The punishments make sense to the people meting them out. The prison authorities transparently use isolation in an SHU as punishment for making them look bad o

The punishments make sense to the people meting them out. The prison authorities transparently use isolation in an SHU as punishment for making them look bad or for inconveniencing them. The two inmates mentioned in the article who acted as 'jailhouse lawyers' seem like good examples of this. Anyone in prison who offers any resistance to the power of the authorities is very likely to be treated this way, even if they are merely requesting legally-guaranteed rights or marginally better treatment, because doing so acts as an example to others. Auernheimer was imprisoned, it seems to me, primarily for unrepentantly embarrassing those in positions of power, and later transferred to the SHU for the same reason.