Are Prisons Obsolete? (Open Media Series)

by Angela Y. Davis

“I have been told that I will never leave prison if I contin- ue to fight the system. My answer is that one must be alive in order to leave prison, and our current standard of medical care is tantamount to a death sentence. Therefore, I have no choice but to continue . . . Conditions within the institution continually reinvoke memories of violence and oppression, often with devastating results. Unlike other incarcerated women who have come forward to reveal their impressions of prison, I do not feel ‘safer’ here because ‘the abuse has stopped.’ It has not stopped. It has shifted shape and paced itself differently, but it is as insidious and pervasive in prison as ever it was in the world I know outside these walls. What has ceased is my ignorance of the facts concerning abuse—and my willing- ness to tolerate it in silence.” —Marcia Bunny72