The letter from the prisoner which came as a plea for prison reform reminded me so much of the Netflix show, “Escape from Dannemora.” The prisoner in this chapter pleading for reform in prison. He goes on to state that the mistreatment he has received had now changed his whole mindset and how all he can think about now is just killing the ones who have mistreated him and made him lose his sense of self and dignity. Basically, he stated that all looks forward to in life is killing those who treated him like a dog without further regard to what that will actually mean if he does become free to kill.
In “Escape from Dannemora,” it is a true story about a lady jailhouse worker who helped two inmates escape. In the beginning she is having sex with one of them, but then his friend gets in on it and she has sex with both of them, not at the same time. I won’t ruin the Netflix show but she is supposed to have a car waiting for them and when she second guesses herself and has a panic attack, she ends up in the hospital unavailable to the two men who just escaped from jail and needed her to be waiting for extraction. Long story short, one of the men was so mad she didn’t show up he no longer cared about his freedom. All he cared about was going to hurt her and kill her and her family if they were in the way. All he could see was red. Luckily, the friend talked him out of heading into town and they fled away instead. (You’ll have to watch the show to know how it ends.)
It’s important to realize how your thought process can become glazed over by thoughts of anger and aggression when your dignity and self-worth and identity are stripped from you like the clothes of a new inmate. There’s no doubt in my mind that creating a mock prison could have many lasting effects on those being deprived the normalcies of their daily life. There is no doubt that also giving prison guards power over the people allows them to feel like gods and overpower those that are in their command vulnerably. Simulating roles, however short or long can change even the most intelligent person when dehumanizing them is the goal.
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