Monday 22 November 2010

FDR 25 or… fascism?

FDR 25 or… fascism? (Xs)
10/21/2010

At the Utah State Koncentration Kamp they have a policy (FDR 25) which is “top secret” as the Division Director, a.k.a. overseer, will tell you here:

“The policy you are requesting is FDR 25, intensive management / suicide prevention / strip cell. FDR 25 is classified as protected under the provisions of Grama Paragraph 63G-2-305 (12). That chapter deals with how staff is to handle and interact with criminals in the system. In fact, we do not let that chapter out to anyone not in law enforcement. Your request for a copy is, therefore, denied.”

A snippet of this policy states:

“Inmates shall not be permitted to receive newspapers, magazines, pamphlets, brochures, etc. Including religious texts, newspapers or pamphlets.”

Fascism: extreme totalitarian right-wing philosophy.
Right-wing: conservative or reactionary.
Reactionary: tending to oppose (esp. political) change.
So basically the “corrective facility” in which I am caged in has policies in which they break down how to treat and interact with Jews (I mean criminals). This policy includes restrictions on allowing captives religious texts and newspapers, etc. and I´m supposed to be corrected in some “out-of-the-blue” fashion, I guess, as I sit all alone with nothing in a solitary cell.

Hypocrisy: False claim to virtue; pretense.

The cherry on top of this Hitler-esque Hill is the symbol the Utah Department of Corrections uses on its letterhead and on their website. Which states they provide Honor, Integrity, and Accountability.

Honorable Departments with nothing to hide wouldn´t have top secret policies aimed at reactionary ends. And no policy supported by that department, could have a single ounce of integrity if it keeps men from practicing their religion and free speech. Last I checked this was still Amerikkka with a constitution that was written by revolutionaries in an attempt to stop that sort of injustice. And accountability. Who´s responsible for caging men for decades alone without magazines, religious texts, pictures, newspapers, and then releasing them? Is this their “accountability” they tout from one of the peeks in Southern Utah´s Red Rock on their letterhead symbol? Are they to be held accountable for men who don´t even know who the Amerikan president is because they´ve not read a newspaper in decades? How do you expect a person like that to get a job let alone be reintroduced back into society?

I just don´t get it. Unless the whole point (goal) is institutionalization. And then you have thousands of men in their youth, or prime, kept away from any and all pictures of the opposite sex in magazines, photos, etc. for decades. For punishment? I´m not even wanting to get the ramifications of that one. Or should I? For propriety´s sake I better skirt it. Yet… it is a reality. It is true. Wouldn´t any grown adult who was kept away from the opposite sex, even in photos, for decades become a management problem? I´d like to see one of you out there attempt it and let´s see if your loved ones don´t treat you with a little “ intensive management.”
And then you´re going to let these men out. The next time you guys see a high speed chase, ask yourself this: Is it possible this man was paroled thinking Bill Clinton was still president and the Twin Towers still stood?

Just imagine it. Is he running from the cops or from a world that suddenly fast forwarded twenty years and grew an internet. Is he scared of the handcuffs or more afraid of being kept without pictures of Britney Spears, Hayden Panitierre or Megan Fox for decades? Maybe this man is a devout Muslim or Christian on parole and as he “high speeds”, he´s attempting to memorize the Bible´s Second Letter to the Corinthians before they cage him and keep him without his holy texts for another decade.

Do you ever think of this society? Or are you too busy hating?

The next time a man at your local 7-11 seems shifty-eyed or suspicious, please don´t call the cops, maybe he just never knew Doritos had thirty-one flavors now and Michael Jackson´s not still the King of Neverland (King of Pop though he´ll forever stand). Maybe the cover of the latest “Maxim” magazine just took him some time to digest and he´s still catching his bearings.
Mayhap actually attending a church service, after two decades without has him overcome with the “Holy Spirit.” Maybe he needs a hug or a conversation and not a phone call to the cops and more solitary.

And know, reader, I´ve personally been at both ends of this field. I grew up being told, shown and believing people in prison are there for a just reason and deserve it, because they are bad people or lacking in some degree. I was taught this by my own family even though my own father was in prison. I was taught to hate him. And I did.

And then I came to prison. And I became the one hated. I paroled and was “that man” at the gas station (mouth full of the new cool ranch Doritos. Hands gripping several Maxims). Four times I received the “phone call” instead of the hug or conversation. And I again sit without religion, photos or newspapers. As society and my family hates me. Yet know, I sit with the utmost respect of my father now and extreme love. I now know why he was shifty-eyed and suspicious. But sadly. I don´t think I´ll ever understand why I was taught to hate him… - (Bourgeoise propaganda?) –

So at the start of this essay I showed you how “corrections” can oppose change. (if that is possible? I question it, even though I live it, is the sad part). I spoke about three words, or six, and how fascism, right-wing and reactionary can hide behind honor, integrity and accountability.

You know, I´m actually afraid that if I was to learn the whole FDR25 policy I´d discover it states how to drive a man mad real slow and convince him he´s mentally ill so they can push mind-numbing and body weakening psychotropics on him to stop his humanity and turn him into a good middle-class sleep. I´m scared it would be the revision of the German code used in the 1930s. The one that had all those past upstanding middle-class citizens driving their children to soccer and piano practice as they crinkled their noses trying to ignore those smells and ashes hitting their windshields. To ignore their Kamps.

I mean. History does repeat.

And FDR 25, at least the part not “top secret,” doesn´t bid well for things to come. Take it from me. I sit inside one of new Germany´s modern Koncentration Kamps. My face is up against the glass as I watch my comrades one by one being marched off to the firing squad chambers.

The precise titles and tags do change. But what they mean doesn´t.
How we smell doesn´t change either, nor what they do to us and the end result. The basics remain true. And foul.

Our ashes are just disguised as “corrections” and “rehabilitation.” Our punishment for dissent disguised as intensive management and control units. Our pleas for help batted down by the $$ Government´s Prison Litigation Reform Act.

Our humanity denied by policies like FDA25.

In strength (don´t you smell us?) and struggle,
B.

Saturday 20 November 2010

Silent Accusation II (Spencer Hooper RIP)

Give us rest, give us time
To sort out why our country doesn't realize
Torture laws and racism exist
And there's more to life than
Those Seinfield reruns you missed
As long as you have a Mazda Miata
With a full tank and a pack of smokes
You couldn't care less about 500,000 dead Iraqi children
Less names to intrude on your child's
Santa Claus naughty or nice list!?! folks?
A dead man hangs from an air vent
As a bunch of cowards laugh at him
But this man's dying breath
Pleaded for me to seek justice for him
And the justice will multiply a thousand fold
Because my strength is endless
I've chosen to pick up a revolutionary cause
And the world's vendettas
Against my supposed country
I'll carry the progressive red flag
And your overweight greedy amerikkkans
Will finally understand the meaning of sad
It's a true emotion that bubbles from within
Totally opposite than your sugar come down
And more human than your bullshit "sin"
Ring around the rosey and pop goes the weasel
Is that spittle on your lip Mr Vegetate?
Dialectics is jet fuel to your racist diesel
Give us rest, give us time
To sort out this mess we've made of our lives
Give us a chance to pay for our crimes
You have our bodies, some of our minds
What more do you want?
More pain and some fines!
Take his rigid body and cut it down
Call him worthless, call him clown
I called him friend, his mother's son
Look at his face, look what you've done.
 (Published here)

Tuesday 9 November 2010

The Statue of Armageddon


I went to church and learned how to cry
Then came to prison and learned how to smile
Seeking forgiveness only from myself
Becoming unshakable on my solitary shelf
Amerikkkan missiles with nuclear tips
Poised like paper tigers ready to Rip
Payloads in excess of seven destroyed earths
Armageddon, she´s ready, with Lady Liberty´s purse
She´s taken her crown and turned it to horns
Her torch turned missile, Her country wanting more
Gimme Gimme, like a spoiled presidential child
Taking from the weak in the United $nakes style
I sit unable to do much more than write
My pen and myself and the long lonely nights
2.4 million captives loudly screeching the truth
Lady Liberty a missile silo waiting to be used
(stop her)

(October 2010)

Wednesday 20 October 2010

Apologetic subterfuge

Published earlier here in this publication.

February 21st, 2010: a three car convoy of Afghans were traveling to the market and then to a hospital for medical treatment. U.$. forces saw Afghans traveling together and launched an air to ground attack. Women jumped out waving their scarves to communicate they were civilians. The U.$. helicopter continued firing. 21 killed. 13 wounded.


December 26th, 2009: U.$. forces raided a home, pulled eight young men ages 11 - 18 out of their beds and gunned them down execution style. U.$. forces and distraught villagers later learned all were innocent of any wrongdoing. An apology was issued by the U.$. military.


Apologetic subterfuge?!
You can love me if you want
Feel free to hate me if you need
Just keep away from me your ignorance
Your racism and patriotic greed
Believe in your jesus
Your superiority and programmed ways
If it helps you sleep at night
Keep preaching your 'end of days'
Seven comes eleven its a crying shame
When the last time you did a pushup
you fucking lames!
Our bodies were built for sweat and love
minds wired for compassion not drugs
Turn off your fucking TV zombie
unplug that phone and those radios
Now listen, you hear it? 'crunch crunch'
That's those red white and blue imperialist goblins
eating Afghani wives and children for lunch
and the ticking sound that's increasing slowly
it's that capitalist system you love
slowly imploding
I'll shed no more tears for you Amerikkka
I'll never forgive you for what you've done
chewing on pregnant mothers and sons
killing unarmed little girls for fun
I'm an anti-imperialist communist poet
and we're winning motherfuckers
Fox 13's just not letting you know it.
February 12th 2010: U.$. forces raided a home and killed five people, including two pregnant mothers and a girl engaged to be married. The New York Times even uncovered Amerikkkan troops engaging in a deliberate cover up in an April 5th 2010 article.

According to a March 3rd 2010 report "The U.$. ignored the deaths of more than 850 Afghan children from treatable/preventable diseases as they focus warring on the second poorest country in the world"
Fuck you Amerikkka!
Straight up.
no apologies.
and no more hiding.
we're watching,
waiting....
tick tick tick!

Saturday 16 October 2010

"Home Sweet Home"

From: Solitarywatch:


October 16, 2010
by Jean Casella and James Ridgeway

Brandon Green is imprisoned in Uinta 1, a supermax unit at the Utah State Prison in Draper. His writings appear on a blog created for him by Utah Prison Watch. In this piece, he challenges readers to imagine what is like to live in solitary confinement, as he vividly describes the physical and psychological deterioration that take place in an isolation cell.

Go to your bathroom door and kick a hole in it. Now lock yourself in tight. Throw all your hygiene items, except a tooth brush and toothpaste tube, out the hole. Everything. Now go to your tub and flip it over. This is where you’ll sleep. Now sit. The light switch disappears and the shower spigot. A little speaker replaces them. It listens and sometimes speaks to you. Laughs at you. Taunts you. Tells you your suffering is entertaining. You can’t shut off the light with no switch and you’ll have to shower using the sink.

As you sit, you hear ten or so voices outside the door. That’s funny. Sounds like that guy who robbed my mother’s house last year and put her in a wheelchair after brutally beating and raping her. It can’t be! Is that the judge that let the man run free too? And his twisted attorney? Why are they here!?!
The worst enemies you could imagine, or put a face to, have just moved into your house. As you sit in the bathroom. These people only wish you harm of the utmost. And your death would be nothing but joy for them. All your food, and any mail you might be expecting, will have to come from these “squatter enemies.” Good luck!

To make matters worse, these enemies of yours control all your heating, air conditioning, water from your sink and to your toilet. And to top it off, if they see you sleeping they’ll kick the door and yell at you. They laugh.
You can hear these men day and night right outside your door. You smell them barbecuing  and smoking. You’re hungry. You can hear these men torturing people. Sometimes other people in similar bathrooms next to yours are pulled out and placed in body bags. To the  amusement of these squatters.
 A day passes this way.

“My god,” you say, “what have I done to deserve this?”
A week passes.
 You cry.
A month.
You attempt suicide but your vein closes up before death.
A year.
You are now talking to yourself and running around naked. You are convinced the food you seldom receive, that’s halfway edible, is poisoned. As you eat the rotten “meat” your beard and mustache get in the way of the teeth chewing. You couldn’t cry if your life depended on it. And it used to. But you’ve forgotten why.
Two years.
You can’t remember. You’ve forgotten. Forgotten what? You don’t know. The “squatter enemies” come around and you look at them. They look at you. They laugh. You start to laugh too. You forgot why. But you do.
Three years.
You sleep 20 hours a day. You can’t help it. But your floor is clean. You keep it spotless. You don’t know why. But you do. You’re skinny. You’ve lost an easy 60 lbs. Your skin is turning yellow and your legs cramp up and atrophy. You don’t want to die anymore. Why bother? You’d rather sleep and dream. The dreams are so vivid. More real than these walls.

Five years.
You go home, you leave your bathroom, this year.
They tell you that. But why? Where do I go? I don’t want to leave now. I like my tub and sink…

Dear Comrades (One Love)


Cats and dogs raining down my window
Dust bunnies roaming around my floor
Learned worms crawling around my stomach
Telling me I was taught to want more
These measly maggots at war with science
And what´s before us as real and true
I pump my blood until the skin stretches
Sweat drips onto the concrete like Chinese tea
Searching each repetition the puddle´s reflection
for truth.
The same as I do each U.S.W. study lesson
For a MC´s guidance into deeper realms
Blood starts to puddle and pool with my sweat
I question from where but continue to pace
Letting the itch of it linger on my face
Three cold meals and denials at mail call
Four cold walls and a solitary cot
One man alone with only one thought
Your punk denials will breed lawsuits
And my stomach turns cold to hot
We, Comrades, are part of something larger
More human than “Jesus” dying on a cross
Steering the people through minefields of hate
Aware it´s a privilege we even ate
A species on the sad cusp of extinction
One Vanguard, one chance, one reason
As planet Earth spins out the seasons
Survival of the fittest as Amerikkka weakens
Our species.

One Love Comrades

Friday 24 September 2010

Kruel Koncentration Kamp

08-13-2010
Dear kruel world,

What´s it going to take? How many more of us must die before someone steps in and stops this control unit´s moves from destroying your brothers, sons and nephews? Is there a lack of belief on everybody´s part because I came across as unstable and untrustworthy? Maybe I am nuts, maybe I am insane, I´ll grant everybody that. But maybe that´s a prerequisite for surviving this… this place. .. these walls… these words:

“So that I don´t have to drag myself to the door, I stay in front of it. All that I have sits in this hollow with me. I prop my mattress up against the door for a backrest. These officers (peterson, randall, stephens, sgt. lund), delight to kick the door, especially so when they know I´m either asleep or writing.

I´m forced by these officers to be stark naked for more than five years; enduring a triple gum abcess, broken teeth, lost filling for over eleven years; being repeatedly starved and dehydrated; have all of my possessions stole repeatedly.”

Damn huh! Those World War II holocaust victims had it bad, right? Of course they did. But would you believe me if I said these words were written only three days ago by a fifty-three year old man in Utah´s Uinta One Control Unit? Only three cells away from myself I´ve sat in witness to this man Mr John Chaney #123899 torture and starvation and sleep deprivation and sexual harrassments and even religious taunts and oppressions. These words you read are dated August 9th 2010. These words are why the UTDOC won´t allow any of us media interviews. These words are why Mr Chaney does not receive Prison Watch´s letters mailed to him repeatedly. And why Mr Chaney´s letters he mails out do not make their destinations. These words:

Concerning food: “Officers steal it more frequently than I am given it.”
When he contacted the doctor: “Dr Tubbo came around and stated ´We don´t care and we don´t have to, I´m glad I´m not in your body.”

“Then nearly a year passed in very great discomfort and I´m stricken with scurvy. I asked for help again. The doctor looked at me and asked if my bones always stuck out like they do. I confirmed so. I was given breakfast drink. I can´t count the number of times I´ve eaten it dry” (they turn off his water, etc.).

He ends concerning his religion: “I shall not be guilty, though it cost my life. I am Yeshua´s and YHWH´s friend. I am willing and pleased to die for them. Amen.”

I don´t hear anyone laughing out there. You guys don´t find this at all funny? That´s fucking strange, because these “corrections officers” find this man´s condition and treatment hilarious. Even some of my fellow captives caper and prance around for the benefit and show of these officers. It gets to be so slap-ass happy everyone seems to forget a crippled man is lying huddled against his cell door. Unshaven and hair uncut for almost fifteen years. Unaware that maybe any day another body bag will be popped out and unfurled and unzipped. Then rezipped…

Then I suppose it´s only fair and just that we forget all about sgt fairbanks´ threats to Mr Chaney. Don´t want to get any of the upstanding good guy Mormons in hot water do we? (if you notice traces of anger you´re dead correct).

09-14-2010
One month shy of today and still nothing has been done to correct these abuses and inhumanities. On this day Mr Chaney told me that in the past sgt lund, feikert, fairbanks, scott and officers stated to him that “We´re going to kill you just real slowly so no one gets in trouble.” He came to prison weighing 190 lbs. And now is below 100lbs. He states he only gets one or two meals a week. If that. His exact words:

“I´m going to go pray. I will ask God, my heart palpitates and I become dizzy because I´m weak. I black out and I´m unable to stand. These guards will not provide me anything to stand up with. My body and legs hurt. I´ve written many organizations, etc. No responses. I don´t believe my mail´s delivered.”

This building houses 97 prisoners. Each and everyone of these captives knows about Mr Chaney´s dire straights. Hundreds of men have come and left over the years. Thousands of men know what the UT DOC has buried in its closet. All the guards know about this man´s condition. Along with medical staff and administration.

It´s time for the world to see and pass judgement on what´s occurring here in this building. You see, we Utahns are the only Americans to use the firing squad. We Utahns, and Mormons, believe in blood debts where the spilling of the guilty´s blood is the only way to pay for your sins. We Utahns have district attorneys who brag about signing death warrants on “twitter.” And a board of pardons and parole who hand out three more years for obtaining diploma´s and completing substance abuse therapy.

We Utahns support the prison policy of placing the mentally ill and legally mentally retarded in the hole for years on end. Decades on end. We Utahns have the upstanding retired executive directors Gary Deland and Lane McCotter who started and ran, after stepping down in Utah amid scandal, Iraq´s infamous Abu Ghraib prison.

I quote mr Deland in an April 2010 Deseret News article concerning our firing squad executions which the man boasts of writing the book on. Quote: “I go down about 30 minutes or so before the execution. I just feel if you claim to believe in capital punishment, and you´re not pulling the trigger (5), you need to be able to look the guy in the eye that´s going down and spend some time talking to him.”

Now this is a call to uphold such magnanimous behaviour on the part of the Utah department of corrections. I ask the modern day directors: Thomas E. Patterson, Robyn Williams, Mike Haddon, Lowell Clark, and Steven Turley to follow in Mr Deland´s footsteps.

If you, modern day directors, believe in starvation, torture, religious persecution, sleep deprivation, cruelty, sexual harassment, retaliation, prejudice for filing complaints, intimidation, etc, etc, and the keeping of a man, a fifty three year old man with scurvy and broken teeth with abcesses, so emotionally scarred and bruised he´s afraid to even ask for dental screenings or visits, after fifteen years at the hands of the cowardly public servants like sgts feikert, scott and lund, and officers ritter, fouret, bartolotti, randall, peterson, nelson and stephens; and you´re not the ones kicking his door all night as he sleeps, or refusing him water out of his sink, food or even access to a bible that´s not torn up each chance officers get; if you´re not these men, “killing (him) slowly so no one gets in trouble, ” then you need to look the guy that´s going down in the eye and spend some time talking to him!

I mean, that is, if you believe in that sort of stuff, and allow it year after year, you kind of owe it to the man to attempt to look him in the eye as he looks up from the ground at you, quivering and smelling of rot, eye twitching, with swollen jaws and cheeks and “bones sticking out.”

Because this man is right here. Today I requested of him to sing “Yesterday” by The Beatles. He barely could! Today I witnessed him not getting fed and I heard him being taunted that he doesn´t know the true god and that he is a dirty liar. I listened as officer stephens and officers peterson and randall degraded him in the most disgusting fashion. Again. For the hundredth-thousandth time. They laughed at him as he attempted to defend himself sitting in his “hollow.” Back against the door that they kick and slam the cuffport on.

I´ve got a neighbor with an IQ of 60, who isn´t allowed to move from the hole, because he keeps attempting to obtain reading materials from his friends!

We´ve got the deaf kept without hearing aids and the crippled kept without wheelchairs!

We´ve got 75 year old fed bologna for over nine years. Constantly guarding his dentures and reading glasses from retaliations.

We´ve got 19 year olds in prison for petty burglary, and 8/25/2009 parole dates, catching two 1-15 year sentences and 2012 rehearings of defending themselves from constant harrassments and abuse.

We´ve got 18 year olds with ADHD, clubfeet, deformed hands, learning disabilities (and again mental retardation) being pepper-sprayed and beat, then left to freeze on strip cell with officer Peterson opening outside recreation doors in December.

We´ve got Iraqi refugees whose deaths, so the officers say, will be a cause for celebration. Still!!!

I´m just sick of fucking seeing it and documenting it and being called a liar. Even though it is all on camera and administration has to keep backpedalling to avoid admitting it. Administration has to keep moving new guards and srgts and captains here and there, yet they leave the most sadistic rookies like stains in their coffee mugs, lingering.

So this is just a call to anyone who may consider themselves a progressive or a compassionate soul. I challenge anyone, any organization, to a little one on one face to face with Mr John Chaney. Let´s see you weigh him and look into his yellow blood-shot eyes. Let´s see UTDOC hide this man´s bones sticking out and crumbling abcess teeth.

I welcome everyone again to Utah corrupt (modern day concentration camp) control unit carnival.

In strength (step right up!) and hope,
Brandon Green

Copyright Brandon Green 2010