At Boston University, Friends of RAIL held a series of events for the End the Amerikan Lockdown month, including a showing of FBI's War on Black America, protesting mandatory minimums at Boston's "Freedom Festival", and, of course, our regular tabling sessions throughout the city where we gather signatures on protest postcards to send in to prison mailroom staff (protesting censorship of prisoners' mail). Unfortunately, the Attica event was canceled due to bad weather. The final event featured a former prisoner, now activist, who spoke on the repressive nature of the prison system. The event began with one comrade explaining the link between the prison system and a larger internationalist perspective on imperialism. This comrade discussed the use of prisons in Amerika as a tool of social control over oppressed nation Blacks, Latinos and Indigenous peoples. S/he pointed out the fact that only certain people in Amerika are arrested for and convicted of crimes such as drug use, rape, and murder, while Bill Clinton is actually committing crimes against the people (like bombing Iraq). The link between prisons and imperialism is clear when you realize that Amerika is all about oppression of other nations, whether internal nations in Amerikan prisons, or nations outside Amerika's borders through bribery and setting up imperialist-friendly puppet governments.
Next the former prisoner spoke. She began by telling her personal story to give people a little background, but was clear that she'd much rather use her experience to discuss the systematic nature of prisons than her own life. She endorsed MIM's Free Books for Prisoners program as an important program to keep people in prison from giving up. She spoke a little about the horrible effects prison has on a person and therefore why we need to support prisoners and try to change the current conditions under which they suffer.
After the feature speaker FORAIL showed a clip from the video "Through the Wire" as an example of how prisons are a tool of social control. One comrade gave an update on two of the wimmin in the video: Puerto Rican revolutionary Alejandrina Torres who was given clemency by the U$, and revolutionary activist Silvia Baraldini who has been sent to a prison in her native Italy. Another comrade read a letter from a prisoner previously printed in Under Lock and Key. The letter criticized the Massachusetts people who were in an uproar over the proposed move of the New England Patriots, but were silent about the murder of 3 prisoners in Massachusetts.
Before opening up for discussion a RAIL comrade discussed what we are currently doing about everything we'd talked about so far including: prison letter meetings, supporting Free Books for Prisoners, helping with the Prisoners Legal Clinic, and working on a RAIL-led correspondence course for prisoners to receive an education.
Most of the 25 or so people stuck around for a lively discussion. One person asked a MIM comrade how one could support China or Russia if they are so opposed to prisons. (What is MIM?) The comrade first explained the situation in Russia during WWII which made it impossible to hold up in face of the fascists without tight security, which unfortunately meant prisons and executions. Then the comrade spoke on Chinese prisons, which MIM upholds as a prime of example of how prisons should be used. Rather than trying to lock up more people the goal in Maoist prisons was to educate people so as to eliminate the need for prisons in the future. Another comrade recommended the book Prisoners of Liberation by Allyn and Adele Rickett for a firsthand account of Maoist prisons from the perspective of two U$ spies during the early years of Communist China.
MIM on EAL Month