One of the psycho patients over here, Wayne Morris, cell 606, was taken out to
the exercise yard about 30 minutes ago. The guards came back to get him and he
refused to “cuff up” in order to be re-secured into his cell. He
was screaming profanities at the guards. They went and got a video camera and
ordered him to cuff up, but he refused again. The Sergeant, Van Arsdale,
ordered an Extraction Team to “suit up”. Several minutes later, the
psycho patient called for an officer and told him he would cuff up. After a few
more minutes, about five guards, along with a nurse, cuffed the patient and
took him out to the core area and put him in “the holding cell”
– where they injected him with a drug and put him back into his cage. As
a result of this incident, no one else has been taken to the exercise yard, and
no more showers have been carried out. The guards will use this incident as an
excuse to do nothing else today – no more exercise periods or showers
will be run – except sit out in the main hallway and tell jokes, gossip,
look at sex books they have confiscated from SHU inmates during
“shakedowns”, and play cards. And it is only
It’s now
I was taken out to the “exercise yard” today,
which is merely a 20’ x 10’ [I measured 25 x 12 ½ of my size eleven
slippers] rectangular concrete-block enclosure, with ½ of the roof open to the
sky except for steel meshing. There’s a video camera out there whereby
one is “monitored”. For exercise, I ran in circles along the wall
150 times, which I figure equals roughly a mile and a half.
Some offender, somehow, got his hands on a black magic
marker, sometime in the past, and wrote in four-inch high, block letters on the
concrete blocks:
GET YOUR REVENGE ON
THE STREETS
KILL THE PIGS!
This got one to thinking about the true state of affairs
concerning this SHU, i.e. “what’s REALLY going on in here”. I
wished that I could get my hands on a tape recorder and a video recorder so
that I could document the daily conduct of SHU guards and their treatment of
SHU prisoners, including, especially, how they treat the psycho patients. The
public at large would absolutely freak out! Man, don’t they know that 90%
of these crazy, i.e. criminally insane patients are going to be released back
into an unsuspecting society, some very soon? These guards and SHU administration
as well as the Indiana D of C apparently don’t give it a thought, rather,
they literally TORTURE us in here in all kinds of ways; acting as if we were
confined in here solely for their entertainment, for their amusement –
and there is no oversight. This is the breeding ground of terrible crimes to
come, crimes that will certainly be committed on an unsuspecting public, on
innocent unknowing men, women, and children. That message on the exercise yard
wall – GET YOUR REVENGE IN THE STREETS – had been painted over with
white latex paint [white-washed] but the message had bled back through –
and that got me to thinking too: about 60 or 90 days before a prisoner is
released from the SHU back into society a so-called “transition
coordinator” stops by in front of ones cage “to chat” for a
few minutes about once every two weeks, asks questions, gives info etc., as if
this will or could, make the slightest difference to one after being
psychologically conditioned to hate over a period of years by SHU guards and
administration. Just as that message written on the wall of the exercise yard
– GET YOUR REVENGE IN THE STREETS – had bled back through the thin
coat of paint, which was a feeble attempt to cover it up, likewise the torture
and physical abuse, the isolation and sensory deprivation throughout months and
years in the SHU, will also bleed back through any such twice monthly [white
wash] chat with a “transition coordinator”. What a joke. Man, the
public just doesn’t know! Most of these guys, probably 80%, are on
mind-altering drug, urge-suppressing drugs [“dummy-dope”]
administered to them 3 or more times a day by the SHU staff. And these patients
– some of them – get a hold of razorblades and CARVE on themselves.
Some stick ink-pen fillers [which is all we are given with which to write] into
their penises or rectums – one must perhaps witness these occurrences
here to believe that men could do these types of things to themselves, albeit
after being driven insane after years of enduring abject cruelty, on a regular
basis. Once these individuals are mandatorily released, and again, 90% of them
will be, it will be someone [or one’s] other than himself that
they’ll most likely be carving on – i.e. some poor citizen who
knows nothing about how the victimizer – defendant had been conditioned,
bred-to-it, through this SHU.
When I was led back inside to my cage [handcuffed behind my
back with a dog-leash attached thereto] after my one hour on the exercise yard,
I discovered that Officer K. Hasky had torn my things apart, again, in a
shakedown; but fortunately nothing was destroyed or taken this time. This is a
regular occurrence: if one chooses to run the gauntlet by coming out of ones
cage for an exercise period or a shower, one is assured; absolutely guaranteed,
of having their cell torn to smithereens by these guards – although, to
be sure, some staff are worse than others. This is the method they employ to
dissuade – really, COERCE—one not to take advantage of the
statutory-based right to a shower and one-hour period of exercise – more
time for the guards to sit on their asses out in the core-area or main hallway
and “shoot the shit” with one another, i.e. play cards, look at
adult magazines, etc.. But, to hell with them; they may just as well get it
through their heads that I’m going to the exercise yard and to the shower
EVERY OPPORTUNITY I GET. One cannot help but feel violated, though, when one
returns to find ones things ransacked and mistreated [if not damaged,
destroyed] or “confiscated” just because you needed some fresh air
or a shower. And, believe it, these SHU guards will bend over backwards looking
for something – anything – that they can rationalize taking from
you, in order to “show you”, and often one will receive a bogus
“conduct report” for something being “altered” or
“damaged” – even though it wasn’t altered or damaged
when one left ones cell. What a tangled life-web these staff-members weave in
here in the SHU, and what pedigree of animal they are breeding for society to
choose from.
These youngsters stared, thrilled, captivated; this was the stuff you saw on
T.V.! Far-out! I tried to ignore them, my face red with embarrassment, but it
was, finally, impossible to do. In silent protest, I extended the middle finger
of my left hand, and maintained this pose for the duration of this outrage
– they seemed to understand my point of view, at the end, for they
avoided looking at me and my message. I would rather have talked to them, but
that would never be allowed. I thought it a lost opportunity, an additional
“shame”, that these young men would not receive, as Paul Harvey
says, “the REST, of the story”, from my side of the plexiglass
covered cell-door. Most likely, they wouldn’t believe me anyway, or if
they did begin to believe me, they’d probably think, as the majority of
Americans seem to, “you deserve it!” It’s an artificially
inseminated mentality of “Us against Them”, “Good vs.
Evil”.
The existential philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche thought that humans enjoy
punishment because we like punishing people, not because we want reform. To
Nietzsche we are perverse and unnatural animals. Animals are neither good nor
evil. Do we praise or blame a fox for killing and eating a partridge? Do we
punish a cat for killing a mouse, indeed for tormenting it beforehand? What is
the relationship between violence and punishment? Animals seem to be violent
for their own good, but human animals seem to be violent in most cases just to
be violent. Our animal nature cannot absolve us from the ways we sometimes
torment others OF OUR KIND, and thus are we unreasonable and unnatural.
Behaviorists explain animal behavior as inter alia arising from the urge to
procreate and the will to survive, and thus demonstrate that animal behavior makes
sense. If humans were merely complicated animals would I be punished with
extreme isolation such as I’ve been subjected to these previous two years
of my life? Fro my standpoint, the housing under these conditions of
non-violent prisoners in particular, and then treating us like wild lions and
tigers, makes no sense. It is sure that these deprivations of social
intercourse and recreational activities, for years on end, are
counterproductive to the notion of reformation, and what’s worse, is creating
antisocial personalities in men who must someday return to society to
assimilate and “make it in the streets”. The “Us against
Them” mentality and the engaging in these impractical and unnatural
“programs” to modify the psyche of “societal outcasts”
is quite simply mad! “Why does SHU staff do things to torment me? Do they
derive some perverse glee from shaming me?” Does cruelty derive from the
same source as that from which comes the will and drive for benefiting mankind?
Possibly some form of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde thing.
I thought that what you said concerning romance was spot-on,
"…Romance is something beautiful and it makes life so much nicer,
but sometimes I believe that true (pure) friendship (without erotism) values
even more…"
I have received many letters from gay men, who have read my ad on the internet
(PrisonPenPals) and who were looking for romance in their lives, wanting to
strike up a relationship with me in hopes, that they could
obtain…whatever.
Many prisoners prey upon such gay men in this way, i.e. they "lead on
them" into hoping/believing that they've found romance and that the future
holds promise of a passionate relationship etc. upon their release, when in
reality it is only a scam for them to obtain money orders and gifts, etc. I
have always been honest with everyone, who wrote to me – I've never
pretended to be something that I wasn't, i.e. homosexual; I have found a couple
of good people, who continued to write me after I dashed their hope about romance
and who became friends, who ended up writing me for the enjoyment of, perhaps,
intellectual stimulation, i.e., I write a lot about philosophy and astronomy,
etc. and we ended up with something, as you mentioned "valued even more
than romance", i.e. mutual respect, admiration, platonice friendship and
companionship. This is very rare.
Philosophers have debated much throughout time concerning the nature of love,
and have made some fascinating conclusions. Some of them deny that love exists
at all, and I must admit that some of their arguments in support of such a
perspective are very persuasive. Most people never analyse life much at all,
and as a result never distinguish their feelings for what they really are,
sometimes leading to unhappy lives, marriages, etc., i.e. as I implied above, I
have come to believe that there is a difference [that many people would be
helped in recognizing] between sexual attraction, friendship, emotional
attachment and LOVE [real love, I think, is rare].
We can be stimulated sexually by certain someones and engage in satisfying
sexual activities, but not feel any deep attraction to the individual as a
person: that is not love.
We can share a hobby or an interest with another person and enjoy resulting
mutual activities, but not feel any affection for that
person: that is not love.
We can possess psychological attachment for a person on the basis of our needs:
but that is not love.
All of these states can be [and are] elements in love, I think, but the popular
expressions of people assert that these elements are in fact "love",
but I disagree for the reasons stated. I think that there is a causal
relationship between "true" love and morality. I
think such a relationship reveals something of nature of love in general. I
think that true love has as its focus the welfare of the
OTHER person – though of course the degrees differ in many types of
relationships. But, in reality human beings often find it very difficult to
love others, it being much simpler to hate others, as history illustrates
– i.e. laws are enacted in order to IMPOSE morality [a state of love] on
peoples. Therefore, my immediate thoughts tend to be that, negatively, most of
what is thought to be love,is in fact not.
The western idea of romantic love is somewhat of an illusion, then, and I think
that upon close analysis is found to consist of a range of sexual and
psychological needs of two individuals each of whom looks to the other to
satisfy. So for me, sexual attraction isn't love, nor is friendship love. Emotional
attachment, when it is the satisfying of ones psychological needs is also not
love. I really believe that the fundamental characteristic of love is the
caring of the other and doing what one can to promote the well-being of the
individual even at a cost to oneself. Yes, I know that this view is very
demanding, and perhaps unrealistic, but it is what logical reasoning tells me
on the subject.
Don't we de-value the term "love", if we do not acknowledge that it
carries within its meaning the most noble aspirations of which humans are
capable? Of course very few of us ever aspire and develop the ability to love
in this sense. [….]
© Copyright 2003 Timothy Greenlee
Tim Greenlee
PCF #865760
The
truth about Supermax by Timothy
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Days in the life of SHU inmate
Timothy Greenlee
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