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I don't find it funny at all. Bureaucracies use that type of excuse all the time to justify piling on additional cruelties. In Florida, inmates may no longer r

by Lendal 4y ago

I don't find it funny at all. Bureaucracies use that type of excuse all the time to justify piling on additional cruelties. In Florida, inmates may no longer receive mail. No love letters. No Christmas cards. Nothing. FDOC claim it's because some prisoner's mail might have had "drugs" in it. That's the excuse anyway. As of last year, no prisoners in Florida may receive mail from loved ones anymore. Insanity is what I call it. Nothing justifies it. Having been convicted of a crime doesn't justify it, because we also find legal ways to be cruel to people who haven't been accused of any crime. I don't know what people get out of it. Something is wrong with us.

LarryMullins 4y ago
> In Florida, inmates may no longer receive mail. This isn't true. You can still send letters to inmates in Florida. The letters are digitized and a copy given to the inmate, rather than the original paper. It seems reasonable to me. Other states have already done similar, but I'm not surprised that Florida gets singled out for the flogging.
- rootusrootus 4y ago
  Wow, that is dehumanizing. This is the kind of thing that really drives home our Puritan roots. It's like we've decided that merely locking people behind bars isn't good enough, we need to make sure that every moment is hell.
- Lendal 4y ago
  You neglect to mention the inmate has to pay for each scanned card or letter, which most inmates can't afford. And you can't write on it, because it's on a screen, so if you're sending crosswords, the inmate can't do the crossword now, which is very demoralizing so they'll just ask you to stop sending them. There is another service where they can pay an exorbitant fee for a printout though. It's also very difficult to read scanned handwritten letters even if you pay for the printout. Inmates will ask you to stop sending Christmas cards because it's not worth it for you, and it's not worth it for them. It costs them more than what the card & postage cost you. Also the screens are pretty shitty so when they break down, it takes months to get a replacement. The worst thing is the lies about why they're doing this. They think we're stupid. They don't really care about prisoners getting sick from possible drugs on the letters. If they really cared about this issue they would screen the letters for drugs, which would be easier & cheaper than scanning and reprinting them, or they would provide healthcare in prisons (they don't), or they could even stop corrections employees from bringing in the drugs in the first place.
  - LarryMullins 4y ago
    If the truth of digital mail is so awful, then it should suffice to say that Florida is digitizing mail to prisons. Saying they've banned mail altogether is simply a lie.

by Lendal 4y ago

LarryMullins 4y ago

> In Florida, inmates may no longer receive mail. This isn't true. You can still send letters to inmates in Florida. The letters are digitized and a copy given to the inmate, rather than the original paper. It seems reasonable to me. Other states have already done similar, but I'm not surprised that Florida gets singled out for the flogging.

rootusrootus 4y ago
Wow, that is dehumanizing. This is the kind of thing that really drives home our Puritan roots. It's like we've decided that merely locking people behind bars isn't good enough, we need to make sure that every moment is hell.
Lendal 4y ago
You neglect to mention the inmate has to pay for each scanned card or letter, which most inmates can't afford. And you can't write on it, because it's on a screen, so if you're sending crosswords, the inmate can't do the crossword now, which is very demoralizing so they'll just ask you to stop sending them. There is another service where they can pay an exorbitant fee for a printout though. It's also very difficult to read scanned handwritten letters even if you pay for the printout. Inmates will ask you to stop sending Christmas cards because it's not worth it for you, and it's not worth it for them. It costs them more than what the card & postage cost you. Also the screens are pretty shitty so when they break down, it takes months to get a replacement. The worst thing is the lies about why they're doing this. They think we're stupid. They don't really care about prisoners getting sick from possible drugs on the letters. If they really cared about this issue they would screen the letters for drugs, which would be easier & cheaper than scanning and reprinting them, or they would provide healthcare in prisons (they don't), or they could even stop corrections employees from bringing in the drugs in the first place.
- LarryMullins 4y ago
  If the truth of digital mail is so awful, then it should suffice to say that Florida is digitizing mail to prisons. Saying they've banned mail altogether is simply a lie.