Incarcerated Pennsylvanians now have to pay $150 to read. We should be outraged | Hacker News Reader

Incarcerated Pennsylvanians now have to pay $150 to read. We should be outraged

washingtonpost.com

87 pointsakudha32 comments

Being outraged about this one policy in one state is like focusing on a paper cut when the patient is a bloated corpse. Prison systems across the country are focused almost exclusively on exploitation of inmates and taxpayers for profit or political gain, making our world less safe. Rehabilitation is given lip service but is actually actively discouraged, because recidivism means more money.[0]

If the article gets people more outraged about the system as a whole, fantastic. If it just gets this one policy reversed, that's a positive, I guess, but it means people get to feel good about that and pretend or forget about all the other problems with these systems.

[0] - I am aware of many of the programs which are exceptions to this rule.

I definitely agree with your assessment, but I do think it's worthwhile to focus on smaller "paper cut" injustices. For one, the smaller injustices are usually microcosms of the overall systemic failures, and provide a digestible window into the greater problem. Two, if it's unlikely (if ever) that system-wide reform will be enacted, it's still worthwhile to relieve inmates of these day-to-day problems, which, over long sentences, can result in real harm at the individual level.

This one is silly and egregious enough that it might be useful to raise awareness.

What is the excuse they are using to push this? People building paper crossbows à la MythBusters?

I can't even see a paper thin justification they could use to sell this. I'd be interested to know who owns the company and who they are connected to in Pennsylvania government. And how much of a kickback the prison system is getting from this.

If this was the only article I read about this subject. I would agree with your comments, unfortunately this is another example of a one sided news article. I was so shocked by this story I looked into it further and it turns out that certain inmates and "donators" were using the book donation system to smuggle books who's pages were infused with drugs into the prisons. Not only that, this article makes it sound like the prisoners have no access to books at all, which is very misleading as all of the correction facilities have libraries and are going to increase funding to improving them in the wake of this new policy. I would agree that it seems absurd to force inmates to purchase an expensive e-reader and this also may be a form of censorship but I'm not sure I disagree with censorship in prisons. You lose many other rights when you are incarcerated and not being able to read everything you want seems very small on the list.

>it turns out that certain inmates and "donators" were using the book donation system to smuggle books who's pages were infused with drugs into the prisons.

I looked into that after another poster replied. I'm almost certain the problem is being exaggerated based on the quotes from prison officials, and removing the ability to deliver books to all prisoners is probably overkill.

Thanks for answering my question though. This sounds like the paper thin justification someone is using to get rich that I was looking for.

There are less silly ways to solve this though. Some prisons have whitelists of approved online vendors you can send books to prisoners from.

Prison officials have blamed books for being a vector for contraband smuggling: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/maryland-...

> Maryland prison officials are limiting access to books for thousands of inmates in state-run facilities in the latest effort to reduce drug smuggling.

> ...Investigators uncovered 3,422 Suboxone strips during fiscal 2017 and 3,362 so far this fiscal year. However, officials could not say how many of those were concealed in books.

I just do not understand why American prisons have to be so harsh on the prisoners. These people are already being punished by having their freedom taken away, where's the sense in torturing them further?

Off the top of my head:

1. For whatever reason, a lot of Americans seem to have the mindset that once you've been convicted, you're basically less than human--you don't have any rights. You deserve to suffer, because you committed a crime. (Yes, I understand that being convicted does not actually mean you committed a crime. This fact is lost on the people I'm talking about). See also: people joking about men getting raped in prison, and saying that they deserve it.

2. Low recidivism rates are bad for for-profit prisons because then they get less money. And remember that, in America, money is speech, companies are people, and people have the right to free speech! To quote an article[0] that I just found through a quick Google search: "The two largest for-profit prison companies in the United States – GEO and Corrections Corporation of America – and their associates have funneled more than $10 million to candidates since 1989 and have spent nearly $25 million on lobbying efforts. Meanwhile, these private companies have seen their revenue and market share soar. They now rake in a combined $3.3 billion in annual revenue"

0. https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/04/28/...

  for-profit prisons

This is not a for-profit prison.

Even our not-for-profit prisons have massive financial motivations. Contractors specializing in the industry specifically.

In my experience as an American, a disturbingly large portion of society seems to be obsessed with revenge and the concept of "deserving to suffer".

The love of money. It's legal slavery and the market masters have always loved that

The cost of an inmate is greater than the cost of a student, per year. The industries in Pennsylvania's state prisons mostly supply the inmates with textiles and soap.

As usual, WP spins the story by leaving out a key detail: all mail is digitized for free.

So, just mail the damn books (or whatever printed matter you like).

I can't imagine that the prison is going to scan an entire book mailed to a prisoner. Where can we read about that?

https://www.cor.pa.gov/Initiatives/Pages/FAQ-New-Procedures....

"Will inmates or inmate families be charged with printing the mail?

DOC is printing the mail from Smart Communications at no charge to inmates or their families."

They may not do it quickly, and they may not do it well, but they are obligated to do it for free under the contract terms.

(This is an Opinion piece -- check the URL. WP does not fact-check opinion pieces at all.)

This probably doesn't belong on HN, but it sure is outrageous. Our system is so messed up, we need federal guidelines and protections for prisoners.

There is at least one prison-IT-focused startup in YC's portfolio: Pigeon.ly (Winter 2015):

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9257818

It's the intersection of (mis) applied Technology, and incarceration. Monetization and Control of what prisoners read, through restriction to digital print. I think thats fascinating, chilling, evil. I bet what you read is re-read by the controller.

I wonder how long before people work out point-to-point covert channels using primitive cipher systems inside shared text corpus?

  Control of what prisoners read, through restriction to digital print

In this case, there is NO content censorship applied to digitization any differently from printed matter.

And all mailed content is digitized for free.

Uh, downvoters: this, like all WP opinion pieces, was not fact-checked.

If you look into the actual rules'[0] Q&A section, you will find:

  Q. Will inmates or inmate families be charged with printing their mail?

  A. DOC is printing the mail from Smart Communications at no charge to inmates or their families.

[0] https://www.cor.pa.gov/Initiatives/Pages/FAQ-New-Procedures....

HN is slowly transforming into Reddit.

All prisons should have free libraries. This is basic stuff. Reading is a good thing and should be promoted at all times. We can talk about edge cases for censorship (extremist stuff) but there is no reason not to allow them ready access to the books available at any local library.

Pennsylvania's state prisons, the ones this article is about, do have free libraries.

It's not a censorship issue. It's a smuggling issue.

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