Hey now! Here’s the best news yet…
My great state of Georgia does it again. Georgia prisoners coordinated a seven-prison strike to complain about unfair labor practices, poor conditions and human rights violations.
No, this didn’t happen at a Vidalia onion processing plant. Nope, nor at a Fort Valley peach farm either. Prisons. Striking workers from seven Georgia prisons. That’s what I said. Link it:
I’ll save you the paraphrasing and let you read it yourself:In a press release, the prisoners listed foremost among their demands a wage for their work. Inmates under the state’s Department of Corrections (DOC) are forced to work without pay.
Prisoners are demanding access to educational opportunities beyond General Equivalency Diploma (GED) certification, improved living conditions, access to medical care, fruit and vegetables in their meals, family visitation and telephone communication rights, just parole decisions, and an end to cruel and unusual punishments.
Okay- let me see if I’m seeing this right: men who made bad life decisions and wound up in prisons now want to have good nutrition, reading-writing-‘rithmatic beyond the high school level, and a good wage. Really? I think you waited a bit too long, Bubba. No pun intended…
The parole decisions and any cruel and unusual punishment complaints are obviously legitimate and even the fruits and vegetables argument is sensible. Prisoners should be given a relatively healthy diet like anybody else. But this list of demands seems like they want prison to become a fast track to college and a part time job. Pull off a few armed robberies and you too can get a college education and a low wage job. If education and a good wage were so important, why did you decide to commit a crime? Somebody somewhere in your life advised you not to be a hood and to pay attention in school. Why didn’t you listen then?
I’m all about rehabilitation. I don’t think all criminals are destined for the recidivist revolving door. But it’s called punishment for a reason. Prison shouldn’t be a fun and engaging place to go, learn, and meet new friends. It’s the place you go to pay your debt to society and come out with your $25 and a bus ticket a changed man. If that means while you’re there you’ll be a cook, janitor, maintenance man, landscaper, trash detail picker, whatever, so be it. It’s prison, not Camp Whattajoy. You’re not supposed to be treated to creature comforts there. Three squares and a work detail. That’s the breaks.
I also realize that some of the prisoners do have educations and made mistakes. Georgia does have some pretty harsh sentences for drug users and dealers that would benefit from a good dose of decriminalization. But wow, c’mon dudes, its prison. You made the first step, and it was a wrong one.
Instead of making prison a vocational-technical school, let’s have a transitional program that helps these guys find their stride after they did their time. AFTER, mind you, not during. That’s a big difference.
I am compassionate for the imprisoned, but not to the point that we rebuild their lives during their time in punishment when they may have shattered another’s.
Chip Grefski
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