Protests Grow in Solidarity With California Prisoners As Hunger Strikes Enters Third Week

DemocracyNow.org - Thousands of inmates in at least 13 prisons across California's troubled prison system have been on hunger strike for almost two weeks. Many are protesting in in solidarity with inmates held in Pelican Bay State Prison, California's first super-maximum security prison, over what prisoners say are cruel and unusual conditions in "Secure Housing Units." Democracy Now! airs an audio statement from one of the Pelican Bay prisoners, and interviews three guests: Dorsey Nunn, co-founder of "All of Us or None" and executive director of Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, and one of the mediators between the prisoners on hunger strike and the California Department of Corrections; Molly Porzig, a member of the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity coalition and a spokesperson for Critical Resistance; and Desiree Lozoya, the niece of an inmate participating in the Pelican Bay Hunger Strike, who visited him last weekend.

For the complete transcript, podcast and for additional reports on the situation in Haiti since the earthquake, visit http://www.democracynow.org/2011/7/15/protests_grow_in_solidarity_with_califo...

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Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• amy goodman
• democracy now
• democracynow
• juan gonzalez
• california
• hunger strike
• prison
• solidarity
• pelican bay
• secure housing unit
• legal services
• critical resistance
• desiree lozoya
• molly porzig

[ReignbowSmite]

I am working from memory but correct me if I am wrong because I don't have the data on hand:

America has 3% of the world's entire population.

America has 25% of that population in prison.

America has the highest jailed population known in the world.

Private prisons are popping up all over america, and make a profit from the government, and the labor of prisoners.

[ReignbowSmite]

@civ2rocks I was in juvenile solitary confinement, once because I refused to participate in the mandatory fitness program in a female teen prison, because the instructor was an adult male who pushed us 'til some of us threw up. Only 3 days, but I got sent again for threatening to hurt my self. Anyone who says that solitary confinement for years isn't damaging is amazingly ignorant.

[caros1100]

@elk1934 are you an idiot. some people wind up in bad places because of thoughtless actions. not everyone hurts others on purpose. not everyone is violent. but everyone is thrown in cages together because no one seems to care about the outcome for each person. people on the outside can never begin to understand until you get involved and try to make the changes that actually make a difference to all of us.we are all humans not animals.

[ReignbowSmite]

@jjcatful What's your problem? Do these statistics bother you? If they do... I am a messenger, not the message.

[jjcatful]

@ReignbowSmite and America has the most assholes..are we sexist for having more men in prison than women??

[jjcatful]

Really?? do you hear this bitch??She is the enemy...

[usaintltrade]

All Hispanic people in slavery suppression poverty California move to Colorado Denver save your children

[lockdownpublishing]

I started a publishing company lockdownpublishing to help other prisoners turn their lives around through writing and art. I spent 10 years in California's prisons and wrote the drug war novel Roll Call by Glenn Langohr to show the public the path we are on is only breeding bigger criminals

[ivonne562ifly]

how can i protest?

[starmanskye]

@elk1934 -- Your crude, oversimplistic stereotyping is typical dumbed-down hubris to justify the barbaric excesses, inhumanity, abuses & cruelty of America's venal, reactionary Police State ideology of Punishment & Control. The US Prison Industry reflects the worst features of dehumanization as per corporate/MIC-subverted America Inc, a fascist kleptocracy operated for the benefit, wealth & interests of minority ownership-class & their stooge functionaries.

[elk1934]

If you give them a phone call they will call a hit to kill someone. If you put them in a cell with another inmate they will kill each other. If you open two door at the same time , they will kill each other. These are violent killers. They will kill for money, power, gang status, or no reason at all. They are in prison because of the violent crimes they committed on the streets and in prison. This is not like adopting a pet, unless of course it was a king cobra.

[JohnBigmon]

@VlcakStalker <----- Liar. Talking off the top of his head and saying that isolation isn't psychologically damaging. That's been thoroughly proven to the point of not even being debatable.

Typical conservative bullshit, "create" facts as you see fit. Oops, you're not dealing with dumbasses though.