Prison By Any Other Name - Maya Schenwar and Victoria Law
Perfectly timed, Prison By Any Other Name is an in-depth review of all forms of incarceration in the US, and why the system needs to be completely overhauled, by focusing on harmful reforms. The authors provide important information on how certain reforms over the years are really only “reforms” in name, and cause possibly even more damage than regular behind-bars-prison (electronic monitoring for example, supposedly a more “gentle” form of incarceration, is actually more invasive and is used in greater numbers, leading to more harm and pain in entire families and communities).
Maya Schenwar and Victoria Law use real life examples of people who have been caught up in the system in different ways to illustrate their points, and this really helps the seriousness of the issues hit home. These individual stories are extremely important as they provide a more accurate overview of how the current system targets Black and Brown people, is extremely biased and unfair, pushing poor communities further into poverty, criminalizing immigrants and refugees, punishing children whose brains are not fully developed, etc. Nothing about our current system and the way it is ingrained into our society promotes rehabilitation, care, or rebuilding. Personal narratives show the true damage that this system causes, and how that damage becomes part of the overall generational trauma that hurts families and communities.
The authors did a great job of covering many areas: drug courts and mandated treatment, mental health convictions, electronic monitoring, foster care and family incarceration, the sex offender registry, neighborhood/community policing, amongst others. Illustrating how each aspect, even if it is aimed at “helping”, usually works to drag people into a system that affects not only themselves but everyone around them, and is very difficult to get out of. I personally really appreciated the chapter on the issues with the sex offender registry, as it gave me more insight into how it is definitely not working in the way that most people assume it does, and how the registry, and all of the restrictions imposed on those on the registry are much more harmful than we think.
In the last section of the book the authors provide us with different solutions that would help abolish the police nation that the US currently is. Unlike bipartisan “reforms” that have up until now just expanded incarceration, these solutions could provide real change: but it is up to us to demand these changes, and to make the community efforts needed to work towards the abolition of prisons, whether they are in institutions or in our own homes and schools.
A must read, especially if you are interested in learning more about incarceration and why people are demanding the abolition of the police state and mass incarceration.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.