What an odd title for this week’s article. After all, don’t we all worry about the same things? On initial thinking, it may be assumed that most people have similar worries but, naturally, it is all dependent on context. For example, a 17-year-old, keen to go to university may worry most about the debt implications of being a student, a 38-year-old parent of two may worry most about climate change and a 68 year old newly retired person may worry most about healthcare.
It’s all about context and the prison context is extreme in almost every way imaginable. A key thing to consider is what choices and responsibilities we have – very few. We can’t choose best domestic energy supplier, we can’t select the best outfit for a party and we don’t have the responsibility to keep our car well maintained therefore, we don’t worry about those things that most people on the outside would call “normal everyday worries.”
Many prisoners don’t worry about personal care, they seem to give up and don’t regularly shower, shave or get hair cuts.It seems to me that this theme of responsibility is present again because prisoners with poor hygiene feel they have no need to look after themselves. They don’t have anyone to be clean for or, to put it another way, they don’t have the responsibility to anyone to care for themselves. Of course, this misses the important point that they have the personal responsibility but maybe that failure was a key factor in their offending behaviour. (Q: Is there a “personal responsibility gene?)
To return to the title, what do prisoners worry about? We worry about getting attacked in the shower (kettling happens not infrequently where a bag of sugar gets boiled in a kettle until it’s extremely hot and then thrown over a guy when he’s naked in the shower). Physical attacks also happen in the exercise yard, either using an improvised weapon or just punches and kicks. Debt is the main cause of physical attacks but conflict can be sparked by the most ridiculous things.
We also rely heavily on the systems and processes of a prison so we worry about them not working properly. Visits, for example. We worry that a visit hasn’t been booked in properly or, if the visit staff are late collecting us, we worry our visitor hasn’t turned up. Canteen is another worry (the weekly order of stamps, phone credit, snacks, toiletries etc). Maybe what I need is out of stock or I notice there’s a problem again with the deductions. I have to say, so many of the internal systems and processes fail on a regular basis and it is a source of constant worry.
Those of us with family and friends worry deeply about them. The truth is that a prisoner’s life is on a totally different track to their friends on the outside. “Normal” for me and “normal” for them are two completely different things and prisoners with children are often almost totally consumed with worry about them.
We also have worries about progression to less secure conditions such as National Top End or the open prison and, of course, parole. These worries are not helped by the rumours and gossip that spreads like wildfire. May people get really worried about regaining their freedom. They fear that they’ve forgotten how to be free, that they can’t do it and the prison system has deskilled them. The sad truth of the matter is that they’re often right, the prison system does deskill us.
The biggest skill of the human race is (probably) to adapt to our surroundings bit it takes time. For those prisoners serving long sentences, it should be no surprise that they have great difficulty adapting to a life on the outside and I worry about that. I worry that my “me” has been damaged irreperably.
NaN.