By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982
Criminal Justice Reform, Law, Virginia Commonwealth State, Prison Reform, Prison Advocacy blog
By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982
In the 2010 Ridley Scott movie depiction of ROBIN HOOD of English tales, RICHARD THE LIONHEART, the English King is told by Russell Crowe, the yet to be Robin Hood, that God wouldn't find favor in his deeds during one of the CRUSADES against Muslims and Russell Crowe's character exact words were "Godless", that The King Richard's deeds were Godless. Needless I add the King didn't take to kindly to it, even though he demanded honest council from Russell Crowe's character, which he subsequently placed Russell Crowe in the stockades for his "honesty".The point is Richard The English King expected and assumed that slaughtering Muslims was a Godly deed, well "History" in the form of Russell Crowe's character, who participated in the slaughter as a soldier following orders disabused Richard The Lionheart of those assumptions which as metaphor fits and is apt in characterizing and defining the professional behavior of the Virginia prison official in the duty of imprisoning Virginia citizens processed under law. Despite the fact that there is a universe of calculations and interests animating and directing the Virginia prison officials' professional behavior and attitudes in the work of administering Virginia prisons, what we know, observe and experience is the unequivocal and unambiguous fact of DEHUMANIZATION. If no human is all knowing, all seeing and omniscient then we can confidently state and declare that dehumanization of the prisoner as a pursued practice result, is just that, another petty and sordid example of gratuitous cruelty of a sadistic psychology. In the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit case, WILLIAMS v. BENJAMIN 77 F.3d. 756(1996)(which Virginia and the Virginia Department of Corrections are under its jurisdiction) gave us this ruling, citing this UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT case, WILKERSON v. UTAH 99 U.S. 130 (1878) "Deference to Prison Officials does not give them Constitutional license to torture inmates", which in plain speak is mistreat, abuse and all the synonyms of dehumanization. The UTAH case which the 4th Circuit based aspects of its decision in the WIILLIAMS case on was decided in 1878 !!!, my exclamations are not to be mistaken with surprise that THE SUPREME COURT of THE UNITED STATES was that enlightened in the 19th century, despite the DRED SCOTT decision in its history. What my exclamations underscore is the fact that Prison Officials, not only in Virginia but Nationally have understood that law prohibits and precludes them from dehumanizing THE PRISONER and the various legislators, Attorney Generals, Politicians have abrogated their mandate of pursing the holistic aspiration of each of their jurisdictional Social Contract. Likewise our Activist and Advocates who speak for Prisoners and the obligations of lawful conditions of confinement haven't been throwing it in the faces of the Prison Official that they have no Social Contractual standing to dehumanize the prisoner in the name of the People notwithstanding whatever decrepit and laughable sophistry they along with their allies dredge up as basis. Instead what we experience is the prison official behaving extra-judicially in that professionally ad hoc manner, above the law and all aspects of Society and the Social Contract turning a feckless and craven blind eye to it as if there isnt the recognition that the Prison Official actions are undermining and destroying the very terms of the Social Contract and its Due Process of Law.
By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982
By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982
I BEGIN: When there isn't any way and guide forward, when despite, self-delusional myths of existence, collective narcissism and its antagonistic pathology on the body politic, the default reaction, and this holds true across the breadth and depth of our Human Condition, is to dehumanize, to see something other in that other human, whose existence is what defacto defines the integrity of self-existence. What concerns me, because I'm a prisoner under Virginia's jurisdiction, is the unoriginal logic of dehumanization plyed by the Commonwealth of Virginia in its detention schemes. What also concerns me is how The Virginian, or People of Virginia ignore and are seemingly oblivious to the fact that if they are unseen, unheard and dismissed by each other in all forms and levels of interaction, it firstly is a result of their winking and nodding to the dehumanization of the Virginia prisoner. Let me qualify what in saying, nothing I'm saying is new, if there is any novelty to this work, its that of being a reminder, that attention to and is required of unforeseen consequences, when due to the myriad obligations and distractions of social interactions, relations and intersections we become that adage which our Vietnamese brothers and sisters have given us, "be mindful that when you go to slay the dragon you don't become it" or in this context accepting the dehumanization of humans who are imprisoned is in turn self-dehumanizing. Society i.e. the Commonwealth of Virginia are not built or constructed on the distortion of short sightedness, which is the operative of a type of world view, which the Virginia prison official and their allies are perennially afflicted with. Short sightedness whether in the Policy realm of Government and governance or in the world view of the individual Virginian, is always self-contradictory, because the assumption is its a pursuit of self-interest, which idealistically it is, but its also at the expense of that other adage, "the devil is in the details ". So for example the Virginia prison official wants to be respected, acknowledged and recognized as first and foremost, a Professional, secondly, a full and all around developed Human and citizen of Virginia and all of this materialized upon the job of a Prison Official. However, the reality is the Virginia prison official isn't respected, acknowledged or recognized by the People of Virginia save for allies who are also just as reviled, because what the People of Virginia recognize in the prison official is a corrupt entity who breaks and violates the law in the treatment of prisoners under their care and authority. It isn't that the People of Virginia are at odds with accountability and its various forms according to their social contract, which includes imprisonment, but they expect it is done under law and the uncompromising recognition of humanness. Here is an anecdote that was reported by one of the media in Newport News, Virginia, the occasion was how the Commonwealth of Virginia in the form of its Koncentration Kamp Red Onion State Prison informed a Mother of the death of her just turned 21 imprisoned son, who allegedly committed suicide, after the Mother had repeatedly called the prison, with none of the officials with the authority responding to her, finally a Nurse dismissed the death.
By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982
I BEGIN: Even in War, actual kinetic existence, Soldiers tasked with the effort and its work admit to errors, mistakes, miscalculations, idealistic formulations, all expressions and forms of being wrong or mistakes. In other words their work of War is intrinsically and inherently "honest", due to the unforgiving nature of it, meaning if Officers of War allow and permit themselves to get caught up in suppositions and its idealistic superficiality, not only will their lives be lost but of those whom they hold dear and all that consisted and constructed the historicity of their existence. Notwithstanding this inherent "honesty" of War, there are always those corrupt Officers of War, regardless of reason who betray its requisite homage and history is replete with their folly. I have said all of this to get to this, we are told the Commonwealth of Virginia's Justice Infrastructure is one in Battle Orders in a "War on crime" and the Virginia Prison Official is a fundamental and primary component and element in its practice, as such the People of Virginia have said, their highest expression of "value" as understood by the allocation of the lion's share of the Commonwealth's productivity is towards the funding of The Virginia Department of Corrections and its Prisons. Now this work is not a polemic against the Virginia Prison Official, or The Virginia Department of Corrections or even the fact that the people of Virginia value above every thing else, even the Education of our children and accessibility to real medical and health care for all Virginians, its prison system and the static economy, it stands on. But what this work focuses on is the fraud and antagonistic relationship the Virginia Prison Official holds and maintains with the actual terms and basis of Virginia's Social Contract, because of the one and simple fact: the Virginia Prison Official is incapable of admitting failings and instead consistently does that most abject base of human behavior, which is "blaming", whether its the Virginia prisoner supposedly in the prison official's care, despite the fact the prison official claims to be waging war on the prisoner, or political opponents of its allies and supporters. In other words the Virginia Prison official has been able to subvert and turn on its head a standard of measure all other Virginians are subjected to, which is the accountability of admitting a failing or a mistake and this subversion exist and is only possible because the People of Virginia regardless of reason are complicit in its existence. We would think that defacto scrutiny of the Virginia Prison official activities would flow accordingly due to the fact the work of the Virginia Prison official of all the other myriad examples is the most speculative, yet true to form is the least scrutinized because of the fact it is inherently corrupt. What I mean by its corrupt inherency, is this, if all human activity and behavior has an economic determinant defined by its valuation, then guarding prisoners, which defines the Virginia Prison official isn't exempt and as a matter of fact is even more beholden to and subject to its dynamic. So the Virginia Prison official will only do that which will ensure their existence and will support the type of politics that cater to them, thereby establishing a symbiotic existence and relationship with it. We see this, we see Virginia Republicans supporting to a fault any and all cockamamie stunts and endeavors played by the prison official.
By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982
I BEGIN: IF the Justice Infrastructure is an expression of a type of Politics, which it is then there isn't anything to debate that it is biased. What I mean by bias, is this, let's recall what one of our ancients in the American context, John Adams instructed. and I paraphrase, that our Nation was one of Laws and not men. Which is to say, in furtherance and the advancement of James Madison's Constitutional anticipation of a "more perfect union", there had to be accountability, which law aspires, or in otherwords because of the clear recognition that the foundation of Society, is our humanness or humanity, which the Great Schizophrenic Thomas Jefferson recognized in the declaration of Independence and I paraphrase that Americans in rebellion against the British King George III, were presenting the reasons for the rebellion to the witness of the Peoples of the world as justification. Or practically seeking humanities general understanding of the right to respond to unjust and intolerable conditions under the without qualifications of Natural law, despite our intrinsic dictatorial nature, presumptions and bias, which Adams recognized with his instruction are at odds with society's obligations and accountability. Needless I add despite the truth of, Adams, Madison and Jefferson's understandings and asserted polemics, the consequences of their hypocrisies, due to their inabilities and unwillingness to extend that same speech onto relations with Black People is why I'm having to do this work in the context of Virginia's Justice Infrastructure and the Prison Official, in 2025. So the question is clear and simple, despite the fact we are ourselves due to Society and in this case Virginia Society, we are naturally biased and when we are then given the privilege of embodying the State as functionaries and as it relates to this work, the Virginia Prison Official, society cannot and theoretically it doesn't simply trust that its members who now have on uniforms will do the appropriate thing. Society anticipates the natural human bias, by having laws and process which society is in turn subordinated to. However humans embodying the State, in this case the Virginia prison official will still figure out ways to manipulate their bias, into the execution of their professional duties which in effect undermines and perverts the very purpose of the law and process. The only way such bias can be remedied is in the ability to question. But there is another aspect to this, which is even though the construction and structuring of society is law and its process upon the acknowledgement of accountability, meaning the process of questioning, there is a fly in the questioning ointment and its characterized as, "Standing", meaning to hold those embodying the State as in the Virginia prison official accountable, requirements of "Standing" must be met and this "standing" aspect has a more arcane origin, which quite frankly is at odds with the recognition of a human being, now and as it was then. I want to make this point, we have allowed, tolerated and permitted imprisonment practices that make a mockery of our genus as HOMOSAPIENS, because what Virginia's imprisonment practices say isn't just the fact The Commonwealth cannot wash its hands off savagery and barbarism, but the nature of imprisonment is simply unable to answer to the fundamental question of, " Why", in otherwords because of the fact the simple," why" isn't asked the Virginia Department of Corrections and its Prison Official haven't had to justify practices that meet the generalized billing of savagery and barbarism.
By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982
By William Thorpe
Recently Virginia Prisoners confined at KONCENTRATION KAMPS Red Onion and Wallens Ridge State Prisons have made it known to family members and Prison Reform Advocates that, there is an ongoing hunger strike as desperate speech protesting their conditions of imprisonment and treatment at the hands of and the impermissible and lawless behavior of prison officials. So in direct reaction, the Virginia prison official at both KONCENTRATION KAMPS in question responded with another illegal and lawless act, that of cutting off prisoner communication with family, friends and loved ones. In other words The Virginia Department of Corrections responded as all garden variety tyrants do when confronted with protest, it played the incommunicado card, which is repression and repression, which has been abundantly made clear to humanity, that no matter how intense and extreme the repression, it never dissuades, nor stifles protest, because those responsible for the circumstances necessitating protest are ignoring and dismissing the existence of those circumstances. The Virginia Department of Corrections and its Prison Official are not unfamiliar with prisoner protest, some legitimate and valid and others distractive. But the fact of the matter is the prison official has the necessary cognition to distinguish when protest is legitimate and when it isn't, because the Virginia Department of Corrections already has process for protest, which are all the forms of petitioning Government for redress and forms of protest like hunger strikes only occur when those administrative processes respond corruptly by all of the forms of corruption known and perfected by the prison official, for starters dismissing the issues. However there is another character to issues at both KONCENTRATION KAMPS in question. So we primarily have a majority Rural White Prison Official work force doing the work of administering and governing the imprisonment of a predominantly Urban Black and Brown prisoner population and it isn't the fact that the prison officials are White, but the "type" of White, because the prison official at both KONCENTRATION KAMPS in question have an irrational and visceral animus for Urban culture, which is the foundational animator of Prisoners in their care. The Virginia Department of Corrections cannot under the guise of maintaining a prison insult, disrespect, castigate and impugn the entire historicity of the Urbanized Human life, just because members of Urban Society and Culture are imprisoned. Convictions of crimes isn't just a Urban phenomenon, the problem though is a type of Virginia Politics for its own Machiavellian machinations is unwilling to see crime without "othering" it, which then gives permission to the Rural White prison official to for no other reason than, one is imprisoned, deny the humanness of the prisoner, which in turn creates those circumstances of a hunger strike as protest.
By William Thorpe
I'm William Thorpe Virginia exiled me to the Texas prison system. I'm solitary confined at the Wainwright Unit and if you feel any kinda way about this work contact me by Securus email using the Texas prison number #2261982