Friendship with the Rebuked

I keep in contact with an inmate (and childhood friend) through https://www.jpay.com/QuickLogin.aspx.  His latest request is that I find him a female pen pal through a website that his buddies have been using: http://www.americanpenpals.com/.  I’m confident that not many people have looked at this site, but I think it’s interesting that we can link two people up that are currently in prison and have similar release dates, related offenses, and who plan on living in nearby areas once released (for only a $35 membership). 

It’s probably a really bad idea to help my friend in this instance.  He’s likely to meet up with this chick once released and terrorize Killeen, TX with a flood of drugs, robberies, and violence.  But, if I know my friend none of the harmful acts will be his fault, so it’s okay.  But wait, I think people on parole aren’t supposed to hang around other parolees, right?  The creators of American Pen Pals are possibly earning a profit while encouraging illegal activities . . . 

Either way, when I think about all the factors I can see that a female friend may help him right now.  He’s not getting reform from the penal system.  It’s making him worse because it’s all punitive and no reform.   The guards leave the inmates to themselves and the inmates, naturally, build their own societies with crazy ground rules like:

• Don’t let no one call you a bitch
• Flush the toilet as soon as the terd starts to peek out of your ass
• If I help you once, then you owe me back before I help you again
• If I buy you something with my commissary then you must have my back in a fight
• You don’t get clean clothes unless you give the laundry guy some cappuccino, and other purely selfish rules that encourage the strong to take advantage of the weak

He’s learning how to swindle for survival. Maybe some human connection where he has nothing to gain but a friend and nothing to hide because she’s in trouble too will help to set him on a healthy path.  As a friend, is it my place to try to guide him, or just support him in what he thinks is best?  I haven’t figured that out yet.  Maybe I can offer advice if solicited.  Fuck, I don’t know.  -antiwasp

Filed under: Jail/Prison, Lessons Learned, Relationships, Technology, Wisdom, dating websites, Friendship, jail, prison, punishment, reform, Relationships

Jail: reform for the worse

My friend at the Joe Gurney Unit (I think State Penitentiary) outside of Palestine, Texas definitely deserved to go to jail.  His antics should have landed him there years before he actually went.  But, by the time Texas finally swept him away he was beginning to calm down.  As a matter of fact, he was heading towards being a productive citizen with periodic, but harmless, bouts where he smoked or snorted some weed or cocaine.  So, the system works in that he broke the law, and is now in jail.  Bravo!

But I get letters from him.  As of last month he had been in four fights while in jail, and he gambles nightly.  I don’t think access to the library is prominent.  I also don’t think that he could occupy his next four years earning a degree if he chose that route.  What better way to reform prisoners than to offer them life options once released from prison?  As of right now his electrician skills are fading, he’s getting used to fighting for pride and status, and he’s picked up a gambling habit. 

The law system works by putting those who deserve it in jail.  The jail system is broken in that it punishes, rather than reforms. 

HAVE A FRIEND IN THE TEXAS STATE PENITENTIARY SYSTEM?  GOOGLE JPAY TO SEND MONEY OR EMAILS DIRECT.  IT’S GREAT.  -antiwasp

Filed under: Character, Culture, Jail/Prison, Lessons Learned, Wisdom, Education, jail, Law, prison, reform, school, university

The United States Army is a Representative of Big Government Policy Working in the United States

The Army is Big Government to the bone:

1. Soldiers in the Army don’t pick where they live, the organization does, but the organization also ensures that they have an adequate place to live. 
2. Soldiers don’t get to pick their jobs, either.  They have input in what they want their job to be when they initially enlist in the Army, but they may not get their choice.  They also have input on whether they want to stay in their current job field, but they can be denied the transfer.  Most people in the Army are placed in positions identified as “Needs of the Army.”
3. No one in the Army receives poverty level wages.  No one in the Army receives upper-class level wages.  There is relatively little difference between someone who has been in the Army for 3 years versus 17 years when it comes to wages.  Same for someone in charge of 60 guys in relation to someone in charge of 5 guys, in relation to someone in charge of 180 guys. 
4. Freedom of speech does not apply in the Army.  Under the Uniformed Code of Military Justice a person can be held guilty and receive jail-time for being perceived as disloyal, and they can also be punished for appearing disrespectful.
5. The Army has Universal Health Care, even after retirement.
6. The Army gives a pension (Social Security for a job well done) to those who retire.  50% of base pay for 20 years, and it increases if you stay in the Army longer.
7. You cannot quit the Army when you want.  If you sign up the Army has you for eight years if they want.  If you refuse they have the right to jail you.  After those initial eight years you sign contracts to sell yourself to the state for periods of time.  By ten years many Soldier have signed their contracts as “indefinite.”  They aren’t getting out until retirement.
8. The Army is a dictatorship.  No argument at all ever.
9. No voting.  You will never decide who makes the rules in the office above you.
10. Communal eating at the Dining Facility.  If you don’t have the option of communal eating (no DFAC around) the Army will pay you wages to find food on the economy.
11. Yearly clothing allowance.
12. Forced health in Physical Fitness training every morning, with mandatory tests every six months or at a commander’s discretion.  If you are out of shape the commander can force you to train several times a day and on weekends, he can deny you time off work, deny you awards, and he can kick you out of the Army.
13. Mandatory drug tests to ensure health.
14. The Uniformed Code of Military Justice, and the trial by commander system of the Army almost always includes labor as punishment for the crime.
15. The Army has no skin color.  Promotions for the first six enlisted ranks in the military are based on a point scale that the individual seeking promotion has almost full control over.  After those first six ranks a board convenes to review the files of people they have never met, and never will meet, to decide who does and does not get promoted.  The Army is color blind. 

I can’t speak for the other branches of the military, but the Army is Big Government.  That’s why I love it and I’ll stay in until retirement.  Everything functions better when government is in control.  -antiwasp

Filed under: Jail/Prison, Military, Politics, Revolution, World Wide Policy, Army, Class Struggle, Communism, Government, Ideology, Politics, Revolution