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Episode 46 America's Incarceration Industry: Exposing Private Prisons Peer into the world of prison profiteers with Shane Bauer. Shane's name may sound familiar. In 2009, he and two friends were hiking near the Iraq-Iran border when they were arrested by Iranian authorities, accused of espionage and imprisoned for more than two years. Extensive international pressure and diplomatic efforts ultimately secured their release. An American journalist and author, Shane decided to dive deeper into the private U.S. prison system after his return to America. Working as an undercover guard in a private Louisiana prison, Shane exposed its conditions and practices in his award-winning book, American Prison: A Reporter's Undercover Journey Into the Business of Punishment. He and host Matt Adams engage in a perspective-shifting conversation on the origins of America's private prison system, which accelerated in the South after the Civil War. They also discuss the impact of Shane's book on the industry, which pivoted into immigration detention during the Trump administration.
Nearly 2 million people are locked in US jails and prisons on any given day. That's a 500% increase in during the last 40 years. Mass incarceration fueled a move toward private prisons-for-profit as states ran out of space to house incarcerated people and money to build new prisons. Our contemporary system of private prisons -for-profit began in the 1980s. Today, private prisons make billions of dollars every year housing, feeding and overseeing incarcerated people who the state pays them to lock up. But making money off of incarcerated bodies isn't a new idea. It's actually older than the United States. For a great genealogical take on the contemporary prison system, check out Shane Bauer's book American Prison: A Reporter's Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment. For more on the drug war, prison profits and CCA (CoreCivic), see Discourses of Deception: (Re)Examining America's War on Drugs.
Welcome back to our book series, On the Same Page. This week we're discussing the award winning, American Prison: A Reporter's Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment by Shane Bauer. In this non-fiction novel, Bauer, an investigative reporter for Mother Jones magazine, decides to dig into America's prison-for-profit system. As a sneak peak, we were not ready for the bluntness, racial inequitities, and the present-day realities that were detailed in this book.
In 2021 it's difficult for the average person to imagine that someone born and raised in the United States does not know how to use technology or navigate public transportation, or could be overcome with anxiety at the thought of crossing the street. Now imagine being in a position where it's frowned upon to ask for help in those situations or even ask questions because you're expected to just KNOW. I was that person 6 years ago. For over a decade I lived in what I call a time capsule. I was eventually released from one of NJ's state prisons but to an area, where I had never lived, at an age that people expected me to act in a manner that was foreign to me, and without the support needed for my survival. I couldn't get a job because I never had a resume, I couldn't get an apartment because I had no rental, employment, or credit history, I couldn't do the many things that would prevent me from going back to the system designed for me to fail. I'm not the only neighbor you pass that has a similar reentry experience. Hiding In Plain Sight: The Neighbors You Never Hear From is an audio series that will take you on the journey of reentry through the first-hand experiences of 6 people and where they are today.Tia Ryans is an advocate against the detrimental culminations of the criminal legal system. Her areas of passion and study surround the intersectionality between environmental, social, and criminal injustices that impact disenfranchised communities. As the Founding Executive Director of Forcing Out Recidivism Through Education (F.O.R.T.E. House), she provides a healthy and stable living environment for formerly incarcerated students transitioning from incarceration through post-secondary education.Tia is also the Founding Chapter Leader of All of Us or None - Northern NJ, where she leads grassroots advocacy initiatives to support families directly impacted by the criminal legal system. As a first-generation college graduate, she holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science from Rutgers University- Newark. Her experiences include her work with Congressman Donald M. Payne, Jr. (NJ-10) to strengthen and maintain constituent relationships, collaborations with ETS for best practices surrounding justice impacted college students in the educational ecosystem, and presentations in spaces such as The AAUW about the advancements to advocacy and education for women and girls. Tia is also a speaker of the Faces of Women Imprisoned Speakers Bureau to deepen and broaden public conversation through public symposiums.To support the continued work of NJ F.O.R.T.E House and learn more about the organization, visit: njfortehouse.orgGet involved: All of us or None-Northern NJ Tia's Book RecommendationsFourth City: Essays from Prison in America, Edited by Doran Larson (2014)Just Mercy, By Bryan Stevenson (2014)Charged: The New Movement to Transform American Prosecution and End Mass Incarceration, By Emily Bazelon (2019)From Prison to Ph.D.: A Memoir of Hope, Resilience, and Second Chances, By Jason SoleCaught: The Prison State and the Lockdown of American Politics, By Marie Gottschalk (2014)A Colony in a Nation, By Chris Hayes (2017)Insane: America's Criminal Treatment of Mental Illness, By Alisa Roth (2018)American Prison: A Reporter's Undercover Journey Into the Business of Punishment, By Shane Bauer (2018)Among the Lowest of the Dead, By David Von Drehle (1995)Anatomy of Injustice, By Raymond Bonner (2012)Autobiography of an Execution, By David Dow (2010)Burning Down The House: The End of Juvenile Prison, By Nell Bernstein (2014)Convicting the Innocent: Where Criminal Prosecutions Go Wrong, By Brandon Garrett (2011)Inside Private Prisons: An American Dilemma in the Age of Mass Incarceration, By Lauren-Brooke Eisen (2017)A False Report: A True Story of Rape in AmericaBy T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong (2018)Prison Rape: An American Institution?, by Michael Singer (Author)Inside This Place, Not of It: Narratives from Women's Prisonsby Robin Levi (Editor), Ayelet Waldman (Goodreads Author) (Editor)Dark Alliance by Gary Webb (1998)S Street Rising by Ruben Castaneda (2014)This series is part of the Newark News, and Story Collaborative made possible with funding support from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation and the Victoria Foundation. The Newark News and Story Collaborative is committed to elevating community-driven storytelling to fill information gaps in local and national media. The Collaborative trains community members in storytelling, media-making, and other creative art forms to share and amplify their experiences. It's laying the groundwork for a collaborative network that will address longstanding information inequities in Newark, New Jersey. For more information and hear local stories, you can go to newarkstories.com.
On this episode we talk to Monticello’s Niya Bates about an event she moderated at the Northside Library centered around the largest sale of enslaved people in Monticello’s history. We also talk about what we read. Abby read American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment by Shane Bauer Katie read Disappearing … Continue reading S.3 Ep.9 – Roots and Remembrance →
Today's episode is a fascinating and timely conversation that comes to us courtesy of Barnes & Noble's Discover Great New Writers program, featuring Kiese Laymon the author of Heavy: an American Memoir, and Shane Bauer, the author of American Prison: A Reporter's Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment. Heavy and American Prison were, respectively, the first and second place recipients of the 2018 Discover Great New Writers Award for Nonfiction, and both are works that urgently grapple with the state of America today, winning deep praise from critics and readers alike. In Heavy, Laymon takes readers with him on an unforgettable journey from his Mississippi childhood to life as a university professor and acclaimed writer - an odyssey in which racism, sexual violence, trauma and other monstrosities of 21st-century America are challenged by love and a spirit of questing intelligence. And in American Prison, investigative journalist Shane Bauer sought out the real experience of Americans living in incarceration by taking an entry-level job in a private Louisiana prison - and bringing what he found onto the page with eloquence and painstaking care. In a moment when the issues that these books address seems more urgent in our nation's life than ever, we asked the authors to sit down with Miwa Messer, director of B&N's Discover Great New Writers program, to talk about their work, and how they see its meaning against the backdrop of America in 2019. A note for listeners: at points in this conversation, some strong language does come up, which may not be appropriate if you have young children in earshot.
After being detained in a notorious Iranian prison, Shane Bauer returned to journalism and took on an astonishing assignment: to go undercover as a guard in a private prison in Louisiana. His book “American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment” was one of President Obama’s favorite books of 2018. Sponsored by Mother Jones Magazine.
Listen to everything you missed (or listen again to the stuff you heard and loved!) - including all the topics everyone's talking about today, a LOCAL feel-good story guaranteed to make you smile, and a cool deal from Matt Granite. Shane Bauer talks about his experience working undercover as a prison guard in his book, "AMERICAN PRISON: A Reporter's Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment" and our iHeart Deal today is a $50 Nautica Queen certificate for just $25!
On The Gist, Europeans are fighting over daylight saving time, which is way better than having a World War. Mother Jones reporter Shane Bauer has been on both sides of a prison’s bars. After spending two years as a political prisoner in Iran, he returned to the U.S. and got a job as a private prison guard. His real aim, of course, was to report on why the American prison system—private and public—is broken. Bauer’s new book is American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey Into the Business of Punishment. In the Spiel, a debate roundup ahead of the midterms. This episode is brought to you by Exchanges, a podcast from Goldman Sachs. Listen today wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
On The Gist, Europeans are fighting over daylight saving time, which is way better than having a World War. Mother Jones reporter Shane Bauer has been on both sides of a prison’s bars. After spending two years as a political prisoner in Iran, he returned to the U.S. and got a job as a private prison guard. His real aim, of course, was to report on why the American prison system—private and public—is broken. Bauer’s new book is American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey Into the Business of Punishment. In the Spiel, a debate roundup ahead of the midterms. This episode is brought to you by Exchanges, a podcast from Goldman Sachs. Listen today wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Shane Bauer is a senior reporter for Mother Jones whose new book is American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey Into the Business of Punishment. He sits down with Isaac Chotiner to discuss his four months as a guard at a private prison in Louisiana, and what he learned about the American system of justice. Email: ask@slate.comTwitter: @IHaveToAskPod Podcast production by Max Jacobs. Listen to I Have to Ask via Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Shane Bauer is a senior reporter for Mother Jones whose new book is American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey Into the Business of Punishment. He sits down with Isaac Chotiner to discuss his four months as a guard at a private prison in Louisiana, and what he learned about the American system of justice. Email: ask@slate.comTwitter: @IHaveToAskPod Podcast production by Max Jacobs. Listen to I Have to Ask via Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices