1 in 31 ... 1 in 11 ... 1 Alone is Too Many

Sorry, Peter ... I admire your stance and have tried to adopt it myself, but I do not have sufficient discipline for it. However, I offer this ramble within his “practicalities” context, because the implications of those statistics and their rippling effects are not often deeply considered.

My guess is many of you have already seen a report based on the Pew Center study on states’ prison policies. A friend brought this one to my attention yesterday. It niggled at my brain all evening, as I considered my day’s activities: jumping into the car to run errands at a time convenient to me; choosing the route to each place, and which stores to visit and in what order; selecting what I wanted to buy and how to pay for the items; and once home, choosing where to store the materials until they’re needed; and then choosing the menu for our dinner. As the snolfs are also free individuals, I had the choice of inviting them for company, and they had the choice to come along or stay at home.

Lots of choices ... a lot of freedom in my days—freedoms that were not known to the 7.3 million individuals locked away by the state in this USSA in 2007. That works out (according to the news report—I haven’t looked at the study for methodological details) to 1 in every 31 adults. What would the ratio be if juveniles were included? Perhaps I’m allowing recent sensationalism to cloud my thinking, but I suspect with horror it wouldn’t be better.

I know someone who was one of those 31. And while I know it isn’t representative, I cannot help but recall George Potter’s recount of his experience with the Cook County, Illinois thugs some years back. Along with others’ tales told to me, perhaps you can understand why I look at those ratios and see not numbers, but individuals. Lives mostly shoved onto a devastating course ... and possibly (likely?) never to regain a firmer footing. The sadness of that thought fills me with cold dread on this fine, early spring morning.

I characterized that switching of paths as “shoving” because a significant proportion of those individuals warehoused in cages are not guilty of a real crime—that is, they did not initiate force or fraud upon someone. Most likely their preferred recreational substance isn’t on the approved list; or maybe they enjoyed sensual pleasures with someone who consented but is considered by others incapable of consent on the sole, flimsy basis of age (and those “others’” opinions matter most in such situations, don’tcha know). Increasingly these days, being the victim of a wrong-house raid or targeted by a cop with a Terminator ‘tude can land a person in jail—no “crime” of any sort needed at all. But even if someone did initiate force against another, is this the best way to handle that transgression? Is it even a proper way?

For voluntaryists and most anarchists, the answer to that latter question is certainly a resounding “No!”, primarily because the state replaces the real victim as the aggrieved party, and it is the state’s agents who mete out consequences and administer them. Where such a system might once have held face validity in rehabilitating aggressors, it has long ago vanished; today, it’s replaced by alarming recidivism statistics, as more individuals—having been branded a criminal—accept the label and learn more of the trade, so to speak, while imprisoned. Why don’t more people recognize this most basic failure of this model? How can otherwise reasonable individuals be deaf to real victims’ complaints?

But all this is well known, firmly established, and is not the point of my wanderings this morning. I, a person who has never had dealings in the stereotypical “criminal class” and who isn’t of the race that is most often locked away, can easily recall 5 individuals of my acquaintance who’ve been jailed. If I thought harder I could probably identify more ... and who knows how many of my acquaintances have never spoken of their ordeals to me? It’s a sickening thought.

And that brings me to my point at last. Yesterday, before my friend shared the CNN link with me, I’d come across another that set my mind to work. New and Unexpected Mechanism Identified How the Brain Responds to Stress [sic] focuses on brain responses, but brain responses ultimately have consequences elsewhere—and possibly throughout—one’s body. From the article:

Using a rat model, Jaideep Bains, PhD, a University of Calgary scientist and his team of researchers at the Hotchkiss Brain Institute have discovered that neurons in the hypothalamus, the brain's command centre for stress responses, interpret 'off' chemical signals as 'on' chemical signals when stress is perceived. "It's as if the brakes in your car are now acting to speed up the vehicle, rather than slow it down." says Bains. This unexpected finding is being published in the March 1st online edition of Nature Neuroscience.

Normally, neurons receive different chemical signals that tell them to either switch on or switch off. The off signal or brake only works if the levels of chloride ion in the cells are maintained at a low level. This is accomplished by a protein, known as KCC2. What Bains and colleagues have shown is that stress turns down the activity of KCC2, thus removing the ability of the brake, a chemical known as GABA, to work properly. A loss of the brain's ability to slow down may explain some of the harmful, emotional consequences of stress.

It is well established in humans and other animals that confinement and/or warehousing is very stressful. Even short-term events can have long-term, cascading effects, both biologically and psychologically. Knowing that, it seems clear to me that the fundament of the “incarceration as restitution” model is cruel and unusual punishment. Rather than rehabilitating individuals through various programs, they at best only dampen some of the pervasive stress. Thus, instead of wondering why so few turn their lives around, it should be clear that it’s approaching miraculous that anyone manages it.

Getting back to Peter’s practicalities, with so many individuals crammed in jail in this no-longer-free country, how can a person address this burgeoning problem? I don’t mean to imply that each former prisoner is a ticking time bomb, because my experience clearly demonstrates otherwise—but it remains true that their experiences have stressed them, and that can have long-term, and maybe somewhat hidden consequences. Lila Rajiva touched on an important element in her statement: “Everyone needs a portion of their souls left to themselves, even criminals.” Leaving aside those aggressors who attempt to take another’s life (because in a genuinely civil society their first attempt to do so would almost certainly be their only attempt), even other aggressors are human; and I think the only way to have any hope of sparking a desire to change in such people is to treat them as what they are: an individual. A person, with hopes and fears and dreams and insecurities and problems, just like we all have.

More naïveté from the Snake, you say? I prefer to cast it in terms of Peter’s reclamation of the concept of idealism; and I thank him deeply for that presentation. I have much to consider.