Virginia Department of Corrections In Its Operation Unlawful Treatment of Reentry Prisoners At Virginia's Greensville Correctional Center

We at "Virginia Prisons Accountability Committee" have received the following alarming letter from concerned families of prisoners  At Greensville Correctional Center. We have been alerted officials there are not doing their jobs and denying guys their earned good time, overriding their security levels thus keeping them incarcerated longer than they should be. VADOC headquarters in Richmond (atmore) is also not listening to the families when they call the court legal services unit and the correspondence department is not responding to inmate requests, assistance etc. my husband should’ve been home last month and they’re denying him his review and all the things aforementioned. 
We are asking our followers and members to share this post as a step in the process by exposing VADOC violations at Virginia's Greensville Correctional Center. 

Thank you
Submitted Anonymously protecting their identity by a member and follower of Virgina Prisons Accountability Committee.

Victims Ploy Or Accountability

Are the various victims "Rights" enactments actually designed to address issues confronting victims of crime or are the enactments political ploys exploiting victims for the benefit of politicians in the pursuit of speculative power?

Let us hear from you!

By vapac

Virginia Tax Payers and $30,000

How many Virginia Taxpayers understand that the approximate $30,000 per year spent on imprisoning a prisoner within the state's Virginia Department of Corrections approximate 38,000 plus prisoner population is comparable to the Commonwealth of Virginia giving 30,000 citizens $30,000 per year.

There would be an uproar and a revolution were Virginia taxpayers and voters to realize 30,000 of its members have the privilege of such a yearly stipend.

If law, order, and justice are the logic of society, it's social contract and compact and if, imprisonment besides sanction of execution is the absolute social imposition on the sovereign individual. Then there cannot be any abstractions of nuances in its cognitive determination as it is voted for and funded by the taxpayer.  Virginia taxpayers and voters have to understand what is being done IN THER NAME.

The question isn't what is to done with citizens who run afoul of Virginia's criminal laws. Rather what we have to come to terms with is: If the Virginia taxpayer is unwilling to spend $30,000 on citizens in mitigative expenditure on the probability and possibilities of imprisonment in the first place, why then do we gladly spend it to imprison the citizen?

Why should a Virgina citizen convicted of larcenous activity to the tune of a $1,000, given a prison term of 5 years cause a $150,000 financial outlay by the Commonwealth of Virginia. Which is what it would approximately cost Virgina taxpayers and voters to imprison the convicted citizen. There isn't an argument or reasoning that defends such political fact. yet taxpayers and voters glibly participate in this social insanity. Particularly when those same taxpayers and voters criticize and are antagonistic towards the various governmental programs giving assistance to laid-off workers and disabled taxpayers in need.

Imprisonment is a governmental function that is practiced by the state as voted for by taxpayers and if society is a constituent progression of enlightenment. Then citizen-voters have a specific obligation: to recognize what is practical and what is idealistically-speculative.

By William Thorpe
At Red Onion State Prison Solitary Confinement.

On The March 30th 2017 Tour of Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] By Interfaith Action for Human Rights [IAHR]

On Thursday, March 30th, 2017; a coterie of self-styled advocates for prison reform in Virginia including members of the group, Interfaith Action for Human Rights [IAHR] toured Virginia's Red Onion State Prison [ROSP].

The group walked past cells in c-building ROSP's primary solitary confinement building. Cells which held and hold prisoners who are denied outside exercise, showers and sometimes meals. They walked past cells improperly and inadequately holding mental health prisoners. [it is noteworthy that since 2014, 3 prisoners in solitary confinement in ROSP's C-Building have committed suicide], They walked past the cells holding prisoners, some of whom have been in Solitary Confinement over 20 years and the walk through, tour for them was a festive affair. Their voices rang giddy with the excitement of being inside the ROSP environment. As one asked their tour guide [a member of ROSP's investigative or intelligence department] could they go out into the outside exercise cages! Then a prisoner's voice yelling through a cell door, in C-Buildings 3/pod called to account the spectacle that prisoners are not animal exhibits or displays in a zoo.

IAHR in its subsequent newsletter/email titled "Report on visit to Red Onion State Prison" gave itself the proverbial congratulatory pat on the back.

What IAHR and its ilk ignore is: 1. Prison officials work for citizens of society which also includes prisoners. 2. Advocates for prison reform shouldn't be motivated by friendship with prisoners or prison officials. What I mean by prison reform shouldn't be motivated by amicability with either prisoners or prison officials is this: Prison reform is necessary because prison and imprisonment stand at the accountability apogee of society, playing a crucial and pivotal role to the social contract and compact. Because when society practice of imprisonment is done in an idealistic and reactionary manner, society as a whole suffers and pays the price. Because prisoners, once released from the imprisonment, who have been brutalized and dehumanized while in prison will now interact with an unsuspecting society in alienating and destructive ways and daily news accounts bear this out. to which prison officials are quick to shift the narrative and blame prisoners and the released prisoner for whatever stupid mayhem the released prisoner brings society. But the reality is prison officials are squarely and primarily to blame because of the idealistic conditions and sadistic treatment they subjected that imprisoned human to. Conditions which if the prisoner before the imprisonment was deviant, prison officials and their prison experimentation have now catalyzed and enabled the maturation of the deviancy. So society's interest in prison reform is primarily all about society's self-interest because to put it simply, accountability irrespective of the subjective is the objective of the social-contract and compact.

But as it related to IAHR and their March 30, 2017, ROSP tour, IAHR is oblivious to all that I have said. If Government is, to quote Abraham Lincoln, "of, by and for the people", prison officials are functionaries of government and are not exempt from the"..... by and for the people" nature of government and the only dilemma [which IAHR in its "Report on visit to Red Onion" describes itself as facing] was when it was confronted with the inadequacy and immaturity of its understanding and perspective of what is the prison official in a modern American prison. Which was starkly exposed by IAHR's behavior, its interaction with ROSP officials prior to and during the March 30, 2017, tour within the fraudulent context that it is about prison officials and the gentility of their sensibilities.

IAHR doesn't see the prison officials as a functionary of government which then means it doesn't understand that the only interactive operative prison officials have with society is that of accountability, specifically treatment of the imprisoned and how it readies and prepares them for release in a practical manner and not self-serving sloganeering for budgetary opportunities.

Instead, IAHR's behavior on March 30th, 2017, revealed it has a fantasy, an idea, a supposition that prison officials are to be reasoned with, cajoled or implored. Which then upends the only relevant fact: Which as I've stated, prison officials are functionaries of government and are bound by law, procedures, and policies to which they must and can only be held accountable.

Had IAHR interacted with ROSP officials within accountability imperative and context it wouldn't have accepted Virginia Department of Corrections and ROSP's  pre-condition for the tour, that it shouldn't talk to prisoners, whom it claims its advocacy is for?  Maybe prison officials wouldn't have permitted the tour. But then IAHR could have challenged such a decision and the obvious lack of accountability by 1. Legal action to obtain access to ROSP and 2. Politicizing the issue of access to ROSP and if it took a ballot initiative to specify public access to prisons which are governmental function funded by tax payers, so be it.

Instead on March 30th, 2017, IAHR and advocates for prison reform walked right past cells holding prisoners at Red Onion State whose conditions and experiences are the self-claimed basis and motive-force for the advocacy. Once again IAHR and prison reform advocates toured Solitary Confinement building at ROSP, walking right past cells that held and hold prisoners who experience daily violations of the United States, Virginia Law, and Prison procedures and policies. But because of a pre-condition that only mocked and undercut the very reason for prison reform advocacy, IAHR rendered itself impotent.

By William Thorpe

William Thorpe is held in Solitary Confinement at Virginia's Red Onion State Prison.

Accountability, Prison Reform Advocacy and the 13th Amendment

The focus on the 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution as an educational tactical tool by prison reform advocacy is idealistic.

"Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." 

13th Amendment circa 1865

Focus on the above 13th Amendment places prison advocacy on the defensive and at a disadvantage. Because for example, let's take the state of Virginia. Virginia does not have specific laws of what it's imprisonment practices are. Despite the existence of Virginia Code Title 53.1 which deals with: Prisons and other methods of correction, it has consciously and purposefully omitted specificity of its prison related law.

What Va. Code 53.1 does is, it sets up parameters. So for example, Va Code 53.1-32 "treatment and control of prisoners; recreation; religious service speaks to employment, training, and education of prisoners and Va. Code 53.1-32-1 references payment or wages but in a pedestrian manner. Meaning Va Code 53.1-32.1 do not embrace the 13th amendment, nor does Virginia Legislative Action specify wages       what it does codify at Va. Code 53.1-32.1 "Classification system; program assignment; mandatory participation" @ F, is..."inmates employed pursuant to Article 2 (53.1-31 et seq.) of chapter 2 of this title shall not be deemed employees of the Commonwealth of Virginia or its agencies and shall be ineligible for benefits under chapter 29 (sec. 2.2-2900 et seq) of title 2.2, Chapter 6 (sec. 60.2-600 et seq) of title 60.2, chapter 5 (sec.65.2-500 et seq) of title 65.2 or any other provisions of  the code pertaining to the rights of state employees. "[unquote] 

What is significant and noteworthy is the degree of specificity to which Virginia keeps at arm's length any hint of prisoners being employees of the state, despite the fact in all other regards Virginia prisoners are subjects of the state. On the question of wages, Virginia leaves its response to the undemocratic and non-legislative speculations of the State Board of Corrections and the Director of the Virginia Department of Corrections.

The point I'm making and the motive-logic behind "vapac" [Virginia Prisons Accountability Committee] is people, the citizenry needs to know and understand that what goes on in Virginia prisons or any prison system for that matter [because the lack of specificity in-laws governing the prison condition isn't limited to Virginia] are consequences of ideas, prison officials [who are no more qualified than any drunken bum under a bridge] have about how to treat a prisoner.

So, for example, the idea and practice of Virginia prisoners confined in Solitary [segregation] only permitted 2 phone calls a month are simply that "ideas," the Virginia Legislature neither debated it as law nor it passed it. Virginia prisons officials enacted it because Va. code 53.1-10 "powers and duties of Director" permits the Director of the Virginia Dept. of Corrections statutorial authority to "speculate" on what his administration and governance will be. So regardless and irrespective of how the 2 phone call a month idea was concluded and decided on, the fact remains: That it is simply that someone's idea.

On the question of ideas, let's take for example the idea why drivers and passengers should wear seatbelts in cars. It's an idea based on scientific and measurable fact. Meaning science-physics instructs that if one is in a vehicle unrestrained by a seatbelt and there is a crash, you will keep moving forward till you smash into the dashboard or windshield, incurring injuries beyond the initial crash. So the requirement seat belts are worn in vehicles is based on science and not idealistic-speculation.

So on what science is the practice of 2 phone calls a month for Virginia prisoners confined in Solitary [segregation] based on? Despite whatever logic prison officials dredge up, what is ignored as prison officials experiment on prisoners, is the prisoner, not proxy for exercising and playing out fantasies by the state as it develops the social-contract. Virginia prison officials bandy about a term "evidence based program" to cloak their speculative treatment of prisoners as science based. But none of it is. Which is why the Virginia Legislature, left the notion of what is the imprisonment condition up to prison officials with a wink and nod, understanding that the social-contract mandates of the state can be one-dimensionally and superficially pursued by the surrogacy of un-elected prison officials.

What prison advocacy the reform movement has to orient from is the position: If people are imprisoned as a result of the social contract and if prison is a function of government and if government is "off, by and for people," then the people have every right to question determine whether treatments being done to prisoners in their name are valid and not the sadistic ideas of less enlightened minds for the sake of mere gratuitous cruelty. Because in all other aspects and facets of society and its consciousness, the trend and imperative are towards enlightenment. But, only when it concerns prisons and the treatment of prisoners do we encounter a speculative, idealistic hodgepodge. So what happens is: The one facet of society that requires society's full throttled enlightenment, it its treatment of its members who violate and run afoul of its laws      is where we find society retreating from enlightenment and behaving and displaying the exact impulses that resulted its citizens to do that which landed them in prison [regardlessof reason] In conclusion. Yes as we do the work of demanding accountability of social-contrast, as we focus on the antagonisms of the 13th Amendment and its endorsement of the par none ahumanistic relation, slavery. Nonetheless, as a tactical response to the struggle of holding the imprisonment practice and it's prison official subjective, accountable, it's merely an intellectual speculative exercise.

Constitutions, laws, procedures, policies, and practices do not precede the human condition. Instead the human condition defines constitutions and laws, naturally, the dominant narrative will frame their utility    and redefining the narrative, not constitutions or laws but the socio-narrative is the work of prison reform advocacy, because once there is a cleansing of the narrative of its status quo impulses that have nothing to do with the practice of justice, then our political action will be practical and up to the task.

By William Thorpe held in Solitary Confinement at Virginia's Red Onion State Prison

  

The Prisoners Wife By Asha Bandele: A Review

The book is supposedly A Love Story. But I don't know what to make of it---It's too full of recriminations, regrets, resentments, and condescension to be a result of love, as love is understood by the human condition.

The setting for this "Love" is Prison, not any prison for that matter but the insidious and
Machiavellian enterprise of an American prison, The Department of Corrections of The State of New York. The story is a reflection of the tumultuous state of American cultural expression and it's subjective, American Hearts and Minds, because if the cultural and emotional expression of the human is simply a sum of character, then love as the ultimate value of emotion and its medium culture will reflect the state and nature of its subjective. Emotion in the most sublime of conditions and environment is still a strange and mysterious beast, add the ingredient of the most alienative and perverted environmental condition known to humanity, prison and what will you have? What you should have is the sum value of human character, that baptism by fire through adversity, that qualitative redemption from the disjointedness of chaotic quantity but Ms. Bandele fails to even have an inkling of the maxim "I'm Solitude made Man" ---- Solitude which in this context is anguish, that accomplice of love, love which she claims.

The author's emotional consciousness is either objectively malnourished or her alienation from the objectivity of her femininity is so complete that she is confused, She mistakes the adventurous inclination of her Eros with that most consuming of emotions, "Love". Whether or not she wants to face up to and has the presence of mind to acknowledge it, she simply had a stimulating adventure with a prisoner, a test in that most simplistic and primitive of human urges, self-gratification in its motive of one-upmanship. As she tongue in cheek, succinctly puts it "I wanted to be important to someone again" [ pp.27]

For starters, Rashid her beloved, lover and subsequent husband is too one-dimensional and acquiescent, an emasculated corollary of collateral damage from the war between the sexes submitting disgracefully to his wife Asha's each and every undisciplined desire an infantile idealism for whatever it is and was, that was between them to be of that higher human emotion, Love, The only excusable rationalization for his behavior is the stimulus of the relationship in-it self and its satisfying impact on his "...Scorched-Earth" [pp.165] psyche was enough to overlook the dominance of his wife and that spells eunuchism.

Asha, on the other hand, would have us, readers believe that her most yearned for desire and sought for reality is to have her imprisoned mate free and with her, yet when she is impregnated, granted the germinating testimonial seed of their love, she has no problem aborting the fetus.

What is striking and revealing is at every turn of the way, their way and obstacles crop up, which in the general sense, with its solution or how they contend with it would enable their humaneness to define and give credibility to the love they purportedly share both fail its qualification pathetically. Rashid the prisoner and husband for being effeminate and obeisant to his wife's each and every indulgence and Asha the wife for misplacing her need for self-affirmation and its redemptive catharsis with love.

The author presents an unstated and treacherous premise that the pursuit of emotional, mental and physical communion between the imprisoned human and a free one is utterly unrealistic, futile and its fidelity is unattainable--- this premise itself raises the question of what role if any those higher sentient and sapient potentials of humanness plays in the condition of love, not as we misconstrue it to be but as we aspire it to be. If as we are wont to say that love has many facets and conditions then Rashid and Asha's rank at that, no greater than the sum of their undeveloped psyches. What then is Ms. Bandele telling us, "that the spirit is willing but the body is weak"? Or the whole relationship was nothing more than an academic project that is now bearing fruit with her writing a book about it.

To make a long story short "The Prisoners Wife" is a story of relationship between male and female and their dishonesty and inability in coming to terms with the fact that they lacked the manhood and womanhood to develop, nurture and sustain love in that most stifling of environments------Prison.

I close with Asha Bandele invoked Assata Shakur's
"...If I know anything at all
it's that a wall is just a wall
and nothing more at all.

It can be brought down."

And for 219 pages made a mockery of it with erecting that most noxious of walls       

"condescension".

By William Thorpe, I am detained in Solitary Confinement at Virginias Red Onion State Prison

Prison Phone Calls Hustle-Priority Alert

One of the results of Donald Trump becoming the President is he either doesn't care or favors (whatever the reasons are) phone companies jacking rates and policies back up on prison phone calls

During Obama's Presidency, the FCC made phone companies price down rates on prison phone calls. Naturally, phone companies squealed, hating it because the prison phone call business is an extremely lucrative hustle, squeezing every last hard earned penny from families and friends of prisoners.

So phone companies appealed the Obama FCC rule and in early June 2017, the United States Appeal Court for the D.C. Circuit ruled that the FCC exceeded its authority by regulating intrastate prison phone call rates. To which the Donald Trump FCC will let stand and not appeal. So prison phone call rates can or will be jacked back up to those outrageous rates pre-Obama.

As it applies to Virginia we need to know this: Virginia has a Special Law, Va-Code 53.1-1.1

• Telephone systems within Correctional facilities the Department of Corrections shall offer debit or prepaid telephone systems, in addition to any existing collect calling system, which allows telephone calls to be placed to the telephone number or numbers on an approved call list. Such telephone systems may be established with the lowest available rates.

The law quoted above requires the Virginia Department of Corrections [VADOC] provide prisoners with the cheapest call rates available.

During the Obama FCC prison phone call rate decrease. The average rate of intrastate (within) state calls in Virginia averaged $1.10 for 20-minute call  This is very important. Because it reveals it was a low rate phone companies would provide prison phone calls and still make a profit. Which was a dramatic decrease from the pre-Obama ruling of approximately $5 for a 20-minute phone call?

So if phone companies providing prison calls within Virginia want to return to their $5 rates, VADOC will have to square it and explain why it isn't in violation of VA. Code 53.1-1.1.

So, people, we must be vigilant and use every means at our disposal to ensure that phone rates for prison calls are not slyly increased by phone companies with a wink and nod from VADOC.

LET US HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE.

In Strength,
By vapac

Psychological Warfare Against Virginia Prisoners By Michael Hunter Warehoused At Greensville Correctional Center

vapac

Solitary Confinement At Red Onion State Prison: They Want To Silence You, While Warehousing You

On 5/1/17; @ 10:37 a.m. Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] Counselor J.M. Gibson violated Virginia Department of Corrections [VADOC] Operating Procedure 830.1 "provisions governing Solitary Confinement Release Review and a prisoners right to speak at a hearing."

I have been in Solitary Confinement, continuously since August 9, 1996, and every 90 days VADOC procedure requires a formal Solitary Confinement review for either continuation or release from the detention. The Prisoner is to make a statement during the hearing.

During the 5/1/17; Solitary Confinement release hearing at ROSP, Counselor J.M. Gibson REFUSED to take a statement and he quipped "I asked for a statement, not a book." Here in its entirety is the "Book" Gibson didn't want.

"I want a security level decrease and transfer. The 1/11/16 ICA [institutional classification authority]  that changed the security level to 6 used erroneous and contrived grounds in violation of O.P. 830.2 and it was deliberate. My continued detention in Administrative Segregation or Solitary Confinement since 1996 is being done in violation of O. P. 863.3 specifically @ IX (A) ALL OF IT. This ongoing continued Solitary Confinement makes a mockery at least and at worst, the pronouncements of VADOC AND ROSP on reform and practice of Solitary Confinement a lie.

My 5/1/17; experience is just another example of prison officials at ROSP violating VADOC policies while using it, misusing it, when it suits their idealistic intent of warehousing Prisoners in Solitary Conefinement. In essence, they want to silence you while they warehouse you.

The public is blatantly manipulated by VADOC strategically placed propaganda in the media, touting Solitary Confinement Reform at ROSP.  But the reality is , the practice of Solitary Confinement at ROSP IS MAXIMUM.

By William Thorpe

(William Thorpe is detained at ROSP, Solitary Confinement)

The PREA Directive Antinomy

By Definition~The PREA Directive: Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) "Ends the abuse - Protecting LGBTI Prisoners From Sexual Assault.

PARADOX

*Note The Response*
"I Can't Read Your Handwriting"
But should have read
"I Don't Have A Clue"

By vapac

At Red Onion State Prison, Solitary Confinement Reform Is Reduced To Platitudes, Murals and Sloganeering

A dated memo 6/6/2016 to Red Onion State Prison
Note the written comment: The problem with this memo is, it relates to the Solitary Confinement of Segregation building, where prisoners are held and warehoused for decades. There isn't any HEALING ENVIRONMENT. It's only abuse, mistreatment, and violence against prisoners. Murals & slogans on walls will not impact any of that. What will is an investigation by an NON-VADOC source. Solitary Confinement reform is a must but it needs a unified voice against it. By the way? It is now 2017 and they have yet to put up mural/slogan!

Virginia Department of Corrections Considers Transgenders Mental Health Cases and It Labels Transgender Prisoners as GENDER NON-CONFORMIST

Virginia Department of Corrections Memo to prisoners:
Note the written comment: What O.P. 810.1 and 810.2 are saying is Virginia Department of Corrections [VADOC] considers and classify Transgender prisoners and issues as Mental Health cases and issues. But most importantly VADOC does not recognize Transgenders and considers Transgenders as Gender-Non-conforming. This is discrimination against transgenders.

Solitary Confinement Reform Advocacy Is Golden Goose For Vera Institute of Justice

Solitary Confinement and Justice

Reform Advocacy is Golden Goose

presenting an exploitive opportunity for the usual suspects, i.e The Vera Institute of Justice.

The exploited are Prisoners for whom Solitary Confinement isn't an academic symposium at a Black Gala, but decades under conditions of imprisonment the U.S. Supreme Court has declared as "infamous" and their families who suffer along with them. 

Along with holding prison officials accountable for their action.  We have to expose this culture, where prison reform becomes petty opportunity for certain mind and hearts, i.e The Vera Institute of Justice to profit at the expense of Prisoners who are subjects of the barbarity of prison officials experimentation.

Prima facie evidence, see from the Vera Institute of Justice for upcoming 4/25/17; Reimagine Justice Gala. That is obscenely nothing less than profiting at the expense of Prisoners.

By William Thorpe, I am detained in Solitary Confinement at Red Onion State Prison

VADOC's Red Onion State Prison Food Service & Starvation Portion Control

Yes, the menu LOOKS good to the eyes until you actually SEE the food items and how indicated portion size ISN'T what Prisoners at Red Onion State Prison get. We at vapac Use Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] as the example as most Department of Correction [DOC] prisons are to be included.

(note #VADOC & #ROSP's MENU IS  the Punchline NOT the misspelling of  standardized on menu)

*Menu Not Funny Enough*
*The Joke is with our starving Prisoners*
Operations Director [FOD] and "IT IS NOT FUNNY ANYMORE!

By vapac

Solitary Confinement Reform In Virginia Is All Talk and The Vera Institute Is Being Duped By William Thorpe

$2.2 million and an association with the social good of correcting governmental barbarism is a reality few will resist and the Vera Institute of Justice can be understood but not excused for succumbing to its opportunity.  As a tool in the employ of Prison Officials, Solitary Confinement or Administrative Segregative, it's current euphemism has long since been understood as barbaric.  The U.S. Supreme Court in 1870 in it's in Re: Medley Ruling indicted its practice and excoriated its use.

For over a hundred years critics of the practice of imposing Solitary Confinement on prisoners have railed against it and only during the Obama Presidency did the criticism gain traction. Nonetheless, practioners,  proponents, and defenders of its barbaric use have as all reactionaries responded with deflection.  whether it's with euphemism or and as with the case with the Virginia Department of Corrections [VADOC], exploiting affliction with NGO i.e. The Vera Institute of Justice     The intent is to maintain the practice and use of Solitary Confinement.

VADOC has been playing a three card monte, a shell game of musical chairs, that old tired sleight of hand, two step shuffle of reactionary deceit while maintaining the practice of Solitary Confinement.  Despite press release after press release that it has reformed its use of Solitary Confinement at it's primary prison, Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] and other illegitimate claims concerning prisoner complaints and grievances, that purport to indicate operational ethics and management efficiency, the practice of Solitary Confinement and it's use at ROSP is maximum.

After securing recognition from the U.S. Department of Justice, the Council of State Governments, Southern Legislative Conference and others, all of whom have their relative self interest, that VADOC's euphemistic scheme touting Solitary Confinement reform has dramatically reduced it's use at ROSP. VADOC has recently secured alliance with the Vera Institute of Justice to anoint it's "Solitary Confinement Reform" claims.  It is easy to understand the eagerness of Vera Institute, considering it is receiving $2.2 million from the U.S. Department of Justice, to attest in that idealistic usual congratulatory manner that VADOC is progressive.  While turning a blind eye to the reality ongoing at ROSP Solitary Confinement.

What Solitary Confinement reform looks like are: the headlines coming out of California with it's  Ashker v. California settlement.

The almost daily news out of Pennsylvania and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3d circuit of the release from Solitary Confinement of prisoners confined for 29, 22,37 years to list a few.

Virginia on the other hand, despite having it's share of prisoners in Solitary Confinement for 21 years and counting is conspicuously absent from the roll call of Solitary Confinement reformers and no amount of NGO affiliations and it's dupe of the Vera Institute can deflect and distort the fact that Solitary confinement  reform is all talk in  Virginia.

By William Thorpe and I've been in Solitary Confinement in VADOC since 1996 and at ROSP since 1998

RED ONION STATE PRISON SUICIDE POLICY: OC PEPPER GAS THE PRISONER

Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] Suicide Prevention Policy  (*NOTE* page 17 in VADOC policy and procedure 730.4/5) seems to be in practice: OC Pepper Gas the Suicidal Prisoner while the Prisoner is hanging with sheet around the neck, before prison guards in riot gear enter the cell to cut the Prisoner down. Don't forget the time it takes to put on the riot gear.

On 2/19/17; @ Approx. 4:30 a.m. a Prisoner detained in ROSP C-Building #106 [Solitary Confinement] [who wants to remain anonymous] was hanging himself and the ranking officer in charge [OIC] authorized the OC Pepper Gassing of the hanging Prisoner before guards entered the cell to cut the Prisoner down.

OC Pepper Gas is a debilitating toxin that causes a gag reflex which one would which one would think is the last thing a potential hanging victim should be subjected to.

ROSP, Solitary Confinement Unit, C-Building has had at least 2 suicides over the past 2 1/2 years as well as others over the compound since its opening in 1998, (Its sister prison Wallens Ridge State Prison [WRSP] has had a few of its own as well since it's opening in 1999). Why are Prisoners dying and attempting to kill themselves at ROSP Solitary Confinement?

By vapac

*NOTE* vapac affirms https://www.facebook.com/groups/vapacommittee/?ref=group_cover Every day someone dies of suicide, A link to the facts: http://bit.ly/2mKSqgm, 43,000 Americans per year and our imprisoned loved ones be not excluded. To our members who have loved ones on the inside, be aware of some of the warning signs and know their Rights While they are In Prison/Jail, the following link provides us with some legal Rights to advocate on behalf of our imprisoned loved ones be they need it, these are also the people we contact when there is suspicion of VADOC abuse and violations against our imprisoned Mentally Ill: 
Criminal Justice Self-Advocacy

Frequently Asked Questions: http://bit.ly/2n4POGD in Virginia. The NAMI [National Alliance on Mental Illness]
NAMI Virginia’s Information Line And Email
Phone: (804) 285-8264 (not a crisis line)
Email Address: info@namivirginia.org
PO Box 8260
Richmond, VA 23226-0260

Crisis Lines:
NAMI Virginia Area Crisis Line
Crisis Line: 1 (888) 486-8264
NAMI’s National Information Helpline
(800) 950-NAMI

References & Related articles
VADOC Oleoresin Capsicum (OC) Aerosol Spray http://bit.ly/2mXovkr

• You can think "Inside the Box" with solitary confinement exhibit
• Facebook testing AI for suicide prevention tools

Virginia Republicans Are Right On Ousting Virginia's State Inspector General June W. Jennings

The Republican-led Virginia's House of Delegates Recently ambushed Governor Terry McAuliffe by voting not to reinstate his appointee, Virginia's Inspector General June W. Jennings and vapac supports the Republican move to oust June Jennings.

During the tenure of State Inspector June Jennings, there have been a number of Prisoner deaths at Virginia's jails and prisons, specifically Red Onion State Prison [ROSP]. But more systemically are the food violations at ROSP, from its Food Service through prison guard malfeasance and misconduct to mistreatment of its mental health prisoners.

Inspector General June Jennings has received numerous letters from prisoners at ROSP highlighting Virginia Department of Corrections [VADOC] policy and procedure violations by prison officials.  To which June Jennings has relatively ignored because "vapac" continues to receive complaints that the malfeasance and officer misconduct continues.

Vapac urges the office of State Inspector General to administer oversight ensuring that there is accountability and transparency in Virginia prisons. That prison officials manage Virginia prisons by complying with U.S. Virginia law and VADOC procedures.

By vapac
*NOTE* By clicking on the right-hand Pop-Out option or at the end of this hand written letter you can tap on the zoom in/fit page option to get a clearer/darker view of a letter sent to June Jennings, by the way, there was never a response or acknowledgment by her or her department of receipt of this letter

Contra -Kristi Jacobson and She Was Exploited By Red Onion State Prison

Either Solitary Documentary Director and Producer Kristi Jacobson is a moll for the Department of Corrections [VADOC] and it's Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] practice or she is recklessly naive and in her idealistic eagerness to participate in the relatively current debate on the use of  and Solitary Confinement and state organized violence of prisons, she has allowed herself be exploited by VADOC and ROSP in their shell game of Solitary Confinement reform.

My name is William Thorpe and since 1998 I've been detained in Solitary Confinement at ROSP.  I was confined in D/6-Building during the filming of Kristi Jacobson's work, the documentary Solitary on detention at ROSP.

Let me state this: Kristi Jacobson should take every last cent gained from the documentary Solitary and establish a litigation fund that will facilitate legal challenges to the Solitary Confinement of ROSP prisoners, whom in her reckless naivete and idealistic eagerness are being doubly victimized by her help and enabling the VADOC and ROSP shell game narrative that there is cogent and authentic reform in their practice and use of Solitary Confinement.  Because what Kristi Jacobson with her Solitary Documentary has become is a manipulated moll and an outmaneuvered shill for the idealistic futility of those historic minds who have and employ the practice and use of Solitary Confinement as a conscientious governmental function in the name of taxpayers and citizens.

Despite the idealistic construct of the use of Solitary Confinement and its arbitrary imposition of its practice by ROSP officials who by their malfeasance and misconduct work hard and diligently at instructing and tutoring prisoners on how to violate with impunity Virginia and U.S. laws and VADOC procedures in spirit and in deed.  Kristi Jacobson should have enquired of VADOC and ROSP, she should have exercised  due diligence into what was ROSP's anticipation and speculatively to what end would it's prison officials go to attain it. Instead by her own admission, Kristi Jacobson revealed that her due diligence went as far as the colloquial conclusion that ROSP is one of the "worst" prisons in the nation, without understanding what that colloquial "worst" meant.  Instead, she allowed her own suppositionary bias fill in and flesh out what "worst" could mean which as her Solitary documentary exposes is that dubious mystification and mythology of prison, which prison officials have historically utilized in shrouding and diverting attention away from their law breaking and malfeasant activities-and ROSP particularly is no exception.  ROSP is first and foremost a "worst" prison because of its operational philosophy and model results in daily VADOC procedure violations and Virginia and U.S. law-breaking by its officials and guards.

The closest Kristi Jacobson came to in exposing this fact is by retaining and not editing out of the Solitary documentary what ROSP guard Jordon expresses as the satisfaction of loving it, having scored a touchdown or hitting a home run during the violence of a cell extraction.  Which simply means 4,6 and 8 ROSP guards in riot gear [helmets, Kevlar vest, shin and arm guards] after OC gassing a prisoner inside a windowless 8x10 cell, charges into the cell and whether it's 4, 6, 8 guards against one prisoner, violently subdue the prisoner.  Sometimes using handcuffs or shackles as brass knuckles to hit prisoners, which at that point becomes assault and battery and a federal civil rights violation a la Rodney King.  Had Kristi Jacobson understood what ROSP as one of the "worst" prisons meant, which as I've shown above is specifically in the context of it is a serial violator of the law and VADOC procedure, her lenses would have given us something comparatively authentic as Ava Duvernay's 13th.

The Leopard Spots of Solitary Confinement Reform at ROSP and Kristi Jacobson Exploited

Besides pockets of Northern Virginia and enclaves around some of Virginia's College campuses, Virginia is a reactionary state.  This reaction, despite Barack Obama carrying the state twice, in 2008 and 2012; is squarely entrenched in its political activity which is to mean it's Jurisprudence. Consequently, this reactionary inclination extends to its imprisonment practices. Contextually particularly in the lack of accountability of prison officials and legitimate oversight from the appropriate political overlords.  So it's to this backdrop Kristi Jacobson haplessly found herself being outmaneuvered by prison officials who always have a self-serving and adverse interest and their association with her as if heaven-sent manna falling into their laps was a moment they couldn't ignore and seized the opportunity to maximize how Kristi Jacobson would be exploited. 

ROSP has been and is a prison without purpose.  Virginia legislators determined in 1985 that never again would Virginia pursue a prison policy of having the so-called "worst of the worst" prisoners at one prison considering the fiasco one of the nation's prototypical super-maximum prisons, Mecklenburg Correctional Center turned out to be for the state.  Beginning with the 1984 first mass escape of death row prisoners in the nation and culminating in an approximate 23-hour building take over,  the hostage situation that necessitated the then Gov. Chuck Robb appearing on network T.V. Sunday Morning Shows arguing that the state had a competent Department of Corrections.

Fast forward to 1998 and the opening of ROSP doing exactly what the 1998 Virginia Legislature determined it shouldn't.  Nor is it operating as it was designed, considering its $70 + Million price tag and it's only imperative to date is the self-serving pursuits of prison officials perpetuating and maintaining their economical relevance for themselves and for the adjunct support for the diminishing returns of its Southwest Virginia locale, Coal Mining Industry.

It isn't difficult to grasp why certain VADOC elements and their ROSP functionaries would recognize that the music for the ROSP operational game of musical chairs would self-servingly play longer, hence extending their relevance by exploiting the language of Solitary Confinement Reform without actually reforming its use and practice. Which would mean affording release of prisoners who have been detained 20+ years in Solitary Confinement.

VADOC and ROSP have bandied about claims of dramatic reduction of detention in Solitary Confinement. But what has conveniently been omitted is, the rate of the reduction is historically consistent with the type of prisoners being released. It's one thing for ROSP to release prisoners who have historically it detains for no more than 3 to 5 years in Solitary Confinement. Than for it to release prisoners who have been detained in Solitary Confinement for multiple decades and those prisoners are not being released and Kristi Jacobson swallowing the bait, hook and sinker of VADOC's Reform Talk failed to recognize this and make the distinction.

Nothing about ROSP's Solitary Confinement Reform as it is presented as a Step Down Program is novel, enlightened or objective, because the fact of Solitary Confinement or Administrative Segregation in Virginia and ROSP is still arbitrary and vindictive and release from it's condition is still subject to the whims and caprices of prison officials who for their self-serving interest maintain it.

Conflating VADOC and ROSP pre-release program which is relevantly for prisoners within 2-3 years of completing prison sentences as Kristi Jacobson naively allowed prison officials to do, with Solitary Confinement Reform, reveals the insidious comprehensiveness to which Kristi Jacobson was out-maneuvered by prison officials in the quest to maintain relevance and the grace of public opinion with the narrative of reform of a Human Condition that even the 19th Century knew to be Barbaric and ahumanistic.

"Unprecedented Access"

Kristi Jacobson and HBO have made much more about her "unprecedented access" to ROSP. Unprecedented access to a prison that's a public facility and we are supposed to "applaud" prison officials for that?

Let's talk about the unprecedented access: Did it allow Kristi Jacobson to document and reveal to the public scrutiny that; ROSP Prisoners are denied meals, prisoners are assaulted, beaten while in handcuffs and shackles, Prisoners are chained in manners that inhibit and limit ability to stand upright for hours on end, even days, Prisoners are tied to bunks hours on end, denied access to the toilet, Prisoners are denied outside exercise, prisoners are denied showers, Mental Health Prisoners are mistreated, confined in cells months on end without ever let outside for exercise and showers, taunted, provoked, denied meals, meal tampered with, Prisoners are starved due to the noncompliance of food service to provide VADOC food guidelines mandated meal portion amounts, Prisoners are denied forms to file complaints and grievances and then "VADOC can claim that grievances and complaints have decreased by 70%", Prisoners mail tampered with, prisoners allegedly commit suicides, Prisoners are OC pepper gassed in windowless cells, Prisoners are lied on and given contrived and fabricated charges for the purpose of justifying detention in Solitary Confinement, Prisoners are kept in stripped cells, prisoners given loaf diet, prisoners are denied clothing, mattress, blankets, sheets.

Despite the harm, Kristi Jacobson has done and I say "Harm" because her Solitary Documentary has in no way, form or fashion been a shot in the arm of the abolish Solitary Confinement movement.  Nor did Jacobson's lenses delve into the latent impetus of malfeasance and misconduct once it discovered it along with the concurrent hint of the apparent mental and psychological health of prison guards who are obviously ill-suited by their own comments, for the professionalism required to uphold the privileges, the citizens of Virginia have given them per virtue of employment at ROSP.

However, despite Kristi Jacobson's opining to the Independent that......"there are enough portrayals in the media of one-dimensional inmates and one-dimensional guards, and I wanted there to be far more complexity than we are normally given in today's world of media and criminals and prisons "[unquote] she still ended up doing exactly that which she derided.  What would've been refreshingly complex is "instead of apologizing for ROSP guards symptomatic malfeasance with her"...."I think I began to understand if you're looking from the outside but thought those guards were incredibly brave for sharing some of their honest feelings about what it's like to work inside there" [unquote].

What Kristi Jacobson ignored was prisons exist because of law and if it was about empathy and apologies prisoners equally lay claim to both as prison guards and as such a prison guards propensity for malfeasance shouldn't be excused nor apologized away.  If the Documentary is to be made on prisons it should give us that.

By William Thorpe ~ I'm detained at ROSP Solitary Confinement

Free Speech, Dan Cathy of Chic-fil-a..And God Said Or The Bible Says and History Will Erect Tombstones

The Implicit activity of free speech is it anticipates antithesis, it recognizes there will be opposition.  Couching theological liberties as free speech is either the work of a lazy and feeble mind or at its very core an effort to reassert idealistic dicta.

Dan Cathy of Chic-fil-a Restaurants as most Republican-Conservatives when confronted with the reactionary nature and backwardness of their thought and world view find refuge under the banner of...and God said or the Bible says.  So when Dan Cathy touched off a recent firestorm with his anti-gay comments, he was quick, along with his supporters and defenders to claim free speech because it was his religious belief and liberty.

The Issue and the problem with... and God said or the Bible says, as free speech is we cannot argue with God, we cannot debate God, even the Devil isn't truly antithetical to God.  So... And God said or the Bible says for purposes of free speech definitions is as idealistic as the notion of "being outside of history" which is what Dan Cathy and his ilk would always demand of the Human Condition and it's dialectical-materialist reality.

The United States Constitution articulates religious freedoms as specifically being without the dicta of the state and its bias.  Free speech is subsequently defined antithetically to religion because free speech is the activity of thought, mental labor.  Religion isn't an idea to its believers, it's rather a suspension, suppression, and repression of ideas, it frowns on the activity of free speech.

So for the very elements, free speech warns us against to conceal their reactionary practice under its mantle hints at two occurrences, either we have become militantly decadent or we have lost the Jacobin edge of polemics.

Dan Cathy, his reaction, and backwardness can and will invoke God as a medium of their idealistic intolerance and history will erect tombstones to their failure.

By William Thorpe Imprisoned at Red Onion State Prison

The American Status Quo, It's Policing Organized Violence, Black Masculinity, Cooperation and Control

The Idea that the American status quo and it's policing organized violence is fearful and threatened by Black masculinity isn't wholly accurate and can be disproven by the level of injustice the American status quo and it's policing organized violence metes out to Black masculinity.  Because if the American status quo and it's policing organized violence was fearful and threatened by Black masculinity, it would be cautious and circumspective in it's blatant and overt practice of injustice, because the prospect of retaliation and retribution would loom large in it's Conservative imperative, but as the murderous practices of it's policing organized violence shows us, it's oblivious.

What however is accurate and correct is Black masculinity, in the calculus of the American status quo is to be controlled and as much as the American status quo and it's policing organized violence denigrates and dehumanizes Black masculinity it requires cooperation from Black masculinity to effect the control.  Meaning the American status quo and it's policing organized violence recognizes the humanity of Black masculinity as a comprehending medium even as it propagandizes the dehumanization of Black masculinity, a recognition that exposes the petty base nature of the controlling dynamic.

By William Thorpe Held in Solitary Confinement

Religion is the New Racism, Intellectual-Liberalism, Charity and it's Political-Economy Contradictions

Religion is the new Racism.  Specifically, it is that old friend tyranny guised up under the Johnny-Come-Lately of the monkey see monkey do banner of that lover of the Human Condition, ignorance.

Racism being intolerance and beyond the pale is understood by the most backwardly naive to the sophisticated cynic.  But religious intolerance in all it's diverse forms thrives from planes slamming into the Twin Towers and Pentagon to the shrilling babel of voices across the land that places of unfamiliar worship and fellowship are sinister and evil.

Intellectual activity during ages past was of reason and enlightenment, laboring for tolerance and selfless apathy.  Intellectual activity in the age of religion is the new Racism labors for intolerance and it's defense.  It is Intellectual-Liberalism resurrecting the most crass, idealistic and misanthropic attitudes.  Religion is the new Racism is selfishness wrapped in the mantle of charity and it's Political-Economy contradictions.

From every religious fundamentalism to it's reaction and intolerance, religion is the new Racism has pathetically shown itself to be the bastion of Farmers Almanac aphorisms, pop psychology, and snake oil charlatans.  Each hypocritically requiring it's purported antithesis for survival and existence.

By William Thorpe Imprisoned at ROSP since 1998

Smoking But Not Inhaling and Marijuana Legalization

To those defiers of respiratory physics, Smoking but not Inhaling. To those who for whatever reason defame and extoll the virtue's of Marijuana. To the question of Marijuana Legalization. I have for you one experience, Read, Dope inc. By Lyndon Larouche.

by vapac

On Injustice

Injustice exists and is pervasive because it's prey and victims rarely respond in that conclusive and commensurate manner that would give pause to the machinery and medium of injustice.

By William Thorpe Imprisoned at ROSP 

Red Onion State Prison Food Violations

We have received numerous complaints from Prisoners at Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] Solitary Confinement concerning the activities of P. Scarberry, the Food Service Manager at ROSP.

Virginia Prisons Accountability Committee [vapac] is concerned that P. Scarberry is violating clearly established Virginia Department of Corrections [VADOC] Food Service Manual provisions and what the standardized Master Menu requires is prepared and with mandated portion size served at ROSP.

Numerous Prisoners detained at ROSP Solitary Confinement have informed us that you are well aware of P. Scarberry's violative activities because they have written you, bringing it to your attention that P. Scarberry is not following VADOC Food Service procedure.

P. Scarberry has attempted to explain her actions in response to Prisoner complaints and grievances that she has the discretion to make menu substitutions.  Vapac disagrees that P. Scarberry is simply making Procedurally correct substitutions.  On the contrary, what P. Scarberry has been doing is "altering and changing" the menu at the institutional level and she doesn't have the authority to do so.

Vapac states that Virginia Citizens are well served when prison officials and prisoners both comply and abide by the necessary prison procedures and rules.  Vapac anticipates you agree with us and you will ensure P. Scarber

ry operates ROSP Food Service within the appropriate guidelines.

Virginia Prisons Accountability Committee

Red Onion State Prison Obstructs Prisoner Complaints While Touting It's Reduction

The Virginia Department of Corrections, [VADOC] recently has been touting the reduction in Prisoner complaints and grievance at Red Onion State Prison, its primary Solitary Confinement Prison.  As indicative that its self-claimed Solitary Confinement Reform is progressive. and Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] is a well-managed and operationally ethical prison, where it's officials and rank and file guards comply and follow U.S. and Virginia laws and prison procedures, policies.  The truth, however, is the purported reduction in prisoner complaints and grievances by the ridiculously obscene amount of 75% and 71% respectively is the result of ROSP and VADOC officials at its Western Region Ombudsman employing gimmicks, gambits that obstructs and impedes Prisoner filing of complaints and grievances.  Click Here  to see example of grievance department declined to process and file.  A violation upheld by the Western Region Ombudsman under contradictory reasons.  Click here  to see VADOC grievance procedure OP 866.1, which clearly shows the grievance by William Thorpe should've been processed and filed and the Western Region Ombudsman was complicit in obstructing its filing.

Posted by vapac

Prison Reform, Political-Economy and "Open Political Action"

Is Prison Reform as envisioned by the Barack Obama Presidency and Senator Jim Webb of Virginia a co-opt and preempt of organic Prison Reform?

Historically Prison Reform, which is to mean advocacies by persons and groups towards the purpose of achieving a reform of imprisonment and the way it is used in the United States has floundered and hasn't achieved its objectives. If some of it's objectives were realized it was concessional ploys by government. Firstly as a means of co-opting reforms evolutionary direction and secondly tactical maneuvering that strengthens the governmental position all the more firmly. A classic example of this is the Anti-Death Penalty position and advocacy, with the way government, maneuvered by strengthening that weakness of the governmental position and then enforcing it even more draconic ally after the revision and correction of that which made Capital Punishment susceptible to attack by it's foes.

Prison, as used in the U.S. is a means of controlling elements of society who because of their economical oppression are politically and socially marginalized. What this means in the broad sense is, those members of society who because of their manner of interaction with the economy are without the political and social basis to demand substantial access and positive recognition from society are the one's laws and imprisonment are designed for. It doesn't take much to realize that if an element of society lacks the means to stably interact with it, decisions made and the resulting behavior will run counter to society's laws and as such will result in imprisonment. Elements in society who for the most part meet this controlling imperative have been Black people (descendants of enslaved Africans) and the poor blue collar worker or the ubiquitous "working poor".

U.S. society and government does not view its Black elements and blue collar working poor as productive beings in the Political-Economical sense. But it views the population in question first and foremost as a group to be controlled. This antebellum mindset dates back to it's feudalistic and royalist origins when common people were to be controlled and rigidly tied to the land by their so-called betters, in a statist undertaking of Political-Economy. Even with the advent of industrial technology and it's socialist production, those societies of which the United States is a historical offspring simply carried over the feudalistic mindset to socialist industrial production. Of Which even if the so-called commoners, "working poor" of the United States society, Black people and the poor blue collar working Whites are not in practice feudalistically tied to the land they are in principle just as much tied to it due to their lacking of that substantial means of removing themselves from that imperative of control.

The issue of Prison Reform is also the question of what is the structure and development of the materialist-dialectic of American Political-Economy. In other words, if the issue is what is to be done with the predominant imprisonment of Black people and the poor White people, the answer lies with the radical reputation of the American Labor narrative and the speculative-value antagonism. It also lies with a heightened political grasp of the "working poor", to clearly and starkly contrast the divergence of interest within Political-Economy dynamic of their condition. This means not allowing the status-quo and it's support functionaries to describe and define facts as they see fit.

Historically Prison reform holds the position that "open political action" is a specific intellectual activity with the final arbiter the very cause for it's practice and as the Barack Obama Presidency and Senator Jim Webb's initiatives outline the question it preempts organic Prison Reform.

Written by William Imprisoned In Solitary Confinement at Red Onion State Prison Since 1998

Hostages, Captives and the Contradiction of the Prisoner Dialectic

This fails me. There is the ubiquitous parade of Psychologist and so-called experts each dispensing "expert" advice on the Psychological trials and adjustment deficit for released former hostages and captives. Statistics are hurled about showing the Socio-Dysfunctional rates of former hostages and captives, be it Divorce, Suicides or physical trauma and the qualifier is the statistics represent persons detained as hostages, held captive for ransom for the various reasons. Consequently private and public resources are expended in efforts of support for and rehabilitation of the former hostages and captives.

On the average Tens of Thousands of Prisoners held in American Jails and Prisons under relatively similar conditions as hostages and captives are released yearly without an assessment of their experience within the linguistic and critical framework of released hostages and captives. This begs this question is inhumane, and barbaric treatment of a detained human being in all it's sensory deprivation and physical mistreatment dependent only on the clinical and academic distinction of legal and illegal?

Is the existential reality of the detained subjects experience of injustice, inhumanness,, and barbarity a contradiction mitigated or aggravated by the mere means of it's procedural application?

By William

William Thorpe is confined in Solitary Confinement At Red Onion State Prison Since 1998

Related articles

• Solitary Watch and The Antagonism Of Idealistic-Journalism and Accountability
• What We Are About
• The Prison Condition, Anal Cavity Searches and Terrorism

WE ARE

We are "The Wretched of the Earth",
the suffers of injustice,
the bearers of the yoke of oppression.

We are the down-trodden,
the exploited,
the repressed and we can always rest assured to be manipulated and compromised.

We are The People,
The Populations, The Masses. We build civilizations, we construct edifices and structures attesting to the creativity, ingenuity, and expression of humanity.

We are the basis and foundation that prosperity, wealth, and stability are built on. We surmount the insurmountable. We labor as "Beast of Burden" and the rule is we do all this in the pursuit of anothers interest. We always place anothers welfare above ours. We compromise our lives and settle for wretched existence in consequences of our pursuits of alien ideas.

We are Human Beings. Yet we settle for Civil Rights instead of Human Rights. Some of us claim ignorance as a justifiable reason for subjugated, subservient existence we call our Human Condition.

Those of us who exist in societies that the rule is an exchange of labor for Capital, meaning the dictated means of acquiring and attaining the necessities of life: water, food, shelter, and clothing, experience it's consequences as an inequity of their material realization, an inability to attain that maximal realization of their Human potential.

Those of us who exist in societies that the rule is allegiance to the state, garners you the basics in life experience the injustices and inability of the state to contend and deal with the frailties, whims and caprices of it's human elements, those petty tyrants who at every inch of the way exhibit that rat like frenzy of rats abandoning a sinking ship, grasping and grabbing what their placement within the state machine allows as the wretched masses once again look on
stupefied--- our blood was shed for this?

Those of us who exist in societies that the rule is fiat of theocracy, experience the hypocrisy of human sensuality and sentience totally at odds with the sapient potential of human realization. We persistently encounter that infantile inability of the theological basis to come to terms with the profane cause-effect of the material basis defining and determining that exponential parameter of our lives and condition, which as a result repress and alienates us the masses from our humanness---which in effect produces that one dimensional Human Being we all know so well.

We, "The Wretched of the Earth" have the obligation of understanding that all these factors and conditions that bring us so much despair, grief and anger have no other solution than ourselves. We hold in our hands the turn of our destiny and the relative means to direct our lives upon that path of maximal realization of which the legacy of humanness is our inheritance. The progression of humanness lies with us because we are humanity.

We are the People,
The Populations, The Masses. The frustrations we revel in permitting our articulation of that defeatist slogan "that's the system and that's the way it is", illustrates our continued submission to an existence that takes everything out of us and puts nothing back. It drains us of our humanness and replaces it with the illogical and a humanistic urge of oblivion under the guise of redemption.

By William Thorpe

William Thorpe is confined in Solitary Confinement at Red Onion State Prison