Reading
Angela Davis this week really made me think about our ideas surrounding
justice. As Davis states, “the prison has become a key ingredient of our common
sense” and I think it has become a part of our understanding of the world. The
way the prison industrial complex has been set up has made it such an integral
part of our economy, sense of safety, and understanding of “good” vs “bad”
citizens.
When we
discussed if we could imagine a world without prisons, it was extremely
difficult for me to do so. I think that the idea of prisons has become so
engrained into every aspect of our being. I think we see it starting from when
we are young children, and we are punished with “time-outs” – a time away from
the larger “society” to think about what we did and make us not misbehave
again. But, as I think most of us know, this rarely works as children misbehave
again after time-outs, and often don’t understand why they are happening. I
know when I was a child, my mother gave me one time-out (that I remember that
is) and I cried through the entire thing. I don’t remember what I did, but I do
remember that I hated being separate from everyone else and not being able to
know what was going on around me. That may not be the best example, but I think
that prisons are not effective solutions to stop people from committing crimes.
Instead we need to look at the root of social problems and find ways to address
them there.
Angela Davis’
ideas reminded me of readings of Foucault I have done in the past where
Foucault discusses how schools, hospitals, and prisons are all set up the same
way. Everything in rows, everyone labelled with numbers. Thinking about this shows
how we are conditioned to be able to move from one place to the next and back
again. So, if we really want to overhaul the prison industrial complex, we
would have to do a complete overhaul of our entire system. Our entire society
would have to be reorganized not according to numbers, and reducing to people
to what they have done but who they are. It seems like a noble project, but
one I’m not sure could happen easily, or in our current societal context.
I am curious what people think about the possibility of a form of justice that is not set up around separating the non-normative individuals from the “rest of us?” How can we (if it is even possible) overhaul our entire societal system?
I am curious what people think about the possibility of a form of justice that is not set up around separating the non-normative individuals from the “rest of us?” How can we (if it is even possible) overhaul our entire societal system?
This is on a
complete side note, but I am also curious how people feel about major companies
involved in the prison industrial complex (for example, I am thinking of
Aramark) also being involved on our campuses, places we consider to be spaces
of social transformation.
Your question of the possibility to transform to a justice system that does not separate the "non-normative" individuals from society makes me happy. This is mostly because I think the normal is boring and if we keep pushing the abnormal away into disciplinary institutions the normal is reinforced.
ReplyDeleteBut is it?
WIth the huge number of people in prison today I do not think we can say that the people in prison are abnormal. In America it is almost as normal to have been a prisoner than not if you are a person of colour.
Concerning your larger discussion of the need to change society so that it is not built upon institutions that discipline their subjects into docile bodies, I think that that for this to even be possible society beyond these institutions would need to be changed. As Foucault discusses, places such as the family also work to produce a normalized body. We have taken the job of surveillance and discipline out of the hands of these large institutions and placed it upon ourselves. We self-surviel and self-discipline to ensure we become a normal conditioned body. So even if we move, within these institutions, to being concerned with who individuals are, rather than their actions, disciplinary work outside of these institutions still creates a normative body with normative actions.
Hi Emily! I really love that you brought Foucault into the conversation. I too had Foucault's Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison resonate throughout my thinking while we worked through Davis. Something that was brought up in my group discussion was the issue of necessity to not only break free from prisons and incarceration, but from the various institutions that, Foucault points out, run on the same types of systems and models of classifications and control. Schools, hospitals, industrial factories, etc. are all brought up in Discipline and Punish as places that function similarly to reduce people down to what they do and not who they are.
ReplyDeleteIn the History of Sexuality (and I'm also thinking of Whorter's Bodies and Pleasures which really helped to simplify things for me), Foucault highlights how sexuality is one of the only parts of a person that actually creates an identity for them (along with crime). For example, a gay man would not be seen as a man who also happens to be gay and possibly participates in sex with other men, but would be seen as whole new identity of "gay man". Now, I think that this is really interesting, but also difficult, when we think about sexual assault because does committing the act sexual assault transform your identity into a rapist or sexual offender? Or should it simply mean that you are someone who has committed sexual assault? Honestly, for me personally, (and I know that Foucault would probably condemn me for this), I think that sexual assault is one of the rarer instances where, yes, the act is not simply just "something you did" outside of who you are but warrants the label. I understand that this is probably just something personal, and I respect others who disagree, but I think that it might be very hard for a survivor to hear someone say that their rapist or perpetrator was actually "not really" a rapist, but someone who committed the act of rape.