Women of Color in the Prison Industrial Complex
Racism hides from view
In Angela Davis’ book Are Prisons Obsolete, the reader begins exploring the relationship between systemic racism and the prison system. In the chapter “The Prison Industrial Complex,” Davis explains.
Despite the important gains of antiracist social movements over the last half-century, racism hides from view within institutional structures, and its most reliable refuge is the prison system
Davis begins to explain not only “the racialization of prison populations” but also the media and privatizations’ influence in strengthening the prison industrial complex. Davis evaluates the underlying and obscure fact that the prison system was pushed onto society by those profiting from the prisons rather than from an actual need to quell crime or violence. Prisons are advertised as a microcosm for larger American society, necessary to separate criminals from the larger “innocent” society. Although both prisons and the United States have “been driven by ideologies of racism and the pursuit of profit,” they are not exact replicas of each other. Prisons’ representation of groups is skewed, and there is a gross overrepresentation of certain marginalized groups, specifically Black and Latinx bodies within the incarcerated population. For once, there is an overrepresentation of minority’s bodies, but it is tied to societal ideals of violence and immorality, a strategic and racialized move.
This racialized use of prisons has happened many times in history. Firstly it dates back to the time of emancipation. Upon being granted their freedom, Black people (former slaves and free Blacks) found themselves swallowed into legal loopholes that the United States government created with the ratification of the 13th amendment.
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
Now that slaves were no longer available for cheap labor, the white patriarchal power enigmas began to file nonexistent crimes to exploit the free resource of inmate labor.
Then again, later with the massive prison-building project that began in the 1980s.
The prison industrial complex is fueled by privatization patterns that, it will be recalled, have also drastically trans formed health care, education, and other areas of our lives.
Products of this “new slavery” include chain gangs, license plates, Victoria’s Secret underwear, and medical treatments.
Women of Color and The Prison System
I believe that just as inmates are being used to continue the prison industrial complex, poor women of color are being exploited to “strengthen” American society, which manifests itself in many ways, medical treatment, media coverage, and general treatment. Both inmates and women of color are the workers that keep their systems running. Yet we must focus on how the inequities of poor women of color shift or compile when they become prisoners.
Medical Examples
Just as racist medical practice issues have been seen in the medical field against poor women of color, such as the Madrigal case, there are parallels with inmates.
Davis emphasizes this parallel when she states:
Society’s marginal people were, as they had always been, the grist for the medical-pharmaceutical mill, and prison inmates, in particular, would become the raw materials for postwar profit-making and academic advancement
Davis further explains inmates’ roles as practice or trials for clinical studies of skin creams. She details the manner in which inmates are a source of income rather than human beings. It is critical to understand that prisons were never made for the benefit of people of color or women. The privatization of prisons focused its interests on that of rich white patriarchy exemplified by those businesses that benefit from these experiments.
Johnson and Johnson, Ortho Pharmaceutical, and Dow Chemical are only a few of the corporations that reaped great material benefits from these experiments.
Like the women in the Madrigal case, these inmates are being harmed to perfect the product for the “innocent society.” Medical professionals have been interviewed on numerous occasions objectifying marginalized communities to benefit the white patriarchal enigmas.
~Dr. Kligman 1966
All I saw before me were acres of skin. It was like a farmer seeing a fertile field for the first time.
Rather than understand the inmate's value as a human and trial run of the medication, the Dr. rather saw a piece of flesh without thoughts, emotions, or capability to deny. Davis explained that the prison industrial complex and other institutional structures “generate huge profits from processes of social destruction.” Therefore they prey on marginalized or disenfranchised communities specifically because they have not had support in history. Their lack of resources makes them the perfect demographic for the school-to-prison pipeline and the continuation of a “new form of slavery”…
INCARCERATION.
Media Examples
Issues of media coverage also affect inmates and women of color.
From 1990 to 1998, homicide rates dropped by half nationwide, but homicide stories on the three major networks rose almost fourfold.
Similarly, issues or media coverage influence society’s view of women of color, with harmful stereotypes.
Once again, when there is a representation, especially an overrepresentation of marginalized bodies, it is to amplify preexisting societal conventions.
This is compounded when women of color are inmates. They are being described as violent deviants because of their inmate status and as oversexualized bodies trying to seduce the “pure white man”.
Basic Treatment and Societal Impacts
This idea of corruption can be seen in issues of sexual assault, particularly guard and inmate assault. This already traumatic experience gets more complicated for the victim when they hold multiple minority identity aspects.
This repetitive loop of hopelessness minorities face in the prison system, and larger United Sates society is reminiscent of the repetition of recidivism. As the United States finds new ways to exploit and constantly marginalize people of color only based on their ethnicity/race/identity markers.
Similarly, the prison system cuts inmates from the world, allows them to sit and wallow during their sentence, and lets them back out into society with no means of rehabilitation. Many parallels can be made between the United States and the Black community.
Thus as Davis stated, there are new ways of disguising racist ideals. The issues of the prison industrial complex are an ever-relevant issue. As long as prisons profit off of free labor and the historical pitfalls of minorities, society should be hyper-focused on this system. And yet, even I did not focus on prison exploitation issues until my professor handed it to me. The power enigmas have ensured that empathy for these inmates and minorities is buried beneath the stereotypes and divisive media coverage.
