I follow a prisoner blog called Prison Proxy and read an excellent post there today. The post titled “Thoughts on Prison Culture” is written by a prisoner serving life in prison in the Texas State Penitentiary. It is offered here without comment because it speaks for itself.

Thoughts on Prison Culture…

Prison Culture dictates that inmates follow certain rules and policies, and break others. The prison staff expect and are okay with this, even though it involves rules being broken, because it reaffirms inmates into their accepted roles within Prison Culture. And, by extension, this reaffirms the officers’ roles for themselves. New inmates and officers are subsumed into this character casting without so much as a fight, and thus the tragedy continues.

Yesterday, I was again in one of those reveries where I like to hear myself talk. I rhetorically asked an acquaintance how I could claim that I’m not supposed to be here, while doing everything that I’m supposed to do in this backwards system. Put differently, a syllogism: This is a backwards system, and I’m a ‘forward’ person who’s not supposed to be here, therefore I won’t do the backwards things that I’m supposed to do.

I buy toilet paper from inmates who steal it solely for the purpose of selling it. Inmates are only provided with one roll of toilet paper per week, and if one runs out before that week is out, he’s – pardon my French – S.O.L. As a result of this punitive policy, a black market in stolen toilet paper thrives, and I for one buy them. Or, take the inmates that are dying of A.I.D.S. They get one extra sandwich at lunch (an extra sandwich!), ostensibly so as to boost their caloric intake. These inmates unfortunately tend to have no outside support, so they sell these sandwiches (two pieces of white bread and a slice of cheese) for a couple of mint sticks. They give up possible months of life for the comfort of an otherwise unattainable piece of candy. The rule prohibiting these activities (i.e. no trafficking and trading), and many other rules are to varying degrees unjust, so inmates are permitted – even duty-bound – to circumvent these rules. Even if by means of our own (what would generally be) injustices – e.g. sneaking, politicking, etc. , just so long as our (justified) injustice is to a lesser degree than that of the rule. Because there is no hard and fast ruler for degrees of injustice, my own means of rule breaking must be significantly less unjust than that of the rule.

Likewise, there are no rules on the books against investing in stocks or blogging, yet Prison Culture nonetheless prohibits these activities because they redefine what it means to be an inmate (i.e. in his relation to the free-world).

I break all of these rules and unspoken rules, not only for the purposes of the act – be it accumulating toilet paper reserves or penning this blog – in itself, but also for the purpose of breaking rules simply because they are unjust. And this particular modus operandi makes me a maverick – the essence of which is to reject being cast, by rules or norms, into pre-defined (i.e. regurgitated) character roles.

Prison Culture is all about preserving the slave/master relationship. In the plantations of the Antebellum South, there was no right or wrong. The masters did what they wanted to do, and the slaves did what they needed to do to survive. Here in prison, the guards do what they want to do (here in Texas, the backs of their caps are inscribed with “looking out for our own”), and the inmates do what they have to do to survive.

The inmates take this mentality to the free-world, which is neither the Antebellum South nor Prison Culture, and thus come right back to Prison.