The Lost OITNB Episode

Did you ever see that one episode where the inmate went to court with no pants?

Season 4 of the ever controversial show Orange is the New Black featured the usual same old stand-offs and confrontations we’ve all pretty much come to expect and even love. A quirky group of inmates and Alex conspire murder. The Dominicans and Piper were back at it again (no surprise here). Sophia still being hidden in the shu.

Oh, and let’s not forget about the uber creepy prison guards. Who didn’t get chills when Inmate Ramos came back after eating that baby mouse? Or when the guards forced Inmate Flores to stand up on the table without food, drink, sleep, or restroom breaks? Repulsive, yet comedic isn’t it? Which seems to be the main goal for every punishment the inmates find themselves accidentally in.

Well let’s take this a bit further. On July 29, 2016 court footage was released of an African American female defendant who was brought into court pant-less. The defendant had been brought into custody at Fayette County three days prior, wearing only a t-shirt with no apparent pants.

The detainee had been picked up for failure to complete a diversion program for a shoplifting incident that occurred in 2014 without further charges since then. Judge Amber Wolfe had already questioned why she had been in prison for three days, for an offense that she deemed only worthy of “one day tops”.

“Excuse me? Excuse me? This is outrageous. Is this for real?” Wolfe stated when the woman stated that she had been denied pants and feminine hygiene products. Wolfe proceeded to make furious calls demanding information on why an inmate had been treated in such an inhumane way.

Blends in pretty well with OITNB, wouldn’t you agree? Except there’s one major problem- you probably aren’t chuckling to yourself like you would be during a binge sesh of your favorite season. Allow me to explain why.

Angela Davis’s essay on Public Imprisonment and Private Violence fits perfectly for the scenario presented before us. What you’re looking at here is a case of gendered punishment and violence. The female prison system began to be designed in 1853 with the notion that these institutions would be rehabilitation centers with a focus on a feminized public punishment system (Davis, 14). Meaning that women (typically just white women) would serve out a sentence while being trained in the “important” female role of domesticity- this is the gendered punishment. Criminal women were not seen as a threat, rather just as women who needed to be corrected.

More important to recognize about the female prison system is there is a distinction between the public sphere and private sphere of punishment. The public sphere, as you probably have already come to piece together, is the prison system. The private sphere of punishment is the home environment where the history of women’s corrections began. Punishment here could be dealt by the hand of a man. By this thinking, the prison system should have eliminated the need for private punishment and dealt out an equal correctional system.

Unfortunately, this did not happen as such. We can still see the lasting effects of these inequalities in play. Black women imprisoned were often segregated and treated less equally; their sentences nor the labor they were compelled to do were lessened by the virtue of their gender because of their race (Davis, 9). Moreover, in relation to the video of the Tennessee inmate, this woman was subject to a gendered and racial punishment that treated her as if she wasn’t human, and valued less than the other females in the prison. The detainee at one point said it herself: “I came to booking, and they were giving some people uniforms, they weren’t giving some people uniforms. Like, I don’t know what they were picking and choosing what their criteria was but…”.

What was the necessary criteria to be worthy of a uniform and hygiene products? White? Male? Should she have asked for a skirt instead? What’s worse is she is not the only one. Refusal of equal treatment, denial to basic rights such as clothing or proper hygiene- as OITNB loves to highlight and normalize- is completely discriminatory and unequal treatment.

Which leads me to my final question, so is orange really the new black if an inmate is denied the orange?