Orange Is The New Black

[imperfect_cupcake]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

Interesting interview of Piper Kerman
http://www.salon.com/2013/09/06/the_...black_partner/

A couple of excerpts:

Was the prison staff as homophobic as the warden in the show?

I only reflect upon my own experience, so I definitely saw a lot of homophobia from the prison staff directed at prisoners and also towards each other in sort of an unfettered or unchecked way. No one is getting in trouble in prison for being homophobic, let’s put it that way.

Is the character of Sister Ingalls — the nun who is a protester — close to reality?

Sure, fairly close, yeah, though the show’s character of course is quite different than Sister Ardeth Platte, who gave me permission to use her real name in the book. But yeah, that’s a good example. Those folks are closely drawn.

In your book, you write about encountering other political prisoners, particularly those arrested for protesting the School of Americas.

There are many political prisoners in America, particularly in the federal system. That’s where they generally all go. Often, they were serving really short sentences if they were first-time offenders, like a 90-day sentence, which is sort of ridiculous on some level, but a number of those folks had short sentences, like 90 days or six months.

Someone like Ardeth Platte was considered a repeat offender because she had committed many protests of conscience, so she was serving, if my memory is correct from the book, close to four years, as were the two other nuns she was arrested with.

How do you respond to critiques that you — and “Orange Is the New Black” — are profiting off the struggles and stories of women of color?

The book is the book, right? I wrote the book to depict my own experience, and I think that’s a really important thing. I don’t see any problem whatsoever with me depicting my own experience and telling my own story. I’m very proud of the show, but Jenji is the show’s creator and at the end of the day, she’s the ultimate decision-maker. I remain in close contact with some women I did time with—a variety of women, some of them are white, some of them are not white. The people who have been in touch with me —both when the book came out and when the show started—are excited. The people I knew in prison, if they are not excited, have not communicated that to me.

I try to be very respectful of other people’s stories and other people’s ownership of their stories. I hope that the show opens up more and more desire and demand for stories that come out of the criminal justice system. That’s what I think is most important: for people to have more and more hunger to hear about a system very different than what has been depicted to date in the media.

I went to that interview and read it. Holy shit am I ever niave. And completely ignorant. Of of my old and close friends I've know since 14, his mom was a prison officer. She never ever wanted to talk about her job. And I only heard about Wormwood Scrubs in London via whispers and rumours about what went on in there. I can't imagine what that prison is like. I've been around the outside of it as its in London, but the outside of it scared the shit out of me. Its as far from anything in my highly privileged canuckian little life as the shanty towns of Jakarta were (which also scared the shit out of me, but also filled me with awe that humans could be so strong they could survive in that. Wormwood just made my stomach funny with nerves).

I realize I know nothing about our punishment system in BC. I have been to BC Pen when it closed down. We broke in after a flood and took pictures of the old cells. The most disturbing was the solitary. They kept the front house but the rest was pulled down and the land is now condos. They did the same with Esindale, where they used to put people with learning disabilities and emotionally ill. Because when I was a girl that was still done. It wasn't until I was about 14 that all of that changed.

Driving past BC Pen and Esindale, they are on the same road, with the woods behind and the river in front was a creepy drive and I used to always stare as a kid. People locked up. Scary people in a scary place. So scary we don't talk to them or see them.

I'm now going to look to see if there are stories by any women from our prison system, in particular, first nation as that seems to be the women here who get the shortest end of the stick. I want to hear it from their mouths.

If I find anything I'll let people know.