was necessary for their self-esteem that they consider, no matter how comically, that they were in charge of their own destiny, and to break the rules a little demonstrated this. It also got stuff passed, which was probably even more important. The perfect convict, the man who lived entirely by the rules set down for him, was not a man but a vegetable. And the constant troublemaker, no matter how sick he was inside, was actually doing just what the State expected of him, therefore justifying the existence of the prison. So it was a matter of delicate balance between defiance and obedience.
