I recently started taking a constitutional law class, where we study Constitutional amendments as they have been interpreted throughout history. Of course, anything the teacher informs me of relating to civil liberties, I immediately connect back to a disputable topic in criminal justice.
As we went over the 8th amendment this week, I found myself wondering how so many aspects of the US criminal justice system do not violate this right.
In order for retribution to occur, our legal system seems to ignore the values which it was founded upon.
The detail that really troubled me was solitary confinement. Often known as “restrictive housing,” a mask for its true nature, this practice has been deemed torture by the UN. In the past few years, around 40,000 people have been kept in solitary confinement, for up to 15 days.
15 days in a small cell, confined to their own company, without the ability to represent themselves and challenge this practice.
Solitary confinement is not just morally wrong, but also a true form of torture. It drastically weakens prisoners’ mental health, contributing to depression, suicidal thoughts, and even claustrophobia from being in a 6-by-9 foot cell for almost all hours of the day.
The flaws in this practice are not only limited to conflicts of health. Solitary confinement also utilizes racial discrimination, as it disproportionately targets black people — 27% of those in solitary are black.
In women’s prisons, where the practice is not as popular compared to its counterpart, black women are still the majority of those placed in solitary.
Not only is this practice disgusting in a moral way and damaging in regards to prisoner welfare, but also racially discriminatory. How many flaws can this practice contain before people recognize it as wrong?
Solitary confinement is not protecting anyone from prisoners. It is not helping public safety.
If anything, this so-called “restrictive housing” only worsens those conditions, exacerbating the struggles of inmates prior to when they entered.
Supporting solitary confinement is not contributing to anything, really. While it may make someone feel good to hurt a prisoner — get their revenge or punish them or whatever it may be — this practice is wrong.
It was wrong when the United Nations claimed it was wrong, and it is still wrong as it is practiced in American prisons today.
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