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The underground economy of solitary confinement

themarshallproject.org

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Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#31

Post by randomacct8162 »

mgkimsal wrote: post #25
randomacct8162 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was on computers a lot as a kid and sort of taught myself programming (very poorly) in my early years. When I caught this charge, I had just turned 18. It really ruined my life. Currently, I work in tech. For a very long time I was barely making ends meet, working in a fast food restaurant for minimum wage while trying to interview to get a developer job. I went through 8 interview processes, and received offers fr…

Had to go search for it, but YC funded a company - https://www.70millionjobs.com - that focuses on felon-friendly companies hiring.

I won't sling mud, but the jobs are the same you can already get as a felon (construction, kitchen, hospitality, factory, etc) and I had a negative experience with my interaction there

Thank you for looking though. I think it's important to offer felons the chance to get a decent job in a proper career field too.

There's one organization doing this called "Underdog Devs":

https://www.underdogdevs.org

https://twitter.com/underdogdevs

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#32

Post by randomacct8162 »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #27

What is the alternative to solitary confinement? There are some people who are a persistent threat and menace to others. There are 3 ways that society has dealt with them: Execution Banishment Imprisonment We are trying to do away with execution, so that is not a real alternative. Banishment really doesn't work in the modern, connected world. That leaves imprisonment. However, within prison, you also have a society,…

FWIW, I am not against the death penalty. It makes much more economic sense than life in prison (it costs ludicrous amounts of money to house prisoners per-annua) and as someone who has done prison time my personal opinion is I'd rather be killed than face the mental agony of living the rest of my days in there.

I'm not sure why so many people are against it or think it's inhumane. I think it's a bit silly considering most people who hold that opinion have never been to prison.

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#33

Post by jrochkind1 »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #17
Synaesthesia wrote: post #13

The US prison system is so brutal and things like solitary confinement, which is torture, totally normalised. We need to call attention to these things.

There's a video on YouTube of a prison warden who went into solitary for 48 hours. He said it was painful - but that, considering how violent some of the prisoners he had to hold were, he would still not rule out its use. It's not an ideal option in any way, but sometimes it's just the least-bad option. In my opinion, we should focus on overuse and abuse of solitary confinement, but elimination is not possible for so…

I feel like there's probably a pretty big difference in how it feels between voluntarily going into solitary for 48 hours by your choice, only for 48 hours, and being in there for months (or years!!), with no known end.

There's also a big difference between "ruling out it's use entirely", and having hundreds of thousands of people in it every day.

It is not treated as a last resort in the current US incarceration system.

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#34

Post by randomacct8162 »

Ekaros wrote: post #26
randomacct8162 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was on computers a lot as a kid and sort of taught myself programming (very poorly) in my early years. When I caught this charge, I had just turned 18. It really ruined my life. Currently, I work in tech. For a very long time I was barely making ends meet, working in a fast food restaurant for minimum wage while trying to interview to get a developer job. I went through 8 interview processes, and received offers fr…

I never understood the whole felon thing, if that is allowed discrimination outside certain roles how can those people ever be expected back to society? Ofc, they are going to do more crime if it is their only realistic option for reasonable income.

  > "if that is allowed discrimination outside certain roles how can those people ever be expected back to society? Ofc, they are going to do more crime if it is their only realistic option for reasonable income."
And you've found the answer to why the American judicial/prison-complex is a revolving door system.

"Welcome to the Hotel California. You can check-out any time you like, But you can never leave!"

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#35

Post by pc86 »

jopsen wrote: post #30
matheusmoreira wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy shit I didn't know that. Those guards belong in jail themselves, what they did is torture. Prison exists to remove from society people who are incompatible with it, nothing more and even that must be constantly questioned and re-evaluated. Nobody deserves to have their dignity stripped away like that.

> Those guards belong in jail themselves... The guards are just the product of a system/culture.

As are most of the prisoners, but many of them belong there as well.

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#36

Post by Akronymus »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #20
randomacct8162 wrote: post #3

I spent 3 years in US prisons for drug charges picked up when I was an addict and did a 90-day stint in solitary for breaking up a fight between two acquaintances. AMA. I'll start with: Yes, "fishing" is one of the first things you learn. It's not just for solitary, you use it to get stuff under other people doors when you're not out of your cells on a regular unit too, or when you don't want guards to suspect someth…

Holy shit I didn't know that. Those guards belong in jail themselves, what they did is torture. Prison exists to remove from society people who are incompatible with it, nothing more and even that must be constantly questioned and re-evaluated. Nobody deserves to have their dignity stripped away like that.

It also exists to make people compatible with society again. Or at least should be.

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#37

Post by Cthulhu_ »

jopsen wrote: post #30
matheusmoreira wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy shit I didn't know that. Those guards belong in jail themselves, what they did is torture. Prison exists to remove from society people who are incompatible with it, nothing more and even that must be constantly questioned and re-evaluated. Nobody deserves to have their dignity stripped away like that.

> Those guards belong in jail themselves... The guards are just the product of a system/culture.

Don't make apologies for people who choose torture and who chose to participate in said system / culture. It's a job; if they had morals they would quit, whistleblow, or punish colleagues for this behaviour. I can't believe the pay would be THAT good. There's clearly no adequate chain of command or repercussions for this crime.

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#38

Post by pc86 »

syki wrote: post #22
randomacct8162 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for doing that, it's an important job. I learned spanish by taking an hour-long spanish class every weekday while I was in there. If your class wasn't mandatory, then I'm sure you know that most people were just there probably to get extra time out of their cell or to break the monotony. And I assume most of them were complete assholes to you. After I am financially independent, I want to try to get state/f…

I quickly figured out they were mostly there to break the monotony. I threw out the curriculum and did basic graph theory and some logic stuff. I only had one run in with someone. The prisoners treated me decently. I gave them all passing grades and just wanted them to get out of the experience whatever they wanted to get out of it.

How did you get into that? It's something I would love to do but I never knew how or if you could volunteer to just do a single course, if you'd have any sort of support, etc.

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#39

Post by Cthulhu_ »

Bradlinc wrote: post #12

Three things occur to me as I read this article: 1) Toilet paper seems like a necessity. 2) In America, we treat our prisoners horribly. We are going to look back on this in a 100 years with the same disdain we look back on slavery. 3) Though I have a hard day a head of me, my life could be far, far worse.

> We are going to look back on this in a 100 years with the same disdain we look back on slavery.

We can only hope, but why only in 100 years when 'we' - the people in this thread and a lot of others - already look at it with disdain.

But there's others - lawmakers, the private prison industry, etc - who think this is just fine and dandy, because it fills their pockets and is a legal avenue into a slave labor force (prison labor). It's in their interest to get people in jail.

Re: The underground economy of solitary confinement

#40

Post by Cthulhu_ »

moralestapia wrote: post #23

This is torture. Period.

I don't think anyone's arguing against that - at least not on here - the question is how to stop it from happening and undo the harm. That'll take big reforms, all the way up to the current political system in the US.
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