Amnesty International Takes on U.$. Prisons A letter from a New York Prisoner says the real criminal is Amerika Welcome to Under Lock and Key, news and commentary about prisons from the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist League. The U.$. incarcerates a greater percentage of its population than any other country. The rate for imprisonment of Blacks is 4 times that of apartheid South Africa, and the U.$. sends more Black men to prison than college. The purpose of this program is to educate about, and inspire activism against, the Amerikan lockdown. Amnesty International Takes on U.$. Prisons In early October, Amnesty International initiated its campaign entitled "Rights for All." This campaign focuses on human rights violations by the United snakes internationally and domestically. The campaign is to run from October 1998 to May 1999. "Rights for All" is campaigning for: "an end to police brutality; an end to torture and abuse of prisoners; the protection of asylum-seekers; the abolition of the death penalty; ratification of human rights treaties; and a code of conduct for arms sales." At the beginning of the campaign, Amnesty released a 150- page report documenting human rights violations in the U.$. by "police departments, prison systems, detention facilities, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) and other institutions." RAIL welcomes this mainstream exposure to the daily atrocities committed by and backed by the United Snakes of Imperialism. Details provided in the reports adds to the work that RAIL and prisoners have done to expose the nature of the U.$. INjustice system as a system of social control and national oppression. We invite Amnesty chapters and supporters to struggle with and work with us. There are many projects which we can collaborate on based on our mutual goal to expose and oppose U.$.-imposed oppression. In this feature, we focus on the aspect of Amnesty's report dealing with the Amerikkkan prison system. We credit Amnesty for conducting investigation and exposing some of the conditions in Amerikan prisons. In the past, we have used information that Amnesty provides and have credited it when Amnesty has been correct in exposing imperialist-country atrocities. The Amnesty International report's chapter on prison says: "Every day in prisons and jails across the USA, the human rights of prisoners are violated. In many facilities, violence is endemic." Further, Amnesty adds, although "many of these practices violate US laws as well as international human rights standards," in current prison system "serious violations can occur and continue without being effectively challenged." The report documents many cases of brutality by prison officials, including: administrators supervising beatings of prisoners, "gladiator" fights arranged by guards, false reports filed to cover up guard atrocities, racist attacks and false disciplinary charges lodged against Black prisoners, 600 prisoners handcuffed outdoors for 96 hours, wimmin prisoners raped and sold by guards for sex (which is torture according to international law), the use of restraints deliberately imposed as punishment, chains and leg-irons (illegal under international law), prisoners who died from blood clots from prolonged immobilization, prisoners tortured while strapped in restraint chairs, prisoners with tape wrapped round their mouths and football helmets placed backwards on their heads, hogtying, pregnant wimmin forced to give birth in shackles, the use of dangerous amounts of tear-gas as retaliation for nonviolent protests, prisoners maced and racially taunted while already in handcuffs, lethal use of pepper spray, the use of electric stun guns to shocks prisoners already restrained, and the use of dangerous remote control electro-shock stun belts. One useful element of the report is Amnesty's documentation of where U.$. practices violate international laws. These are largely hollow in the case of the Amerikan government, which generally ignores them, but pointing out these violations helps expose Amerikan hypocrisy in its treatment of prisoners. For example, transferring prisoners thousands of miles from their communities, which RAIL and others have protested in recent years, violates the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners in international law. These international rules are pretty much used as toilet paper by Amerikan prisons. Imagine what prisons would be like if they followed all this: "Under the ... Convention against Torture, the US government is obliged to ensure that people are not subjected to torture (including rape) or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and that people deprived of their liberty are treated with humanity and with respect for the dignity of the human person." The U.$. government ratified this Convention in 1994. However, said it would interpret the rules to apply the same way the "cruel and unusual punishment" clause of the U.$. Constitution is used. In other words, the Convention against Torture is to be heeded by Amerika rarely if at all. Listening to any edition of this Under Lock & Key program exposes the lie of these so-called rights in Amerikan gulags today. --- Part of Amnesty's focus is on how prison guards should do more to prevent violence between prisoners. For example, "Overcrowded correctional facilities lack the space and staff to protect vulnerable inmates from predatory ones. As a result, physical and sexual violence and extortion are rife in many prisons and jails," examples of which they provide in some detail. In the real world of politics such demands turn public opinion against prisoners, lead to increased prison funding and a bigger prison system, and divert attention from the central issue, which is the national, gender and class oppression of the injustice system. These are not the concerns of Amnesty International, however. RAIL agrees that the injustice system should be held responsible for crimes against the people committed in prisons. And we know that the conditions of prisons and the machinations of the prison officials cause immeasurable harm to prisoners. However, we don't want to put our political energy into demanding that prison guards do more to stop these crimes. And progressives must make clear that additional guards will not decrease violence within prisons. The guards themselves are the primary perpetrators of crimes in prisons and we do not trust these pigs to end violence. In many cases reported to RAIL, even prisoner on prisoner violence is instigated by the guards like some sick human version of a cock fight. The crimes which prisoners commit within prison represent consequences of the root injustice of the system. The pitfall of single issue politics in this situation is revealed when Amnesty's solution does not take into consideration the social causes of violence amongst prisoners. Setting aside pig violence -- prisoners fighting themselves or even being self-destructive through the use of drugs, stems from social inequalities and massive repression and denial of a meaningful existence prisoners face. Under the leadership of the Communist Party of China up to 1976, the Chinese people developed prisons which helped prisoners to rebuild their lives as productive members of society. The Chinese prisoners were assisted in genuine rehabilitation with the result of prisoners having more respect for themselves, other individuals and for society in general. This is one of the many reasons RAIL addresses problems like violence within prisons from a revolutionary analysis. Piecemeal approaches will not solve the problems of either crime or prison torture. -- The Amnesty International report on the injustice in U.$. prisons also criticizes supermaximum securityÑor supermax-- prisons. As of 1997, there were at least 57 supermax prisons in use by 36 states and the federal government. More than 13,000 prisoners are currently in these high-tech dungeons, and many more facilities are currently under construction. Supermax prisons have already been condemned by Amnesty as well as the UN Human Rights Committee. Supermax violations of international law include: cells smaller than 80 square feet, no windows and little or no access to natural light or fresh air and insufficient exercise. Further, "In Westville, Indiana, prisoners were not allowed to wear watches or ask the time until a hunger-strike and a lawsuit led to some court-imposed changes." U.$. courts have forced some changes, but generally permit supermax administrators to have their way in the name of "legitimate security needs." According to Amnesty, QUOTE "the process of review is discretionary, or the criteria for moving out of the units are vague or difficult to meet. Some prisoners may spend years in supermax units." In particular, "Prisoners may be assigned for long periods ... for relatively minor disciplinary infractions, such as insolence towards staff ... Others have reportedly been moved to supermax units because of overcrowding or because they have complained about prison conditions." In Valley State Prison, California, for example, wimmin were "assigned, or threatened with assignment, to the supermax unit if they complained about sexual abuse by guards." Finally, "some prisoners have reportedly been put in supermax units because of their political affiliations." Listeners will be interested to know that QUOTE "International standards clearly specify that medical care and treatment shall be provided whenever necessary, free of charge." Not only is medical care inadequate, but it is often not free. -- The report goes on to list many reforms that would reduce specific abuses, such as banning stun guns, limiting time in supermax conditions, and so on. It is useful to have groups such as Amnesty agitate for these reforms. RAIL has led or joined some struggles to improve prison conditions. However, the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist League takes it as our main task, to build public opinion against the injustice system as a whole, and to build a movement to overthrow the system that imposes these draconian conditions. We have long criticized Amnesty International for its focus on the oppression committed by Third World governments without assigning blame to the imperialists in the background whose power and influence are often at the root of "local" acts of oppression. We have also criticized Amnesty for its whole approach to "human rights" and supposed "apolitical" stand, as if rights could be divorced from power and politics in a world dominated by imperialism and patriarchy. Amnesty generally uses a bourgeois theory of 'human rights.' We argue that there are no inherent rights, there are power struggles. This means we recognize the reality that those in power are the ones who determine what is and what is not a right. The ability to be treated in a certain way, or for the bourgeoisie to hold its property or any other 'right' is only supported by the ability to actually gain and defend it. Conceiving of justice in terms of rights allows the bourgeoisie to determine what is and is not a right and for which groups of people. Capitalism forcing whole villages to starve or denying health care to Blacks in the U.S. is typically not thought of as a human rights violation. That disagreement with the overall approach is unchanged. But we have also blamed Amnesty for a tendency to ignore or tone down criticism of the First World -- and especially the local First World -- country. Within the United Snakes, Amnesty will sometimes focus timid pressure in some death penalty cases. People can most effectively organize in their own territory, but Amnesty chooses to ignore the torture in police stations and prisons right around the corner. Even from within the reformist perspective, the people who need to shut down the Control Units at Marion prison--cited as torture by Amnesty -- live within the United Snakes. For local issues not to be an integral organizing strategy is a mistake. And here Amnesty has improved their record in our eyes. Yet even now, as the mainstream media generally ignores the Amnesty report after a brief mention, the problem with Amnesty's piecemeal approach is apparent. The next time the pig media do a report on atrocities in a Third World government the U.$. is hostile toward, and it's splashed all over the news, we hope someone from Amnesty will stand up. Amnesty will need to expose the imperialist power structure and history behind the offending government, and compare the atrocities to the crimes of imperialism. These crimes include not just wars and interventions, but also starvation, disease, and environmental devastation. In short, Amnesty criticizes a series of misbehaviors by governments, but not the systems that drive them. This leaves their work open for use by the many people who use "human rights" as a club to impose Amerikan hegemony on the rest of the world. But Amnesty has also taken a big step forward with the organizing of local U.$. chapters to oppose torture and injustice in their own country. The current Amnesty International campaign to focus on the abuses of the U.$. prisons is a great contribution to the movement for justice in North America. -- A letter from a New York Prisoner says the real criminal is Amerika Let us start with the fact that if the same laws enforced by the U.S. empire upon its population were applied to the state, we would find them *currently* guilty of 1st degree robbery, 1st degree murder, extortion, 1st degree of unlawful imprisonment, 1st degree assault with deadly weapons, possession and sale of controlled substances, kidnapping.... The list goes on but you get the picture, the U.S. empire is, according to their own law, an illegal government in direct violation of the RICO Act. Law is the political, economic and social domination of one class or nation over another class or nation. The ÒlawÓ is manifested and exercised through state institutions such as courts, local police, alphabet police (FBI, CIA, IRS, BATF, DEA, INS) and backed by political branches such as the legislative, judicial and executive. These institutions enforce the ruling class or nationÕs will by violence in order to fortify their domination and market. So lets remember that society is whipped in line by violence and the constant threat of violence. Crime is a term used to describe actions that defeat the ruling class or nationÕs power. Essentially, the labeling of murder, extortion, robbery and other acts as crime has nothing to do with the act per se, if this were the case all of Amerika would be ÒcriminalsÓ acting in concert, for we have and continue to benefit from the 1st degree armed robbery, 1st degree murder, extortions, kidnapping and holding hostage entire nations that the U.S. empire commits on a daily basis. If I violate humanity via murder robbery etc. in the name of the ruling power and I do a good job at it then I will be showered with praise and medals, but if I do it in contrast to their power then I will be showered with punishment, imprisonment, and humiliation. So we can see that the act per se is not criminal but who and what the act is against makes it a crime.... When a person is punished by the state with imprisonment for defying the economic repression, political domination and social control of those in power, that person is in all sense of the word a political prisoner. Just because a person/people is not consciously aware that they are in fact oppressed does not mean they arenÕt oppressed and just because a people are not consciously aware that they are political prisoners does not mean that they arenÕt political prisoners. No matter if you do or donÕt commit [so-called] ÒcrimeÓ if you are a member of the nationally oppressed the pressure by the state will remain on you. Just so you can realize that the violence places demands on you no matter what. We walk with prisons hovering above our heads. The state seems gigantic to us, Ôcause we sitting on our asses. Let us rise. That was a letter from a New York Prisoner. -- This has been Under Lock and Key, a weekly Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist League program about prisons. For more information, contact: RAIL PO Box 712 Amherst MA 01004, or email mim@mim.org.Return to Under Lock and Key RAIL Radio Program page