Waiting for an Echo: The Madness of American Incarceration
Written and Narrated By: Christine Montross
Length: 10 hrs and 8 mins
A most DEFinite slug to the gut—with the tiiiiiniest of glimmers of Hope at the end. And I DO mean TINY
Christine Montross was offered two jobs after completing her psychiatric education, asked a mentor which one might suit, and the mentor dismissed both of them, asking instead: Have you thought of working in the prison system?
This was an extreme no, and so Montross took a job with a hospital of the sickest of the mentally ill, a job she loved. Soon, however, she found that a variety of her patients, upon being released, wound up in the criminal justice system, behaviors based upon their illnesses having landed them in custody where, she found to her utter dismay, bad things were happening.
And so Waiting for an Echo is 10-hours of a trip into the hell of America’s incarceration system where the sick get sicker, and those who went in mentally stable are driven to madness, new and dangerous neural pathways being developed by methods used in the prison systems and in jails.
Have no doubt, she reiterates what’s readily known: The impoverished are more likely to be caught up in the system, and there are HUGE disparities in sentences given out due to race. Plus, the mentally ill are simply not understood.
This is a gut-wrenching journey into, not man’s inhumanity to man, but Americans treating fellow citizens in the worst possible ways. Tho we spout things about sentences being time for reflection, tho we spout things about the prison system being a deterrent against crime, no. None of that is true: It’s entirely a matter of revenge, and you’ve caused harm so great harm will be done unto you. And the system is so broken, so brutal, we all, if we give it even a single thought, simply shudder and look away. Or p’raps we self-righteously, coming from privilege and with options, fling out phrases such as: If you can’t do the Time, don’t do the Crime.
Small, itty bitty offenses are met with unmeetable demands. A woman who steals clothes to sell so that she might buy a car seat, be able to, as required, take her newborn home instead of having it taken from her, is caught, sent to jail where the very lack of money that doomed her choice keeps her from making the pittance of bail. She gives birth in jail, and she has her child taken away from her. She had no options, and we as a society would just as soon tsk, tsk, and move on to other, less depressing, interests.
Hers is by NO means the worst story in Waiting for an Echo; indeed, listening to this was like being hammered by a 2-by-4 of Shame! each time a story that Montross relays of her experiences in interviewing prisoners, mentally ill to begin with, or those who became exceedingly traumatized after extended stints in segregation, or after violent attacks which are de riguer in prisons left inmates feeling helpless and with nightmares that continued to haunt them.
Add to all of this that the vengeful measures, causing so much damage, in no way, shape, or form, ready the individual to reintegrate into society as a productive and whole member, quite simply makes our communities more unsafe.
All based on Fear. Our media relentlessly relates the rare violent crime as: This Might Happen To YOU; our candidates are voted for based on Tough On Crime agendas, again based upon our Fear. And within the prison walls, we WANT our prisoners to be stripped of their humanity; we treat them like Monsters.
And we create what we say we don’t want, we create individuals who’ve become what we’ve treated them as.
The only, ONLY glimmers of Hope occur in Part Three, where Montross travels to Scandinavian countries who once had as crazy violent prisons as we do in the US, where riots occurred, where recidivism once released was waaaay high. But in those countries; there’s a trust in science, a trust in the government to do the Right Things for the Citizens. Here are the problems, the scientists/researchers are told, What can we do? And when answers are found, there’s a willingness within their governments to implement findings. And each of these things have met with success. That such turnarounds happened as recently as 1995 offers some hope, that modern populations, that quick successes can be felt so immediately, made me breathe (A difficult feat after the constant pummeling).
But we have a barrier in the US between scientists who find the facts and solutions, and politicians who dismiss them if they don’t meet with their specific agendas or moral codes. I’d Boooo! this soundly, but trust me when I offer that I simply haven’t the breath within my body to exhale for any period of time.
This is one loooong held breath, one horror show that’ll stay with me for a lifetime. And through it all, I was very glad, sooo very glad that I’d listened to Trust First by “Ghetto Rev” Bruce Deel who puts ideals and great love and acceptance into actions, who does NOT believe the, however justly, accused are only the sum of their actions. He believes in seeing the human being behind the struggle, and he believes in assisting and offers the helping hand… to anyone.
So maybe, when all is said and done here: I don’t believe we’ll ever, as a society, go the way of the Scandinavian countries in seeing the humanity within the even violent criminal (Who CAN be taught other ways of living, who CAN have wounds and suffering addressed). But I DO believe, as Deel offers: We, as individuals can learn to see a shared humanity.
Montross doesn’t offer it, seeing this as a nationwide problem (Which it most definitely is!), but whereas I feel blessed having been born in this country, the current discord and incivility leaves me with a lack of faith in government change occurring. No, Montross wraps her book up with reiterating just how good people can make bad choices based upon Fear of What MIGHT Occur.
I guess I’m left with It Begins With Me, and that means offering blankets and cigarettes to the homeless veterans living by the creek, even if they might be struggling with addictions to illegal substances, even if their behavior gets erratic when car alarms go off, enough to get the cops called.
Cuz the Bigger Picture? Oh good god, Montross makes her case powerfully, but those threads of Hope are but the sheerest of gossamer strands ever.
Can I breathe now…?
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