I remember seeing a documentary on chimpanzees, that showed male chimps “humping” other males as a means to establish dominance. I was wondering, and I know it’s tough to quantify, how much of prison sex is really just about establishing a dominance hierarchy. I mean there is always good old masturbation for a release.
Prison * rape * is about establishing dominance.
Prison * sex * is about a lot of things, including loneliness, protection, and alot of gratification.
stoid
from “Prison Sex” by Tool, Undertow.
Since neither “hot” nor “soapy” appear in the thread title, I’m afraid I have nothing to contribute here.
Ira Glass (Host of “This American Life” on public radio) did a show on prison life once, and one of the segements was the reading of an informational pamphlet on prison sex written from one long-time con to newbies. They had to issue all sorts of caveats and warnings before reading it, I recall.
Anyway, the relationships described were often more like husband-and-wife roles. Being in such a relationship was a protection from rape, but also could be a mutually satisfying arrangement and an improvement in the quality of life for both parties. While there is clearly a dominant role for one to play (the husband and protector) but I don’t think that this establish dominance among the entire convict community.
In other words, what stoid said.
Forgive my naivete but why is this allowed to happen? If a man commits a crime he cannot be surprised if he is punished for it. If the judge gives him three years, or whatever, he should serve his time, and at the end of it he has paid his debt to society.
If this three years includes any kind of sexual abuse then the prisoner is entitled to feel let down by society. Do the prison authorities feel any kind of responsibility towards inmates who are raped? Yes, there is the problem of the prisoners’ code of silence. But I imagine, rightly or wrongly, that prison staff know what goes on and should be protecting the victims.
My perspective on this is not wide. I have read magazine articles. I have seen ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ and the first three series of ‘Oz’. I have read 'Presumed Innocent. Exactly how widespread are these practices? Should a prisoner destined for ‘hard time’ expect the time to be so hard? (no pun intended).
I am not thinking of taking up a life of crime, at least not yet, but consequences of this kind would worry me greatly.
** Nostradamus **, these are very complex issues.
The bottom line as to why it is permitted to occur is because as a society, we treat our criminals like trash, instead of like the flawed human beings they are. We prefer to pretend that they are lower, less redeemable, and less worthwhile than bugs, so if they want to kill and rape each other, who gives a fuck?
It does not have to be this way, and it would be better for our entire society if it weren’t, but that’s too complicated for the society to consider. Easier just to brand them worthless junk and forget about them.
But we are getting into great debate territory here. As to how much it happens? Nearly guaranteed, depending on the prison. You have to either rape or be raped or prove you are such a badass, by kicking someone else’s ass, that you don’t do either. Oz is exaggerated, but the fundamental principles apply.
stoid
tough to get a handle on this one - the prison officials have a stake in minimizing the amount that goes on, the victims aren’t very likely to make waves about it either.
I think this is reference to sex used to establish dominance outside of the prison, from Fielding’s World’s Most Dangerous Places:
I poked my head out of the hole and saw an AK-47 four inches from my nose. I crawled down the side of the tank cautiously and passively and listened to my translator standing near the tank interpret what the soldier was screaming while his gun was still trying to impale me. “If you come back here again, I will kill you!” As we drove away I was a bit thankful because an AFP veteran, Terrence White, told me what happened to him when a taliban soldier didn’t like what he was covering. The soldier said in all seriousness: “If you come here again, I will fuck you, then I will kill you!”
Um… how many of us have raped a man in prison? How many of us have been raped by a man in prison?
I thought so.
and your point is what? that if we personally have not done something or had it done to us, then we have zero knowledge and credibility on the subject? Hmm.
My background is 20+ years working with offenders post incarceration. No, I don’t routinely ask “gee whiz, are all the stories true?”. However, I linked to a couple of cites discussing the topic, one of which had some information about studies done.
However, this subject is difficult to get a good picture on - due to, as I said, the prison officials have an interest in minimizing the incidents, the prisoners themselves don’t generally like to remember the incidents, either.
My comments stand.
Yeah. I apologize.
I just listened to that episode of “This American Life” that Cranky mentioned. The segment starts at about 32 minutes into the show. It is matter-of-fact, reassuring, and chilling. But listen to the segment after that about a comic’s gig at a prison.
I don’t think there’s anything in these segments that would be offensive to SDMB regulars. But if you want to read the advisory, (which contains mild spoilers about the comic’s segment!) it’s at http://www.thislife.org/pages/trax/dacs/lock_up_advisory.html. The show itself can be heard at http://www.thislife.org/pages/descriptions/99/119.html.
Well, thanks (I think) to Stoid, Wring & Sofa King for their responses.
I’ve read the links and the whole situation is like a horror story. It seems that everyone knows what is going on but the relevant authorities either seek to minimise the problem or pretend it doesn’t exist.
There is something very, very, wrong with this. Apart from the psychological effects on the victims of these crimes, which I do not seek to lessen, one has to consider that the Justice System is being defeated by itself.
A prison sentence should be just that. Time served, end of story. Yet it is possible, and it has happened, that prisoners have been slowly executed by unremitting rape, because they have consequently contracted AIDS and died as a result.
So, a man could go to prison for one year on a bad cheque conviction, or whatever, and the sentence could be death. And if not death then deep psychological trauma, clinical depression, loss of self-esteem and many other resulting problems. Where is the Justice in that?
God help us.
When I was in prison people used to rape me all the time. God, those were the days.
This is the cached version of “Hooking Up: Protective Pairing for Punks”, the article by Stephen Donaldson (deceased) featured on Ira’s show. The original has been taken down. The original was attached to the site spr.org, or Stop Prison Rape, a group dedicated to, well, stopping prison rape.
I don’t know how long google keeps its cached pages, so do what I did: Select all of the text (usually accomplished with a click of the right mouse button on PCs, ask someone else for Mac help), Copy it, then Paste in into a text editor and save it as a document, so you have it for future reference. It looks like a good read.
A link that actually works
My links work just fine for me.
actually from what im told any physical contact between prisoners is illegal and there’s various remedies for it if there caught
but they have to be caught and someone has to say something so technically even consensual sex between prisoners is illegal
in the old days they used to segregate prisoners that were perceived to be gay and such
even earlier than hat they just beat them unconscious and harassed them
but on preventing rape and such the officials will respond “we try but its over crowded” ect basically the same excuse they give for anything in a prison
what ive found disturbing is the amount of sexual abuse that goes on between inmates in juvenile halls and the like its like the normal molestation/abuse cycle but it goes on as they graduate in to the adult prisons