9 ms·

Federal prisons prep to move trans inmates as early as next week

19 points by pizza 2y ago

_heimdall 2y ago
This is such a tough issue to deal with, definitely in the "damned if you do, damned if you don't" category in my book. There's just not good, clean answer. Sex is almost universally binary (there are exceptions, though very rare). Gender is by no means binary though, its a totally different concept that just happens to correlate well enough to sex for most people. I'd like this to be a scenario where you just don't have prisons if you can't decide how to effectively group people and keep them safe. Most people wouldn't go for that though, we very much like punishing people for their mistakes and making them trade months or years of their life as penance.
- bitshiftfaced 2y ago
  Do you believe that because of the circumstances you mentioned, people shouldn't necessarily go to prison even if they murder someone?
  - meristohm 2y ago
    In many cultures, exile or retribution was the answer to murder, and to prevent things getting so heated, strong and secure family and community bonds go a long way. American prisons (I'm American, and also don't know much about non-US prisons) continue to be a great way to take advantage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution and thus continue to benefit from slave labor. My military uniform was made by enslaved people, for example. I'm with Angela Davis and numerous other abolitionists on this topic.
    - s1artibartfast 2y ago
      What would exile look like? where would they be sent? It is hard to imagine another country taking them, and any no-mans land the US establishes would likely be at least as hellish as the prison system. Do we just keep dumping them on some island to Battle Royale/ Hunger games? is that more humane?
  - _heimdall 2y ago
    If we can't safely imprison people, absolutely. Do you believe that someone who committed murder deserves to be held against their will in an unsafe environment? My point isn't that prisons must be completely safe and nothing could ever go wrong. They should, though, be on par with the relative safety of the world outside prison walls.
    - pixxel 2y ago
      [dead]
    - beretguy 2y ago
      > Do you believe that someone who committed murder deserves to be held against their will in an unsafe environment? Absolutely. Give them what they want. Give them a taste of their own medicine. If they don't want to be civilized - don't give them civility.
    - bitshiftfaced 2y ago
      The hazard rate of a violent act is much higher among violent offenders, and it would be inhumane to put everyone in solitary confinement, even if you could afford it. Therefore, a prison containing violent offenders will never be as safe as the overall outside population.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  Let’s back up: what do we need to do to keep these (and other) inmates safe? They can call themselves a man, woman or air fryer, it’s almost irrelevant. What’s essential (and being lost in the hair-picking exercise of trying to solve for a universal theory of gender and sex) is that they not be shanked while Twitter has an incel side panel on sex ed. We divide inmates by more than just sex. We put sex offenders, literal rapists and pedophiles, in separate accommodation for their safety. Why can’t we do the same for trans folk? Even if you believe they’re deranged, what right does anyone have to extend their disgust to damnation? The situation is complicated. But not tough.
  - s1artibartfast 2y ago
    Im curious how the status quo compares with respect to the safety angle. Is the primary safety concern sexual violence, or hate crimes? I imagine pregnancy would also be a concern. If the main concern is sexual assault, can imagine there are risks either way, status quo and ex-post. If the concern is hate crimes, I could imagine trans people also suffering under either case. Prison is a high risk place.
    - toomuchtodo 2y ago
      If we can’t derisk prison, it’s a human rights violation to incarcerate in them. It’s high risk because of choices.
      - s1artibartfast 2y ago
        What is the alternative? Corporeal punishment only? No law enforcement? Solitary confinement would also be a rights violation.
        toomuchtodo 2y ago
        Funding corrections systems at an appropriate level where violence is an exception, not the norm. If you can’t afford to do it, you can’t afford to incarcerate. American prisons are about making humans suffer though (vs rehabilitation) as inexpensively as possible, so I don’t see this changing in the near future.
- smallerize 2y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_rights_in_the_United_States#V-coding https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_rights_in_the_Un... 58% of trans women placed in men's prisons report being violently sexually assaulted. One answer is a lot more damned than the other.
  - _heimdall 2y ago
    That falls squarely in the "if we can't imprison citizens safely, maybe we shouldn't imprison anyone" category for me.
    - yawpitch 2y ago
      … ok, you might be getting a little closer to waking up here. If prisons worked (as anything but a source of cheap labor) all Americans would be safe.
      - _heimdall 2y ago
        I don't need to wake up here, and your condescending tone wouldn't help convince me otherwise.
        yawpitch 2y ago
        [flagged]
        _heimdall 2y ago
        I didn't mean tone as in the intonation of your words, I meant the specific words you chose and what they imply. You made it clear that you know where I currently stand on the topic, where I have stood on it in the past, what I do or don't know, and that you're way of viewing the topic is right and I just need to "see the light" as it were. All of that was very clear in your written words, verbal intonation was needed to know what you meant and how you viewed me in that exchange.
jmclnx 2y ago
Maybe have a special prison ? In the US, how many can there be ? But like everything else, Musk and his lackey Trump only cares about how much they can pilfer from the US.
- mingus88 2y ago
  I hear they’re making Guantanamo Bay into a special prison. A camp, if you will.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
    Cuba libré!
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > Musk and his lackey Trump only cares about how much they can pilfer from the US Musk is a failed father, particularly when it comes to his trans kid(s). This might be a personal thorn for him that will wreak havoc and waste public resources to salve.
  - computerthings 2y ago
    [dead]
- s1artibartfast 2y ago
  Your question made me wonder enough to read the article. It said: > Previous data from the BOP website indicated there are 1,529 transgender women and 744 transgender men in custody. It's also unclear how many are currently housed in prisons according to their birth sex versus their gender identity. Of course, The issue is complicated by levels of security. However, a tran-man and a trans-women prison would at least eliminate the hypothetical problem of pregnancy during incarceration. It would be interesting to see numbers on that as well in the current status that has people assigned male and female at birth in the same facilities
- Ajay-p 2y ago
  this already exists in the form of medical facilities for inmates with mental and physical limitations.
gaganyaan 2y ago
Men don't belong in women's prisons. Find a way to keep them safe in the sex-appropriate prisons, but don't make it women's problem. Tremaine Carroll is a good example of why we need to stop coddling people's feelings on this.
- lores 2y ago
  You're on Hacker News, therefore a rational person. Shouldn't you be forming opinions from statistics rather than extrapolating from individual cases?
  - gaganyaan 2y ago
    Can we first agree that this case is a terrible one, in which a man intentionally identified as a woman in order to get the chance to rape women? There's more cases, but if we can't agree on ground truth in such an obvious case then there probably won't be common ground for calculating statistics.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
bobalob 2y ago
This is good news for female prisoners, at least those in federal prisons. Hopefully the federal government can take measures to keep male inmates out of women's prisons and jails at the state and local levels as well. Perhaps through conditions attached to federal funding.
- locopati 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - bobalob 2y ago
    That is a strong ideological belief, for sure. Implementing it as policy in the prison system has been disastrous for female prisoners, with multiple cases of rape, assault and impregnation of incarcerated women by male inmates who claimed to be "not men" and gained access to women's prisons on that basis. So it's good that this policy has been reversed and cancelled. It was a massive safeguarding failure that should never have happened in the first place.
    - locopati 2y ago
      There's nothing ideological about biology. Trans women are more aligned with cis women than cis men. Links to your claims?
      - bobalob 2y ago
        What do you mean by "more aligned"? Some names to search as examples of why this policy of incarcerating males in women's prisons is so harmful: Tremaine Carroll, Janiah Monroe, Demi Minor, Ramel Blount, Karen White. To go back even further as to why prisons became sex-segregated in the first place, please look up the work of Elizabeth Fry. She documented the awful conditions in mixed-sex prisons of the 19th century, and how terrible this was for female prisoners. Her evidence helped bring in changes to the law that ensured female and male prisoners were separated.
johnea 2y ago
I'm sure many of those "men" will be eagerly awaited in the US's giant state funded homosexual rape facilities...
locopati 2y ago
To everyone in this thread referring to trans women as men... fuck right the hell off with your ignorant bigotry.

19 points by pizza 2y ago

This is such a tough issue to deal with, definitely in the "damned if you do, damned if you don't" category in my book. There's just not good, clean answer. Sex is almost universally binary (there are exceptions, though very rare). Gender is by no means binary though, its a totally different concept that just happens to correlate well enough to sex for most people. I'd like this to be a scenario where you just don't have prisons if you can't decide how to effectively group people and keep them safe. Most people wouldn't go for that though, we very much like punishing people for their mistakes and making them trade months or years of their life as penance.

bitshiftfaced 2y ago
Do you believe that because of the circumstances you mentioned, people shouldn't necessarily go to prison even if they murder someone?
- meristohm 2y ago
  In many cultures, exile or retribution was the answer to murder, and to prevent things getting so heated, strong and secure family and community bonds go a long way. American prisons (I'm American, and also don't know much about non-US prisons) continue to be a great way to take advantage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution and thus continue to benefit from slave labor. My military uniform was made by enslaved people, for example. I'm with Angela Davis and numerous other abolitionists on this topic.
  - s1artibartfast 2y ago
    What would exile look like? where would they be sent? It is hard to imagine another country taking them, and any no-mans land the US establishes would likely be at least as hellish as the prison system. Do we just keep dumping them on some island to Battle Royale/ Hunger games? is that more humane?
- _heimdall 2y ago
  If we can't safely imprison people, absolutely. Do you believe that someone who committed murder deserves to be held against their will in an unsafe environment? My point isn't that prisons must be completely safe and nothing could ever go wrong. They should, though, be on par with the relative safety of the world outside prison walls.
  - pixxel 2y ago
    [dead]
  - beretguy 2y ago
    > Do you believe that someone who committed murder deserves to be held against their will in an unsafe environment? Absolutely. Give them what they want. Give them a taste of their own medicine. If they don't want to be civilized - don't give them civility.
  - bitshiftfaced 2y ago
    The hazard rate of a violent act is much higher among violent offenders, and it would be inhumane to put everyone in solitary confinement, even if you could afford it. Therefore, a prison containing violent offenders will never be as safe as the overall outside population.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
Let’s back up: what do we need to do to keep these (and other) inmates safe? They can call themselves a man, woman or air fryer, it’s almost irrelevant. What’s essential (and being lost in the hair-picking exercise of trying to solve for a universal theory of gender and sex) is that they not be shanked while Twitter has an incel side panel on sex ed. We divide inmates by more than just sex. We put sex offenders, literal rapists and pedophiles, in separate accommodation for their safety. Why can’t we do the same for trans folk? Even if you believe they’re deranged, what right does anyone have to extend their disgust to damnation? The situation is complicated. But not tough.
- s1artibartfast 2y ago
  Im curious how the status quo compares with respect to the safety angle. Is the primary safety concern sexual violence, or hate crimes? I imagine pregnancy would also be a concern. If the main concern is sexual assault, can imagine there are risks either way, status quo and ex-post. If the concern is hate crimes, I could imagine trans people also suffering under either case. Prison is a high risk place.
  - toomuchtodo 2y ago
    If we can’t derisk prison, it’s a human rights violation to incarcerate in them. It’s high risk because of choices.
    - s1artibartfast 2y ago
      What is the alternative? Corporeal punishment only? No law enforcement? Solitary confinement would also be a rights violation.
      - toomuchtodo 2y ago
        Funding corrections systems at an appropriate level where violence is an exception, not the norm. If you can’t afford to do it, you can’t afford to incarcerate. American prisons are about making humans suffer though (vs rehabilitation) as inexpensively as possible, so I don’t see this changing in the near future.
smallerize 2y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_rights_in_the_United_States#V-coding https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_rights_in_the_Un... 58% of trans women placed in men's prisons report being violently sexually assaulted. One answer is a lot more damned than the other.
- _heimdall 2y ago
  That falls squarely in the "if we can't imprison citizens safely, maybe we shouldn't imprison anyone" category for me.
  - yawpitch 2y ago
    … ok, you might be getting a little closer to waking up here. If prisons worked (as anything but a source of cheap labor) all Americans would be safe.
    - _heimdall 2y ago
      I don't need to wake up here, and your condescending tone wouldn't help convince me otherwise.
      - yawpitch 2y ago
        [flagged]
        _heimdall 2y ago
        I didn't mean tone as in the intonation of your words, I meant the specific words you chose and what they imply. You made it clear that you know where I currently stand on the topic, where I have stood on it in the past, what I do or don't know, and that you're way of viewing the topic is right and I just need to "see the light" as it were. All of that was very clear in your written words, verbal intonation was needed to know what you meant and how you viewed me in that exchange.

jmclnx 2y ago

Maybe have a special prison ? In the US, how many can there be ? But like everything else, Musk and his lackey Trump only cares about how much they can pilfer from the US.

mingus88 2y ago
I hear they’re making Guantanamo Bay into a special prison. A camp, if you will.
- LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
  Cuba libré!
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> Musk and his lackey Trump only cares about how much they can pilfer from the US Musk is a failed father, particularly when it comes to his trans kid(s). This might be a personal thorn for him that will wreak havoc and waste public resources to salve.
- computerthings 2y ago
  [dead]
s1artibartfast 2y ago
Your question made me wonder enough to read the article. It said: > Previous data from the BOP website indicated there are 1,529 transgender women and 744 transgender men in custody. It's also unclear how many are currently housed in prisons according to their birth sex versus their gender identity. Of course, The issue is complicated by levels of security. However, a tran-man and a trans-women prison would at least eliminate the hypothetical problem of pregnancy during incarceration. It would be interesting to see numbers on that as well in the current status that has people assigned male and female at birth in the same facilities
Ajay-p 2y ago
this already exists in the form of medical facilities for inmates with mental and physical limitations.

gaganyaan 2y ago

Men don't belong in women's prisons. Find a way to keep them safe in the sex-appropriate prisons, but don't make it women's problem. Tremaine Carroll is a good example of why we need to stop coddling people's feelings on this.

lores 2y ago
You're on Hacker News, therefore a rational person. Shouldn't you be forming opinions from statistics rather than extrapolating from individual cases?
- gaganyaan 2y ago
  Can we first agree that this case is a terrible one, in which a man intentionally identified as a woman in order to get the chance to rape women? There's more cases, but if we can't agree on ground truth in such an obvious case then there probably won't be common ground for calculating statistics.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

bobalob 2y ago

This is good news for female prisoners, at least those in federal prisons. Hopefully the federal government can take measures to keep male inmates out of women's prisons and jails at the state and local levels as well. Perhaps through conditions attached to federal funding.

locopati 2y ago
[flagged]
- bobalob 2y ago
  That is a strong ideological belief, for sure. Implementing it as policy in the prison system has been disastrous for female prisoners, with multiple cases of rape, assault and impregnation of incarcerated women by male inmates who claimed to be "not men" and gained access to women's prisons on that basis. So it's good that this policy has been reversed and cancelled. It was a massive safeguarding failure that should never have happened in the first place.
  - locopati 2y ago
    There's nothing ideological about biology. Trans women are more aligned with cis women than cis men. Links to your claims?
    - bobalob 2y ago
      What do you mean by "more aligned"? Some names to search as examples of why this policy of incarcerating males in women's prisons is so harmful: Tremaine Carroll, Janiah Monroe, Demi Minor, Ramel Blount, Karen White. To go back even further as to why prisons became sex-segregated in the first place, please look up the work of Elizabeth Fry. She documented the awful conditions in mixed-sex prisons of the 19th century, and how terrible this was for female prisoners. Her evidence helped bring in changes to the law that ensured female and male prisoners were separated.

johnea 2y ago

I'm sure many of those "men" will be eagerly awaited in the US's giant state funded homosexual rape facilities...

locopati 2y ago

To everyone in this thread referring to trans women as men... fuck right the hell off with your ignorant bigotry.