California Prisons

As a counter to this messaging, the Strugglen Artists Association (SAA) has emerged as a culture project of United Struggle from Within. Through the SAA prisoners can send out unique messages that reflect the transformation they've made from parasites to productive people and leaders.

I displayed the [email protected] greeting cards at the last dayroom with a few [email protected] prisoners who i read the bible with (illustrating Christ as a socialist :) ). They were impressed and the entire ten cards I laid out are spoken for; just have to collect the stamps!

MIM(Prisons) adds: The above report comes from a Propaganda Worker of the Strugglen Artists Association (SAA). The job of a Propaganda Worker is to spread revolutionary culture amongst those at their locale, and help fundraise for the cultural arm of the SAA. At the time of our July 2015 Congress, the SAA had raised $44 on top of the expenses to run the project! These funds are slotted to be used to expand the SAA.

Building revolutionary culture is an important task for our movement. We know that even after a successful socialist revolution the people won't instantly learn to be selfless and automatically focused on serving the best interests of society. It will take many years to counter the reactionary culture of imperialism even after the economic system has been revolutionized. We saw this in the long struggle of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) in China, which mobilized people to attack leaders who were using positions of power for personal gain. A new bourgeoisie was forming within the party, and the GPCR was an ideological attempt to defeat it. The cultural work we do today is part of the broader cultural revolution that will extend into the construction of socialism.

You don't have to be an artist to help spread revolutionary culture; you can sign up to be a Propaganda Worker. We have blank greeting cards with revolutionary images; bookmarks with themes of spreading peace and overcoming drug addiction and alcoholism; coloring book pages to help reach children and illiterate folks, and to provide a creative outlet for those who do better with color than lines; and small posters to remind us to stay focused on a correct vision.

MIM(Prisons) is not selling these items outright; we are only sending them out in small bulk packages to be used as organizing tools. We know our subscribers have lots of skills for hawking and hustling. So why not put those skills to good use for the communist movement against all oppression? Write in for more info on how to become a Propaganda Worker.

As a loyal comrade who is committed to the struggle I have utmost respect for Under Lock & Key and I appreciate all that they/you contribute to the revolutionary struggle that is taking place today for those inside these concentration camps in the United Snakes. As the leading member of the Abolitionist From Within (AFW) I do support MIM and embrace as a group the five core principles of the United Front for Peace in Prisons.

While AFW may not agree with every political issue MIM advocates, it is the issues that we both support that bring us together in this revolutionary struggle. AFW recently had our first demonstration at High Desert State Prison (HDSP), bringing together a cohesive front in reflecting, fasting and uniting to honor those nameless and faceless men of Black August and Attica(1971) by coming together in solidarity. We brought up the issues of the day affecting us and we all offered solutions from each individual's perspective. It was a beautiful and righteous energy as we synergized listening to each other and offering suggestions and the best of ourselves during this time. We will meet again on September 9th and try to agree on the best solutions in attacking and combating the issues that are inflicting us today from the first meeting.

Memorializing Yogi, his comrade David Johnson called him an "educator" and the "spirit of the prison movement."(1) Former Black Panther and long-term friend Kiilu Nyasha said the word that came to her mind was "love."(2) Most of the information in this article comes from Kiilu as well as Yogi's fellow San Quentin 6 comrades David Johnson and Sundiata Tate.(3) All recounted stories of his immense love, his prominent leadership, his indomitable spirit, his dedication to creating and becoming the "new man" and his role in educating others.

The state of California attacked Hugo Pinell for 50 years, from the time of his imprisonment on a phony charge of raping and kidnapping a white womyn, through to his death this week. He was one of a number of comrades involved in an incident on 21 August 1971, in which George Jackson was killed along with three prison guards and two prisoner trustees. Hugo Pinell was charged and convicted with slashing the throats of two prison guards during this incident, though neither was killed. One of these guards was known to have murdered a New Afrikan prisoner in Soledad and had gone unpunished. Those prisoners charged with crimes for the events of 21 August 1971 became known as the San Quentin 6. It was this incident, and the murder of George Jackson in particular, that triggered the takeover of the Attica Correctional Facility in New York by prisoners of all nationalities in response to the oppressive conditions they had faced there for years. Beginning on 9 September 1971, the prisoners controlled the prison for four days, setting up kitchens, medical support, and communications via collective organizing. Prison guards were treated with respect and given proper food and medical care like everyone else. It all ended on 13 September 1971 when the National Guard invaded the yard, killed 29 prisoners and 9 staff, and tortured hundreds after they regained control. It is the collective organizing for positive change that occurred during those four days that we celebrate on the September 9 Day of Peace and Solidarity in prisons across the United $tates.

The prisoners in Attica acted in the ideals of men like George Jackson and Hugo Pinell who were well-respected leaders of the first wave of the prison movement. Jackson, Pinell and their comrades, many who are still alive and mourning and commemorating Yogi's death(1, 3), always promoted unity and the interests of all prisoners as a group. The Attica brothers took this same philosophy to a more spectacular level, where they flipped the power structure so that the oppressed were in control. Not long afterward, prisoners at Walpole in Massachusetts won control of that facility as a result of the events at Attica. In both cases prisoners worked together collectively to meet the needs of all, peace prevailed, and spirits rose. Like a dictatorship of the proletariat on a smaller scale, these prisoners proved that when the oppressed are in power conditions for all improve. And it is historicaly examples like these that lead us to believe that is the way to end oppression.

Following the incidents of August and September 1971, the Black Panther Party printed a feature article on Hugo Pinell, who they upheld as "a member in good standing of the Black Panther Party." It read in part:

"[Prisoners across the United States] began to realize as Comrade George Jackson would say, that they were all a part of the prisoner class. They began to realize that there was no way to survive that special brand of fascism particular to California prison camps, except by beginning to work and struggle together. Divisions, such as this one, like family feuds, often take time to resolve. The common goal of liberation and the desire for freedom helps to make the division itself disappear, and the reason for its existence become clearer and clearer. The prisoner class, especially in California, began to understand the age-old fascist principle: if you can divide, you can conquer.

"There are two men who were chiefly responsible for bringing this idea to the forefront. They helped other comrade inmates to transform the ideas of self-hatred and division into unity and love common to all people fighting to survive and retain dignity. These two Brothers not only set this example in words, but in practice. Comrade George Jackson and Comrade Hugo Pinell, one Black and one Latino, were the living examples of the unity that can and must exist among the prisoner class. These two men were well-known to other inmates as strong defenders of their people. Everyone knew of their love for the people; a love that astounded especially the prison officials of the State. It astounded them so thoroughly that these pigs had to try and portray them as animals, perverts, madmen and criminals, in order to justify their plans to eventually get rid of such men. For when Comrades George and Hugo walked and talked together, the prisoners began to get the message too well."(4)

Today the prison movement is in another phase of coming together, realizing their common class interests. It is amazing that it is in this new era of coming together that the pigs finally murder Yogi, on the three year anniversary of the announcement of the plans to end all hostilities across the California prisons system to unite for common interests. This timing should be lost on no one.

As a Nicaraguan, Yogi became hated by certain influential Mexicans in the prison system for ignoring their orders not to hang with New Afrikans. While the prison movement over the last half-century has chipped away at such racism, we also know that racism is an idea that is the product of imperialism. Until we eliminate the oppression of nations by other nations, we will not eliminate racism completely. But we work hard to fight it within the oppressed and in particular among prisoners, as Yogi, George and others did 50 years ago.

In the 1950s and 1960s the racism was brutal, with nazis openly working with correctional staff. The state used poor, uneducated whites as the foot soldiers of their brutal system of oppression that is the U.$. injustice system. Tate and Johnson tell stories of being terrorized with the chants of "nigger, nigger, nigger" all night long when they first entered the California prison system as youth.(1, 3) While we don't agree with George Jackson's use of the term "fascist" to describe the United $tates in his day, we do see a kernel of truth in that description in the prison system, and the white prisoners were often lining up on the side of the state. But the efforts of courageous leaders broke down that alliance, and leaders of white lumpen organizations joined with the oppressed nation prisoners for their common interests as prisoners at the height of the prison movement in California.

We recognize the national contradiction, between the historically and predominantly white Amerikan nation and the oppressed internal semi-colonies, to be the principal contradiction in the United $tates today. Yet, this is often dampened and more nuanced in the prison system. Our white readership is proportional to the white population in prisons, and we have many strong white supporters. So while we give particular attention to the struggles of prisoners as it relates to national liberation movements, we support the prison movement as a whole to the extent that it aligns itself with the oppressed people of the world against imperialism.

The biggest complaint among would-be prison organizers is usually the "lack of unity." Any potential unity is deliberately broken down through means of threats, torture and even murder by the state. Control Units exist to keep people like Yogi locked down for four and a half decades. Yet another wave of the prison movement is here. It is embodied in the 30,000 prisoners who acted together on 8 July 2013, and in the 3 years of no hostilities between lumpen organizations in the California prison system. Right now there is nothing more important in California than pushing the continuation of this unity. In the face of threats by individuals to create cracks in that unity, in the face of the murder of an elder of the movement, in order to follow through on the campaign to end the torture of long-term isolation, in order to protect the lives of prisoners throughout the state and end unnecessary killings, there is nothing more important to be doing in California prisons right now than expanding the Agreement to End Hostilities to realize the visions of our elders like Hugo "Yogi Bear" Pinell.

During the day it's the same thing except the wand makes a high-pitch beeping sound when hitting the button. So 24/7 it's non-stop excessive noise that doesn't allow us to sleep longer than 30 minutes without being woken up. I feel like I'm living in a dream 24/7 as I'm always stirred and feeling the effects of being denied sleep and not being able to go through my normal sleep cycles. Anyone with common sense can see this is cruel and unusual punishment. The ironic thing is staff say it's to prevent suicides. Yeah let's make a bunch of excessive noise all day and night and not let anyone sleep longer than 30 minutes at any given time, that should prevent suicides. If it's driving relatively stable prisoners crazy I'm sure it's pushing those with mental health issues over the edge.

Also by doing this, even though it's misguided and unnecessary, the CDCR is admitting that the SHU makes people more likely to commit suicide if they need to check on everyone every 30 minutes. I have filed an administrative appeal on this to have it stopped or modified and plan to file a lawsuit if we are not allowed to sleep normally again. In the mean time I'm writing friends/family to call the prison/CDCR head quarters and complain about this, and I'm writing all prison organizations and public servants to make them aware of this new form of torture being conducted.

MIM(Prisons) adds: This sleep deprivation torture tactic has been reported on from San Quentin for some time, and we recently received word from a comrade on pending litigation on this issue:

"I am challenging a blatantly obvious psychological torture program put in play by Jeffrey Beard, Secretary of the gulag system in California, as a payback to the SHU guys for the hunger strikes. The CDCR had to throw us, death row, under the bus too, to make it less obvious who the target really is.

"There is a program whereby they come and shine lights in eyes, bang and yell, using a 'beeper' stick to hit the cell tray slots, every 20 to 30 minutes, all day and night.

"In my moving papers I proved it is utterly pointless as stated, as a suicide prevention program. Anyone knows you can commit suicide during the half hour between walks, and also in our unit it takes them over 20 added minutes to get the keys, get shields, and race in and pounce on a guy hanging by the neck. It is specious.

"So I filed saying this is far too onerous to be a mere act of stupidity, it is a malicious torture of the SHU units only (including PSU, psych wards, all lock-up units). If this does not cause suicide, what would? Ha!"

This latest tactic of inhumane sleep deprivation reinforces our point that the settlement of the Ashker v. Brown lawsuit will do nothing to end torture in California prisons. As the comrade above points out, this is not rogue COs, this is facility policy. We received reports over a year prior about the new Guard One torture program. As one comrade pointed out at the time, most deaths in cells are due to medical neglect.

Calling this a "new tactic" is a bit of a misnomer. This same exact system of "security checks" every 30 minutes has been used in recent history in Texas and North Carolina. Though in these cases they seemed more targeted, and the comrade in North Carolina grieved the abuse and won. In fact, this type of sleep deprivation dates back more than 50 years when prisoners suffered similar conditions in Walpole, Massachusetts. All these examples go to show that the system is inherently oppressive, and only by overthrowing imperialism will we ever begin to see humane treatment of prisoners.

We view the latest behavior by guards at Pelican Bay as a form of retaliation against the prisoners held in SHU, to show them who is in charge and that torture is alive and well in spite of the "successful" settlement. Exposing this consistent mistreatment of prisoners in California is a must to counter the narrative that the modern prison movement has succeeded in transforming the CDCR, or the conditions they submit their prisoners to, in any way.

The acute threat of this form of torture requires an immediate response.

A concerted effort has been taken up by a number of groups supporting the California prison movement to contact the warden to demand an end to this torture.

Write to:
Warden Clark E. Ducart
Pelican Bay State Prison
P.O. Box 7000
Crescent City, CA 95531-7000
email: [email protected]
call: (707) 465–1000 ext. 9040

The bastards concocted a local rule called San Quentin Death Row Operational Procedure #608, section 650. It voids clergy confidentiality, allowing the attorney general to compel testimony against only male, death row, at San Quentin. Females and anyone not at this prison are exempt. Non-condemned are exempt.

The rules in play are 15 CCR 3212, which creates the confidentiality of clergy in prisons in California. Then they want to have clergy compelled or allowed to rat on us, saying we are not good reborn bible thumpers, as we pretend... so kill us all.

I won it. Clark v. Chappell, CV 14 02637 ygr.

The new acting warden was told by the attorney general to feign surrender, and issue a memo voiding that rule. The problem is, the minute the federal court judge looks away they can re-instate the rule. It is an at whim rule, he can redo it. I am going forth to get not just a surrender but declaration that it is and always was discriminatory, undue process, unequal justice, and such. So we won the present day, and I will puruse the retroactivity to 1977, date it was put in place, to protect all the old guys.

I thought I'd share how it works up here in Ad-Seg. I trip on how I've been going at it since the end of September. I'm doing what I'm supposed to do, from request forms, to 22 [inmate request] forms, to 602 [inmate appeal] and no good results. The appeals here are quick to catch a mistake and return it. First off, I am not a lawyer, second I'm a CCCMS mental health prisoner. But that does not mean anything here.

Anyhow, I wrote Sacramento, letting them know that I never wanted to do a 602 but it concerns my back brace and prescription glasses. And they're in my property at the property room. I had to pay for those 2 items in state and I needed them so I was OK with that. Now I'm just asking for what's mine and it's a need. I use a cane and have a vest. I bought some glasses from another prisoner who wanted hygiene, but I'm not supposed to do that.

Nobody listens here and the 602 process is meaningless. I don't know what else to do.

MIM(Prisons) responds: California was where the demand for grievances to be addressed began five years ago. It has since been taken up by comrades in a dozen other states. The focus is on petitioning state and federal officials responsible for the care of prisoners. In doing so, comrades are attempting to rally prisoners together as a group to defend their basic rights, like the ones the writer above describes; basic medical care and property rights.

But there are reasons why the arms of the injustice system are so unaccountable. Their central task is to control certain populations, and they must be given leeway to achieve that task. If their task was about justice, then obviously injustices like the ones above would not be tolerated. So we must rally together to ensure the rights of all are respected. Yet, ultimately, we must build a system that serves the interests of those who are oppressed and exploited by the current imperialist system that dominates our world. Petitions will not prevent these ongoing abuses.

Many prisoners view the organization formerly known as the Mens Advisory Council (MAC), now known as the Inmate Advisory Council as servants of the people behind prison walls. Most of the people believing this fallacy are the new or relatively newer and younger prison population, and even some older prisoners who should really know better by now. However, for those of us who do know better we not only know the true limitations of the MAC but their true purpose within these walls, and so it's not for nothing that some of us refer to the MAC organization for what it really stands for: "Man Against Convict."

The original idea for what came to be known as the Mens Advisory Council can be traced back to the turbulent 60s and 70s inside of California prisons and the violent years that followed which included a relatively high number of staff assaults, prisoner-on-prisoner violence, and both peaceful and violent protests. The Council was initially conceived of by socially conscious prisoners as a way to not only encourage and develop dialogue between prisoners themselves to avert unnecessary violence between the white, [email protected], New Afrikan and First Nations, but also as a way to develop this same dialogue between prisoners and the prison administration. In this way then the precursors to the MAC were meant to function not only as representatives of the prisoner population with prison administrators, but as advocates of prisoner rights.

And for some years this precursor to the MAC org did what they set out to do, maintaining both a level of favorable and positive bias towards the prisoner population as well as enjoying a righteous level of credibility amongst prisoners themselves. Both the precursor to the MAC organization as well as the MAC itself tackled issues ranging from visiting policy and procedure, to basic hygiene and sanitation issues, to quantity and quality of food, to how our mail was to be properly handled.

As time went on however the MAC went from an organization representing the interests of the prison population as a whole to being co-opted by the powerful lumpen chiefs and representing their narrow and counter-productive interests, from which it was then taken and turned into an organization working in the interests of prison administrators. Today the IAC functions as an extralegal means for prison administrators to get from us exactly what they want, which is a highly passive and compliant prisoner population. As such, the MAC/IAC organization has become just another tool of the prison administration used to control us not unlike the tools on a pigs belt; like the pepper spray they use to gas us, or the batons they beat us with — just another tool.

I would like to take this concept even further. One can even liken a MAC rep to a neo-colonial ruler in the Third World who, thru their representation in government, gives the illusion of independence and a real self-determination to their compatriots; a nominal independence or a fictious level of power. This is not to say that the MAC/IAC never get anything done or accomplish anything for us. Quite the contrary, they do manage to accomplish a small victory from time to time. But prisoners get it twisted when they begin to believe that the MAC/IAC reps are there to serve or win anything for us. We must be clear about one thing here, the MAC reps accomplish nothing for us that the administration doesn't allow them to. In other words, in the battle for prisoners' rights, prison administrators do not lose to the MAC/IAC, rather they concede. Concessions in the prison realm are "necessary evils" to prison administrators as they are used to lend a level of legitimacy to the MAC/IAC org and hence continue their support from the wider prisoner population. Just like the system of neo-colonialism in the Third World, nominal leaders are allowed to govern and rule exactly because the imperialists allow them to, but these leaders must also have the support of the masses so that they may keep on ruling, or else the entire system collapses.

Surely there will be some who want to consider my allegations to be untrue, but it is hard to argue with my thesis when you see the MAC/IAC reps actively working against you. All you have to do is look closely at your MAC/IAC reps and ask them, what have they done for you lately? What oppressive and repressive policies have they helped the pigs peacefully implement and transition to with or without prisoners' consent? Not for nothing that a lot of the MAC/IAC reps are flat out hustlers and silver-tongued liars looking to swindle you out of your rights and privileges. Indeed if we look closely at these MAC/IAC reps we can see that they are messenger boys and running dogs to the administration because they have to be.

This is not to say that all MAC/IAC reps are bad. Of course there are some who actually seek out and take up these positions because they are truly interested in bringing positive change to the oppressed prison population, but these people are few and far between. These people however are also naive because they actually believe that they can bring real change to the prison environment thru steady reform, therefore they can also be some of the most convincing and legitimizing aspects of this oppressive prison apparatus and hence the most lethal to the prison movement for they will try the hardest to convince you of working within the system.

For those of you still not convinced of what I'm talking about, let's examine CCR Title 15, Article 3, Inmate Councils, Committees and Activity Groups 3230. Establishment of Inmate Advisory Councils:

(a) Each warden shall establish an inmate advisory council which is representative of that facility's inmate ethnic groups. At the discretion of the warden, subcommittees of the council may also be established to represent sub-facilities or specialized segments of the inmate population.

...

(2) The council shall operate only under the constitution and by-laws as prepared by the council's inmate representatives with the advice and guidance of designated staff and approved by the warden.

...

(d) Inmate advisory council representatives shall not, as a council representative, become involved with inmate appeals unless the matter affects the general inmate population and such involvement is authorized by the warden.

...

(h) A staff person at the level of a program administrator or higher shall be designated as the inmate advisory council coordinator.

(i) Facility captains shall be directly involved in council activities within their respective programs and may delegate specific aspects of supervisor, direction and responsibilities for council activities within their unit to subordinate supervisors.

"The structure of a decision making process — the rules for who is involved in making the decision, how voting is conducted, and so forth — can affect the outcome, especially when a group has indeterminate preferences because no single alternative appeals to a majority participation. Experienced participants in foreign policy information are familiar with the techniques for manipulating decision making process to favor outcomes they prefer. A common technique is to control a group's formal decision rules. These rules include the items of business the group discusses and the order in which proposals are considered ... Probably most important is the ability to control the agenda and thereby structure the terms of debate."(1)

"the strategies used by governments to guide their actions in the international arena. Foreign policies spell out the objectives state leaders have decided to pursue in a given relationship or situation as well as the general means by which they intend to pursue those objectives....States establish various organizational structures and functional relationships to create and carry out foreign policies. Officials and agencies collect information about a situation through various channels; they write memorandums outlining possible options for action; they hold meetings to discuss the matter; some of them privately outside those meetings to decide how to steer those meetings. Such activities, broadly defined are what is meant by the foreign policy process.'"(1)

The Machiavellian implication of all this is all very apparent then, and one must be a special kind of naive to not see the resemblance between imperialist foreign policy and how prison administrators choose to deal with the prison population; the majority of whom come from the oppressed nation lumpen.

Amerikan imperialism is hostile to the oppressed global majority and their foreign policies are reflective of this hostility. Likewise prison administrators' dealings with the prison population mirrors Amerikan foreign policy exactly because prisons are extensions and tools of national oppression and social control, and so it is logical and to be expected that Amerikan foreign policy and the policy of prison administrators are two sides of the same oppressive coin. Whereas one deals with the oppressed nations on an international level, the other deals with the oppressed nations on a domestic level. Furthermore, as a matter of foreign policy U.$. borders are the structures used to keep Third World workers out and unable to gain access to their portion of wealth stolen by U.$. imperialism, whereas prisons are used to keep the oppressed nation lumpen in their place and away from this same global metropolis.

It has been said many times before, prison is a microcosm of society and it is time we begin to actively engage in this society. Marxist philosophy holds that we are all products of our environment and just as our environment has the power to influence and mold us, so do we have the power to influence and mold this same environment. We shouldn't be relying on individuals or small cliques of people to speak and act for us. We should rely on ourselves and our sheer numbers to bring change. Therefore, it is time that this whole business of MAC/IAC reps be done with and put to an end. It would be a positive qualitative development for the prison masses to begin relying on themselves. Individuals don't make hystory, the masses do.

As early as October 2012, the administrators of California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) have relentlessly advocated to the public how the step-down program (SDP) is an improvement upon the gang validation policies/practices that previously existed. But history informs us that any mantra of change being presented by the powers that be means more of the same, literally.

On a day in March 2015, I was the sole prisoner transferred out of Corcoran SHU via special transportation, as the warden issued some type of "special order" for me to be housed at CCI Tehachapi SHU. I have yet to see this "special order." I'm not going to get into the litany of horrendous living conditions that exist here at this point and time, however, I've witnessed countless prisoners be issued bogus rule violation reports (CDC 115 RVRs) and then coerced to start over and repeat the step that they were just in. This subjects the prisoner to being interned to indefinite solitary confinement status once again, as there are no mechanisms in place that would prohibit and/or prevent this process from reoccurring. It's nothing more than the same old barbaric and dehumanizing gang validation policies and practices.

For example, the most prominent reason for prisoners being issued CDC 115 RVRs is because their name has been found in a "kite" that was written by another prisoner. Not only is this contrary to our primary 5 core demands from the mass hunger strikes, in relation to behavior-based "individual accountability," but it is also contrary to the new SDP policy. In particular, CDCR memorandum dated 9 August 2013 states in part on page 4:

"At times this information includes a list of names or other personal information being found in another offender's possession that has some nexus to STG activity or behavior. During the DRB reviews, the offender whose name is simply on the list (versus the individual being in actual possession of the list) will not be held accountable for the contents."

But wait, it gets even better my people. While at Corcoran, counter-intelligence officer S. Niehus searched my personal legal property in February 2015 and stole ("confiscated") my legal exhibits for active legal cases under the false premise of it being gang-related contraband. In my first level 602 appeal interview with Institutional Gang Investigator Sergeant Pierce, he told me:

"Corcoran's litigation office has confirmed [your] active legal cases and that the confiscated materials were indeed legal exhibits for said court cases, but he is going to retain possession of them, as CDCR has deemed the materials to be gang-related contraband per CCR Title 15 Section 3378."

It can't be both ways! Either they're legal exhibits or not. This type of subjective rationale makes it fundamentally impossible to challenge these bogus allegations of gang activity, because no sooner do we get evidence that refutes these ridiculous allegations, it is then stolen under the falsity of being gang-related. How is this not more of the same old policies and practices? But more importantly, how can we win under these circumstances? It is imperative that the people send letters and emails to M.D. Stainer, Susan Hubbard, Scott Kernan and others in CDCR's headquarters in Sacramento, California to voice your outrage on this contradiction.

MIM(Prisons) adds: In the meantime, we will also fight from the angle of publicizing these abuses via our independent media resources (Under Lock & Key and prisoncensorship.info). We also fight injustice by offering educational materials and study groups to raise the political understanding of anyone with an interest in putting a permanent end to false imprisonment, torture via inhumane long-term isolation, and an oppressive state and military which tries to bully the entire world. The more we understand our oppression, the better equipped we will be to fight against it effectively.

Here at a torture unit known as the Corcoran Security Housing Unit (SHU), we New Afrikan freedom fighters and other entities are getting retaliated on by the fascist Institutional Gang Investigators (IGI). IGI and their cronies seem to think that attacking those who were hunger strikers and at the forefront of the prison movement is gonna distract us from our main objective in challenging this oppressive system. They are holding onto our mail for months at a time, giving out petty disciplinary cases after cell searches and calling miscellaneous items contraband, such as extra laundry, or wire we use to make our digital channels come in clearly and radios without static.

Due to the outside support we received for the collective solidarity we expressed on the inside, we've received but a few items we requested in our yearly packages and canteen purchase. The legislators gave the administration an earfull of how they mistreat us in the SHU, and how mental torture is much worse than physical torture and solitary confinement must be abolished.

The retaliation is a given, and just this past week I personally had some books sent back to the sender and was told they promoted racism and violence. Well, I filed a grievance against the sergeant they sent to my door because his actions were racist. The reading material was in fact about anarchism, and they have allowed the white/European inmates to have literature on this very same subject. I was also referred to as a racist because he saw pictures of a few Black Panthers on my wall, and asked why do I read racist books of the past. I just looked at the sergeant standing before me and shook my head. How can a New Afrikan be a racist considering all the things that have happened to my people in previous times, and are still happening around the country?

We are also being moved around the yard to the different buildings, and we hear it's only due to the warden wanting to place mentally ill inmates in the left side of the building and those who are not on medication to the right side of the building, but this is so they can revalidate those who the Departmental Review Board might be considering kicking back to the mainline, and to disturb think tanks we have been able to put together throughout the prison diaspora. We who have been buried alive in these concrete tombs (Pelican Bay, Corcoran, Tehachapi SHUs) will stand firm in our principled discipline and continue our revolutionary studies, because we have a world to win. We will not let our oppressor's strategies and tactics stop our movement or break our momentum. In true liberation and struggle I encourage all to show solidarity until all oppressed are free.

Dare to Struggle
Dare to win....

MIM(Prisons) responds: While we agree with what this comrade wrote above, we want to expand on this topic. Racism is the ideology that arises from national oppression: a way of seeing certain groups of people as inferior based on their alleged biological differences, or "race." National oppression is the system that engenders racism, a system where one nation has power over other nations. New Afrikans are an oppressed nation within U.$. borders, and so this discrimination based on race by the guards is no surprise (and something our comrades see all the time behind bars). But a persyn from an oppressed nation could be racist (though not in the way that the prison guard claims). We see racism manifested as incorrect ideas about Mexicans by New Afrikans or New Afrikans by Mexicans, for instance. Or oppressed nation people thinking white people are oppressors because of some biological deficiencies.

Despite the utter lack of scientific evidence that race exists, Amerikan academics have succeeded in replacing discussions about national self-determination with ones of race and multiculturalism. This has led to the popularization of lines such as "Black people can't be racist." One video from the Ferguson uprisings has gotten a lot of promotion by white nationalists trying to show how ridiculous the protestors were because they accuse a reporter of being racist because he is white and claim that they can't be racist because they are Black. While we cannot win over the white nation as a whole, by being more scientific and more correct in the line we put out there we can better win over those at the margin who will be turned off by illogical statements. The revolutionary movement needs to work on educating people on incorrect ideas about racism and the material definition of national oppression. This will both help us recruit the support of others as well as be more successful in everything we do because of our own greater understanding of things as they are.

Who denies that New Afrikans (Blacks colonized in Amerika) have been viewed and treated as a "Security Threat Group", and consequently subjected to varied forms of repression by a myriad of state and non-state reactionary pigs since our enslavement here? Who denies that this country's "laws" or judicial system (e.g., police, prosecutors, judges, prison guards, etc.) has been and continues to be used as a weapon of oppressive domination of our people? I assert that the actual function of "law enforcement" - as particularly applied to our neo-colonial context - is to beat, harass, humiliate and kill, i.e., to contain and control. On an ultimate level, this is the actual purpose of those who operate in law enforcement.

We can see this evidenced in the 1921 Tulsa, Oklahoma massacre of New Afrikans in the Greenwood district, the 1920 Ocoee, Florida, the 1923 Rosewood, Florida massacres, and the list goes on. The historical pattern is that those who embody the Amerikan judicial system/law enforcement functioned with the primary aim of our domination in exploitation as remains the case in 2014, even under Eric Holder as the Attorney General.

What's most important to grasp and take to heart is that as a group/nationality New Afrikans are in fact a "validated" population as a result of being calculated to represent a serious political threat against the white male power structure. Naturally, as we constitute a diversity in terms of political tendencies and hence threat assessments, the validation process is pursued and applied in varying forms. Even as all forms of the validation process (e.g. disciplinary techniques in the military, corporations, universities, law enforcement, industries, NBA, NFL, Wall Street, etc.) are ever geared towards our containment and domination.

"Classifications which are frequently encountered in social science literature of the European American variety frequently reduce people to categories like the 'aged,' 'the schizophrenic subjects,' 'the culturally deprived,' etc. Such categories, which are initially nominal are invariably treated in some qualitative fashion resulting in an ordinal classification based on superordinate-subordinate arrangement. The necessity to refer to people involved in psychological studies as 'subjects' is clearly instructive about the goal of such studies which is to subject. This is the value of the 'valueless' European American experimental methodology." - Dr. Naim Akbar

Here in California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCr), prisoners are designated via terms such as "contaminate," "subject," "disruptive groups," "security threat groups," "E.O.P.," "CCCMS," etc. In the larger society, New Afrikan gang members and even political organizations are designated as "domestic terrorists," "security threat groups," etc. In each instance what those individuals/groups whom are designated by one-or-the-other terms have in common is the status of being classified, i.e. a procedural identification for purposes of categorization and monitoring techniques for state repression.

This is the essence and actual political function and primary objective of what is referred to and defined as "validated." In penological terms to be "validated" means that a prisoner has been found or confirmed via investigation to be an affiliate of either a prison gang or disruptive group. The "stamp of approval" (rubber stamp) is exacted without sincere consideration and nor recognition of a prisoner's supposedly accorded "due process rights." In the final analysis, the validation process is fraught with legal indifference and profound official bias since it is CDCr's penological interests which are ever paramount.

Although a prisoner has a right to appeal, the end result of such futile pursuit is most predictable since this amounts to "appealing" to another part of the monster which is dead-set on punitive measures immersed in authoritarian arrogance. I stress political function, since from the beginning, in the case of New Afrikans, ours is a relationship based upon institutional domination in terms of the racist prison system. As is often said "war is an expression of politics by other means," so too, "prison is an expression of politics by other means." The prison system is an element of protracted war against our people ever with the aim of subjection.

Indeed just as the U.S. government employs covers (e.g. "humanitarian aid," "fighting terrorism," "spreading democracy") to legitimize its politics and practices in Iraq, Iran, Nigeria, Somalia, Congo, Mali, Sudan, Ukraine, etc., the same is true on a domestic level as regards the covers employed to legitimize the state's repressive policies and measures (i.e. stop and frisk, ten-twenty-life, three strikes, mandatory minimum sentencing, anti-terrorism act, war on drugs, war on gangs) directed against the New Afrikan and Latino(a) communities and oppressed nation people in general. In the case of the New Afrikan and Latino(a) communities the pretext used is "working to make the streets safe" via targeting our youth/warrior-oriented groups with "Gang injunctions," "Prison Gang Validation," "Behavioral Modification Units," etc.

As in the case of their recently conceived repressive tactic referred to as the "Step Down Program," merely one element of an ever-adaptive strategic program rooted in our control, the paramount aim of the state's obvious subterfuge is our subjection to forms of reorientation/indoctrination which operates in total conformity with their dictates, i.e. socio-economic, cultural, security and political imperatives.

"(I)t is the government which gets to define what a 'security threat group' is. According to a national survey conducted by the Department of Justice in 1997, the Department of Corrections of Minnesota and Oregon named all Asians as gangs, which Minnesota further compounds by adding all Native Americans. The State of New Jersey DOC lists the Black Cat Collective as a gang. The Black Cat Collective is my free foster son along with two friends who put on Afro-Centric cultural programs in libraries."(Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly, Vol.39)

The above komrad goes on to point out that "the government considered the Black Panther Party a 'street gang' under their loose meaning they employed." As we're aware, it is the convenient policy of oppressive and exploitive governments to define and designate especially oppositional radical political forces/individuals (e.g. Mau Mau, RNA, Hamas, IRA, BLA, Harriet Tubman, Nat Turner, Marcus Garvey, Yaa Asantewaa, Winnie Mandela, Steve Biko, Patrice Lumumba, Amilcar Cabral, Martin L. King, Malcolm X, etc.) by an array of self-serving propagandistic pejorative terms including thugs, hoodlums, savages, terrorists, and mass murders, so as to demonize them and discredit their socio-political causes. This common tactic of attack via de-legitimization measures is currently being employed against our Black Riders Liberation Party based in Los Angeles.

In California prisons, on the classification Chrono we're referred to or identified as "subject." As a validated prisoner/captive I am treated as and considered to be what they call a "contaminate." I've already listed other official terms in which the state employs to conveniently designate those from the ghettoes. Thus, we discern that the necessity to refer to people as mere "subjects" is also a penological methodology in society and prison. Why not the "oppressed," "colonized," or "exploited"? Because the appropriate and applicable designations would not only operate to accurately identify and classify First Nation peoples, Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, New Afrikans, etc., but they'd also work to indict the white male supremacist capitalist-imperialist system. Yes, to a large degree the saying: "He whom defines reality...has the power," is accurate and this is the reason the labeling process is so important to our political adversaries. Classification procedures function as a method of identification with the intended aim of targeting/profiling individuals/groups who are perceived to constitute a "threat to the security" of institutional operations as they're not in conformity with the dictated program.

Once labeled via the classification process the individual/group is made subject to all sorts of political repressive tactics. This even applies to those individuals/groups defined as "gangs" and engaged in criminal activities whether confined to prisons or that of society since it is the "power relation" which is the ultimate crux of the matter.

As is well known, Pelican Bay State Prison as a "model" of repressive control was built along the lines of Marion, Florence, and other maximum security prisons and its authoritarian methods are being implemented across the country in other tombs of gloom. As the "subjects" of these punitively-geared penological settings we are experimented upon (e.g. sterilization, SHUs, suppressive measures such as tear gas, pepper spray, tasers, block guns, E.O.P., CCCMS) As a method of instruction I often explain to brothers that our relationship to the prison system (classification committees, disciplinary hearings, SSU, ISU, IGI, parole supervision) is rooted in and motivated by politics in the sense of alien authority being exercised over us and against our interests.

The fact that one can penalize via some prison official ought to inform us of our subordinate status since it is obviously others who are making the final decisions which negatively impact our lives since they are in a superior position of power. So, for those who have a naive tendency to think in terms that somehow politics is limited to the political process (e.g. voting, referendums, policies, etc.) it must be grasped that the very nature of our relationship with CDCr is actually one based upon politics. Logically, this especially applies to the larger macrocosm or society in terms of our peculiar neo-colonial relationship with the U.S. Empire.

In CDCr, the terms used to define and classify the nexus between prison gangs and disruptive groups (now redefined and reclassified as "Security Threat Groups"), are "subservient" and "subordinate" since the disruptive groups/street gangs are said to be "inferior" to, and thus under the dictation of, a prison gang whom prison officials perceive as the "worst of the worst." The "dictation" goes to program expectations - i.e., rules to abide by on pain of punishment - and general agendas as well as ideological patterns. This attitude and perception, of the nexus between prison gangs and disruptive groups, presumes that those of the latter groups cannot or are not given the latitude to think for themselves nor to govern their lives in their own interests.