There’s an assumption running through and underneath the writing of virtually every television and movie depiction of our criminal justice system. And it’s deeply troubling. It goes something like this: Prison is a world full of unimaginable tortures, ruled by criminal despots with little or no regard for justice such that sending certain white collar criminals to prison can equal a punishment worse than death.
It’s difficult to watch more than one or two episodes of any of the most popular crime dramas on television without coming upon a familiar scenario.
It goes something like this:
Some man has done something pretty horrible. Let’s say, he’s raped a child. (That’s horrible enough that most of us can get behind wanting to see the guy punished.) We’d much rather identify with the detectives or the D.A. or whoever is sitting across the table from this bad guy and we usually do. Then, there’s a turning point in the negotiations. The turning point generally rests on “us” reminding “him” in some way shape or form that if his fellow prisoners are “accidentally” informed of who he is, what he’s done, he can look forward to a whole host of unimaginable tortures, possibly even resulting in his death. Though not before he’s gone through a suitably medieval course of torture.
The suspect then either begs or pleads or breaks down into a sobbing heap to show us, the audience, that he’s seriously freaked out at the prospect. And, depending on the show, the power brokers either use this to get a confession or if it’s the end of our story, they may just smile knowingly, condemning the sorry sack to a life in Hell.
What’s amazing to me is: No one questions this. They are not sending these criminals to a prison in Syria. They are talking about our prison system. The U.S. prison system. And there’s a wink and a nod to the fact that these “systems” are completely out-of-control sewers in which gangs decide who will live, who will die, and who will get raped and tortured and how often and by whom.
How is it we accept this? And aren’t these TV shows and movies at least a bit complicit in this state of affairs if they never ever question this as a fact of prison life.
With more than 1% of our total adult population behind bars in this country, isn’t it time, we gave a damn about what does go on on the inside?
pictured above: Kyra Sedgewick as The Closer.
