MIM(Prisons) is a cell of revolutionaries serving the oppressed masses inside U.$. prisons, guided by the communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Under Lock & Key is a news service written by and for prisoners with a focus on what is going on behind bars throughout the United States. Under Lock & Key is available to U.S. prisoners for free through MIM(Prisons)'s Free Political Literature to Prisoners Program, by writing:
MIM(Prisons) PO Box 40799 San Francisco, CA 94140.
“It shows that circumstances make men just as much as men make
circumstances.” - Karl Marx in the German ideology
Can we say that a new phenomenon is brewing behind these walls? We can
all see the new level of political consciousness in California prisons,
where prisoners are resisting the repressive policies of the California
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) in a more collective
manner. Change has been slow, but progress is evident. The root of this
is us prisoners with a little political and legal education to enlighten
others and at the same time inspire others to participate in progressive
action.
The California hunger strikes weren’t spontaneous demonstrations against
injust human rights violations in the Security Housing Units (SHUs), but
rather carefully laid out plans to get outside attention and assistance.
It was years of suppression that brought a few together to gather many
in a common purpose that serves all of our interests. Some men are
mentally broken while others carry on in these SHU conditions.
This is but a simple dialectic; or two sides of a contradiction forming
a unity. On one hand we have those who deteriorate under these
conditions and seek any way out, while on the other hand we have those
prisoners who adapt and at the same time find ways to better themselves
by educating themselves in law, reading good books, or picking up
hobbies to keep themselves occupied. It is through these individuals who
know the conditions in the SHU who are capable of creating campaigns for
abolishing its policies, especially the gang validation policies that so
many prisoners fall victim to.
Exposure and propaganda play a vital role on our behalf. This is where
USW comrades come in, not just as advocates for human rights, but as
advocates of an overall anti-imperialist campaign, as everything is
connected to the imperialist system. The SHUs within CDCR are an aspect
of imperialism, utilized for social control. And the oppressive
conditions within are nothing more but to assert more social control
behind prisons. It is through current events that this new phenomenon is
manifesting a wave of politically conscious prisoners creating new
circumstances. More validated prisoners are leaving the SHUs but more
are taking their place. It is possible that one day through a collective
effort the gang validation will be dismantled entirely and a SHU cap may
be part of our future. I think it is.
Expansion Cell Blocks (ECB) were designed to hold two prisoners in order
to increase unit capacity. But Texas officials have labeled ECB as high
security in an attempt to negate the facts and distort the actual
security level of the ECB.
In order to justify this use of ECB, in spite of staff shortages and
unlawful conditions, the authorities create a hostile environment which
conforms to their false reality. Prisoners are agitated to commit acts
of violence, create disturbances, or become aggressive, so that the ECB
takes on an air of a high security prisoner housing area where sanctions
and restrictions are necessary. Sanctions and restrictions enable the
ECB to be operated even without the staff they are short. Constant
lockdown cameras have been installed to document everything. This
expense must be justified. The staff creates incidents for the
technology to record. Restrictions begin. Policy becomes practice.
Lights are turned on every time count is taken, food is delivered, or
staff feel it is necessary. Prisoners are required to regularly produce
ID and are disturbed to the point they are deprived of REM sleep. Cell
searches are performed irregularly during the day and throughout the
night. A heightened state of anxiety and stress is created. People kept
under high levels of stress are known to snap or break.
In addition to this high stress level, prisoners at ECB are provoked by
staff. Most lack the capacity to respond to chaos in a rational manner
thereby perpetrating the myth of high security and enabling the
authorities to further control and empower themselves.
There is a systematic campaign of psychological warfare being waged
against prisoners in control units. The evidence proves sensory
deprivations experienced in isolation produces extreme states of mind,
impulsiveness and irrational behaviors. Statistics show a decline in
mental health in prisoners confined to solitary confinement for years.
Without stimulation our minds and bodies begin to break down and decay.
Prisoners are conditioned through a system of punishments and
indifference to view all forms of resistance as futile. Requests aren’t
answered. Responses are purposely vague or misleading. Policy is
interpreted to undermine prisoner autonomy. The authorities use every
tactic available to promote complete dependency of the prisoner and to
ensure despondency is total.
All the while the public is being told prisoners are being provided with
forms of rehabilitation and that support is given to those who desire to
make modifications to their mentality.
Facilities designed to house 1200 prisoners are used to house 600.
Prisoners in control units, Ad-Seg or high security do not receive good
time, parole or work time. Their sentences are only discharged at their
maximum release date. The result is requiring more money to provide for
more prisoners and more staff to control them. The goal of the prison
staff is achieved.
MIM(Prisons) adds: These long-term isolation cells are a common
tool of oppression in the Amerikan criminal injustice system. And we
have plenty of evidence of the detrimental effect of this isolation on
humyns. Get involved in the campaign to shut down control units to
resist this repression in Texas and across the country.
Comrades here at Special Management Unit (SMU - long-term isolation) are
doing what they can to protest and fight against the illegal housing
that they are being subjected to. Prisoners here are going on hunger
strikes and are suffering due to the lack of outside support. Further,
the DOC has taken actions to keep outside inquiries from being made
public and the news media is refusing to expose the inhumane treatment
of prisoners in Georgia’s SMU unit.
Prisoners are being transferred to SMU for refusing to participate in
the so-called tier step down programs they’ve started in Georgia. The
DOC is trying to force lumpen groups to be housed two men in a 24-hour
lockdown cell, thus placing prisoners in physical jeopardy, in order to
start a war. Just another attempt to enact the Willie Lynch mentality
amongst these prisoners. Before, the prisoners enacted peace and
brotherhood policies amongst and between the lumpen groups, and there
was no tier step down program. So this program is to create strife
amongst the brotherhood by building enough stress and confusion to
destroy peace that prisoners worked hard to establish.
MIM(Prisons) responds: We have received a lot of
reports
about the hunger strike in Georgia, and the struggles against
SMU
classification. The unity and awareness being built in Georgia
prisons is definitely frightening the prison administrators. This is an
important lesson for organizers: when we build for peace among the
lumpen organizations our enemies will take this as a call to war. The
United Front
for Peace in Prisons is bringing together organizations and
individuals in this important battle. Get involved today in building
peace in your prison.
There comes a time when a person in oppressed conditions must wake up,
stand up and speak up about the conditions that we find ourself in. I’m
being held in a minimum facility that’s being run like a super max and I
realize the social and psychological effects that this has on a person.
Twenty two hours trapped inside a unit with no interaction with other
prisoners, except in passing and chow, living in a dorm unit that
doesn’t have enough seats for everyone to watch TV, not enough restroom
stalls, and the numerous mental states that a person has to deal with
while living in this boiling pot of confusion, depression, and
aggression.
A director of Colorado’s Correction Department, Rick Raemisch, spent the
night in an isolated cell as an experiment and he said it left him
“feeling twitchy and paranoid.” He also said he suffered mental anguish
after spending only 20 hours in solitary confinement on 23 January 2014.
Some of our brothers spend 20 months in these confined conditions, and
some 20 years. Most people who get tossed into solitary confinement
already have mental problems and these places are dumping grounds for
the mentally ill.
There was a prisoner here in the Nebraska state pen who did most of his
time in confinement. He told the staff that he had mental issues and
that he needed help before he got out but they refused to help him. He
told the staff that if he didn’t get any mental health programming or
help that he just might get out and kill someone, but they didn’t help
him, they just made him do his full time and tossed him back into
society. Within 30 days he went and killed 4 people. This is just one
issue out of many and our problems run deeper than just mental health
and substance abuse treatment. There are issues that need to be
addressed like political interest, job skill programs, and community
development. The prison overcrowding issues needs to be addressed as
well because this overcrowding is causing prisons to put these
institutions on a modified lockdown status which is why our minimum
institution is run like it’s one big Ad-Seg.
So let’s wake up, stand up and speak up, about these issues and
conditions. Much love and respect to the brothers on the east coast,
fighting in the belly of the beast, stay strong to my family in the
Midwest and down south and to all my comrades on the West, go hard till
ya go home.
MIM(Prisons) adds: Colorado Executive Director of Correction Rick
Raemisch wrote an
editorial
in the New York Times about his experience in solitary confinement
that this comrade describes. In this article he quotes
Terry
Kupers on the psychological effects of long term isolation.
He admits that “I would spend a total of 20 hours in that cell. Which,
compared with the typical stay, is practically a blink. On average,
inmates who are sent to solitary in Colorado spend an average of 23
months there. Some spend 20 years.” But he still tries to justify the
use of solitary confinement as targetting the “worst of the worst”,
those who “act up” when in reality it is often those who are politically
aware and organizing that get slammed behind the isolation door.
Not only does Colorado have formal control units, but they also have
Restricted
Privileges units which are on lockdown 22 hours a day. Further,
Colorado prisons, like those across the country, continues to refuse to
address prisoners’ grievances, a battle taken up with a
grievance
campaign in that state. We are not optimistic that Raemish’s words
will translate into fundamental change in the Colorado prisons. Until we
eliminate the basis of prisons as a tool of social control, even the
best sentiments of one executive director will not have a significant
impact on the system.
It seems that change in our society is only brought about by those of
our populace who are considered to be radicals, so this piece is written
for those radicals who are compassionate enough to care and who will
take the necessary efforts to make a lasting difference for those of us
who are held and tortured in Security Housing Units (SHUs), which are
specifically dedicated for those prisoners who are supposed to be under
the care of an institution’s mental health system. These american gulags
are also known as “Psychiatric Services Units” (PSUs).
These specially dedicated SHUs are rarely, if ever, visited by outside
prisoner rights organizations, to my knowledge; and the prisoners housed
therein are simply forgotten. These prisoners have no representatives
and no means to voice their concerns and so the atrocities accumulate
unchecked.
Aggressive and sadistic prison guards have been known to pepper spray an
individual until they cannot breathe due to the accumulation of
micronized capsicum (pepper essence) absorbed into their lungs after the
guard empties onto the individual several canisters of the corrosive
irritant chemical weapon. This is not third party hearsay, I know of it
personally, for it has happened to me. Of course nothing is done about
it when you have the foxes guarding the henhouse.
Think a prisoner can obtain justice through the prison’s
administrative
grievance systems? You had better think about it again, no way. And
the courts, including the federal courts, will not entertain themselves
of the issues of complaint where the completion of the administrative
appeals process has been denied by a corrupt prison administration; it
has been made law, a statutory prerequisite otherwise known in
litigation circles as a “procedural bar.” It creates gross injustice and
perpetrates unchecked human abuse which is tolerated by our society, it
is a blatant indication of how cruel and vicious we have become as a
people.
Even more sinister is the presence of food pantries created within each
of the blocks of SHU/PSU units, which are independent from the main
kitchens where mainstream prisoners receive their meals. These food
pantries are not under the control of licensed food service employees
and are in fact totally controlled by the guards assigned to that block.
Those prisoners who are targeted by the “system” quite often find
themselves physically sickened by the meals they are served, meals which
stink with rotten foodstuffs. Milk cartons are served bloated with
full-blown contamination.
The milk is a favored vehicle to get an inmate victim to ingest a
“knock-out” drug and get raped while he is unconscious. This is a fact;
it has happened to me twice. Also milk is utilized in these modernized
dungeons as a tool to get unsuspecting targeted prisoner victims to
consume psychotropic substances which has the effect of a “truth serum”
and is used as an aid in covert interrogation of all prisoners suspected
by debriefer informants and snitches. And, for the same purpose targeted
prisoners are placed in cells with low pressure or dysfunctional
ventilation systems which are used to force irritant gasses, pepper
spray or other toxic obnoxious chemical weapons through to be inhaled by
the occupant of that particular cell. In addition to the above abuses,
the usual torture routine includes the air cooling system on full blast
in mid-winter, and the heating system turned full up in mid-summer.
MIM(Prisons) adds: We appreciate the risk that our comrades take
to get reports of such horrible abuses to Under Lock & Key.
Information like this is important to get out because, as this writer
points out, very few people are looking at these prisons or monitoring
the treatment there. But Under Lock & Key is more than a
tool of exposure, it is a rallying point for activists and leaders to
bring together others and work out strategies and tactics in our fight
against the criminal injustice system. We should read reports like this
one and be outraged. And then we should turn that outrage into action,
working to educate others and build support for our fight to put an end
to this system of injustice.
I want to give you some updates on some new developments around here. In
the last couple of months here in the PBSP SHU we are now being given
more privileges. We are now allowed 3 hour visits and the items/property
that we may buy and possess was expanded so that we can now have 40
pictures, up from the previous allowed 15 pictures, we can have a bowl
and cup, slippers/houseshoes, jalapeños, hot sauce, 2 pairs of sweats
and thermals and two appliances, and others have already received a CD
player/tape player for the radio. So it just goes to show that there was
no reason to deny us such things in the first place.
Also, on 11 February 2014 Assembly Member Tom Ammiano introduced
Assembly Bill No. 1652, which if passed and signed into law would limit
the time validated inmates would spend in the SHU solely based on
validation status to 36 months. It would also allow validated prisoners
to earn and receive good time credits again. Write to: Legislative Bill
Room, State Capitol, Room B22, Sacramento, CA 95814, and request a copy
of the bill, or have someone on the outside go to
www.leginfo.ca.gov.
Lastly, a new favorable validation case came out last year: In RE
Cabrera, 216 CAL. APP. 4th 1522 C CAL. APP. 5th Dist. 2013. There’s
some good news but let’s not get comfortable as we have a long way to go
to abolish solitary confinement. Getting Assembly Bill No. 1652 passed
would be a big step in the right direction, so get involved in any way
you can and spread the word.
MIM(Prisons) adds: We’ve said before that you can’t reform
torture. California Assembly Bill No. 1652 would certainly improve
individuals’ lives by shortening the length of torture they face. But
the state will still be terrorizing prisoners with the threat of 3 years
in isolation for talking to people the state doesn’t like or sporting a
tattoo they find offensive or being a member of an organization they are
opposed to.
The In RE Cabrera on Habeas Corpus case may make it a little
harder for the CDCR to torture people for just a tattoo as it requires
that one piece of evidence used to label a prisoner a Security Threat
Group member must prove a two-way relationship between the prisoner and
the group. Still, the process of “validation” using secret evidence
remains in place making it hard for SHU prisoners to even know if this
case applies to them.
As this comrade says, we still have a long way to go to abolish solitary
confinement. But the progress in terms of organizing and building an
opposition to this blatant torture and social control shows that the
oppressed will not put up with this forever. Once a symbol of the
state’s strength over the oppressed, the torture kkkamps across the
United $tates are becoming a point of weakness that exposes its
oppressive nature while rallying resistance to its repression.
I’ve been confined in Administrative Segregation (Ad-Seg) 23/1 lockdown
for a mysterious dangerous weapon which was claimed to be found in my
cell. I am considered to be a leader of a Security Threat Group (STG)
and my political views and my choice to pursue activism, and communism,
has unlawfully become an institutional justification to deny my access
to you, to educational reading material, and more importantly I’ve been
buried alive in a seg unit.
I’m escorted with full body restraints and a dog leash as if I am an
animal. The administration claims that MIM(Prisons) is a threat to the
order of the facility, yet no hearing officer has ever been able to
point out or identify any indirect or direct word or words that
encourages, promotes, or glorifies violence. On the contrary, oppression
and injustice of any kind is not accepted or welcomed in the
MIM(Prisons) publications. Anyone or any organization that fights for
justice, fights for fair treatment in and out of the prison system, and
anyone that opposes a system built on oppression and slavery will be
considered an enemy of the state. I will not abandon MIM(Prisons), nor
my constitutional rights to pursue education, equality, justice and
freedom as a human being.
The conditions of my people are a direct reflection of the bigotry and
intentional misuse of authority by the government of the United States
of Amerika. The prison system in Michigan took college courses out of
the prison while claiming not to have money.
By classifying someone (as an STG) the state receives more money from
the government. Once a prisoner has been given the label of a “gang
member” the prisoner has to remain in maximum security (level 5) where
the prisoner has to go 3 years misconduct-free before the STG
Coordinator will interview the prisoner and determine if s/he will be
let off of STG. The problem is 85% of prisoners classified as STG aren’t
gang members, and have been classified STG because the system uses it as
a disciplinary scare tactic to flip prisoners against each other, and as
a way to justify “selective treatment” towards prisoners who refuse to
accept oppression, corruption, injustice, racism, etc.
MIM(Prisons)’s publications stand as a lifeline for freedom fighters in
prison and therefore MIM(Prisons)’s publication has been placed on the
prison’s restricted list. I can not find the words that will truly
capture the magnitude of my appreciation for you and the supporters of
MIM(Prisons). But please understand that I will never surrender to these
legalized criminals clothed in the fabric of the department of
corrections.
After nearly 2 years in the 23 hour lockdown setting of Ad-Seg in Texas
I have recently been released to General Population - medium custody
status. My experience in Ad-Seg taught me some harsh truths about the
reality of the Texas criminal injustice system. I witnessed numerous
beatings of the lumpen, and I watched in astonishment as Texas
Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) employees lied in order to cover
up and minimize heinous acts of violence aimed at prisoners.
There isn’t any oversight. A major use of force resulting in deaths is
used in exchange for calling it like it is: cold-blooded murder! On 22
October 2013 a white male prisoner housed on the Bill Clements High
Security unit in Amarillo, TX was gassed to death. The prisoner was
known to suffer from asthma! TDCJ employees regularly murder the lumpen
with no consequences what-so-ever.
The prison conditions in Texas’ many Ad-Seg
control units are
deplorable. Last year the Bill SB1003 was passed during the Texas 83rd
state legislative session. This bill, authored by State Senator John
Carona, proposed a study be conducted by an independent committee in
order to assess the policies and procedures of TDCJ in regards to how
they handle prisoners housed in Ad-Seg. The goals of the committee
were:
Reduce Ad-Seg population in Texas
Divert adults with mental illness to alternative programs instead of
housing them in the torturous conditions of Ad-Seg.
Decrease the length of time adults and juveniles are housed in Ad-Seg in
Texas.
As of the date that this article was written, there has not been one
meeting of this so called “Third Party Independent Study Committee.” The
main reason is lack of funding. The Texas Legislative Budget Board
estimated the law (SB1003) would cost less than $128,000. As of 2011,
TDCJ housed 8,784 prisoners in Ad-Seg. More than 2,000 of those
prisoners have been diagnosed with serious mental illness. Comrades, do
you realize that Texas would save tax-payers close to $36 million yearly
if they decreased their Ad-Seg population by half?
Many comrades criticize MIM(Prisons) for exposing the blatant and overt
racism that still exists in states such as Texas, Alabama, Mississippi,
South Carolina, Florida and California. I supported 100% the release of
“The Peoples’ Lawyer” Lynne Stewart but what about Albert “Shaka”
Woodfox? What about Sekou Odinga, Sundiata Acoli, Herman Bell, Jamil
Al-Amin, Lorenzo Johnson, and Mumia Abu-Jamal?
Renisha McBride was shot in the face seeking help after a car accident
in Dearborn, Michigan and
Andy
Lopez was simply playing in the street [and murdered by the pigs the
same day as the prisoner with asthma mentioned above]! We cannot ignore
the race issue but I believe the BLA best summed up our stance on this
issue: “…Black revolution is socialist revolution, aimed at the monopoly
capitalist class, its lackeys and agents, and not indiscriminately at
white people. We must seek, if at all possible, to isolate the monopoly
class from its white worker base of support and bring about a cleavage
in amerikan society such as occurred during the Vietnam war. This must
be a conscious part of our strategy…” -BLA Study Guide.
MIM(Prisons) responds: This article clearly demonstrates that
prisons are not about saving (even less, making) money, they are about
social control. Reducing the size of prison control units would threaten
the criminal injustice system’s use of these as a tool of social
control. And it would also encroach on the jobs of the many people
receiving exploiter wages to run these high security units. So we’re not
surprised that Texas is failing to implement a law aimed at reducing
their Ad-Seg population.
We would go further than this writer in calling out not just the symptom
of racism, but the cause which is national oppression. The unity of the
white nation with the monopoly capitalists comes from a system that
elevates the white nation and oppresses the New Afrikan, Chican@ and
Indigenous nations within U.$. borders, and Third World peoples around
the world. The principle contradiction in the world today is between
oppressed and oppressor nations. That same contradiction is principle
within U.$. borders as well, which means that while we should always
strive to split off the members of the oppressor nation for the cause of
anti-imperialism, their national and class interests tie them very
strongly to the imperialists. It is when wars with the Third World start
to impact the white nation at home, such as during the Vietnam war, that
we might see conditions more favorable for splitting off a section of
the white nation.
click image above to download pdf of all proposed rule changes
On 4 February 2014, a five page
Notice
of Proposed Regulations disseminated among prisoners warehoused in
the death row Security Housing Unit (SHU) known by it politically
corrupt misnomer “Adjustment Center” (AC). The notice states in part
that any person may submit public comments regarding proposed changes.
That’s an open invitation to everyone reading this (including all
prisoners disenfranchised by the state) giving us an opportunity to
advance the struggle. Lately it’s been like talking to the walls.
I’m a “person” on Calincarceration’s death row who is currently
warehoused on the first tier of this secret torture unit at San Quentin
(SQ) State Prison called the AC. Per order of the oligarchy overlords
who comprise the “Institutional Classification Committee” (ICC) my
appeal submitted 2 December 2013, which provides documented evidence
that their decision to continue to warehouse me here is based on false
disciplinary history and a capricious misapplication of local
operational procedures, is being ignored. Even the CDCR 22 requests
making status inquiries to Appeals Coordinators M.L. Davis and R.
Baxter, and the former LIEutenant S. Fowler, now a counselor and ICC
lackey (full member), return nothing except their deliberate
indifference.
That excerpt of my individual situation is only one example of how
California’s most dangerous Security Threat Group (STG) gets down and
dirty. Mine is not an isolated incident either. It’s only one of many
weapons of mass corruption the
CDCR
Pilot Program has utilized to minimize, obscure, and censor the fact
that they really are torturing prisoners in a way that’s no different
than what Phillip Garrido did to Jaycee Dugard – minus the sex crime
factor. CDCR’s goal is to take more hostages, build more torture units
in back yards across the state, and their hideous
Pilot
Program is a bait and switch attempt. CDCR’s main STG Pilot Program
objective
continues to be to crush, kill and destroy their hostages’ ability to
organize in a peaceful protest against no touch torture and other
inhumane conditions of confinement.
Expanding the definition of “disruptive groups” by adopting several new
terms is really the bastard children produced by CDCR unions. It’s the
sick minded schemes of bourgeois pigs behind the scenes of the
Calincarceration Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA), the
Amerikkkan Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCRME)
and others affiliated with the CDCR who would in fact reap a profit as
the additional lackeys get hired to guard the torture units popping up
like 7-Elevens everywhere! Yes, that’s right. All in the name of PEACE
officers AND job SECURITY (which is paid for by your taxed income).
What makes the CDCR STG “the most dangerous” is the fact that they all
know what’s really going on, and know that they’re torturing prisoners.
The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture has clarified that only
15 days in solitary confinement constitutes torture. I’m going on two
years and some here have more than 10 times that. Here, in the secret
torture unit at SQ, the STG Pilot Program is still being cooked up – and
with “specialized” ingredients for an even fouler taste. The AC is a
sort of ground zero for testing policies, a variety of no touch torture
methods, and a twist on the death penalty experiment only depraved
criminal minds could have concocted. SQ death row SHU prisoners
shouldn’t have to be the disposable human guinea pigs getting tortured
to death in the CDCR STG Pilot Program. If the state is allowed to
continue its medieval oligarchical practices resulting in another word
game amounting to “de mock racy” then the public must not have realized
California’s most dangerous STG is the CDCR!
send your comments to: CDCR Regulation and Policy Management
Branch PO Box 942883 Sacramento, CA 94283
Make use of the grievance campaign by attaching your comments to
copies of the petitions (see page 12 in ULK).
I wanted to write a few words concerning the
new
step down program that the California Department of Corrections and
Rehabilitation (CDCR) has begun to implement. There is nothing new
about this brainwash program because brainwash kamps are tools learned
in the “School of the Americas” (aka Western Hemisphere Institute for
Security Cooperation), which was founded in 1946. Brainwash kamps were
unleashed on the Vietnamese by the French, on Jews and communists by the
German Nazis before the gas, and the Koreans tasted these kamps by their
Japanese colonizers. In fact, all colonized people experience some form
of brainwashing by the oppressor. Security Housing Unit (SHU) prisons
are examples of U.$. imperialism following this tradition.
First we should keep in mind that many folks captured in these SHUs are
not guilty of what they are accused of. So long as information is
extracted via torture, i.e. years of solitary confinement, then false
information will be provided to the torturers. It is a fact that some
humyn beings will say or do anything to stop the torture, and
as a result many prisoners will be subjected to torture for false
accusations.
We happened to get our hands on one of the journals that are used in the
step down program. A guard slid one of them into our pod by “accident”
and as you could imagine it was heavily scrutinized.
This brainwash manual has quotes of nameless supposed prisoners
sprinkled throughout saying things to the effect that the supposed
prisoner once blamed the system or other elements but has now realized
it was her/his own fault. Each page has the following words on the
bottom, “It is illegal to duplicate this page in any manner.”
The supposed purpose of this program is for prisoners to work their way
out of the SHU. This will supposedly be done to allow prisoners a way,
outside of informing on people, to get back to the general population.
What they don’t tell you is that you will have to now go through their
brainwash course. Even then they can deny you if they feel you are not
sincere. But my question is, why do I have to undergo a deprogramming
when I am the torture survivor? Why shouldn’t my torturer have to take
classes on why it’s wrong to torture?
In the “journal,” each page asks questions, such as for the reader to
list wrongdoings you have done and then asks what caused you to
make these choices. Examples are given of different crimes the supposed
prisoner committed. They then ask for pros and cons of crimes one
committed and one is even asked if you feel sly or manipulative when you
deceive people.
All these questions are asked in a way that implicates you and attempts
to blame you for not just being in prison but in SHU as well. At no time
is the possibilty even hinted of someone being in SHU for false
allegations. There are lists of good habits and “criminal” behavior. But
good habits like “caring” or “responsibility” are what we already showed
in the strikes, and “criminal” behavior listed like “dishonesty” or
“irresponsibility” is exactly what the state has done. Yet this
brainwash journal wants us to say we are criminal if we want to
advance in this de-programming or de-revolutionizing program. There is
no way I will even act or role play with my torturers just to go to
general population. What they are doing is wrong and rather than take
them off the hook by falsely admitting to criminal behavior I will
refuse their brainwash program and continue to publicize this torture
and agitate for resistance in these death kamps!
MIM(Prisons) adds: This comrade asks a good question as to why it
is not the torturer who has to take classes to help them understand that
what they did was wrong. Of course there is a class character to every
justice system, and in the United $tates we have a bourgeois state. When
there was a proletarian-led state in China it was the torturers,
landlords and spies for the imperialists that underwent re-education in
what might be called a brainwashing program by the imperialists. The
difference in the class character of the Chinese prison system and the
Amerikan one is that those deemed criminals were put in communal living
situations, where they had to learn to live and work together with
others, where they were given reading materials, and required to study.
So while the ultimate goal of getting the criminals to recognize that
what they did was wrong was similar, this was done through group study
and struggle, rather than long-term isolation and torture as is common
for the oppressed languishing in U.$. prisons.
We do not oppose re-education as we are all products of our environment.
Even in U.$. prisons, many of the oppressed locked up have committed
(relatively minor) crimes as they emulate the values of the bourgeoisie.
What we do oppose is torture, wasting of humyn lives, and a justice
system that prioritizes profits over humyn life.