The issue of the privileges that we are afforded in prison is one of the favourite bugbears of the wittering classes, who latch onto the existence of TV's and pool tables as if these items held the secret to a successful prison policy.
What is completely overlooked is that privileges don't exist to smooth off the rough edges of incarceration. Privileges, since 1995, exist solely in a framework whose explicit purpose is to enhance control over our daily lives.
There is no part of a prisoner's life, no matter how small, which escapes the Incentives and Earned Privileges Scheme. Privileges ceased being a positive and instantly became a burden, a thread of control that is viciously insidious and unjust.
When you add to that, the sometimes thicko attitude of some Prison Officers, then you have a distastful experience! Add that to over thirty years of the same, with no real experience of adult life before this all started, and you end up with "you" Ben!
ReplyDeleteYou need to sleep between silk sheets from now on. The latter, I have never done myself, so you will have to let me know what it feels like, Ben?
And if I hear another word mentioned, that it was all your fault, I will piss in their shoes! Society has no idea of what it does to us folks. It is all built on a pack of lies anyway, as I have found out too often!
i blame the parents
ReplyDelete… clearly they’re burdensome when the personal discipline required to continue having them is no longer there, or felt to be slipping out of reach (again).
ReplyDelete… so why bother behaving when having TV access etc etc is so depleting?
What about self respect.
But whatever….before dissing incentive arrangements, you need to take a reality check from your fellow cons ----cos they will see these things as fruits of the regime, rather than burdens, tbh …