No One Left Behind

This weekend I visited Monroe Prison. It was my first prison visit ever!

I never visited when my church would go. I never visited any family or friends. It wasn't something that I would have EVER chosen to do.

We all enter a form of awareness with the belief that "police are good" and "prisons are where bad people go". Until we have our eyes opened and our "awareness" deepened this is the premise that WE ALL FUNCTION in and with at some point.

In America, 1 in EVERY 37 Adults is under some form of Correctional Supervision (jail, prison, parole, probation, etc). Imagine a classroom, or a bus, or a hospital waiting room, at least 1 of the people you come in contact with is suffering from the impacts of mass incarceration. Your peer, your bus driver, your wheel-chair pusher, your classmate. None of us are untouched by this system.

My friend, for whatever the reasons, hasn't had a single visit since being in prison (5 years). I know my reasons for why I had never gone to any prison, but they were all based in false narratives around prisons, laws, masculinity, crime, and blackness. NONE of those beliefs served me...and they aren't serving those left behind bars.

Prisons literally exist in our backyards (see the picture below - that's Monroe Prison from Monroe High School field - a whole different commentary is coming) there are very few if any excuses anymore for why we don't visit our so-called loved ones. AND NO prison isn't a choice so slap that taste out your own mouth! NO ONE casually wakes up and says "I want to go to prison today" NO ONE sits before a judge and says, "I choose prison over freedom"

And if you can't visit, write

And if you can't write, send some change

And if you can't send some change, prepare!

Prepare for the day they come home...ready with PATIENT love and support to help them reintegrate into society.

We can no longer throwaway, leave behind, or hide the fact that the very people we love are being stolen and locked away from us...no more "they making a movie", "On vacation", or any other false humor shame-based tale as to why they are absent.

A broken leg doesn't heal simply by forgetting about it...it requires attention, care and time. A broken family, community, a person doesn't heal by throwing them away, locking them up and forgetting about them...they require attention, care and time also!