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Prison Tropes “R” Us: Why it’s so damn hard to reform correctional facilities in the United States and what can we do change this state of affairs

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Lots of things are standing in the way of reforming correctional facilities, the controversial practices that occur inside them, and the people who work there.

This is not because we haven’t accumulated a respectable amount of peer-reviewed research that provides advice on all manner of ways to improve jails and prisons.

And it’s not simply because of powerful correctional officer unions that lobby against change, punitive beliefs held by many members of the public, the popularly held view that a stint behind bars serves as a deterrent against crime, the ossification of the bureaucracies that manage jails and prisons, or a lack of resources. Although these are important obstacles, these factors alone are not the reason why correctional institutions are so difficult to change.

The most important reason why it’s difficult to reform jails, prisons and other carceral facilities is because the general public has a poor understanding of what goes on in correctional institutions and this is largely because their opinions about this branch of the criminal justice system are based upon the knowledge and myths they have derived from popular culture portrayals.

For example, no movie or television series (or even an episode from the same) that is set in a correctional facility (nor the deluge of contemporary “shock-umentaries” like America’s Toughest Prisons, or even commercials featuring prisons) seems complete without some physical confrontation on the yard, somebody being shived, a prison rape, or intimidating looking gang members. Many times this is simple pandering to prison voyeurism. I could go on.

The reality is that life inside jails and prison is mostly boring both for the inmates and the correctional officers who work there. Opportunities for rehabilitation are sparse. And most people who are sentenced to a correctional facility come out worse than when they went in.

When proposals, policies and laws, proposed or introduced in correctional facilities, or city hall, county executives, state legislatures, or Congress, that attempt to reform the correctional facilities under their jurisdiction, the public frequently does a mental check on what they know about jails and prisons and if it is out of sync, they say hell no. This public opinion translates its way back to elected politicians who make the ultimate decisions.

That’s why, if we’re going to make a meaningful dent into changing jail and prison policies and practices, laws connected towards their operation, and maybe even abolishing prisons, we need to examine and reform the way correctional facilities are presented to the public. Scholarly research is important, but a systematic public education campaign, and through the news media investing more effort and resources towards coverage of what happens behind bars, and presenting programs and policies that work is equally pressing.

Bring on the enablers: Why are so many Republicans still making illogical arguments against the impeachment of Trump by the Senate?

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You have seen and heard them, the familiar faces of the Republican Party; Cruz, Gaetz, Jordan, Rubio and the rest of the so-called Freedom Caucus.

They are the same politicians who argued in Congress, and in front of the American people, to reject the results of the electoral college.

Despite the fact that their actions enabled the outgoing president to spread seditious lies and led to a violent mob that threatened their safety and security and that of their fellow congresspeople three weeks ago, they continue to argue at length that now twice impeached former President Donald Trump should not be convicted in the Senate.

Mitch McConnell, the former Senate Majority Leader, who famously said two weeks ago that he would support Trump’s impeachment by the senate, is now waffling. House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy, who blamed Trump’s speech for inciting the rioters, flew to Florida this week to have an audience with Trump, like he was the pope or some mafia boss.

Do both of these politicians think that the future of the Republican party would be better off with Trump acting like a puppet master behind the scenes? Or do they worry that Trump might start a third party and take away the Republican base with them?

In some respects watching these GOP politicians is like seeing the Stockholm Syndrome play out where victims develop intimate bonds with the people who perpetrated the crime against them. But that’s letting the GOP off the hook. They are not victims. They’ve been actively courting a racist and xenophobic base and thought they could control Trump.

Meanwhile not only have the enablers harassed House Republicans who voted in favor of impeachment (e.g., Cheney), but also ganging up on Republican Senators (i.e., Collins, Murkowski, Romney, Sasse, and Toomey) who voted in favor of the forthcoming impeachment hearing. Do they not think that the Lincoln Project or other better funded PACs won’t funnel a considerable amount of money behind the re-election campaigns of these politicians if they are floundering in the polls?

The enablers must be hoping that they can still curry favor with Trump, or his loyal base, and that when it is time for re-election that if they strongly come out against impeachment now, that it will pay dividends in terms of Trump’s endorsement and perhaps the channeling of campaign funds.

What they don’t want, as we move into the spring, is for Trump and the organizations he created or was affiliated with to be increasingly embroiled in criminal and civil litigation. His creditors will ramp up the cost-benefit calculations they are already making, and many as they are already doing will start pulling the loans they entrusted him and his organization with. Trump may even be behind bars.

Trump’s enablers are making all sorts of illogical arguments, like just because Trump did not actually tell people to violently storm the capitol, he can’t be held responsible in any shape or fashion. Or impeaching Trump will not heal the country. In fact it will have to opposite effect of tearing the country apart. And why’s this?

This is as much nonsense as suggesting that the vote was stolen.

Perhaps these arguments make sense to their supporters or the cult that loyally voted for Trump?

Maybe this is what they perceive is the needed rhetoric they need now if they are planning for the next midterm election.

They are operating out of sense of fear, short term thinking.

Although some of us may believe that they are destined to fail, sitting back and casually accepting this posturing is unacceptable.

Photo by Ruperto Miller

El líder de la mayoría republicana en el Senado, Mitch McConnell, reconoció este martes por primera vez la victoria del demócrata Joe Biden en las elecciones presidenciales de EU, marcando así un punto de inflexión en el Grand Old Party

Should people who didn’t follow the CDC guidelines to reduce the transmission of COVID-19 be given priority for treatment in overflowing and understaffed hospitals?

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One of the most important pressing moral questions of our time, that few of us want to ask or answer, is should people who have disregarded or intentionally ignored CDC guidelines to minimize the spread of COVID-19 and end up in the emergency rooms and intensive care units of our hospitals with corona virus symptoms be treated as anyone else who has done their best to comply?

In many states, counties and cities in the United States hospitals are overflowing with people who have COVID-19 or corona virus like symptoms. Most of these people have unsuspectedly been exposed to the virus. Some of them are our essential workers, while others are people in nursing homes. The young and the old, the virus is an equal opportunity phenomenon. The deaths and destruction that the virus has caused is not just unfortunate it’s tragic.

Assuming we could determine with certainty who rejects the guidelines, and thus science, and who doesn’t, most Americans by now know the virus is spread by asymptomatic people and that they need to avoid large gatherings, wear masks, social distance, wash hands frequently, etc. Many (perhaps most of the 74 million who supported Trump’s second presidential bid) believe COVID-19 is a hoax or at least exaggerated, ignore these recommendations and attended crowded events without masks or social distancing.

Some of these individuals also express hostility towards those who wear masks, advocate the use of masks, and towards folks who try to enforce the guidelines. For example, flight attendants spent most of their time enforcing the mask mandates and getting verbally and sometimes physically abused by noncompliant passengers.

These science and expert-rejecting folks believe that in the United States they have freedom to do as they please. Of course, this is nonsense. We have restrictions on most of our behaviors – you don’t have the freedom to run a red light, you don’t have the freedom not to wear a seatbelt, etc. We even have restrictions on our first amendment right of freedom of speech. So at the very minimum, if our behaviors potentially endanger the lives of others and of ourselves, we really don’t have the freedom to engage in that behavior. It is now abundantly clear with reams of data to prove it that failing to follow COVID-19 guidelines puts others at risk, drains needed health care resources, and puts the lives of health care professionals and essential workers at higher and preventable risk.

Despite the recent slow and dysfunctional rolling out of a vaccine, in the United States alone, we are now up to 24,438,786 number of people who are infected with the virus and 406,159 deaths. Reports indicate that there are x number of people who die each day.

There are few historic parallels to what has occurred with COVID-19. For example, during the 1980s HIV/AIDs was ravaging through the gay community. The public was advised to take precautions to not have unprotected sex with strangers, minimize the number of partners, etc., and if they had contracted the virus they had the moral obligation to disclose this information to their partners. Predictably there were people who were diagnosed with HIV/AIDS, ignored the guidelines, had unprotected sex with partners, and their partners contracted HIV/AIDs. Some of these folks were even charged with attempted homicide.

So, in light of these tragic statistics and a dangerously at capacity and over capacity health care system in many states/cities, many hospitals are very close to rationing health care. The question is should people who rejected science and experts and willingly and knowingly, with complete disregard for human life, infected others have the same access to diminishing health care resources in the same way as the rest of us who have been doing everything right to minimize transmission?

Clearly the medical profession is governed by the Hippocratic oath, which despite its slight modifications over the years, basically affirms the notion that that health and medical care profession should engage in their duties to patients without fear or favor in a totally equal manner. So perhaps the moral question of our time is best targeted to hospital administrators and health care planners whose job is to allocate limited resources judiciously. What will they do?

Photo “Virus Outbreak Italy” by Ninian Reid