first person
The Banality of Mandatory Surcharges
In New York and elsewhere, exploitative court-ordered fees shouldn't saddle a person who is already poor and criminalized.
first person
8 posts in ‘first person’
first person
Closed Doors
Prison is no place for grief and closure. Yet even as I mourned, glimmers of love and life surrounded me.
first person
Learning to Live
For incarcerated people, prison education programs can offer not only knowledge but also hope that a different future is possible.
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Hope Against Hope
A candid portrait of the experience of fighting for clemency in Louisiana—a route to freedom now severely threatened by the state’s new carceral governor.
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Censoring Women’s Health
In prison, even learning about your own reproductive health is met with repression.
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Misadventures in Mail Censorship
An incarcerated writer’s grievances against a sad new normal of censorship and mail obstruction in a Pennsylvania prison.
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Envisioning Futures
The art of knowing what we’re confronting and revealing who is being made invisible by the carceral state.
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No Leaving Rikers
For the scores of people who have suffered on Rikers Island, their experiences, and scars, of living through it remain long after release.