Looking out: ... teach us
@column intro = "Beginning of the teaching for life,
@column intro = The instructions for well-being ...
@column intro = Knowing how to answer one who speaks,
@column intro = To reply to one who sends a message." — Amenemope c. 11th century BC
The well-known "get tough on prisoners" mentality has begun to personify itself in a host of different ways, not the least of which is communication (or more correctly, the lack thereof).
For example, in this cell house, meals are delivered to each cell in increments. One guard, pushing a cart, comes by and places a tray of what passes for food on the cell door. Later, another guard comes by and places a carton of milk and an empty styrofoam cup (the latter for coffee) on the bars.
Knowing that an orderly would soon be coming to pick up the tray and the empty milk carton, I poured what little milk was left in the carton into the empty cup. A few minutes later, yet another guard appeared pushing a cart on which a coffee dispenser rested. Seeing that he was about to pick up the cup and pour coffee into it, I cautioned him saying, "Be careful, there is milk in that cup".
He responded simply by saying "Okay", then, in his usual, almost violent manner, he snatched up the cup, spilling its contents onto both his shirt and face. Instantly his face was stricken with rage as he profanely asked, "Why didn't you tell me *!# milk was in that *!# cup?"
I chose to say nothing. In that short exchange he had told me a great deal about himself. After all, I had given him a full and civil warning about the cup's content; he in turn had acknowledged receipt of that warning.
It is my opinion that, when he consciously said "okay", he was unconsciously saying to himself something like "I have been conditioned to not pay any attention to anything that you convicts have to say. I only pretend to listen to any of you." Well, I got his message.
Here is another, more telling, experience. The cell house is cold and, for some usually absurd reason born of neglect, the switch that turns on the heaters has been left off all night.
When the guard comes by at 7am someone in the cell down the line asks, in a civil and respectful tone, "Officer so-and-so, how about turning the heat on for us?" In officer so-and-so's customary perfunctory manner he says, "Okay". Three hours later the heaters are still off and the officer has passed no less than six times and has been asked by other prisoners to turn on the heat.
The first prisoner, now freezing and fed up with being civil and respectful, becomes more than a little angry. At the top of his voice he reminds the guard that he is a faecal-eating maggot who enjoys copulation with his mother and father simultaneously ... if he does not turn the heat on immediately. In less than a minute the heaters roared to life.
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to learn the lessons being taught here: You learn — year in, year out — that obnoxious behaviour is not only acceptable, it is necessary.
So when your loved one comes home and while sitting at the dinner table eats as if (s)he has never seen food before, and in casual conversation yells at you as if you are in the house across the street, try to remember that (s)he is a graduate of a "tough ..." school; and that is only a fraction of what (s)he has been taught. You see, prisoners are very good students ... no matter what you choose to teach us.
[The writer is a prisoner in the United States. He welcomes letters commenting on his columns. He can be written to at: Brandon Astor Jones, EF-122216, Georgia State Prison, HCO1, E-2-36, Reidsville, GA 30453, USA.]