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In case this interests you or the blog , from an email to dad I'm sorry for bugging you during your aurora Borealis thingy , but I wanted to make sure you heard that about the thing with Mrs Purdy, since I expect it'll be a long time before you read the email I sent, whether due to securus or not. Basically the staff here are hypocrites or just lie to our faces about stuff, and more and more of the inmates are politicking and pulling all this deceptive bullshit . Like, for example the thing that happened today that I talked to you about . That's an example that this pod, h5 , because of the decisions of the higher ups here and in my opinion probably because of Fenns' decisions, this pod is becoming more like just a normal pod ... Where there is politicking and racial animosity and where inmates do whole smear campaigns on each other and you can't trust anyone other than the few people you know personally are OK . That's how prison normally is and this pod has always been different but its becoming more and more like that and it shows. We've got more and more racist people ... I'm talking white people too ... And normally that used to be a big no for this unit. Like they would just kick you out. The guy who talked to me today got kicked out of this unit for fighting and now he's back . The little white short guy is like extremely racist and he called someone an n* and got in a scrape with them just a week or two ago and he's still here. Its not my place to judge , I'm not a cop, but that kind of thing used to be not OK in this unit which was one of the things a lot of people liked about it and its come full circle now to where its just as bigoted and treacherous as any other min custody unit here, if not worse. And more and more the staff just don't care about any of it like, we specifically get the staff who turn a blind eye because they want those kinds to work here because they aren't doing what they're sposed to be doing here. I wanna also say that I really thought your friend was really nice and I was very impressed and I'm very grateful but that on another level, I'm afraid of talking to her, not because of her status exactly , but similar to like why I'm afraid of talking to Pam. They're both people who I respect and whom I owe a debt of gratitude to and in Pam's case, a degree of familial deference. However, despite the fact that I respect them both I'm afraid I'm living in too dark and cynical a world for me to speak candidly to either of them. If a random person from outside of prison offered me kindness and respect , a person who didn't have certain experiences ... even someone who cares about that stuff like your friend or whose family by marriage and has helped my like Pam ... I can't speak candidly to a person like that and expect a good result. My opinions and all that ... about myself and others and about the bureacreacy ... They're too poisoned for me to feel comfortable talking to your friend. Or to Pam. I'm uncomfortable because I recognize that they have a good attitude and sense of civic duty and all that ... But on the other hand ... Like ... Its weird. I wouldn't say I'm a criminal in the sense of like that being my identity or anything , I really don't think of myself that way but like ... If we say I was addicted to drugs by the age of 18 ( which is pretty fair to say ) and then in prison by 23 ... No matter how geeky, passive, and educated I might be ... I'm now 30. For 12 years , more accurately 14 , I've been a member of a different caste. I'm not saying this out of some kind of need for identity or to try to claim some kind of rep I don't have or to seem dramatic. But it effects the way I feel about people. I It doesn't effect the way I feel about you or mom or sales or jay or Andrew because I've known you the whole time so maybe you don't notice, and some of you know a thing or two about that world ... you from your own experience ... But ... I feel so strange being helped by your friend or by Pam or even just talking to them because of it . Or by strangers. Like as a hypothetical, I don't think its just them. Its like become impossible for me to not categorize people in these ways , I've probably been doing it since I was "homeless" , so it probably began back then. I basically learned to other anyone who wasn't having experiences I could relate to. In the same way as a person who was doing well, working and having an apartment and such, playing bridge and all that, probably othered me, I othered them. Jail and then prison have added more layers to that. Its like I said I don't think I'm tough or hard or even smart and I have no illusions about my privilege but I've still been where I've been for so long that like. I know politicking when I see it. I know corruption when I see it, I assemble a psychological profile of people around me just like everyone else in my position does. Its second nature. So now, now that that prison layer of prejudices has been added, its hard for me to relate to someone like your friend : somebody whose not one of the types from my life ages 17-23 ( A down and out free person , a weekend warrior, a housie, or a cop. I know its cringe but how else can I say it those are the categories ) or from ages 24-30 ( an inmate I can trust, or an inmate I can't trust, or a CO , or someone ignorant from the outside) ... those are the only categories. I don't know how to relate to someone from the outside whose not down and out but who isn't ignorant and wants to help like your friend or someone whose probably learned enough about the situation from you to not be ignorant like Pam probably has. I mean, its like I said , I know I'm privileged in a lot of ways and I know I'm not like some kind of hard prison dude, but I think its ... probably a lost cause that I'll ever be able to relate to anyone who doesn't fall in to one of these categories when I get out, at least not without getting to know them personally.