I continue to hope readers are not tired of all my blogging about Inquest, "a decarceral brainstorm," because the site continues to publish must-read essays and other great materials that remain so blogworthy. Here are some new great new reads from the site since the last time I blogged about it, concluding with an excerpt focused on the intersection of incarceration and reproductive rights:
From James M. Binnall, "Carceral Wisdom: Like the value they bring to the classroom, people who have experienced the harms of the penal system have much knowledge to bring to our nation’s jury trials."
From Felix Sitthivong, "Divide and Conquer: For those of us on the inside who believe in prison abolition by any means necessary, prison closures really mean prison closures. The state and some of my fellow prisoners don’t like that."
From Inez Bordeaux, "Radicalized at the Workhouse: The criminal legal system almost took my life from me. The anger that came after now fuels my life’s work."
From Angel Parker, "The True Jailers of Rikers: As demands grow louder for decarcerating and shutting down New York City’s deadly jail complex, judges and prosecutors have escaped accountability. But they’re the ones driving the crisis."
"Saying Their Names: How public defenders in New York City organized to speak up for those who have died on Rikers — and to keep others from going there."
From Crystal Hayes, Carolyn Sufrin & Jamila Perritt, "Where Choice Ends: Unless and until mass incarceration is ended, Roe v. Wade, and reproductive freedom writ large, will never be safe." An excerpt:
Mass incarceration is a system that wields enormous control and power over people’s lives and violates every single tenet of reproductive justice. Reproductive justice, a theory first coined in 1994 by 12 Black women, maintains that all people, especially communities that have been historically excluded and marginalized — Indigenous women, Black women, trans people, and other women of color — should have access to the material resources necessary to fully realize the range of reproductive, sexual health care, and technologies available to them, unencumbered by any barriers.
Reproductive justice includes four main tenets holding that everyone has a human right to decide if and when they will have a child and the conditions under which they will give birth; to decide if they will not have a child and their options for preventing or ending a pregnancy; to parent the children they already have with the necessary social supports in safe environments and healthy communities, and without fear of violence from individuals or the government; and to possess bodily autonomy free from all forms of reproductive oppression. Black women who pioneered reproductive justice were seeking a broader way to understand and frame the need to access reproductive health care. Their efforts included a racial analysis, and critique, of the idea that all women have access to the same resources to make healthy decisions about their own bodies and fertility — while assailing the flawed assumption that all women who choose to have children get to do so and even parent their own children.
For people in prison and jail, all these tenets are beyond reach. Once incarcerated, people are stripped of bodily autonomy and the freedom and capacity to make healthy decisions over their own bodies in nearly all respects, including reproductive health. In these environments, it is well documented that abortion access is heavily curtailed and in some cases non-existent, despite legal precedent that incarcerated people retain their right to abortion. Protecting abortion care and access, contraception, and other sexual health care as part of a holistic approach to reproductive health care, for people in Texas and beyond, demands that we go beyond pushing the courts and political actors to protect Roe v Wade. Protecting Roe is woefully insufficient in a society where any person is denied basic reproductive healthcare, including those who are incarcerated. We must protect Roe while also ensuring it is a reality for incarcerated people. To do so, fighting to end mass incarceration altogether is critical.
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