Part 1 of this diary analyzed some of the alarming statistics surrounding our nation's prison systems.
To wit:
We have more of our citizens locked up than any other nation in the world, including China, and that's both in sheer numbers, and per capita. Even more disturbing is the fact that we lock up black citizens at a rate 7 times higher than whites; and latinos more than twice as often. You can argue whether or not the criminal justice system is racist in intent, but there's no denying the outcome - a far-from-colorblind penal system. In fact, according to the aptly named PrisonSucks.com, the USofA locks up a higher percentage of black men than APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA!!
Part 2 (of 2) analyzes how our society looks at our enormous rates of imprisonment, and our recidivism rates, on the flip.
While the media blithely ignores the non-issue of our exponentially expanding and racist-in-outcome "criminal justice system," our popular culture definitely makes hilarious usage of one prison phenomenon: SEXUAL ASSAULT.
You know folks, as a (very) part-time comedian, I don't like to harsh everyone's vibe and start telling folks who should or shouldn't laugh at what is or is not funny. But honestly, the one-inmate-rapin-the-other shtick has been done again and again and again - and ALWAYS FOR A LAUGH. It's tired. I mean sure, what could be more hilarious than a violent sexual assault?- one that, according to some science-y types and a little old organization called Human Rights Watch, happens with alarming frequency:
. . the most recent statistical survey, published in the Prison Journal, showed that 21 percent of inmates in seven Midwestern prisons had experienced at least one episode of pressured or forced sex since being incarcerated, and at least 7 percent had been raped in their facility. And an internal departmental survey of corrections officers in one southern state found that line officers ?those charged with the direct supervision of inmates estimated that roughly one-fifth of all prisoners were being coerced into participation in inmate-on-inmate sex.
21%!!!!! HOLY SHIT!!!
This is how we treat people are paying their debts to society? By placing them in lawless hellholes where 1 in 5 may get raped? And what's more - then we laugh about it??
What has this nation become? Dostoyevsky said that if you want to know the true character of a nation, see to its prisons.
We expect our prison system to reform people, so that they don't commit further crimes in the future - and this is how our country hopes to do it - by providing a safe haven for acts of brutality, and desperation, and then laughing about it. Surely this is the way to reform people into productive members of society. I wonder what our recidivism rates are like. Probably very low - right?
A recent study shows that:
U.S. Prisons Overcrowded and Violent, Recidivism High
Within three years of their release, 67% of former prisoners are rearrested and 52% are re-incarcerated, a recidivism rate that calls into question the effectiveness of America's corrections system, which costs taxpayers $60 billion a year
So this is where we're at folks. Our prison system is the largest and most expensive in the world. They're overcapacity, and they've got really nasty problems like rampant sexual assualt, violence, oh and largely they don't work.
What can we do to fix this system?