Prisons, Prose & Protest - #13
Rants, Musings & More
I remain furious, bereft, and committed to an end to Israel's occupation of Palestine. I’ve been beside myself during the ongoing genocides in Congo, Sudan and Palestine. We’ve lost so many universes with each death. One discovery that I’ve found informative is the Makdisi Street podcast, which has featured many brilliant guests from whom I’ve learned so much about Palestinian history, the current genocide, and more. Despite current conditions, my belief that Palestine will be free remains rock solid.
It’s hard to believe but the newsletter is officially one year old. I decided to start it as a way to share my thoughts with anyone who might be interested. So maybe my mom and my best friend. I am grateful to those who take the time each month to read it and to engage the ideas. I plan to continue with the project through this year. Thanks again for reading and please feel free to share it with others!
In this month’s edition of Prisons, Prose & Protest, I share some thoughts about prison labor. I share Sojourners for Justice Press’s new publication about Mary Wilson. I recommend a podcast series about Layleen Polanco hosted by Raquel Willis, several good recent articles, and much more….
Join Sojourners for Justice Press on April 6 at the Feminist Zine Fair in NYC.
Prisons/Policing
In my collection, I have a September 1925 edition of the following catalog: A Descriptive List of the Articles and Materials Made By the Labor of Prisoners for Use in the Public Institutions.
The catalog is issued by the Department of Corrections of Massachusetts and it includes a lot of different items made by prisoners and available for sale.
In 2024, the products of prison labor are everywhere. Prisoners manufacture athletic equipment and uniforms, traffic signs, license plates, mattresses, office furniture, and glasses. A recent AP report found that prisoners are involved in the production of food for hundreds of major brands. They are involved in meat processing for McDonald’s, Walmart, and Cargill. Frosted Flakes cereal, Coca-Cola soft drinks, Gold Medal Flour, and Ball Park hot dogs are all created in part through prison labor, though that labor is responsible for a very small percentage of the total profits of these companies.
Given the ubiquity of prison labor, some anti-prison activists have argued that forced labor is the core injustice, as well as the underlying impetus for dehumanization, in prisons. However, the truth is that exploitative, dehumanizing labor in prison is enabled by the exploitative and dehumanizing nature of prison itself. Importantly, focusing mainly on the exploitation of incarcerated people by the private sector ignores the reality that it is the public sector that most benefits from the work and the very existence of prisoners. Workplace protections for prisoners are important. But ultimately, work in prison, like existence in prison, cannot be just until all prisoners are free.
Labor in prison has long been dangerous, cruel, and coercive. After the Civil War, prisons leased convicted people to former slave plantations, and later created chain gangs where prisoners worked on roadways under direct supervision of the state. Some have called this “slavery by another name.” The conditions were brutal and guards regularly beat prisoners, sometimes to death.
Today, prison working conditions remain harsh. Around 790,000 incarcerated people labor in the US prison system. Most federal workplace laws do not cover them. Prison workers do not receive a minimum wage, and authorities frequently pay them less than a dollar an hour—sometimes much less.
Federal workplace safety protections also don’t apply to prisoners, and over three-quarters of prison workers report they cannot choose their own work assignments. If they refuse to work, they face coercive punishment, including solitary confinement and revocation of family visitation.
Almost two-thirds of incarcerated workers surveyed in an ACLU report said they were worried that they were working in unsafe conditions, and many had to handle hazardous chemicals or operate dangerous equipment with little or no training. Incarcerated workers who lose fingers or limbs, or who are paralyzed or killed, rarely receive workers’ compensation.
Recent efforts to fight this kind of egregious labor exploitation in prison have focused on addressing the loophole in the 13th Amendment. The 13th amendment abolished slavery, but it made an exception for forced labor as punishment for a crime. Activists hope that by repealing that exception, they can reduce prison labor or end exploitative practices around it. Thanks to this advocacy, several states—including Colorado, Nebraska, Utah, Alabama, Oregon, Tennessee, and Vermont—have banned involuntary servitude in prison.
These changes may help some incarcerated people. However, profit and labor exploitation do not in themselves drive mass incarceration. Prisoners overall produce around $2 billion in goods. Even more prisoners engage in work to provide upkeep and services in prisons themselves; the value of that labor is estimated at $9 billion. That is a great deal of money. But it doesn’t come close to offsetting the $80 billion cost of incarcerating people, most of which supports prison staffing and capital expenses.
Moreover, the injustice of prison goes beyond exploitative labor practices. One recent project to interview prisoners about labor issues, for example, found that many prisoners wanted more opportunities to work. Work in prison can mean training for jobs after prison. It also gives people the chance to feel like they are contributing or doing something meaningful with their time and skills. Frankly, some incarcerated people also find work a useful way to pass the time.
Many of the worst aspects of prison abuse and exploitation do not have a direct connection to labor. COVID, not the workplace, caused the worst prison safety issue of the last few years. Around half a million people in prisons contracted the virus, and approximately 3000 individuals lost their lives. The virus swept through overcrowded institutions while officials refused to provide basic protections like masks or hand sanitizer.
One of the most devastating forms of punishment in American prisons actively prevents prisoners from working. Solitary confinement in the US puts prisoners in isolation, preventing most forms of contact, activity, and as a result making labor difficult or impossible.
Some 80,000 prisoners are in solitary at any one time in the US, many for committing minor infractions like cannabis possession, insulting a corrections officer, having food in their cells, or harming themselves. The pettiness of the offenses is in stark contrast to the horror of the punishment; even short-term isolation can cause psychological damage and suicidal ideation. The UN and human rights organizations classify solitary confinement for 15 days or more as torture.
Prisoners aren’t just exploited as workers; they are also exploited as consumers. Monopolistic vendors charge prisoners and their families exorbitant fees for phone calls—over 13.5 cents per minute—adding up to some $1.4 billion a year for the companies. Commissary fees are also exorbitant, especially compared to prison wages. In Illinois, the average incarcerated person spends $80 a year on toiletries, which for many people in prison is half their yearly pay.
Prison labor is dangerous, coercive, and highly exploitative. The primary beneficiary of such exploitation is the prison budget itself. To a much lesser extent, private industry also benefits. But the harms of prison labor are largely the result of all aspects of existence in prison being dangerous, coercive, and exploitative.
Raising the minimum wage in prisons, legislating against labor exploitation, applying free world labor safety laws monitored by those outside of prisons—all this might improve labor conditions for some prisoners in some situations. But ultimately labor in prison, like all life in prison, is by its nature unjust and unfree. The only lasting way to improve conditions for workers in prison is to abolish prisons.
Publishing
I’m excited about a new pamphlet that we’re publishing at Sojourners for Justice Press this month. Mary Wilson has captivated me for years, and I wanted to share her story with a wider audience. Thanks to my friend Dr. Jen Ash, more people will come to know Mary.
Mary Wilson was a 37-year-old Black woman who confessed to the killing of a white military officer at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, in 1913. While many of its details are still unknown, Mary Wilson’s story sheds light on the ways Black women were and continue to be forced to navigate systems of state violence. In turn, those systems were/are deeply and historically interwoven with the legacy of slavery and the rise of the prison industrial complex in the United States after emancipation.
The state and vigilantes repeatedly subject Black women to more violence when they defend themselves against interpersonal violence. Mary Wilson's case exemplifies these patterns of violence, but the authorities acquitted her, making her case unique. Mary went free based on a claim of self-defense. Kayla Hawkins beautifully designed the zine. You will be able to purchase the publication here in the next few days. Let me know what you think of it!
Prose
This collection of mini-essays about books on Palestine from Book Forum contributors is filled with insightful writing as well as great book recommendations.
This New Inquiry feature by the Palestinian Youth Movement traces the important interconnectedness between the struggles to Stop Cop City and to free Palestine: “our vision of freedom in this life and the next requires us to confront and challenge the entangled forces of oppression in Palestine and in Turtle Island, and to identify the sites of tension upon which these systems distill their forces.”
In MOLD Magazine, Ashanté Reese looks at the Stop Copy City movement from a different angle, as a source of liberatory food justice work that has the power to transform the Weelaunee Forest’s long history of subjugation and carceral harms.
John Legend and Jocelyn Simonson have written a clear, smart op-ed about the dangers and historical context of Georgia’s anti–bail fund bill and other similar proposals. A good one to bookmark for future reference.
I love this deeply personal exploration of the legacy of artist and teacher Alma Thomas by the lyrical poet and scholar Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs.
This paper by Amna A. Akbar examines the crucial role of social insurgency in “the messy, non-linear dynamics of social change” over the past decade.
Podcast
I strongly recommend Afterlives, a series in which journalist and activist Raquel Willis explores the life, death, and public “afterlife” of Layleen Xtravaganza Cubilette-Polanco, an Afro-Latina trans woman who died in solitary confinement on Rikers Island in 2019. Willis talks with people who loved Cubilette-Polanco about her life and spirit, and speaks to a wide array of experts about the social and carceral problems that caused her death. Finally, Willis explores the organizing and advocacy that Cubilette-Polanco’s life and death have sparked.
Poem
In “For the Sake of Strangers,” Dorianne Laux captures the way kindness and beauty pull us toward life, even in extremities of grief.
Potpourri
It’s Women’s History Month and also the official launch of our expanded guidebook Lifting As They Climbed. Join us TODAY at 6:30 pm ET for our virtual launch. If you’re in Chicago, my co-author Essence McDowell is hosting an in-person event on March 24. Stop by! You can register here.
We’re reading about Sojourner Truth for our next session of the Life Stories of Anti-Slavery Abolitionists book discussion group, happening on April 21. Register here if you want to join us.
In the project’s own words, “What Time Is It?” A Cultural and Civic Archive “invites Chicago’s BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ artists, healers, and freedom fighters to examine our historic moment through the lens of global time.” As part of this project, my comrade and friend Irina Zadov has put together a new art book which is really lovely. The limited edition, 180-page artist book features 20 full-color portraits and conversations painted and facilitated by Irina, designed by Jay Sath, and printed by For The Birds Trapped in Airports. I wrote an introduction to the book. Thirty percent of all book sales will go towards the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). Get your copies today.
I love this Periodic Table of Black Revolutionaries by Char Jeré.
I appreciate the short documentary Sol in the Garden by Débora Souza Silva and Emily Cohen Ibañez; it follows a woman as she reenters the world after 16 years of incarceration.
This Audre Lorde Hidden Voices poster is gorgeous. The collection it's from combines original art by LGBTQ+ artists with captions by historian Hugh Ryan.
“Avec le coeur” by Sarah Liz is a song that resonates for me in this season of my life…
On a aidé des gens sans rien attendre en retour
S'ils sont pas reconnaissants, ça ne nous dit rien du tout
Demain, après demain, on va toujours faire du bien
On le fait au nom de Dieu pas pour plaire à quelqu'un
S’ils croient qu’ils nous ont eu, c’est bien pour eux
S’ils croient qu’on ne sait rien, c’est bien pour eux
En plus de tout ça its s’en vont gâter nos noms mais c’est pas grave nous on leur dir merci.
I’m so excited that the Prison+Neighborhood Arts/Education Project (PNAP) has opened its own exhibition and community space on Chicago’s West Side. The space is called Walls Turned Sideways.
Cool Library Thing of the Month
Take an hour to listen to Dr. Laura Helton talk about the great Dorothy Porter, a groundbreaking and brilliant Black woman librarian and bibliographer. It’s really worth your time. Preorder Dr. Helton’s forthcoming book while you’re at it.