REPLY ID "Solitary Panel"

Solitary Confinement

I've been held in solitary confinement for around 5 years. Last time I came down, I was in seg for around a year before I went home. But it's not uncommon to come across people back here who've been here for 10 or more years.

To me, it's just another aspect of incarceration. I've been in General population, Medium Custody, Close Custody (Max Disciplinary), and seg, and each environment has its good and bad sides. Solitary is no different. It's a two edged sword. It can make you or break you.

I mean back here, a lot of the distractions of conflict and gang/race warfare is removed from occupying most of our time, as is work and the ever decreasing and limited opportunities for formal educational advancement. So we're faced with a huge void in things to occupy our time. Like they say - "Nature abhors a vacuum" and it's true here as well as anywhere else. We have a saying - "If you don't do your time, your time will do you". And I can cite example after example of cases where I've seen the time do someone.

I don't know if it's just weak minded people - I think anyone's capable of falling into destructive thought processes and vices if they don't actively rebel against them. I mean, the delusions and vices are almost infinite. Like the sexual deviants. Some of these freaks may have initially started out with a little more self discipline and control - but when they consume their time with thoughts of sex 24 hours a day - well, the appetite grows and needs more stimulation. It's real common - especially among Blacks (not being racist, just making a common observation from experience, if that's allowed nowadays) to masturbate on the female officers that come through. I know a lot of the officers may be flattered, which only deepens the problem and encourages it, but it eventually becomes almost pathological - to the point where an officer will ask them to stop, even order them to stop, but they just won't... or can't.

Some develop deeper pathologies. Some begin to masturbate on male officers. Some will masturbate on any male inmate who happens to be standing at his door. There seems to be a lot like this nowadays, that may not have initially been so imbalanced and controlled by impulses, but now are completely driven by them.

We just had one leave our pod last month named Kiki. He would jack off on people at the door for around 10 hours straight, every day. But his mind was gone, that's all he thought about. Emotions all haywire, thought people were talking about him, or couldn't figure out why no one would talk to him even though he would masturbate on them all day long. I got into it with him on the rec yard, arguing through the fence - he even pulled it out on me, and I had to spit in his face... his mind is gone. Hopefully he'll be out in the free world soon.

But there are all sorts of deviants like that. Former full blown white supremacists with kids and family... that now shave their legs and wear skirts in the cell... man, the perversions are almost infinite, like I said. Which is why I pass on the girly books when they are passed from cell to cell - it only fuels the fire...

Other psychological abnormalities that are pretty common around here are the cell warriors. The idiots who pass their days arguing and screaming with anyone willing to respond. I guess this psychosis also grows with practice. I was placed in one cell (as an unofficial punishment, I suspect) with two of these lunatics on either side of me. Even when no one was speaking with them - they would begin a screaming argument with the cell door, cursing and threatening -- for hours. If someone would ask who they were talking to, they would argue with them or explain that someone way down the run or on some other pod that it's impossible to hear anyone on said something about them. Sometimes one idiot would wake up another idiot who would begin screaming also, perpetuating the cycle. One such idiot screams so loud that the guy in the cell across from him, who can see about a foot into his cell, says that he can see him putting his fingers in his ears when he screams... 'cause the noise hurts his ears!

There are psych patients back here. But a lot of them types wouldn't fare much better in population, or, after the multidisciplinary infractions that they would inevitably incur, in medium or close custody either. I was on the bus one time with two young white dudes going to high security Smith Unit - Close Custody. They were clearly psychologically unfit - blank stare, clipped statements, moving from the front of the bus to the back of the bus 'cause it was cold... then back 2 minutes later when the "weather changed".

But they were talking about the crazy people at the psychiatric unit they just left, Montfort. One said to the other - "my cellie was CRAZY... every time I would go to sleep he would jump on my back... I said 'Man, are you crazy or what?'" Yeah, I don't know what twisted official sent them to close custody, but they were two rape victims waiting to happen. They might as well have just painted them up and handed them over to one of the predators. In cases like that, I think solitary is a good thing. Solitary Confinement in some cases probably stops some people from killing or raping or being killed or raped. Either way - it helps in those cases.

Of course, some people are also just nuts before they enter prison or solitary. Some of them couldn't possibly have committed the crimes they are convicted of. Just some ambitious prosecutor in conjunction with a sell-out lawyer saw an opportunity for an easy conviction and got it.

On the other hand, if you use this time wisely, you can definitely become very educated in a variety of different fields. We have an almost unlimited time for study and contemplation. Exercise - physical and mental, prayer time, for those of us willing to discipline ourselves and put forth the effort, seg can be an invaluable asset. Instead of sinking into Vice, we go from Virtue to Virtue. Like I said, solitary is a two edged sword. If you set goals to study, learn and grow, and stick with them, man, I can't tell you how many days have went by where I was unable to complete all the tasks that I set out to fulfill. And the weeks, months and years just fly by as if they were nothing. You just become absorbed in learning about things. Deepening, expanding, and in a lot of ways, modifying your views of yourself (and the forces at work within you - both genetic and psychological), the world, and everything in between.

Me personally, I think solitary opened my eyes to a lot of things that I would not have otherwise had the time to understand. I'm sometimes grateful for the crooked cops that planted evidence on me and the whole corrupt system of prosecutors and judges who knowingly, intentionally allow these injustices to continue. My Faith is stronger than ever, and I truly believe that God was able to turn all the evils that my government and nation has inflicted upon me into an instrument for my growth. I see super clearly who's on the side of right and wrong in this world now, and it's not the Afghans, nor the Iranians, nor the Chinese that I see as the enemy. Solitary has freed me from the media-engineered delusional reality that most people live in.

Like I said, I don't feel solitary in itself is a bad thing, it's just up to the individual to turn the situation to his/her advantage. Everyone has a cross to bear - if you rebel against it and become bitter, it will destroy you, but if you embrace and accept it, it becomes an infinite source of Grace and Strength. I wouldn't waste my time worrying about Solitary if I was y'all. I feel that economic motives alone will either destroy or drastically reduce it in the near future. Very Near. It's only a matter of time before overcrowding and budget constraints force them into placing two people in a cell currently occupied by one. I don't see America coming up with the cash anytime soon to embark on another prison building boom anytime soon. Nor do I see the population growth magically coming to a halt. Or crime mystically disappearing. Add it up, you'll see what I mean. Solitary Confinement's days are coming to a close in my opinion.

Chris Hall #1565195