There is good news, and bad news, and completely predictable news in the fight against prison rape. The good news: the Justice Department last week announced a major new initiative designed to fight against prison rape. The bad news: it’s being opposed by right-wing ideologues. As Think Progress explains:
This week, the Department of Justice published new standards addressing the epidemic of rape and sexual abuse in our nation’s prisons. The guidelines, which apply immediately to federal prisons and give financial incentives for states to comply, are a laudable, widely praised, and long overdue step in combating rape in the United States.
The American Action Forum, a Wall Street-funded group whose C(4) runs millions of dollars in attack ads against Democrats, responded by lambasting the move as too “costly” and “complicated.” …
The Weekly Standard echoed AAF’s response, bemoaning the cost of preventing people from being raped in prison. The total expected cost is less than 1 percent of the overall cost of our prison system and ultimately “end up saving money — for example, by avoiding the medical costs of injuries suffered by rape victims,” according to the New York Times.
The completely predictable news? Men’s Rights Activists are completely oblivious to all this.
If the Men’s Rights movement were truly concerned with helping men, rather than playing “oppression Olympics” and complaining about feminists and women in general, they would be all over this issue. But I have seen nothing about this on any site in the manosphere, aside from one post on the Men’s Rights subreddit that drew all of six (mostly ignorant) comments. (Looking through one large thread on the subject of prison rape that was recently on r/mensrights’ front page, I found zero references to the Justice Department’s new initiative.)
What accounts for this obliviousness? It could be because MRAs tend to regard the Obama administration as a tool of our (imaginary) feminazi overlordsladies. Or because they would have to acknowledge that women are also raped in prison. But I think the real reason is that MRAs are so disconnected from real activists working in the real world to combat prison rape that they are completely unaware of any of this.
If you are interested in getting involved, or just learning more about the issue, I’d suggest checking out the website of the group Just Detention International, which campaigns against prison rape.
For more links, see this post of mine.
Ruby’s an onion containing endless layers of horribleness, isn’t she?
I’m amazed at the stupidity of her leaving that link. Did she really think her comments would not be seen and commented upon?
@CassandraSays:
Ruby’s like cutting an onion really slowly. Each time you break into a new layer, a little tear-inducing juice spurts out, and it repeats for hours on end. Slowly, because it takes just long enough to recover from the previous one before you hit the next. Even when you cut through the whole thing, that’s just one slice. And it’ll be hours before you can finally through the now-dried-up bits into the pan and eat dinner.
I should not be making food metaphors on an empty stomach.
Aw, c’mon hellkell. Amazed? Really? Ruby?
@hellkell
in ruby’s eyes, being pissed off about this is just another example of how unreasonable and extreme we are. it’s just fuel for her onanistic fire
Well, the MRAs aren’t going to comment on this positive development because they aren’t actually interested in positive developments. They’re only interested in their victim narrative and this doesn’t fit with their view of how “oppressed” they are. Feminism is based on working toward something–equality–whereas the MRM is just based on resentment and a sense of entitlement.
“Prison rape is funny.” Spoken like a person who’ll never go to prison.
“Onanistic Fire” –when you reach for the lube, and accidentally grab the Ben-Gay.
It’d be a great name for either a band or a D&D spell, though.
Spoken by a person who THINKS s/he’ll never go to prison. It’s like a disease amongst the (usually conservative) people who are all about people getting what they deserve, and victims of bullies just need to toughen up, and people who object to legal domestic spying just shouldn’t do anything wrong.
They seem to be literally unable to imagine a reality in which THEY are victims of bullies or trumped-up charges, or any of myriad preventable injustices.
And spoken like a person who think that people go to jail because they are Bad People, which is a different subspecies than Upstanding Citizens. There’s this pervasive idea that “criminals” aren’t ordinary people, they’re somehow fundamentally evil.
Oh, never mind how many ordinary people have had a few drinks and gone “I’m only driving a little ways” and gotten away with it–if you go to jail for a DUI, suddenly you’re a capital-C Criminal and have nothing in common with normal humans.
3) Courts sentence people to a particular prison term. That’s their punishment–the prison term. If rape is an intentional part of the punishment, let’s make the courts spell it out in the sentence. (That’s a bitterly sarcastic joke. I only say that because obviously no court would do so.)
This. Also goes for police brutality: “The police had the right to shoot him, because he robbed a house!” Not unless the legal punishment for robbery is getting shot!
And spoken like a person who think that people go to jail because they are Bad People, which is a different subspecies than Upstanding Citizens. There’s this pervasive idea that “criminals” aren’t ordinary people, they’re somehow fundamentally evil.
Oh, never mind how many ordinary people have had a few drinks and gone “I’m only driving a little ways” and gotten away with it–if you go to jail for a DUI, suddenly you’re a capital-C Criminal and have nothing in common with normal humans.
I’ve noticed this too. Witness illegal immigrants as “illegals:” they (or their parents) broke a law, so now that defines their entire identity.
@ captainbathrobe
“Onanistic Fire” –when you reach for the lube, and accidentally grab the Ben-Gay.”
That’s awesome! 🙂
-2 to your will save for each party member who is of your preferred gender. (album title)
Who even believes in punishment? If a person does something that harms some other member of society, society’s responsibility is to sequester that person such that such harms will not be revisited on relevant vulnerable people. Punishment ought not to enter into this scenario. It accomplishes nothing.
2D: Society can also try to deter other people from committing crimes, and get the people who committed crimes to not commit them again! “You are a bad person so I shall hurt you” is pretty bad logic, though.
Also bad logic: “You are a bad person so I shall force you to work for $0.25 an hour doing for-profit manufacturing, and I’ll keep the profits. Don’t worry, this won’t cause any conflict of interest with our mission to rehabilitate and release you!”
The depressing thing about that Cliff is that even the people who are convicted of DUIs think they are better than “criminals.” Yes, you got behind the wheel of a car with a .21 but it was a mistake that anyone can make (no, actually, a .21 means you can barely move unless you are a habitual drinker, meaning you can mask the symptoms better but they are still there.) Not like you are those punk kids who just mouthed off to the wrong officer. Or that dude who was smoking weed at some party that got raided.
But the thing is to the smug self righteous person claiming that with a DUI they are still better than those “lowlifes”? Those “lowlifes” are just people who have generally made more mistakes, had less opportunities and still do not deserve to be treated the way they are in prison or at the tents.
*sighs*
Also the complete disconnect from logic that someone being here in the US without jumping through the gazillion legal hoops put in their way who is brought before a judge, sentenced to a fine and put on some kind of program to become a citizen or have legal status of any kind. I have colleagues who are normally very sensible people who have complete derangement on the issue. If the person who is here without lawful status, that person cannot have any other punishment than deportation. Regardless of how little effect it would have on bringing these people out of the shadows. Nope, only deportation. Anything less is “amnesty” even if it was a hefty fine, payment of all back taxes and then stick them on a pathway of some kind of legal status. I finally started asking if it was “amnesty” to sentence people committing other kinds of illegal acts that allowed for reinstatement (like driving on a suspended license) after payment of a fine. They tend to get blustery and claim, against all evidence, that it is different.
No it is not-someone committed a wrongful act and was punished for it with the prevention of a further offense. What more does one need?
PosterformerlyknownasElizabeth — .23 in my father’s case, and yep, still thinks he’s better than “those damned punk kids” (which seems to mean anyone he doesn’t like, particularly anyone not white who dares touch a joint).
And even if the point of prison were punishment, there’s punishment and then there’s torture, rape has got to be over that line by any reasonable definition (I can’t come up with punishment that wouldn’t be torture actually, but maybe someone who isn’t sweltering can?)
I think there are sensible, reasonable, thoughtful arguments that can be made in favor of punishment. (I’m unlikely to be the one making them, since I tend more towards your views on the subject, but I’ve heard others whom I respect do so.) The critical thing isn’t “prisoners should never be punished.” It’s “rape is really, really, really not an acceptable form of punishment.” I don’t have a problem with respectful debate on whether, say, prisoners should get to have access to TVs, but there’s a world of difference between a position like “once you commit a violent crime, you should forfeit your access to luxuries until you are released from prison” and “once you commit any crime, you don’t count as a person and people can do anything they want to you.”
Polliwog — thank you, “we’ll remove the TV” is definitely a non-torture punishment. This heat is really killing my ability to do logic (yes, “do logic”).
He got fairly horrible on the second page, going on about how prison rape is the real problem because all the rape that purportedly happens outside prison is fake. But yeah, Ruby still managed to be at least nearly as awful as him.
I just right now came back from a call. I was called in to advocate for a homeless, addicted guy who had been sexually assaulted.
I was able to convey to someone who was in a position to help him how fucking difficult it would be for a man to come forward with an SA accusation — and (even as absolutely fucking basic and miniscule as that is) that felt like a huge achievement.
At the program I’m with, we get called to advocate for prisoners who have been raped also. I haven’t done it yet. I can’t imagine how I’ll have to recharacterize what an achievement looks like in that situation.
Fucking seriously. IF NOTHING ELSE, the government should protect vulnerable people. I’m … well, I’m angry. Fuck rapists, and fuck anyone who looks at someone who doesn’t have a home or any power or a voice and doesn’t give a shit what happens to them. If you don’t give a shit about a homeless person (or a prisoner, or an addict or a migrant farmworker … ) getting raped, you are the worst. Officially.
Oh yay, actual people who don’t buy into the whole prison = punishment thing! You would have thought by now that people would have noticed that the threat of being stuck in a scary prison (complete with rapes, stabbings, beatings by guards, gangs etc) doesn’t actually deter people from committing crimes.. but no (and that’s not even getting into putting people in prison for stupid things and making things worse rather than better).
There’s more to be had from prisons if we’d go with “rehabilitation” and “education” rather than “punishment”. Obviously some people commit crimes too far beyond them reasonably being allowed back into society, but keeping them away from everyone else is good enough.
I will say that i’m no expert on prisons, crime or punishment, or the actual logistics of having a rehabilitation-based system over a punishment-based one, so it might sound a bit idealistic. 😛