This wasn't supposed to happen here

What more volatile living situation can there be than hundreds of men, hostile, anti-social, and often downright lethal, thrown together in prison? With so many incarcerated men on the receiving and giving end of physical abuse since youth, it's understandable that prison administrators try to take special precautions in the ordering of prison routine, to maintain some degree of equanimity.

Until recent years, it was left to prison authorities and each state to determine how best to handle its prison population. Policies were set by wardens and/or state personnel, including decisions about racial and ethnic housing assignments. In general, separation of the races, especially blacks and whites, met with consensus among prison administrators and the inmates as well.

But as the social policy of integration in this country took the form of a quasi-religion, becoming a virtue unto itself, some prison officials were forced to abandon common sense policies designed to keep the peace. Prisons came under the inspection of social engineers, who were determined that prison life reflect the standards being imposed on mainstream society. Symbolism became more important than practical considerations. The busybodies won the day against the attempts of prison administrators to retain the old order.

In "Race-Based Prison Policy Is Under Justices' Scrutiny" (New York Times, 11/3/04), Linda Greenhouse tells of California's current policy that separates a part of the prison population--newly arrived inmates--by race. Now under pressure by the U.S. Supreme Court to maintain integration, the state is defending its separation policy, while trying to make those out of touch with the reality of prison life understand the special needs within.

Francis Grunder, of the state attorney general's office, explains, "California is ground zero for race-based street gangs. The animosity between the gangs is purely race-based, and the racial pressures in prison are very, very severe."

It is hard to believe, even though the eminent Supreme Court Justices live in the highest of ivory towers, that they know nothing of the documented evidence concerning rape in prisons -- especially rape that white men and others suffer at the hands of more physically powerful black men. Such documentation is readily available--in academic format, as well as in direct revelations by former and current inmates. Because this is a subject that most people find too objectionable and shameful to ponder even for a few minutes, it goes unaddressed, and thereby becomes all the more urgent.

In 2001, the liberal organization Human Rights Watch, whose members might well be described as bleeding heart civil rights apologists, published their hair-raising research on violence in American prisons. Even this group, whose sympathies, by any measure, land solidly on the side of those considered society's ethnic underdogs, or the "disenfranchised," could not gloss over the truth of what goes on behind prison bars.

The report, entitled "No Escape: Male Rape in U.S. Prisons," offers background and details:

In the nineteenth and much of the twentieth century, racial segregation was commonplace in U.S. prisons and jails--indeed, in some cases segregation was statutorily required. In the South, blacks and whites were typically housed in separate prisons, while in northern states prisoners were segregated by race within the same facility. A Supreme Court decision banned the practice in 1968, but nonetheless many penal facilities continue to separate inmates by race, sometimes relying on surrogate variables such as gang affiliation or following inmate preferences for self-segregation. . . .

Racial antagonisms are another important contributing factor to prison violence and abuse. In the prison context, it bears emphasizing, the racial tensions that pervade U.S. society are significantly magnified. Even though in prison, more so than in the surrounding society, members of different racial groups are placed into close contact with each other, racial divisions are one of the dominant features of inmate life. Prisoners' social relationships are largely determined by race; their gang affiliation, if they have one, is racially defined; and whatever racist beliefs they may have held prior to their imprisonment are likely to be significantly strengthened over the course of their stay in prison.

In their correspondence with Human Rights Watch, both black and white prisoners emphasized the importance placed on racial distinctions in prison.

In its article "Hard Time," a discussion about the Human Rights Watch report, American Renaissance analyzed the report's findings:

To its immense credit, a lefty organization called Human Rights Watch has done a serious prison-rape study and has published its findings in a book-length report called "No Escape." Human Rights Watch ordinarily specializes in trendy causes: opposition to landmines, the death penalty, and alleged violence against homosexuals in American schools. In this case, it has taken on the most untrendy of subjects, and describes inmate rape--and hatred for whites--in unflinching detail. . . .

The racial dynamic in prisons puts whites at a tremendous disadvantage. First, whites are often outnumbered by both blacks and Hispanics. But far more important, just as they show no racial solidarity in "the free world," whites in prison do not band together to protect each other from predators. . . . "No Escape" recognizes reluctantly that blacks and Hispanics often rape whites out of pure hatred, and relish the chance to degrade whites.

"No Escape" elaborates: "Through the act of rape, the victim is redefined as an object of sexual abuse. He has been proven to be weak, vulnerable, 'female,' in the eyes of other inmates. Regaining his 'manhood'--and the respect of other prisoners--can be nearly impossible." Which, of course, is the goal -- to effectively cause the ultimate humiliation of the raped victim, is to symbolically demoralize all white men.

Given these circumstances, it comes as no surprise that a black inmate, Garrison Johnson, is the one whose lawyer has brought the current "segregation" case before the Supreme Court, which demands an end to all separation of the races in the prison system. (Might Johnson and his cohorts be mocking the very system that might facilitate his victory?)

And there sit the Justices, who might as well be living in another galaxy, appearing at the moment, from the nature of their questions, to lean towards integration of all inmates. Such a decision is more than likely, since the White House has entered this case to plead on Johnson's behalf. One might wonder why the Bush Administration would choose to meddle in such a case. It turns out that anything concerning race that looks even "presumptively unconstitutional" to current White House residents must be stricken from the land. Apparently, there must not be a corner in society where any separation of the races prevails.

Johnson's lawyer, who spoke in typical civil rights jargon, decrying "stereotypes," told the Justices that in a segregated environment his client is "unable to reach out across racial lines for support." Can anyone fathom just what these words mean within a prison setting?

Unsurprisingly, many white men who enter these prisons with racially neutral views come out as virulent racists. "No Escape" reports the observations of a white and a black prisoner:

A white prisoner quoted by Human Rights Watch asserts, "I hate to say this but if you weren't racist when you came to prison more than likely you will be when you leave. In Texas prisons race is the main issue and until people wake up and realize that nothing will change." A black prisoner, who described himself as relatively oblivious to racial distinctions before entering prison, told Human Rights Watch that "Most blacks see whites as 'The Man' or 'The Law!' . . . So is it any wonder that when a white man comes to prison, that blacks see him as a target?"

If the Supreme Court does as it is likely to do, such "targets" can expect little or no mercy. Not even the young men, whose stories are reported in "No Escape," who are incarcerated on DUI charges, can avoid the fate of being set upon by incorrigible, recidivist criminals, and sometimes murdered.

That there is now little protection of prisoner from prisoner is abominable as a social policy. However, the prospect of still greater danger for certain inmates, due to the meddling of a remote Supreme Court and the cynicism of pandering politicians is unforgivable.

See a commentary on the Supreme Court decision on this case here.

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