CDCr bragging about using kids on the fireline.
Throughout the day we're gonna drop some basic knowledge on the deep bullshit of the "inmate volunteer firefighter" 1/
Throughout the day we're gonna drop some basic knowledge on the deep bullshit of the "inmate volunteer firefighter" 1/
THERE IS NO CONSENT OR ANY TRUE CHOICE FOR A PRISONER. Your body, your time, your voice. all physical space, your future, your connection to family or anyone else, even the ideas you can express or read are subject to a total control and enforced ultimately by violence. So... 2/
Incarceration is torture plain & simple. Against a backdrop of being utterly controlled, subject to any whim of guards, locked in a madness inducing concrete box for 20+ hours, doing one of the hardest, most dangerous jobs on the planet for $1/hr looks good. 3/
Couple facts: Prisoners die fighting fires. Two died last year in CA, one of them due to a chainsaw accident.
CA has capacity for approx 4300 in its firecamps, but faces shortfalls, last year only fielding 3700 due to early release programs that... 4/
CA has capacity for approx 4300 in its firecamps, but faces shortfalls, last year only fielding 3700 due to early release programs that... 4/
...draw on the same low level "offenders" eligible for firecamp. The Atty Gen office under Kamala Harris, current Dem party darling, actually argued against these early release programs because of their need for slave labor fighting fires. 5/
Often the prisoners that opt for work are the ones that have no outside support to help them get hygiene supplies, commissary food, blankets, shower shoes etc. Prisons no longer supply basic supplies. You have to buy them from a commissary shop run by a corporate vendor. 6/
CDCr claims it "saves" the public $100 million w prisoner firefighters. First, this is a round figure cooked up by CDCr as a public relations tool, not any sort of audit. Second, it is arguing the cost savings of essentially slavery. Third, ... 7/
It only is a "saving" if you take the caging of people as a given: CDCr has an $11bn budget which works out to almost $80k per person locked up so roughly $300 million is being spent incarcerating the same people that could do the job if they were hired by CDF for $100 million 8/
That prisoner firefighters are being trained for future employment is a cruel hoax: BLM, CDF, and fire departments do not hire felons. Period.
This is a myth to make liberals feel better and to maintain the bullshit that prisons "rehabilitate." 9/
This is a myth to make liberals feel better and to maintain the bullshit that prisons "rehabilitate." 9/
"clearing thick brush down to bare soil" = a romanticizing of prisoners making up the bulk of "handcrews", the lowest rank in the hierarchy fighting fires. The rest above them are predominantly white, unionized public service employees or contractors. 10/
"58 youth offenders" = overwhelmingly black and brown boys allowed no real "youth", tried as adults and coming of age in prison. 11/
Considering who policing and prisons target overall, it is more accurate to say:
The state collects and drives an army of the oppressed under threat of torture to fight fires and publicly disguises the abomination with tropes of Heroism, Service, and Redemption.
#burntheprisons
The state collects and drives an army of the oppressed under threat of torture to fight fires and publicly disguises the abomination with tropes of Heroism, Service, and Redemption.
#burntheprisons
