In the May 2009 Focus on Indiana Libraries is an article entitled, "Not Yet Hot Off the Press" by Doug Archer, ILF & ALA Intellectual Freedom Chair. He lists two potentially high impact items that have not yet shown up in the national media. I'm just going to address one of them, and that is the recently proposed regulation from the Federal Bureau of Prisons which would scrap the "Standard Prison Chapel Library Project" and replace that with a system that involves the selection of approved religious books by a "quasi-secret" government panel with an item by item rejection system administered by prison officials. The ACLU is opposing these new rules because it violates statutory and constitutional requirements and statutory protections for the free exercise of religion among other things. More pertinent to our class is the ACLU's objection that the proposed rules fail to specify a decisionmaker and raises the specter of censorship by "low-level" officials.
My reaction to this is mixed. I on theoretical grounds have to agree with the ACLU that prisoners do not give up all constitutional protections once incarcerated, and letting local prison officials make decisions on which books can be read and which cannot introduces more bias than I like to think about. I was employed with the Indiana DOC for seven years as a substance abuse counselor. I saw abuse coming from both sides. I saw AA big books carved out so that drugs could be smuggled in them. It was commonly known that religious services at one institution where I worked were a meeting and trading place for drugs. I also saw authorities exercise unnecessary authority and restrictions and abuse just because they could. However, what about those offenders (no longer called inmates or prisoners) who truly just want to educate themselves and are denied religious books based on stereotypes about a particular religion? I agree with Doug Archer that the Federal Bureau of Prisons need to come up with a better plan, specifically about who the decision-makers will be regarding selection of religious materials. I also understand that those incarcerated have rightfully lost some rights and should not get to have free reign over what they select to read.
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I once read a report of a Satanist (Anton LaVey's Church of Satan) inmate being denied religious materials because the DOC in his state considered his religion to be gang-"affiliated." Now, anyone familiar with LaVey's brand of Satanism realizes that the vast majority of his followers are simply self-centered wankers who like to wear black and look fierce.
ReplyDeleteGood example of a common reason for censoring various materials in the prison system. Not familiar with LaVey, you give a humorous description of his followers.
ReplyDeletePam, I agree: there needs to be a better policy in place in terms of who makes the decisions about "acceptable" religious materials--and they are doing this on an item by item basis? That seems time and labor intensive, and makes me wonder if they've really considered the logistical aspects of the plan--let alone the rights of offenders. Stereotyping religions would almost undoubtedly come into play (there's bound to be someone who has a negative view of any religion there is). I'm sure prison officials are more concerned with keeping order than educating offenders or debating what rights they forfeit when they are convicted--let's not even talk about those who are wrongly convicted and deprived of their rights! Yes, ideas can be dangerous, and perhaps especially so in a prison setting, but denying offenders the right to read about certain religions--and perhaps even to be rehabilitated by that reading(I know that might sound overly optimistic, but religion can be a powerful force for good) Or ill, as I am sure prison officials would argue. Obviously, I don't have the answer, but you've given me some things to think about.
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