MIM(Prisons) is a cell of revolutionaries serving the oppressed masses inside U.$. prisons, guided by the communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
www.prisoncensorship.info is a media institution run by the Maoist Internationalist Ministry of Prisons. Here we collect and publicize reports of conditions behind the bars in U.$. prisons. Information about these incidents rarely makes it out of the prison, and when it does it is extremely rare that the reports are taken seriously and published. This historical record is important for documenting patterns of abuse, and also for informing people on the streets about what goes on behind the bars.
I am writing with a texa$ prison medical copay update. Here on the
Alfred D. Hughes plantation, the medical department’s Senior Practice
Manager Valencia Pollard-Fortson’s attitude is that every procedure is a
valid charge. Aspirin, bandaids, blood sugar checks, clipper shave,
whatever. You’re going to be charged $100. Her idea is if you charge 10
people a day for sick call, that’s $900. Because only one will do the
paperwork for 90 days to get his money back. Now they’ve gone a farther
step.
In Ad-Seg/SHU building, we cannot buy fingernail clippers off store. To
be caught with a pair is a major offense. We have to submit a sick call
request to medical to trim our nails. Even diabetics who must keep
toenails trimmed. Well, that sick call costs $100.
Say January 1st you go to medical for chronic care. It’s charged $100.
Then you go January 15th and again January 28th. You file a grievance
Step One with medical about copay of January 1st. It’s denied February
10th. You file a Step Two appeal to Regional Medical Supervisor. It’s
granted March 13th. Your monthly invoice will not show up until April
15th showing March 13th $100 was refunded for medical copay of January
1st. BUT a new charge for January 15th appears and the $100 is
taken on March 13th. You start all over again, stretching out for months
just like I’m doing now on a charge from March 2016. These pigs are
determined to keep your money.
MIM(Prisons) responds: There are many tactics the state uses to
enact medical neglect, and to create and exacerbate long-term health
problems for prisoners. In some states they just throw the sick call in
the trash. But in Texas they are frustrating people using the financial
angle. Our Texas Campaign Pack has instructions for how to fight against
the $100 medical copay. We can use this information to make ourselves a
little bit stronger while we struggle to overthrow the horrible social
and economic system that makes such an exorbitant copay possible in the
first place.
Please be advised that Florida Department of Corrections has banned all
MIM publications. At this time I’m not able to file an informal or
formal grievance or appeal as to do so will result in immediate property
and mail restriction with a stretch of disciplinary confinement to back
it up. Enclosed are the latest rejection slips.
MIM(Prisons) responds: We are seeing many rejections from Florida
prisons, although ULK is still getting in to a few folks. We need
jailhouse lawyers who are being censored in Florida who can help take up
this fight through the grievances and into the courts. Your work will
impact many in this state with so many people behind bars. Get in touch
with us if you can take up this censorship battle. And for anyone on the
streets reading this, we really need lawyers who can support these
lawsuits from the outside. Check out our extensive documentation of
censorship in Florida (and elsewhere) from our
Amerikan Censorship
Documentation Project
En semanas recientes hemos visto los vídeos ofensivos de colonizadores
atacando a gente Indígena que están tratando de proteger sus tierras de
la invasión y destrucción en su tierra natal de la Nación Lakotah. La
resistencia ha unido a muchas personas de “First Nation” (Primera
Nación) así como también muchos partidarios alrededor del campo Piedra
Sagrada en la punta norte de la reserva Standing Rock. Este es el punto
donde la Tubería de Acceso Dakota (DAPL por sus siglas en inglés),
actualmente en construcción, se acerca a las actuales fronteras de la
reserva. Esta semana, 200 personas se mudaron, a la isla que Energy
Transfer Partners (Compañeros de Transferencia de Energía) reclama,
colocando su campamento de invierno en el camino a la tubería.
En respuesta, Energy Transfer Partners le dijeron a la gente que estaban
entrando sin derecho, que “el comportamiento ilegal no será tolerado.”
(1) No hay mejor ejemplo de cómo la “ley” puede ser una institución
utilizada por el opresor para legitimar su poder. Cuando los colonos
vinieron por primera vez a matar indígenas y a robar sus tierras, ellos
declararon esta tierra “ilegal.”
Los Lakotah Sioux están usando un dominio eminente para reclamar la
tierra en cuestión como se establece legalmente en su tratado de 1851
con el gobierno de los Estados Unidos. El presidente de Cheyenne River
Sioux Harold Frazier se reunió con el Presidente Obama, y con el Abogado
de la Oficina de Gobierno para discutir su campaña y la represión
policial desatada sobre protestantes pacíficos. Frazier relató una
conversación que tuvieron:
Frazier: ¿cómo puede un Indigena asaltar físicamente a un Indigena y
salirse con la suya?“ Abogado U.S.:”Bueno, esto esta en tierra del
Estado. Frazier: “¿Entonces eso significa que si un no-indígena
viene a la tierra de un Indígena, el Indígena puede hacer lo mismo?”
Abogado U.S.: “Oh no, iría a la cárcel.”(1)
De nuevo, la farsa de lo que es la ley de los colonos Amerikanos se
presenta ante nosotros. La Tribu de Standing Rock Sioux organizó el
Primer consejo de Tratado Internacional del Hemisferio Occidental del
8-6 de Junio de 1974. Esta reunión fue honrada en 2007 en otra reunión
donde la República de Lakotah declaró soberanía, reclamando mucha de la
tierra a través de la cual la construcción de la DAPL está ocurriendo
hoy.(2)
Las personas indígenas en Norteamérica siempre han estado en las líneas
del frente del movimiento anti imperialista. Ellos fueron las primeras
víctimas del colonialismo y del capitalismo/imperialismo emergente en
esta tierra. Su lucha constante para reclamar su tierra es central para
la re-civilización de la brutal nación colonizadora de Amerikkka.
by a North Carolina prisoner October 2016 permalink
I’m writing you from a federal jail facility here in Murphy, NC. We have
been on lockdown for close to 3 months now. We are on lockdown for what
another individual had done, what it is I have no idea. Since my arrival
I have come into contact with ULK and value the information and
its message. If possible can you begin my subscription?
by MIM(Prisons) October 2016 permalink
Click here to download a PDF of the Arkansas grievance petition
Mail the petition to your loved ones and comrades inside who are
experiencing issues with their grievance procedure. Send them extra
copies to share! For more info on this campaign,
click
here.
Prisoners should send a copy of the signed petition to each of the
addresses listed on the petition, and below. Supporters should send
letters on behalf of prisoners.
Director Wendy Kelley<br>
Arkansas Department of Corrections<br>
PO Box 8707<br>
Pine Bluff, AR 71611-8707<br><br>
United States Department of Justice - Civil Rights Division<br>
Special Litigation Section<br>
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, PHB<br>
Washington, D.C. 20530<br><br>
Office of Inspector General<br>
HOTLINE<br>
P.O. Box 9778<br>
Arlington, Virginia 22219<br><br>
And send MIM(Prisons) copies of any responses you
receive!
MIM(Prisons), USW<br>
PO Box 40799<br>
San Francisco, CA 94140<br>
by MIM(Prisons) October 2016 permalink
Click here to download a PDF of the Louisiana grievance petition
Mail the petition to your loved ones and comrades inside who are
experiencing issues with their grievance procedure. Send them extra
copies to share! For more info on this campaign,
click
here.
Prisoners should send a copy of the signed petition to each of the
addresses listed on the petition, and below. Supporters should send
letters on behalf of prisoners.
Louisiana Department of Corrections PO Box 94304 Baton Rouge,
LA 70804-9304
United States Department of Justice - Civil Rights Division
Special Litigation Section 950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, PHB
Washington, D.C. 20530
Office of Inspector General HOTLINE P.O. Box 9778
Arlington, Virginia 22219
And send MIM(Prisons) copies of any responses you receive!
MIM(Prisons), USW PO Box 40799 San Francisco, CA 94140
“America no puede existir sin separarnos a nosotros mismos de nuestras
identidades.”
La lucha comenzó en 2011, con una lucrativa propuesta de una compañía
Canadiense para acceder a tierras tribales y transportar petróleo crudo
al Golfo de Texas. Dicen que la construcción ayudará a crear trabajos
permanentes, que el dinero dado a los consejos tribales ayudará a
satisfacer las necesidades de las personas. En realidad, esta tubería
creará un desastre ambiental. América nunca puede financiar su propia
estructura, ¿cómo se puede esperar el mantenimiento de una tubería en
las tierras tribales soberanas?
El problema no es sólo la tubería y toda la inmundicia que viene con
ella. El problema es la total violación de nuestros tratados, y la falta
de tratamiento de la auto-determinación y la Declaración de las Naciones
Unidos sobre los Derechos de los Pueblos Indígenas. Esta tubería pisotea
a los derechos humanos y prueba la ciudadanía de segunda clase que se
les da a todas las naciones tribales, y personas.
Tomen en consideración como todos los portavoces del gobierno se
enfurecen con cualquier violación de cualquier tratado otorgado a
gobiernos extranjeros por el gobierno de Estados Unidos, ¿porqué son tan
rápidos al descartar los derechos que se otorgaron a las naciones
tribales?
Fuimos a la guerra por esos tratados. Si, es 2016 y todos los “indios”
deberían funcionar como Amerikanos regulares, al menos esa es la
retórico. Pero al iniciar un tratado se nos provee reconocimiento, y
estipula acuerdos bilaterales que todas las partes deben honrar. Al
menos, de hecho, que nuestros tratados sean sólo “pedazos de papel”, y
si ese es el caso, Rusia debería pasar por alto las resoluciones de la
ONU con los Estados Unidos y bombear Israel. No es igual? El Artículo 6
de la constitución de los Estados Unidos y la cláusula piloto de 1888
dice lo contrario. Ambos reconocen el poder permanente de todos los
tratados Indígenas y todas las Naciones Indígenas. Sólo porque los
tiempos han cambiado no significa que las palabras también.
El gobierno de los Estados Unidos ha estado empujando a todas las
naciones tribales al genocidio por los últimos 298 años. La pobreza,
agua mala, aire contaminado, desperdicio nuclear, minas abiertas de
uranio, alcoholismo, ninguna infraestructura de trabajo para empezar.
El suicidio entre hombres jóvenes se ha convertido en una epidemia.
Solamente somos endulzados con palabras cuando los trabajadores del
gobierno quieren sentirse bien, luego nos quitan a nuestros hijos, los
llevan al lado del estado y los tiran a la “gente blanca” para que los
civilicen — violando así otra ley federal, la Ley para el Bienestar del
Niño Indígena.
Esta tierra significa más para nosotros que sólo una terreno para todo
el pueblo tribal, igual que en 1848 cuando los Estados Unidos se unieron
a todo Aztlán desde México y construyeron la frontera paramilitar más
grande en el mundo, se esta haciendo mucho para separar a las naciones
tribales de nuestras tierras. En 1973 peleamos y morimos por nuestra
tierra. Si es necesario, marquen mis palabras, nos levantaremos y
pelearemos de nuevo. Esta tierra es nuestra identidad. Tiene la sangre
de nuestros ancestros, y la tubería matará a nuestra gente.
by MIM(Prisons) October 2016 permalink en español
The latest camp has moved into land just north of the Sacred Stone
Camp on the map. Also see map below for historic land claims of the
Republic of Lakotah.
In recent weeks we have seen the offensive videos of settlers attacking
indigenous people who are trying to protect their land from invasion and
destruction in the homeland of the Lakotah Nation. The resistance has
brought together many First Nation people as well as many supporters
around the Sacred Stone Camp in the northern tip of the Standing Rock
reservation. This is the point where the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL),
currently under construction, comes closest to current reservation
borders. This week 200 people moved onto the land claimed by Energy
Transfer Partners, setting up their winter camp in the path of the
planned pipeline.
In response, Energy Transfer Partners said the people were trespassing,
saying “lawless behavior will not be tolerated.”(1) There is no better
example of how the “law” can be an institution utilized by the oppressor
to legitimize their power. When the settlers first came to kill
Indigenous people and steal their land, they declared this land to be
“lawless.”
The Lakotah Sioux are using eminent domain to claim the land in question
as rightfully theirs based on their 1851 treaty with the United $tates
government. Cheyenne River Sioux Chair Harold Frazier met with President
Obama, as well as the U.$. Attorney’s Office to discuss their campaign
and the police repression being unleashed on peaceful protestors.
Frazier retold one conversation ey had:
Frazier: “How can a non-Indian physically assault an Indian and get away
with it?” U.S. Attorney’s office: “Well, that’s on state land.”
Frazier: “So does that mean if a non-Indian comes to an Indian on Indian
land that the Indian could do it back?” U.S. Attorney’s office: “Oh
no, you’d go to jail.”(1)
Again, the farce that is Amerikan settler law is laid bare before us.
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe hosted the First International Treaty
Council of the Western Hemisphere from 8-16 June 1974. This meeting was
honored in 2007 at another meeting where the Republic of Lakotah
declared sovereignty, claiming much of the land through which DAPL
construction is occurring today.(2)
Map of Republic of Lakotah from www.republicoflakotah.com
Indigenous people in North America have always been at the front lines
of the anti-imperialist movement. They were the first victims of
colonialism and emerging capitalist/imperialism on this land. Their
continued struggle to reclaim this land is central to a re-civilization
of the brutal settler nation of Amerikkka.
This is in response to ULK 52, page 18,
“Building
Peace and Unity in CO.” This is an untrue statement. There might be
individuals on peace. But that is all, the majority is still the same.
Colorado lacks a gang structure to call a treaty like that. Let alone a
revolutionary mindset. Colorado/the man, learned from other states how
to repress gang structure. And how to ultimately control the gangs and
the entire system. Through divide and conquer strategies within the
gangs, the same gangs, not just different gangs against different gangs.
This is accomplished by privileges and by conforming to their standards.
A lack of discipline for a group’s goals. And the way they breed
juveniles’ minds in their juvenile facilities to show who the authority
is, and snitch programs to confront one another. Brainwashing. With the
exception of few, but not enough to enact any kind of movement for gang
or revolution. I heard a quote “the most common way a people loses their
power is by thinking they have none at all.” That is the majority
mindset out here in every aspect.
I became conscious recently. I have been educating myself as much as I
can to politics, history and different cultures. Empires are the power
through history in every culture. As a conscious man it was not my
choice to be born oppressed but it is my choice to struggle against it.
Knowledge is power, to change yourself and your surroundings. That is
what needs to be attained and given to the people. Especially the
children. So that generation changes the situation. So it becomes not a
choice but the way of life, while always knowing that there will always
be forces to try to destroy that life, but no matter what to continue
on. I educate who I can and always will now. I find it hard to change a
man’s way of thought but I try. Knowing that thought was created for his
destruction.
I am stuck in some of my ways also. Change takes time. Being stuck in
prison is also a hindrance. Something that destroys life and choice.
Always a created struggle. That is what I figured out in these studies.
You need a pure mind to enact a change. And that is our children, they
are pure. A sponge to gain all the knowledge needed to ultimately find
the true meaning of life watch as peace of mind, happiness, love,
family. To teach them what needs to be done so they can have that, along
with their family and people.
I hope one day to become one of a million instead of one in a million.
Ho Chi Minh said “when the prison doors are open the real dragons will
fly out.” I am a dragon full of rage for the oppressor, love for my
people, knowledge to be spread and flames to be unleashed on our
enemies. The day my wings will open to fly out and accomplish all these
things. I have love for all oppressed people.
MIM(Prisons) responds: This comrade starts off disagreeing with
what someone else wrote about building unity in Colorado, but in the end
argues that change is possible and that we need to educate and build for
unity. We agree there is much work to be done, but we must build and
educate in whatever situation we can. In the case of our comrades behind
bars, this means doing the work that is often hard and slow to overcome
the brainwashing of a lifetime of education and build unity against the
criminal injustice system. For those who have become conscious, it is
our duty to share this with others. It is not enough to just understand
oppression ourselves. One good way to get started is by forming a study
group where you’re at. We can supply some information on how to do this
along with study materials. Write to us to get started.
For those of us who have received a political education and are locked
away in Amerikkka’s prisons, the
September
9 Day of Peace and Solidarity should be a call to action. As many
people as have been involved in MIM and MIM(Prisons)-led study groups
over the years, comrades should be more than clear on what their duties
and responsibilities are to the prison struggle as well as to the
International Communist Movement (ICM). The fact that September 9 events
are still few and far between is therefore continuing indicative proof
of a variety of contradictions still plaguing the prison movement. This
essay attempts to address and give special attention to the development
of the mass line.
Some people who have shown interest in taking up revolutionary politics
incorrectly believe that they must spend years on end learning political
theory before they are ready to take up revolutionary struggle,
especially when it comes to applying Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. However,
this type of thinking is incorrect, not only because it has the
potential to slow down revolution, but because it can be used to
purposely derail the revolutionary movement. Just think – where would
any revolutionary movement be if everyone always sought to first become
an expert in any particular field before they did anything? This is what
Maoists criticized as the “experts in command” approach to education,
production and revolution in communist China during the Great
Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) (1966-1976), the furthest advance
towards communism in humyn hystory!
The experts in command political line was initially related to the
intellectual belief during the Great Leap Forward (1958-1961), that only
experts with years of training (usually within the confines of a
classroom or a controlled environment) were worthy enough to lead or
teach. This same line was later used by traitors and the bourgeoisie in
the Chinese Communist Party itself as a way to disempower the
revolutionary masses and consolidate their grip on power.
In opposition to experts in command, Mao Zedong and others began
popularizing Lenin’s slogan of “fewer, but better” by pointing out that
it wasn’t necessary for comrades to have years of experience in
political struggle before they were able to take up leadership roles.
Instead Mao stressed comrades’ dedication to serving the people as more
important than this “expertise.” Furthermore, Mao encouraged cadre to
not separate themselves from the revolutionary masses, but to work
amongst them and help them develop the mass line. To develop and carry
out the mass line is simply to help the masses develop and carry the
revolutionary programs that will best help them accomplish the task of
developing revolution and achieving self-determination. Without the mass
line revolution is impossible; the masses will sink ever deeper into
despair, while the leaders lead the revolutionary movement astray and
the oppressors will rein. Mao Zedong’s instructions for cadre to develop
the mass line are thus:
“In all the practical work of our Party, all correct leadership is
necessarily ‘from the masses, to the masses.’ This means: take the ideas
of the masses (scattered and unsystematic ideas) and concentrate them
(through study turn them into concentrated and systematic ideas), then
go to the masses and propagate and explain these ideas until the masses
embrace them as their own, hold fast to them and translate them into
action, and test the correctness of these ideas in such action. Then
once again concentrate ideas from the masses and once again go to the
masses so that the ideas are persevered in and carried through. And so
on, over and over again in an endless spiral, with the ideas becoming
more correct, more vital and richer each time. Such is the Marxist
theory of knowledge.” - Some Questions Concerning Methods of Leadership
Mao also said it would be enough for comrades to first put an emphasis
on being “red” with an aim towards becoming experts through continued
participation in revolutionary struggle.
There is also the problem of intellectuals in the prison movement. But
does this mean that all intellectuals in the prison movement are a
problem? No, of course not. There are revolutionary intellectuals and
there are bourgeoisie intellectuals. Revolutionary intellectuals hate
oppression, they value knowledge as power and the collective
accomplishments of many people, and they are dedicated to using their
knowledge to serve the people. Bourgeois intellectuals on the other hand
don’t much care if people are oppressed, they are apathetic, they value
knowledge for the sake of knowledge and they view the accumulation of
knowledge as the accomplishment of great individuals. Some of these
people may sometimes cheerlead for anti-imperialism and revolutionary
struggles, but thru their inaction they actually hold up imperialism.
Such people often excel in MIM(Prisons)-led study groups. These types of
people take up revolutionary politics for the sole purpose of study and
discussion without application, which is to say that they get off on
talking about revolution but very rarely do they go further. These types
of people give lip service to communist ideology and the topic of
national liberation. When pressed on putting their knowledge to use
they’ll suddenly come up with excuses. “Now is not a good time for me,”
“The masses aren’t ready,” “The movement isn’t ready,” etc, etc. In fact
it is they who are not ready!
Real revolutionary intellectuals don’t study revolutionary theory for
the sake of knowledge, but to make revolution. Theory without practice
ain’t shit! Mao addressed this in his essay “On Practice”:
“What Marxist philosophy regards as the most important problem does not
lie in understanding the laws of the objective world and thus being able
to explain it, but in applying the knowledge of these laws actively to
change the world.”
Maoism teaches us that there is no great difference between politically
conscious leaders and mere followers, between leaders and led. The only
difference is practice, for practice alone is the criterion of truth for
knowledge, as it is through practice that the masses can come to power
and exert influence over their destiny.