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reasoningdaily · 8 months

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click the header to see the entire photoset, which explains what happened on which days and why.

One of the many guards beaten by inmates on the first day of the riots is loaded into an ambulance by New York State Police troopers and local police.This is a part of americas bloody history that they want to quietly disappear.

AMERICA YOU DID THIS..

Inmates raise their fists in solidarity while one of their leaders speaks with Commissioner of Corrections Russell Oswald on September 10, 1971.

A debris-riddled corridor in one of the four Attica cell blocks is littered with shattered glass and broken equipment on the second day of the riot.

Black Panther Party co-founder Bobby Seale (second from left) arriving at the Greater Buffalo International Airport on September 11, 1971. After meeting with Attica inmates, he proposed accepting the deal put forth by the Commissioner of Corrections — which would have granted the prisoners 28 of their 33 demands.

Heavily armed authorities position themselves on a platform overlooking Attica's D Yard — which had become the main stronghold of the 1,281 rioting inmates.

Inmates had drawn up a manifesto listing 33 demands, from better living conditions to amnesty for the uprising. They elected five prisoners to serve as leaders with negotiating powers, while many others were instructed to work as security or medics. Here, they express solidarity during the negotiation process.

This makeshift hospital station was one of the internal services that prisoners set up during the riot. These services would be widely documented by journalists who were invited into the prison to oversee the uprising.

Inmates barricading themselves in one of the corridors leading to cell block D on September 10, 1971. They had just finished discussions with correctional officers regarding the terms of their impending negotiations. The figure in black standing in the center was one of the television cameramen that inmates allowed into the prison to document events.

National Guardsmen donning gas masks as they prepare to storm the facility on September 13, 1971. Protected from the tear gas that had been delivered via helicopter, they would brazenly open fire on both inmates and hostages in the yard.

One of the military helicopters flying over the prison's D Yard to deploy tear gas. Moments later, hundreds of troops, officers, and guards would storm the prison, firing off rounds with abandon — and killing 10 of their own men in the process.

The immediate aftermath of the riots saw inmates stripped of their clothes and forced to stand with their hands above their heads. A week after the riot had ended, inmates were allegedly beaten by the guards. The McKay Commission used this image during their four-day hearings on the fiasco

The charred hat of an Attica prison guard — and a bullet hole in the railing enclosing the D Yard.

#33 Pictures Of The Bloody Attica Prison Riot That Left 43 People Dead #attica prison massacre #attica prison #ny #rockerfeller #prison rights #prison and corrections in america #human rights

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intersectionalpraxis · 5 months

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Horrifying testimonies from Gaza civilians released by Israel after being falsely labeled as Hamas members. They endured unspeakable torture, human dignity stripped away, subjected to hunger, electric shocks, and medical neglect leading to fatalities. Hundreds held for propaganda, enduring brutal and inhumane treatment. [source: @/ RamAbdu on X. 12/18/23.]

Why is the western media not interviewing Palestinian civilians abducted by Israel? Harrowing testimonies. Israeli soldiers urinated on them, spat on them, starved them, beat them, gave them electric shocks, and kept them blindfolded & fettered in uncomfortable positions for days on end. Some reportedly died from the freezing cold and medical neglect. [source: @/ abedtakriti on X.]

#feminist #feminism #social justice #freepalastine🇵🇸#free palestine #palestine #free gaza #gaza #gaza strip #palestinian prisoners #human rights violations #human rights #israel is a terrorist state #israeli war crimes #end the genocide #end the occupation #current events

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trans-axolotl · 9 months

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nothing makes me more insane than the phrase "selling your body" btw. like was i not also selling my body at every other job i've had where i had to be on my feet all day, lifting boxes, working in a warehouse, etc. why is it that sex work is uniquely labeled as "selling your body" while every other job is sorted into another category, no matter how much that job might have a physical impact on your body. lmao.

#personal #sw #in fact i have had worse long term physical effects from my jobs that were not sw. as a matter of fact #anyway also related conversation to be had about how most of the human trafficking in the US is not sex trafficking but is in fact other #types of labor that is trafficked #and that if you include prison labor as human trafficking based on different definitions. there is a lot of important connections we can dr #draw. about labor. power. control. and how to build solidarity to actually fight for people's right to free + safe working conditions and #self determination

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lilithism1848 · 5 months

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#gaza #leftism #anti capitalism #socialism #communism #anarchy #ceasefire #isreal #gaza strip #free palestine #palestinian genocide #blm movement #intersectionality #racisim #oppression #prison abolition #civil rights #blm2021

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blackpearlblast · 2 months

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five days until the state of georgia is scheduled to execute willie pye

#death penalty #death penalty action #prison abolition #petitions #i can't remember my other tags right now i'm sorry :(#i've been pretty sick so this post is both late and low effort if someone wants to make a better one i wholly encourage it #i'm just signed up to death penalty actions mailing list and crossposting the petitions/other important news on here when i can

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turtleblogatlast · 5 months

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Based on this post of mine, haha.

Leo finds The Last Unicorn. Core memories are made.

#rottmnt #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rottmnt leo #rise leo #rottmnt headcanons #rise splinter #that movie is a rollercoaster #little Leo in his little British orphan boy pajamas should probably not be watching it essentially alone #Leo going through all stages of grief AND fear from this movie #his insomnia was NOT helped by this movie #‘you won’t let me leave right? I don’t wanna go’ flash forward to Leo trapping himself in the prison dimension #all while his father can only listen in horror

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slyandthefamilybook · 6 months

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A NON-EXHAUSTIVE BUT NEVERTHELESS EXHAUSTING LIST OF NEO-NAZI AND WHITE SUPREMACIST DOGWHISTLES

since some of y'all apparently need a refresher course. as always, use your judement when deciding if it's a dogwhistle or just innocent usage of a number or symbol

NUMBERS

100% - 100 percent white

109 or 110 - A reference to the 109 countries that have expelled, in whole or in part, their Jewish populations. 110 refers to the hope that more countries will do so, usually specifically the United States. Often posted on its own as a reply, or phrased as a question (e.g. "If you were kicked out of 109 bars it's probably our fault")

1290 - A reference to the Edict of Expulsion of 1290, which expelled the Jewish population of England

13/50 or 13/52 or 13/90 - The supposed statistic that Black Americans make up 13% of the population yet commit 50% or 52% of violent crime, or 90% of interracial violence. Often posted on its own as a reply

14 - The Fourteen Words, a Neo-Nazi slogan

14/23 - A number representing the Southern Brotherhood, an Alabama prison gang

1488 - A combination of the Fourteen Words and Heil Hitler

C18 - Combat 18, a British neo-Nazi group

18 - The letters A (1) and H (8), standing for Adolf Hitler

21-2-12 - The Letters U (21), B (2), and 12 (L), standing for Union, Brotherhood, and Loyalty, the slogan of the Unforgiven, a Florida prison gang

23 - Often thrown up as a hand sign, with two fingers raised on one hand and three fingers raised on the other. Represents the letter W (23), standing for white

271,000 - A reference to the supposed fact that the Red Cross claimed only 271,000 people had been murdered in concentration camps. In reality, that number reported by the Red Cross only came from reports from 13 concentration camps (there were 23 main camps, plus a large number of smaller "satellite" camps)

88 - H (8) H (8), standing for Heil Hitler

9% - A number representing the percentage of the world's population that is white

SYMBOLS

((( ))) - Triple parentheses, or echo. Used by neo-Nazis to call out someone as Jewish

Iron Cross - A German military decoration

Sonnenrad (Sun Wheel)

Reichsadler (Imperial Eagle) - A blocky, art-deco eagle facing to the side. Variants exist, some facing right, some facing left. The Parteiadler (Party Eagle) has a slightly different design. The Reichsadler is usually clutching a wreath with a swastika, although this is sometimes left out to maintain plausible deniability

Totenkopf (Death's Head) - A symbol used by the SS

Wolfsangel (Wolf's Hook) - Used as the insignia of various Wermacht (Nazi Military) divisions

Wolfsangel (horizontal)

Odal Rune - From the Proto-Germanic "Othala" meaning heritage

Algiz Rune - A symbol used by German nationalists

Celtic Cross

"Broken Sun" Cross

Arrow Cross - A Hungarian nationalist party that was active from 1935-1945. The symbol has been re-appropriated by modern neo-Nazis

Valknot

EMOJI

🤑 Greedy Face Emoji - Used to refer to "greedy Jews"

💰 Money Bag Emoji - Used to refer to "greedy Jews"

🥸 Disguised Emoji - Used to refer to Jews because of the enlarged nose

🤥 Lying Emoji - Used to refer to Jews because of the enlarged nose

👃 Nose Emoji - Used to refer to Jews

🙋‍♂️ Raising Hand Emoji - Used for its resemblance to the Sieg Heil salute

✋ Raised Hand Emoji - Used for its resemblance to the Sieg Heil salute

o/ or 0/ - Used for its resemblance to the Sieg Heil salute

🐸 Frog Emoji - A reference to Pepe the Frog, a webcomic charcter co-opted by the alt-right

👌 Okay Symbol Emoji - A hand symbol co-opted by the alt-right. Sometimes said to resemble the letters WP, or White Power

🚪 Door Emoji - Refers to the fact that some of the gas chambers (such as the ones at Auschwitz) had wooden doors, and therefore could not have been airtight enough to contain the Zyklon B gas used to murder prisoners. In reality, many of the wooden doors were either replaced with airtight metal ones, or were made airtight with strips of felt that then deteriorated or were removed

🚿 Showerhead Emoji - Refers to the showerheads used to dispense Zyklon B gas in the gas chambers

⛽ Gas Pump Emoji - Refers to gas chambers

⚡⚡ Double Lightning Emojis - Used for their resemblance to the Siegrune (victory rune) badge worn by members of the SS (Schutzstaffel)

💀 Skull Emoji - Used for its resemblance to the Totenkopf (Death's Head) used by the SS

☠️ Skull and Crossbones Emoji - Used for its resemblance to the Totenkopf (Death's Head) used by the SS

WORDS/PHRASES

6MWE - Six Million Wasn't Enough. A call for further genocide against Jews

AKIA - A Klansman I Am

Annudah Shoah - A mockery of both the Shoah (Holocaust) and the fear of further genocide

Auschwitz had a swimming pool/rec center/maternity ward/etc. - An attempt to diminish the horror of concentration camps by making them seem more like labor camps with amenities

Blood and Honor - A neo-Nazi slogan

Blood and Soil - A neo-Nazi slogan

Blood Libel - Not a phrase used by the far right, but something they often believe in or claim. Blood libel is an antisemitic conspiracy theory stretching back hundreds of years. The original claim was that Jews used the blood of Christian babies to bake matzah (a ritual food eaten on Passover). It has since evolved into images of Jews drinking blood, kidnapping and killing non-Jewish babies, and conspiracy theories about harvesting adrenochrome

Bowlcut - A reference to white supremacist mass-murderer Dylan Roof

Cohencidence - A portmanteau of Cohen (a common Jewish last name) and coincidence. Used to refer to Jewish control (e.g. "All these companies are owned by Jews! What a Cohencidence!")

COORS - "Comerades of Our Racial Struggle"

Cultural Marxism - A conspiracy theory that Jews are intentionally weakening "Western values" in order to make countries like the United States more susceptible to communism. This was called Cultural Bolshevism in Nazi Germany

Da Shoah or Muh Shoah or Muh Holocaust - A mockery of the Holocaust

Day of the Rope - A day referenced in neo-Nazi book The Turner Diaries when all race traitors will be hanged

Degenerate - An insult based on the false theory that bad morals will cause human beings to regress along the path of evolution (to de-evolve). Used to describe groups, individuals, or ideologies

Early Life - A reference to the "Early Life" section of Wikipedia biographies, which will reveal that a person is Jewish or has Jewish ancestry

Every Single Time - Every time something bad happens, the perpetrator is Jewish

Featherwood - A term derived from racist prison subculture. A featherwood is a woman associated with a racist gang

FGRN - For God, Race, and Nation. A Ku Klux Klan slogan

The Fourteen Words - A neo-Nazi slogan. "We must secure the existance of our people and a future for white children"

The Frankfurt School - A school of sociology founded at Goethe University Frankfurt in 1923. Usually blamed as the originator of "Cultural Marxism"

Fren - Internet slang. A diminutive of "friend", used to diminish Naziism and make it seems more harmless. Often used in usernames to describe one's self (e.g. sad_fren_88)

Globalist - A person who desires connection between countries in terms of politics, trade, and travel. Used to scaremonger about Jews destroying countries by removing their borders

Gorillion - A mockery of the number 6 million, being the amount of Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust

Goy - Hebrew for "nation", used by Jews to refer to non-Jews/gentiles. Used disparagingly by neo-Nazis to suggest Jews view non-Jews as beneath them

Goyslop - Unhealthy food that Jews force non-Jews to eat to keep them weak

Groid - A shortening of "Negroid", an archaic terms used to describe Black people

Groyper - A follower of avowed neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes. A reference to the "Groyper" meme, a variant of Pepe the Frog

GSHW - Germany Should Have Won (i.e. won World War II)

GTKRWN - Gas the Kikes; Race War Now

HDKH - Hitler Didn't Kill Himself. A neo-Nazi theory that Hitler escaped Germany and fled to Argentina

John 8:44 - "You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies." Part of Jesus' rebuke of his Jewish followers

Joo or Jooz - An intentional misspelling of "Jews" in an attempt to bypass censors or automatic content filters

Kate Hikes - A spoonerism of "hate kikes"

Kek - 4chan variation of "lol"

Kekistan - A fictional country imagined by white nationalists with a flag that resembles the Nazi battle flag

Khazar - A reference to the conversion of a group of Khazars (a Turkic people) to Judaism. Antisemites speculate that the entirity of Ashkenazi Jews are descended from these Khazar converts, and therefore have no historical, cultural, or genetic tie to the Levant. This has been proven false on multiple occasions

Kike - A racial slur against Jews

Lizard People or Reptilians - A conspiracy theory by far-right figure David Icke, claiming that world leaders are really reptilian aliens. Most people who believe this theory believe that the lizard people in question are the Jews

Magic Soil - A protest against the idea that people of one nationality can become people of another nationality simply by living in a country (i.e. "France doesn't have magic soil that turns Africans into Frenchmen")

Nicker - An intentional misspelling of the N word in an attempt to bypass censors or automatic content filters

Ns - Black people (as in the plural of the letter N)

NSDAP - Nationalsozialistiche Deutsche Arbeiterpartei. The Nazi party, but using an acronym that is unfamiliar to most people

NS - National Socialist

Noticer - Someone who "notices" that Jews control the world

The Noticing - A mass movement of people "noticing" that Jews control the world

New World Order - A far-right conspiracy theory about Jews taking control over the world and implementing a single world government. Also used in conjunction with phrases like "world banks"

OFOF - One Front, One Family. Slogan of the neo-Nazi group Volksfront

ORION - Our Race Is Our Nation

Oy Vey - A Yiddish exclamation meaning "oh woe". Used by neo-Nazis to mock Jews

Pattern Recognizer - Someone who has recognized the "pattern" of Jews always being in control

Peckerwood - A term derived from racist prison subculture. A peckerwood is a man associated with a racist gang

Power Level - A memeification of far-right beliefs. The more fascist your beliefs, the higher your "power level"

The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion - A 20th century Russian hoax claiming to be the minutes of meetings between Jewish leaders discussing how they will take control of the world

Pure Blood - Someone who is a pure member of the white race

Rabbi Smolett - A claim that Jews fabricate antisemitic hate crimes (a reference to actor Jussie Smolett who was accused of doing the same)

ROA - Race Over All

The Goyim Know - A phrase used by white supremacists acting like Jews who have discovered white supremacist activity, and are afraid that they've been found out. Often "The Goyim Know, Shut It Down", which adds the idea that Jews will prohibit any conversation that gets too close to the truth

The Red Cross - A reference to the supposed fact that the Red Cross claimed only 271,000 people had been murdered in concentration camps. In reality, that number reported by the Red Cross only came from reports from 13 concentration camps (there were 23 main camps, plus a large number of smaller "satellite" camps)

Tiny Hats or Tiny Hatted People - A reference to the Kippah or Yarmulke often worn by Jewish men

Reject Modernity, Embrace Tradition - A fascist slogan warning against social progress and calling for a return to a prelapsarian (usually ethnocentric) paradise

Rubbing Hands - A reference to an antisemitic charicature called "The Happy Merchant"

"To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you're not allowed to criticize" - A quote often misattributed to Voltaire, which neo-Nazis use to decry claims of antisemitism as efforts to silence them. In fact, it's a quote from a neo-Nazi pedophile

Shabbos Goy - A non-Jewish neighbor of a Jew who can be asked to perform acts Jews are forbidden from doing on the Sabbath (e.g. turning of a light or turning on the heat). Used by neo-Nazis to claim someone is a slave to Jews

Sheeeiiit - An over-the-top representation of how "shit" is said with a Blaccent. Often used in memes declaring Black people to be less intelligent

Shekels - Jewish currency (from the Hebrew word for weight, similar to how British currency is called the pound. In reality, the plural of shekel is shkalim). The name has been adopted by the State of Israel for the NIS (New Israeli Shekel). "Shekels" is used by neo-Nazis to mock Jews as being greedy

Synagogue of Satan - An antisemitic term for Jews, stemming from the Chrsitian Bible

They or Them - When used to describe a nebulous group of undefined adversaries, these words almost always refer to Jews

They Cry Out in Pain As They Strike You - An antisemitic proverb claiming that Jews will make false cries of antisemitism while at the same time perpetrating atrocities

Troon - A slur against trans people, particularly trans women

Volk - German for "folk", or "kind". Used by neo-Nazis to refer to white people

We Wuz Kangz - A racist phrase ment to mock Black nationalists

White Genocide - The myth that a group of people (usually Jews) are conspiring to eliminate the white race through various means including immigration, intermarriage, and homosexuality

WP - White Power

WN - White Nationalist or White Nationalism

Wooden Doors - Refers to the fact that some of the gas chambers (such as the ones at Auschwitz) had wooden doors, and therefore could not have been airtight enough to contain the Zyklon B gas used to murder prisoners. In reality, many of the wooden doors were either replaced with airtight metal ones, or were made airtight with strips of felt that then deteriorated or were removed

Zio - An abbreviation of "Zionist". Used derogatorialy by neo-Nazis

WPRWS - 'Weimar Problems Require Weimar Solutions" (sometimes shortened to just "Weimar Problems" or "Weimar Solutions"). Prior to the rise of the Nazi Party, the democratic Weimar Republic was in financial crisis (the eponymous "Weimar Problem"). This was often blamed on the Jews. The "Weimar Solution" is Naziism

ZOG - Zionist Occupied Government, reflecting the belief that the United States government is controlled by Jews

#atlas entry #this took me several hours to compile so please give it a reblog #there are also a lot of ways nazis will mock Black or Jewish names but that's less dogwhistle-y and more foghorn-y #if you see someone say “lol 'Stein' 👃” and don't understand what they mean. I dunno that's on you man #also sorry for putting kike on here but you'd be shocked how many people I've met who have genuinely never heard it before #also the ADL website has a bunch more representing various prison gangs #but I feel like it can be overwhelming to know that 11 12 and 13 can all be racist symbols. I don't wanna make people jump at shadows #besides those are more likely to be worn as tattoos than displayed in someone's twitter bio #jews #jewish #judaism #nazis #neo nazis #neo-nazis #christofascism #far right #alt-right #white supremacy #white nationalism

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politijohn · 5 months

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Reminder that 53% of Alabama’s prison population is black people who are incarcerated at 3x the rate as white people (source).

#prisons #abolish prisons #criminal justice #criminal justice system #news #Alabama #current events #workers rights #workers #capitalism #government

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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 month

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Prison-tech company bribed jails to ban in-person visits

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me in BOSTON with Randall "XKCD" Munroe (Apr 11), then PROVIDENCE (Apr 12), and beyond!

Beware of geeks bearing gifts. When prison-tech companies started offering "free" tablets to America's vast army of prisoners, it set off alarm-bells for prison reform advocates – but not for the law-enforcement agencies that manage the great American carceral enterprise.

The pitch from these prison-tech companies was that they could cut the costs of locking people up while making jails and prisons safer. Hell, they'd even make life better for prisoners. And they'd do it for free!

These prison tablets would give every prisoner their own phone and their own video-conferencing terminal. They'd supply email, of course, and all the world's books, music, movies and games. Prisoners could maintain connections with the outside world, from family to continuing education. Sounds too good to be true, huh?

Here's the catch: all of these services are blisteringly expensive. Prisoners are accustomed to being gouged on phone calls – for years, prisons have done deals with private telcos that charge a fortune for prisoners' calls and split the take with prison administrators – but even by those standards, the calls you make on a tablet are still a ripoff.

Sure, there are some prisoners for whom money is no object – wealthy people who screwed up so bad they can't get bail and are stewing in a county lockup, along with the odd rich murderer or scammer serving a long bid. But most prisoners are poor. They start poor – the cops are more likely to arrest poor people than rich people, even for the same crime, and the poorer you are, the more likely you are to get convicted or be suckered into a plea bargain with a long sentence. State legislatures are easy to whip up into a froth about minimum sentences for shoplifters who steal $7 deodorant sticks, but they are wildly indifferent to the store owner's rampant wage-theft. Wage theft is by far the most costly form of property crime in America and it is almost entirely ignored:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/15/wage-theft-us-workers-employees

So America's prisons are heaving with its poorest citizens, and they're certainly not getting any richer while they're inside. While many prisoners hold jobs – prisoners produce $2b/year in goods and $9b/year in services – the average prison wage is $0.52/hour:

https://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2024/0324bowman.html

(In six states, prisoners get nothing; North Carolina law bans paying prisoners more than $1/day, the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution explicitly permits slavery – forced labor without pay – for prisoners.)

Likewise, prisoners' families are poor. They start poor – being poor is a strong correlate of being an American prisoner – and then one of their breadwinners is put behind bars, taking their income with them. The family savings go to paying a lawyer.

Prison-tech is a bet that these poor people, locked up and paid $1/day or less; or their families, deprived of an earner and in debt to a lawyer; will somehow come up with cash to pay $13 for a 20-minute phone call, $3 for an MP3, or double the Kindle price for an ebook.

How do you convince a prisoner earning $0.52/hour to spend $13 on a phone-call?

Well, for Securus and Viapath (AKA Global Tellink) – a pair of private equity backed prison monopolists who have swallowed nearly all their competitors – the answer was simple: they bribed prison officials to get rid of the prison phones.

Not just the phones, either: a pair of Michigan suits brought by the Civil Rights Corps accuse sheriffs and the state Department of Corrections of ending in-person visits in exchange for kickbacks from the money that prisoners' families would pay once the only way to reach their loved ones was over the "free" tablets:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/03/jails-banned-family-visits-to-make-more-money-on-video-calls-lawsuits-claim/

These two cases are just the tip of the iceberg; Civil Rights Corps says there are hundreds of jails and prisons where Securus and Viapath have struck similar corrupt bargains:

https://civilrightscorps.org/case/port-huron-michigan-right2hug/

And it's not just visits and calls. Prison-tech companies have convinced jails and prisons to eliminate mail and parcels. Letters to prisoners are scanned and delivered their tablets, at a price. Prisoners – and their loved ones – have to buy virtual "postage stamps" and pay one stamp per "page" of email. Scanned letters (say, hand-drawn birthday cards from your kids) cost several stamps:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/14/minnesota-nice/#shitty-technology-adoption-curve

Prisons and jails have also been convinced to eliminate their libraries and continuing education programs, and to get rid of TVs and recreational equipment. That way, prisoners will pay vastly inflated prices for streaming videos and DRM-locked music.

The icing on the cake? If the prison changes providers, all that data is wiped out – a prisoner serving decades of time will lose their music library, their kids' letters, the books they love. They can get some of that back – by working for $1/day – but the personal stuff? It's just gone.

Readers of my novels know all this. A prison-tech scam just like the one described in the Civil Rights Corps suits is at the center of my latest novel The Bezzle:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

Prison-tech has haunted me for years. At first, it was just the normal horror anyone with a shred of empathy would feel for prisoners and their families, captive customers for sadistic "businesses" that have figured out how to get the poorest, most desperate people in the country to make them billions. In the novel, I call prison-tech "a machine":

a million-armed robot whose every limb was tipped with a needle that sank itself into a different place on prisoners and their families and drew out a few more cc’s of blood.

But over time, that furious empathy gave way to dread. Prisoners are at the bottom of the shitty technology adoption curve. They endure the technological torments that haven't yet been sanded down on their bodies, normalized enough to impose them on people with a little more privilege and agency. I'm a long way up the curve from prisoners, but while the shitty technology curve may grind slow, it grinds fine:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/24/gwb-rumsfeld-monsters/#bossware

The future isn't here, it's just not evenly distributed. Prisoners are the ultimate early adopters of the technology that the richest, most powerful, most sadistic people in the country's corporate board-rooms would like to force us all to use.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/02/captive-customers/#guillotine-watch

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