a person. This shows the difference under socialism and the behavior the people developed even to disliked enemies, unlike here in Amerika as we witnessed the gleefullness and cheer in the U$ media when Saddam Hussein was executed. It is clear that under capitalism humyns mean shit.

Shell included Mao's essay "the twenty manifestations of bureaucracy" in its entirety. This document showed Mao's passionate disagreement with different bureaucracy. It was real good to see Mao fervently denouncing ever becoming disconnected from the people. During the Cultural Revolution many plays and dance troupes even addressed this issue with one of the performers wearing oversized glasses, dressed in a suit with much face makeup appearing very pale from staying in an office and carrying a briefcase. This performer played the arrogant bureaucracy.

What I enjoyed about 'In the Peoples Republic' was it gave a brief description of all levels of society in a Maoist country. Even the artists and performers only created artforms that had a correct line and benefited the people, and what was amazing is even the best performers or dancers were never singled out and praised. This is a deep contrast to what is seen here in Amerika where it is totally opposite and performers or dancers and especially actors and actresses are praised for their individuality. Individualism is not only praised here but expected.

This book spoke a lot of Mao's emphasis on including the peasants in all spheres of society, Schell described how dance troupes would take their andmade props and travel by foot to mountainous areas off the beaten path where they would perform their politically charged dance performances and songs to peasants and when Shell asked one of the performers "where do you live on such trips?" the performer stated "we live with the peasants" and he went on to describe how they have the "three togethers": eat together, live together and work together.

A scenario was posed that would be incomprehensible here in the U.$. While touring Schell's guide in China gathered some workers off the street, a factory worker and other store workers, and conducted a political discussion and the workers explained how politics apply to their jobs. Schell wrote how in the U.$. during a foreign tour if one would gather a Kentucky Fried Chicken worker, a Safeway worker, etc and the same discussion was held, how different that discussion would be. I believe this is because in this country it would not be beneficial to U.$. interests for the masses to take up politics because should the people become aware of how things work, capitalism would suffer, so the average person is kept in the dark about politics. I thought this was a good scenario that showed the big contradiction in socialist versus capitalist societies, and the average person living in these societies.

Having experienced the imperialist prisons and its most suppressive states, i.e. control units/security housing units, I was particularly interested in the subchapter on prisons. There was a short description of the prisons in Mao's China that I enjoyed, I saw the real difference in treatment in a socialist prison and in a Maoist prison specifically. Here in imperialist Amerika most prisons will often pass out Christian bibles, prison officials will leave a vast amount of bibles and other religious literature in the dayroom where it is all conveniently accessible to prisoners. Prison officials often send religious pastors cell to cell asking if prisoners would like to discuss/learn about religion. I often tell these pastors I would rather discuss communism and this usually sparks a long debate between me and the pastor, ending with the pastor walking off angry because I point out religion's long history of atrocity and oppression.

According to Schell, when he and his group visited a prison in China, all cells had Marx, Lenin and Maist books in each cell. They also worked and partook in criticism/self-criticism, there were not reports of prison riots, suicide or guards abusing prisoners, unlike here inthe U.$. where there are many of suicides and guards are always caught abusing prisoners. Here even rape is a common occurance, depression is high with guards feeling a sense of hopelessness as well as prisoners. In contrast, in Mao's Chian prison guards felt it a great honor to work as prison guards as it was seen as a great contribution in rebuilding these people and socialist reconstruction as a whole.

This book was good and gave a good study of Maoism in practice. I would liked it to be more in depth on things or to show more on China's economics or its military, nonetheless it was a good look into everyday life in a Maoist society.

MIM(Prisons) adds: The author is a Harvard graduate who travelled with a group of other U.$. citizens to China in the last few months of Mao's life. They worked in a factory for a few weeks, worked in a field for a few weeks, and toured many facilities such as clinics and schools. In the People's Republic is written exclusively through the subjective filter of a typical Amerikkkan with a bourgeois perspective. The main take-home lesson of this book seems to be "Socialism works for the Chinese because they are so odd and different from Amerikans. Socialism is against so many cultural values we have as Amerikans, and it is bad for us for these reasons."

It gives a favorable view of China in this period, but summarizes it as the Chinese are "just different" from Amerikans. The author writes off much of the Chinese hospitality as awkward and boring, and has a near obsession with connecting with the Chinese on an individual level, and telling anecdotes with a sense of irony. While having an apparent ignorance of Mao Tse-Tung Thought, the author does not hesitate to interpret the Chinese's body language and conversation through an Amerikan cultural lens.

If you already have an understanding of Maoism and Chinese society under socialism, it can be interesting to read about such an important project from a bourgeois perspective. While the author's subjective interpretation of events is "off", ey at least doesn't lie about how successful the Chinese were in raising the living standards of even the most destitute people in the country in incredible ways. There is much first-hand favorable reflection on the cultural revolution as well.

There is one point that we disagree with in this review, and apparently also with the author of In the People's Republic. Both Schell and the author of the review seem to think that Amerikan's are not given information about politics because it is in the interests of Amerikan capitalism to keep them in the dark. The reviewer wrote: "I believe this is because in this country it would not be beneficial to U.$. interests for the masses to take up politics because should the people become aware of how things work, capitalism would suffer, so the average person is kept in the dark about politics."

Since 2011 GA DOC has declared war against all prisoners validated "Goodfella." As a whole all priosoners validated Goodfella have been held on lockdown at all prisons in GA for an altercation that happened between Goodfella and Bloods. While on this never ending lockdown DOC started what they call the "Tier" program which is a lockdown program for disciplinary inmates. All prisoners validated Goodfella were automatically placed on this progra, which is supposed to be a 9 month program. Then prisoners get placed back into population. The program was originally a 3 phase program. Prison officials implemented what they call a "3 plus" phase just for all members of Goodfella to keep us locked down as I write this we are still locked down and on this program.

While on this program we are stripped of all rights, property, liberty and subjected to inhumane conditions. We're degraded, treated like animals, denied proper adequate medical and law library. We locked in a prison cell 24 hours a day. Officers and prison officials constantly oppress and suppress us. We're not allowed vocational programs, education classes, job training or job enhancing skills. Newspapers, books, raidios, TV or nothing to help us to grow mentally and help us transiton back into society. So basically our brothers are leaving prison the same way they came in or worse. Nothing rehabilitative comes from this program. It's designed to break us mentally so they can control us like robots.

Since this program started look at the suicide rate and attempts in GA prison system. They don't care about the psychological trauma stemming form this oppression, suppression and repression that's elading to depression.

Myself as well as many other gang members have attempted to bring peace amongst our different gangs or organizations but now DOC scared to let us out for fear we going to unite with other gangs or organizations against the officers.

We've attempted to bring unity while back here on lockdown but brothers are scared and some still on some lil boy story and holding grudges. I went to the door last week and asked did anyone know who Bobby Seale, Fred Hampton, Huey P, Marc Clark, George Jackson and many other Black revolutionaries were. They knew one or two but no one knew everyone I ask them about. Then I ask about Bobby Hutton. Geronimo Pratt, Mutulu Shakur Al-Amin and got the same result and immediately I know the problem: our youth lack proper education. The history book only teach white history and slavery side of black history in the south.

Around 90% of inamtes released off tier program into society either start a life of crime and be in and out of jail, return to prison, do nothing productive with their lives or get killed. Why is that when this supposed to be a "therapeutic" program designed to rehabilitate and change our way of thinking? I'll tell you why, because the tier is being used to break us mentally so they can control us. We being oppressed daily. We being stripped of all rights and forced to endure degrading inhumane conditions. And people wonder why Georgia recidivism rate so high. It's because prisoners not being allowed to pursue an education, get trades or job enhancing skills so our comrades getting out the same way they came in or worse. Keep a man locked in a 2 man cell 24 hours a day for years. Forcing us to accept the small amounts of food on trays. Forcuing us to smell another man feces. Forcing us to live in inclement conditions. Forcing us to endure weather so hot if you move you sweat. How can a person be rehabilitated in this type of atmosphere. They can't they not trying to. That's their plan to either break us mentally or force us into withdrawl or depression where we lash out agressively.

Nothing positive come from this program. Look at how many prisoners have turend to mental health to try to relieve the mental pain being administered by prison officials oppressive program.

[Wisconsin prisoners have been on hunger strike since June 10 protesting long-term solitary confinement practices. Read previous updates from July and April and learn how you can support this struggle.- Editor]

Update on the food strike in Wisconsin Department of Corrections: We are still on it and still receiving support across the country from outside parts. Us at Columbia Correctional Institution (CCI) are eating just enough to prevent them from force feeding until I can get a supervisory writ filed in WI Court of Appeals (WI. Ct. App.) The circuit court in collusion with DOC did not address and/or acknowledge filings. Those at Waupun Correctional Institution (WCI) last I heard were still being force fed and the court made the order permanent fluid.

One WCI striker had to go to the hospital as result of abuse, got an infection and could have died. Broke his nose too.

United States East District court refused class classification. Comrade previously vowed to appeal that but it's supposed to be new 7th Circuit precedent, stating prisoners gotta have a layer for class certification for class action (I'm not sure of this legality. I have yet to see the order and new case).

Both republican and democrat state officials are supposed to be "interested" in new solitary confinement legislation. One official met with a comrade at WCI. They only let two people visit. The official was the second. While that visit occurred, other officials walked through the oppressive confines.

This struggle is not over. The DOC is still making oppressive plays. On August 8 they continued my AC (Administrative Confinement) going on 19 years. The reasons are simple and concise: my release to GP will be a danger because I'll influence the younger prisoners based on my conduct history. And they noted, my lack of participation (code for kiss ass) showing my disinterest in AC process. (AC process: letting them degrade me, demonize me and sit there begging them and demeaning myself, saying I'm not all that bad mas'er.)

DOC and CCI are still making oppressive moves. Our food portions get smaller every week. And they are cutting movement/activities while telling the public they are studying ways to provide the same in more form.

They are frustrating my access to court, not letting me go to law library, or access the computer to type up my motions. Forcing me to send nerve-damage-penned documents into the court. Knowing courts look down on and don't read chicken scratch. We need you all out there reading this to continue the letter writing campaign that was printed in ULK 51. Write Gov. Walker, State officials, wardens at WCI, CCI and DOC secretary.