83.-in-the-belly-1.pdf
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an abolitionist journal







Published and Distributed by
True Leap Press

P.O. Box 408197
Chicago, IL 60640

P.O, Box67
Ithaca, NY 14851


Contents

Welcome, Comrades

Why this? Why new? ________ 6
What is Abolition? 10
The Yard 0

Abolition in Action: Demands in the Covid-I9
Crisis

Release People from Jail to Prevent Coronavi-
rus Catastrephe Behind Bars 2

My Mind Today in Solitary ____ 25
Apparitional Encounters _____ 26
23Hours 8
Dates in Radical History: May —___34
Dates in Radical Fistory:June ___ 36
Book Reviews 38
Brick by Brick, Werd by Word ____ 41

Wasted


Welcome, Comrades

In The Belly is a journal by and for people who
are held captive by the Prison-Industrial Com-
plex. For people whose lives are impacted, de-
termined, and overshadowed by punishment
and incarceration daily: prisoners and. their
families, loved ones, friends, communities and
comrades.

Our project is to strengthen the bonds between
all of us to overcome the state's regime of iso-
lation, to study and learn together, ard to build
a world without prisons. We want this to work
like a kind of forum, a tool for faciliating dis-
cussion and a platform for mutual political edu-
cation. Sometimes that will mean questions in
one issue, and answers in the next. Principled
disagreernent. Call and resporise.

Subscription for incarcerated people is 100%
free. Just write us to tell us you want to keep
receiving In The Belly, and we'll keep sending it
in. Money-wise, we are completely sustained by
outside supporters’ donations.


We hope you'll read it. We hope you'll go farther
and talk about it, share it, copy it, and mark it ug,
Lend it out, read it again. And we hope you'll
write in it. We encourage all our incarcerated
readers to send in their writing, and tell us what
you want to see develop, grow, and change.

Send submissions, art, poems, articles, reflec-
tions, ramblings and questions, comments,
and feedback to the address below. Be sure to
tell us wrether you want what you serd to be
published, and if so, what name you would like
to publish under. All the artwork will have to ap-
pear ‘n black anu white, for now. We hope to
hear from you soon.

In The Belly Journal
PO Box 67
Ithaca, NY 14851
Why this? Why now?

by Stephen Wilson

Sometimes, a crisis can become an impetus, a reason
to co what should have been cone a long time ago.
AL Lig onset of COVIDIS 1 the United States, many of
us in the penal anolition movement realized that we
lacked the means to keep each other informed and to
stay connected. We needed a way everyone, impris-
oned folk and their outside allies, could connect and
learn, While lots 0° information is available online, pris-
one’s cannot eccess it. We cannot participate in saciel
media like those outside the walls. We need print pub-
lications to stay informed and connected to those out-
side. We need print publcations to participate in con
versations abcut prisons, policing, incarceration and
strategies that actually produce safety and justice

As Rachel Herzing said, "I think there is, what |
would call, an over rellance cn social media which has
meant that a lot of people are just left out. There are
many people Iving in cages who don't have access to
social media, And even those who do, they might not
have access to it in the same real time that people Ih
ing outside cages do.. Se there are potentially millions
of people who don't have a voice in the ccnversation”

Print publications facilitate the flow of infor-
mation in between imprsoned folk and between im
prisoned and their oulside allies. It's important thet
we are part of the conversation, that we dialogue with
each other and our supporters. Such dialogues are
central to our organizing strategies and ultimate goal.
Print publications erable us to have collective dia-
logues about what we want cur movement to be avout
and to create space for everyone seeking liberation.
Print publications collapse the distance between us.

These cages were constructed to divide anc iso-
late We cannot tear them down alore. We have to cre~






ate spaces, where we can come together and learn, study,
discuss, debate, strategize and assess. Mariame Kaba
said, “I don’t think you can work on your own. There's
definitely no way to dismantle the systems we're try-
ing to dismanue on our own. That's first and foremost.”
We need eac ozher to learn, to grow, to win. Aude
Lorde said, "Without cornmunity, there is no liberation.”

We have to build forwards together, asimprisoned
folk, formerly imprisoned folk, families and frierds of im-
prisoned and formerly irrprisoned folk, allies, accomplic
es and supporters. We need spaces to develop different
perspectives end educate each other. We need to have
conversations, but they must be inclusive. So much of
what Is written about prisons, pelicing and incarceration
is inaccessible to prisoners. It is ricdled with so much
Jargon that there is no way for ost prisoners to enter
the texts. It wasn’t written with imprisoned folk in mind.

We need mazerial that is understandable and
compelling. We need works that speak directly to
those most impacted and their daily problems. That
work can be intellectually rigorous, well-researched,
and still accessible to mass audiences. We need
print publications. Without thern we cannot learn,
change or connect. Before we can dismantle the sys-
tem and bring abou: a world without cages, we must
learn to build with each other right where we are.

Prison is a place of separation, alienation and di-
vision. Administrators and officers often play off prison-
ers differences tc keep us separated. Sadly, many of us
fall for the divide and conquer tactic. It takes wor« and
study 10 be able to recognize the set of pract ces used
by the stale lo maintain concrol, It takes work and study
to be able to understand, disrupt, and dismantle the
PIC. We need political education. Political education
will provide us with use‘ul tools of analysis. By study, |
am referring to what Fred Moten and Stefano Harney
write about in their book The Uncercommons: “Study
is the relation to other people that happens when we're



7
we're building something of our own, or at least some-
thing that isn’t planned for or provided in Uieinstitution.”

“hat something that isn't being provided is po-
litical education: the knowlecge tha: helps a person to
understand the whys and hows of their life. It is con-
sciousness-raising knowledge that cnce obtained, em-
powers one to change one’s life and one’s world. It is
important that we understand power, how it has been
and is being used against us. It is imperative that we
learn to see the world in newly critical arid imagina-
tive ways. Like Frenk Wilderson said, ‘It's a revolution
ary idea just to create the space to deal wits this stuff”

t's work. It will require time, energy and patience.
‘We have a lot to unlearn. Robin D. G. Kelley said, “People
don't come to the movemert intellectual blank slates,
but loaded down with culturel and ideological baggage
molded by their race, class. gender, werk, community,
religion, history, upbringing and collective memory.’ The
work we do, the studying, teaching, advoca:ing and at-
tempts at inst tutionel change, expose and chip away
the lies that prop up and undergird oppressive systems.
Our learning and teaching are intentional interven-
tions in the systems the PIC depends upon to survive,

Frank Wilderson sald, “We must provide our-
selves with an ‘intramural context’ in which we
can discuss cur issues." It is my hepe and inten-
tion that In The Belly is that intramural cortex.
't is my hope that through its pages, we connect with
each other and build a stronger, more inclusive rrove-
ment. It Is my hore that in it, we will heve constructive
dialogues and conversations about who we are and
what we want. It is my hope that In The Belly challeng-
25 us to broaden our definitions of justice, cormmuni-
ty and freedom. | hope its pages provide us with tools
we can use to grow study groups across this world, in-
side and cutside the walls. | hope its pages provid>
us the sustenance te keep moving forward together.
In struggle, Stevie




Freedom is a habit.
- Kuwasi Balagoon

























iS

Doyou know whe made this? Let us know!
What is Abolition?

by lJ.

We are abolitionists, working to build 2 werld without
prisons, police, punishment and confinement. At first,
this sounds scary to a lot of people. That's probably be-
cause people actually have a pretty good sense of what
that would take. In order for our society to not have pris-
ons, we will need major changes. For ore, we will need
to actually deal with harm, which is different from crime.

We experience harm in many different ways.
‘There's interpersonal harm, which is most of what our
current system claims to deal with (ever though it
tails). Acts like murder, sexual assault, and robbery. But
there's also poverty, structural racism, ard exploitation,
Thete are deadiy drone, attacks, sanctions that starve
and kill people in Iran and Venezuela, and there is the
toxic water in Flirt, Michigan. For most of us paying
rent is a form of harm, but we can't call the cops on
our landlord for charging us to live. We can't ever cal
the cops on our landlords when they won't fix the sink

As abolitionists, we say that the current system,
which they call “the criminal justice” systern, produces
more harm than it prevents, and offers zero justice It is
based on prisons, punishment, probacion, po ice, and pri
vate property. These institutior s, along with a bunch of pri
vate companies that sell them goods and services, make
up the Prison-Industrial Complex, or the "PIC." We don't
believe the system is broken, needing to be fixed. We be-
lieve this system is working exactly asit is supposed to: as
an oppressive, violent regime that upholds white suprem-
acy, capitalism, and patriarchy. People have been reform:
ing the PIC for centuries - what we have to dois abolis

The PIC emerges from colonialism, slaveryand
union busting. As an extension cf colonialism and slav-
ety, the PC disproportionately harms Black, Brown
and Indigenous people. As an agent of strike-breax









10


ing and union busting, the PIC, and especially polic-
ing, enforces a strict and violent social order that keeps
us divided, alienated from each other, and unable
to unite against all the forms of oppression we face.
Through all of this runs gerdered violence - wemen,
queer and trans people experience specific herms ard
injustices on top of the rest. Abcliticn is a project to de-
stroy these systens of oppression and replace them
something new. Or maybe many things new.
Were not promising a world without herm. Peo-
ple hurt each other, and that wen't change. But why do
‘we all just accept that the appropriate response to harm
is more harm, administered by the state? What experi-
ence ftom our own lives tells us that jocking someone Up
is the best way to help them, or the parson they may have
hurt? Whyarewe so quick to call the cops on each othe
‘These are big questions, and abolition is a massive project
that is nothing less than a tctal and revolutionary re-cr-
dering of society. But it is also based on things we do for
each ozher every single day. When we don't call the cops,
we're doing abolition, We do it wher we hurt someone,
when we actually make it up te them and regain their
trust, nd when we give someone the chance to ragain
our trust. We do abalition, when we show solidarity by
sharing some of what's ours, or by takinga risk for a friend.
‘Ona broader scale, we do abolition by weakening

the PIC in any way we can. That can mean fighting to
abolish mandatory minimum sentences, putting an end
to the practice of re-incarceratira people for parole vio-
lations, and building neichborhcod councils that resolve
conflicts without cops. A lot of abolition can looklikewhat
reformers do. But the difference iy that referrers think
‘thet we can fix these problems and have a fair, non-rac-
ist criminal justice system, We say that's impossible - the
whole thing has to be tern up, root and stem. So when
we push for retorms, we push for reforms that weak
en the system rather than strengthen and legitirrize it.
Fellow abolitionist and comrade Ruth Wilson Gilmore











u
calls these “nor-reforrrist reforms.’ For example,
building new jails lo deal with overcrowding is a re
formist reform - it ensures another century of jai
ing people. A non-reformist reform would be some-
thing like decerce-ating and shrinking jail populations
by funding communities and dercriminalizng sex
work, d-ugs, and homelessness, ‘t won't get us full ab-
olition this year, but it pushes us that much closer.

Mos: importantly, abolition means cultivating
inside, and building strong connections be-
tween inside end outside. This movement has always
heen, and will always be led by currently and formerly im-
prisoned people. We keep that gaing with study groups,
political education, mutual aid, letter-writing, and per-
sonal felationsnips besed on trust and solidarity. It 15
‘our hore that this journal is doing the work of abolition,

So what is abolition? Ruta Wilscn Gilrnore says
that abolition is usually thought of as absence - no
more jails, no prisons, and no cops - but what it’s real
ly about is presence. What do we went to build togeth-
er that will meke prisons. jails. cops and landlords ob-
solete? What kind of world do we want? These might
seem like lofty questions, but they are important for us
to think about as we organize. As we struggle, study, and
build community together, the answer to this question
- What is Abolition? - will evolve and grow And when
we remember that every single empire, every single
social order, and every economic system that humans
have ever made has come to an end, we can start to
think of abolition as not only passible, bu: necessary.





What does abolition mean to you? Tellus in
a few words, paragraphs, poetry or art!



12




Artwork by #22 EXSO
Artwork by Todd Hyung-Rae Tarselli







The Vard

by Stephen Wilson

Before,

a call would come,

a bell screeching through
the mumble thick air.

And we'd flow to the yard,
cursing the sun

that beat down upon us.
We'd walk the perimeter

of the ankle-high grass,
eyeing the full-court game
or the handball contest,
envying the few whe made it out first
to the two or three shadows,
that could protect us.

But that was then.

Now,

there's no call,

Just a steel-mesh celling
and four long, (
corpse-gray,
soul-collapsing

concrete walls.

20’ x 40°

16


Abox calleda yard.

As we watch the three-on-three game,
in the cold, angulated shadows,

the memory of grass licking our ankles,
achingly flows through our minds.
And we curse the sun

that used to beat down upon us.

The Hell of Memory

We have rehabbed the dead,
manufactured meaning & heroes
from frail illusions.

Our uncelebrated lives lost,

crashed upon the reefs of experience.
Unmendably broken.

Lesson:

We cannot unlearn the old silences,
the hell of memory.

. That invincible maniac,
its brutalizing smile
. and nerve-jangling laughter lashes us,

as we struggle against time
ina land with no clocks.

Fd
Abolition in Action: Demands
in the Covid-19 Crisis

Across the ward, prisoners are fighting for survival and
protections against the virus. Here re some demands
from prisoners behind the wail in the USA:

Strike at Rikers, NY (reprint from poster)

As of March 22nd, 2020, two dorms of 45 inmates at Rik
ers are refusing to leave our dorms for work duti2s or for
meels.

We take these actions in protest cf:

+ The lack of personel protective equipment (PPE) and
cleaning supplies provided to inmates.

+ The crowded living conditions imposed on us prior
to the pandemic and made worse by the daily ad-
dition of new inmates from other facilities some of
which are highly lixely to rave been exposed to the
COVID-9 virus.

+ The arbitrary disconnecticn of our phones for three
hours on the morning of Sunday March 22nd, 2020.

We clemand the same calls issued by the Board of Cor

rections, that all inmates:

+ Over 50

+ With parole vioations
At high risk due to health conditions
With less than a year of sentenced time

BE IMMEDIATELY RELEASED.

We do this in solidarity with the striking priscners of

Hudson County,

Demands from Pennsylvania

1. Release prisoners, especially those with compromised
immune systems end the elderly (over 50). Also, we hold
that all pretrial detainees who have been enteredinto bail
should he released. They are being held due to poverty.
Lastly, those with clemency and parole petitions should
have their decisions and releases expedited. Healthcare

18


Inside is notoriously negligent. While all of us are vulner-
able, certain populations face more vulnerability. They
should be prioritized for release.

2, Prevention measures should be taken that mitigare
the chances of prisoner becoming infected. Most Import
ant, the DOC needs to enact measures that protect pris-
oners from being infected by their employees. The only
way we will become infected is if the staff brings COVIDI9
inside. Proactive steps need to be taken to diminish, if
not to eliminate, the chances of this occurring. Current y,
little is being done to prevent NOC staff from infecting
prisoners.

Demands from Inside Injustice

Prisons, jails, and detention centers across Amerika a”e

the epicenter of state-sanctioned violence ard death.

Covid-19 cnly makes clear to outsiders what we in-

side have always known: tne state is cruelly indiffer-

ent to injustice Inside and the mass death of pris-

‘oners. The only real solution is to burn the prisons.

Irnmediately, we demand:

1, The relzase and resourcing of all those locked up, be-
ginning with those most vulnerable to infection adn
these near their release dates.

2. Free communication (phone calls, emails, and video
calls) with loved ones outside.

3. Free soap and cleaning supplies for all prisoners dis-
tributed twice a week

4. Mandatory masks, gloves and testing for COs.

5, Free masks, gloves, and testing for all prisoners com-

COs and civilian prisor staff.

id package



ing into contact

6. Weekly acces: lu canteen, cor
rooms.

7. Daily eccess to showers, the yerd, recreation time,
and the law library ofno less than three hours.

8. Anenc to forced labor, aka prison slavery.

9. Anenc to solitary confinement, especially to quaran-
tine sick or presumpt vely sick prisoners.



aly,



19





Release People from Jail
to Prevent Coronavirus
Catastrophe Behind Bars

Reprint fram Shadawproaf, by Jose Saldana, Komrade Z.
and Nadja Guyot

COVID-19, the novel coronavirus. spread
ing across the globe, exposes the dangers of
the US's eroded and underfunded safety net.

Inadequate public health _ infrastructure
and a lack of access to health care, paid sick leave,
and basic material needs leave us woefully unpre-
pared to prevent the soread of the coronavirus and
care for people who get sick in our communities.

But the threat to people —_incarcer-
ated in jails, prisons, and detention cen-
ters across the United States is even greater.

The coronavirus crisis compounds the healt
crisis that incarcerated people across the country face
every day, some for years and decades. This is especial-
ly true for elcerly incarcerated men and women, who
face heightened risk of ceath and injury trom the virus.

For example, ever 675 clderly ircarcerst
ed people have died in New York State prisons
alone since 2011. The vast majority are people of col-
or and the average age at death is 53 years old.
This is a huinan crisis hidden’ Lefind grison walls,

People who are hyper-policed and dispropor-
tionately incarcerated—Black and brown working-class
people, people who use drugs, homeless peosle, trans
and gender nonconforming people, people with dis-
abilities, and poople with mertal illness—come from
communities most impacted by chronic illness and lack
of access to medical care prior to being incarcerated.

Health services in jails may be a person's
first contact with rnedical gersonnel and where
they first receive diagnoses. Once incarcerated, jails,



a.
prisons, and detention centers expose people to in-
carceration-specific health risks, exacerbating ex
isting health carditions ard provoking new ones.

While in‘ectious diseases—from —_legion-
naires disease to chickenpox, tuberculosis to sca
bies—circulate radidly and regularly through cor
rectonal institutions, prisons are more concerned
maintaining order than ensuring health.
Prison staff minimize serious illness, deter in-
carcerated people from raising health concerns, ne-
glect to take them to medical appointments, berate
and punish them for being sick ard retaliate against
them by withholding care. Health care co-pays make
accessing healthcare nearly impossible, especially at
the average wage for prison labor of 14 cents an hour.

In Florida, incarcerated people say when an
infectious disease has been de:ected, physicians
become agents of punishment, stripping incar-
cerated people of their clothes and belongings and quar-
antining them in crovided cells with other sick people.

Under non-pandemic conditions, incarcer-
ation makes already-sick pzople sicker and makes
healthy people less healthy. Jails, prisons, and deten-
tion centers are notoriously deadly in their lack of ried
ical care, Medical services are set up not to provide care
but to guard against “costly’ utilization and lawsuits.

Fundamentally, tre physical facts of con‘ine-
ment—estricted movement, overcrowding, lack of ac-
cess to sunlight and healthy food, and the severirg cf
family end community ties—increase incarcerated peo-
ple's vulnerability to iliness ard reduce their capacity to
fight infection.

COVID=19 and other recent crises bring these fait
ras into dramatic and devastating relief. In 2019, for ex-
ample, as Justice Department lawyers argued in front cf
the Supreme Court that access to soap wasn't mandated
by law, mumps rocketed through immigraticn detention
centers across Texas. And incarcerated seoole are rou-



For
cop
iW
Pre
ree
to
Tr
Pre
PC
40

I
6


ore
sof

h out

tinely left at the mercyof Furricanes and other dangerous
weather ccrnditions, even as they fill sandbags and fight
fires to protect communities outside the prison walls.

So it should corne as no surprise that
jails and prisons across the country are woe-
fully unprepared 10 protect incarcerated peo-
ple frem the unique thrects possd by coronavirus

There is currently no soapin the Metropolitan De-
tention Center, the federal jail in Sunset Park, Brooklyn
that just last year was without heat, hot water, electric-
ity, and medical care during the coldes: days of winter.
Hand sani:izer is contraband for incarcerated people
in many jurisdictions {even as prison labor is being de-
ployed to produce it) because it contains alcohal. in Flor-
ide, cleaning supplies like bleach are contraband anc
incarcerated people can be punished for possession.

Instead of prioritizing expanding access to
coronavirus testing and comprehensive end hu-
mane medical care, jails, prisons, and cetention
centers are likely to rely on restricting family visits,
putting potentially-infected people in *rnedical keep-
lock,” solitary confinement, and facilitywide lock-
downs to ostensibly prevent the dsease's spread.

This is not healtrcare, t is punishment, and
it will increase incarcerated paaple's vulnerabil-
ity to illness, mental realth dis:ress, and suici

COVID.19's impact on the elderly, who are al-
ready suffering from serious age-fela‘ed chronic all-
ments, will be devastating. And oeople who are already
housed separately (and inadequately) for serious health
issues will be further marginalized, created as sec-
ond-class people in a third-class world, even as they will
likely be the first to feel the effects of the coronavirus.

Prison clinics have demonstrated tine and
agein that they will fail to provide adequate care to
growing numbers of sick people as privatized health
care services cu: costs on regular medical needs.

Fortunately, the public health evidence is cleer.







23
If Incarcerating people is bad for individual and cornu
nity health and increases hea th disparities of race, class,
ability, gender, and national origin, keeping people out
of jail, prison, and immigration detertion and releasing
people who are currently confined is good for our health
and safety.

In rasponse to the threat to incarcerated peo-
ple posed by coronavirus, local, state, and federal juris-
dictions must use their powers, including pardon and
clemency, to release people new, beginning with el
derly, ill, immunccompremised, and pregnant people

Jurisdictions also must seize this moment to re-
duce “jail churn"—he rate at which people cycle through
local jails exacerbating the spreac of iliness—by reducing
arrests, declining prosecution, decriminalizing conduct,
eliminating pretrial detention, and releasing people to
fight their cases from home. Providing life’s necessities
instead of criminalizing survival strategies will help, too.









By pursuing a strategy of radical decarceration
we can divest from the jails and prisons that are making
ourcommunities sick and sicker, and invest ia communi-
ty-based, humane, and dignified healthcare for all, in the
face of COVID-I9 and beyond.


My Mind Today in Solitary

by Indy

PREJUDICE comes from Fear and a lack of under-
standing, and life takes a toll as it's truly demand-
ing.

DISCRIMINATION has been around since the be-
ginning of time. We must stand strong, Together,
in this great divide.

HATE Is bred from envy and anon sexual lust.
They wish tobe us so bad they can‘tadjust.

OPPRESSION happens because we are all unique
and different. We are BOLD & BEAUTIFUL. We Must
make a difference.

HOPE Is the potion that keeps us alive. Believe to
succeed and we will survive.

LOVE by itself is potent and pure,the only thing in
this world that is certain to cure.

HAPPINESS is a source within our SELF, put your
worries and inhibitions away on a shelf.

LIFE is what u make it at the end of the day. I
choose to live my life OUTIIHAPPY &GAY(BI)II
25
Apparitional Encounters
by R

The [prison] regime breaks some, physically exterminates
others. An uncounted many..awaken a new and incorrig'-
ble political fantasy, which continuously haunts civil society
and its resident nonimprisoned activists and intellectuals.
= Dylan Rodr’guex,

Forced Passages: {mpiisoned Padical Intellectua's

and the U.S Prison Regime, (2006)

referencing nis correspondence with Hugo Yoo! Pinell

Almost every day | speak with a friend, loved one, or
political acquaintance who is imprisoned. Mostly or
ganizers 'm collaborating with on projects. Some days
more than ance, Some days | speak with multiple peo-
ple locked up. People | sincerely and truly care about,
Whether by phone or letter or email, | do it on princi-
ple, Everyday contact is made with someone. Ive been
doing this for the past year with increasing consisten-
cy. tm not paid to do this. It is part of my praxis & a pro-
cess of what can only inadequately be called solidarity.

{Im trying to think about the language [we/l] use
to describe the unique presence in my life of co-orga-
nizers and friends more generally whe are locked up.
That is, their “absent” presence, or rather their present
absence, in the moments when we are rot commu-
nicating. Whe the phone hangs up. When the jPay
or ConnectNet ernails take days to process. In the mo-
ments when | am incapacitated or unatle to reach peo-
ple. Their presence remains, in my mind, always, in my
bocy-memory and lifeworld. In the spaces between con-
tact and commurication. In the ebb, pause, and break.
They never fully leave me, and what I'm realizing is nei-
the’ I them, An urbreakaole intimacy, a political kinship
ané communatism amidst unspeakable asymmetries,

There is transformation—bollr personal and
communal—in the unfolding of such relationshins



26


that makes this sociality something more significant
to Merrogate than considering it mere “correspon
dence." There is a transformative element to it. More
significant to acknowledge may be the processes of
transformation, that occur in the void between the
structurally-fleeting instances of momentary connec-
tion which define correspondence across prison walls

Avery Cordon writes in her study of haunting és
material sociél phenomena: "Trarsformation mears
something distinct forr resistance..tt is the precari-
ous but motivated transtion from being troubled, of-
ten inexplicably or by repetitively stuck explanations, to
doing someth ng else." Thinking about “haunting” as a
concept gets me closer to thinking about this situation,
The circumstances and the affective register of it al

The longer | do this work, the mere | have come
to realize that it is an apparitional encounter—with the
absent-presence of same of my best friends and ac-
complices held in bondage by the United States—that
motivates and compels me to continue to fignt as of-
ten as this encounter, quite always actually, serves
to reinscribe the isolation, the trauma, the pain, and
the deprivation tha: defines state captivity, bodi-
ly disintegration, and communi:y disorganization.

Although | stil am not satisfied with it, “haunt
ing™ as a concept nevertheless gets me doser to de-
scribing the structure of feeling (or something more?)
at play here, desoite its negative connotation in the
public imaginary and characteristic, symptomatic fear.

In the intensely present absence of im-
prisoned comrades, in the moments when con-
ditions of disappearance become most stark and
real, how does this socialily and feeling of collectivi-
ty remain potent or in tact for the non-imprisoned?

Albeit mostly invisible, albeit asyrnme:
rically experienced, what does his look like on
both ends of the relation that is in lay terms de-
scribed through the dichotomy of “inside/outside"?

27












The question o* absent presence can also be
posed inversely regarding the captive-imprisoned

‘experience the world ‘rom a position of social life,
ofrelative bodily freedom and mobility asnon-imprisoned.
and outwardly cis-genderad end white, while my impris-
oned comredes [live] in systerraticallyenforced civil/social
death. Literal not just figurative/metaphoricalsocial death.

As a structure of feeling, how can meditating
on the appartional presence of the absent imipris-
oned activist Jin what are often dstended moments
dissppearance from the field of social visibility) and
its livirg effects, give rationale and imperative, new
affective drives and psychic registers, or create the
possibility and circumstances for its own undoing?

How dosuch encounters force usto reckon with, or
in the best case, participate in the precarious but motivat-
ed transition from seing troubled often inexplicablyor by
repetitively stuck explanations, to doing something alse?

To be clear, tm nol uying to normalize the
carceral regime that keeps us torn apart; but rather,
in the midst of organizing, fighting, and caily waging
counter-werfare against criminalization and imprison-
ment, what ate the forms of soctali:y—and in my case
as in maybe yours: radical political community—thet
we (differences in positionality considered) are the col-
lective autrors and producers of across prison walls?

I'm being careful to parse out the operative as-
pects here for many reasons. But whatever it mey be,
such encounters with the present absence of my incar-
ceratec loved ones’, and ts lingering effectivity, is what
compess and paradoxically nourishes me. It is such en-
counters that drive my rnadiness (the viofent fluctuation
ane instability of my lived mental health, my sorrow and
grief and range of anxieties) yet simultaneously crient
me towards a horizon of struggle notyet fully articulated.

“Thisis@ pre-paid called from [firstname, last name
for .RG).."is engrained by scolding hotironiamy psyche.

As much as a haunting that pains me to no end









28




it is the very stuff that moves me to change
Uhings. Orie of the many sources of my compul-
sive commitments to abolitionist praxis. 1 won-
der for how many others this sentiment resonates.
In thelr absence. During lapses in communica-
tion. inthe midst of aspirational, apparitional longing for
connectior, How do encountes the ghostly presence
that remains of an imprisoned loved-one? How de | do
this? How do | make space for it? How do | generalize
its collective, social expression in ways that rupture open
historical processes? In ways that cut agairst the grain
of petty bourgeois fatalisrn. In ways that reorient hurnan
gecgraphy In ways that galvanize mass struggle in the
direction of abolition.
[well] need abolition now.
NO.
MATTER
HOV/ LONG IT TAKES,
PEAL CHANGES WILL COME,
AND THE GREATEST PERSONAL REWARD
LIES IN OUR INVOLVEMENT AND CONTRIBUTIONS,
EVEN IF IT MAY APPEAR THAT NOTHING SIGNIFICANT
OR OF IMPACT REALLY HAPPENED,
DURING QUR TIMES
BUTIT DID
BECAUSE
EVERY SINCERE EFFORT
ISAS SPECIAL AS EVERY HUMAN LIFE.
-HUGC PINELL



January 22

“Well said comrade!!!



Twill meditate on this further, but for the time being.

Comrade George ance said: WE MUST PROVE THAT PRIS-
ONS DON'T WORK’. Meaning while this Gestapo Police
State aim to destroy, dehumanize, and break us via their
sadistic tactics, we must constantly struggle towards re-
bullding/redeeming ourselves and thus our communities,

29
This entails forging relations (human bridges) with such
beautiful human beings as yourself, and doing this relative
to our struggle of eradicating prisons altogether.

This has been the impetus towares our connectedness &
we have managed to continue building from here via our
work with/in the WW.L. NOLEN MENTORSHIP PROGRAM. For
example, we haven't communicated in days, but my first
concerns expressed to you was concerning your well be-
ing.

This is what camaraderie entails. It’s about a communal-
isn relative to hurnanity.

REVOLUTIONARY LOVE,
Kijana Tashiri Askari (of the W.L, Nolen Mentorship Pro-
gram)"

“Dear CRG,
Thave always thought or imagined prisoners as ghosts.

Ourfamilies are left with the presence of an absence when
‘we're imprisoned, Our lives are spoken about in the past
tense, like the dead. When we are acknowledged in the
present tense, reference is always made to our social/ci
death: he or she is locked up. We are not seen, butthe rem-
nants of our lives are visible. Our families and friends have
to explain to others why they see pictures of us but we're
never around or rarely mentioned.



People are told to let us go, te go in living without us, but
they find it hard te shake our ghosts, Our loved ones are
often shamed for loving a dead person. They are told that
living means forgetting us.

T often feel haunted by dead friends, lost to HIV and


violence. I feel indebted. I cannot shake their ghosts. I
don’t knawif I want to. They motivate me, Being haunted
is a part of my praxis, my world view.

Iwas intrigued by your comments regarding “the void
between structurally flzeting instances of momentary
connection”... This in fact is where the work Is processed.
This is where we synthesize info. We enter this void to
do the work. We leave it to connect again, sharing what
we've learned and experienced. Thenwe enter itagain. I
know Ido.

Always,
Stevie (of Dreaming Freedom, Practicing Abolition)”











Do you knew who made this? Let us know!



31
23 Hours
by Sarah Torres

Dedicated to participants of the ‘I and 13
California prisonar hungar strikes.

23 hours here lam
7 by 11, barely room to stand

I try to think of you every day, try to see your
face.
Ina room full of gray, time is starting to erase

23 hours here Lam
Only touch I feel is from a guard's glove-cov-
ered hand

It’s been so long since I've felt the sun on my
skin
Fear I'm losing my mind

They are trying to win,

trying to bring me down.


Look to the day when I'll see the sunrise
Feel the rain drops falling from the sky

Hold your hand,
feel your embrace
Tall youa funny story

See that smile on your face, smile in your eyes
Stand together—

Inside and outside, It’s up to us all

Stand together—
Please hear our call

Stand together—
Break through these prison walls

Stand tagether—

There's no time to...

33
Dates in Radical History:
May

May OL May Day! The first day of May is Interne-
tional Worker's Day, a holiday celebrating
working and poor people and the strug-
g@ against capitalism and oppression. It
also commemorates the Haymarket Mas-
sacte of 1886, which came 3 deys later.

May 02 seata Shakur is arrested, Zayd Malik Shak-
1973 ur is murdered by police.

May04 ‘The Haymarket Massacre: At a demorstre-
1885 tion in Chicago to demand that the work-

ing day be sharened to 8 hours, the cons
tried to disburse the crowd violently. Some-
‘one - no one knows who - attacked the
cops. A bunch of people were killed ao the
cops opened fire. Afteward, 8 anarchists
were convicted of murder with no evi-
dence. Their names were: Albert Parsons,
August Spies, Samuel Fielden, Oscar Nee-
be, Michael Schwab, George Engel, Adolph
Fischer and Louis Linag. Parsons, Spies,
Engel and Fisher were hanged, and Lingg
took his own life. The remaining three were
pardoned 6 years later.

May 04 Black Panther Party and Black Liberation
1973 Army member Sundiata Acoli arrested.
May 05, Karl Marx is born,

1818

ce ee ee el
34


May 0S
1981

May 09
1800

May 1s
1925

May 12
1916

May 13
1985

May 15

May 17
2017

May 19
1890

May 20
1743

May 23
1838

Irish Republic Army leader Bobby Sands
dies on hunger strike.

John Brown, slavery abolitionist and leader
of the Reid on Harper's Ferry, is born.

Malcolm X Is born.

trish Rebublican Army leader James Con-
nolly executed for leading the failed revolu-
tionary Easter R'sing acainst Britain,

Philly police bomb the MOVE home from a
helicopter, murdering “I people and incin-
erating ¢ city block.

Nakba Day: The day Pelestinians mark the
invasion of their ancestral lands by the set-
Uer colonial State of Israel.

Chelsea Manning freed after 7 years’ incar-
ceration, Chelsea has just been freed again
after she was jalled for refusing to snitch.

Ho Chi Minh is born.
Toussaint L'Ouverture, hero of the Haitian
Revolution, is born.

Beginning of the “rail of tears," the mur-

derous removal of Cherokee peosle from
their ancestral lands Lal is origgir g today.
Dates in Radical History:

June

June 01 Indigencus rights fighter and mem-

1977 ber of the American Indian Movement
Leonard Peltier is given two life sen-
tences for the deaths of FBI agents at
a shootout at Pine Ridge Reservation.

June 01 ‘The George Jac«son Brigade attacks DOS

1975 headquarters in Seattle, Washington.

June 02 Harrist Tubman leads the Corbahee River

1663 Raid, helping more than 700 enslaved peo-

ple to freedom,

June04 After more than a year in jail, abolitionist
1s72 Angela Davis is acqui:ted of kidnapping
and murder charges.

June? The Guatemalan governmentis overthrown
1954 by the CIA,

dure10 After 27 years in prison, Bleck Panzhet Par-
1997 ty member Geronimo Ji-Jaga is released.
JunelZ — ANTI-LGBTQ shooter murders 49 people
2016 and leaves £8 wounded at Pulse nightclubs

in Orlando, Florida. This s the deadliest
attack on LGBTQ people in LSA’s history.

June13_ The Prison abolitionist journal Bulldozer is
1983 raided by cops in Teronto.

ee ee ee el
36


June 16
197i

June 16
1975

June 13

June 26
1975

June 27
1869

June 27
1905

dune 28

1969

dune 23
1917

Tupac Shakur is born.

700 stucente are killed in the Soweto mas-
sacre during an uprising against apartheid
in South Afr ca,

Juneteenth! This day marks the legal end to
savery in the USA, and many people were
freed. In reality nowever, slavery continued
because this proclamation only applied to
former confederate states, and because tre
proclamation was casually enforced and
made exceptions for criminalized people.

Shoctout at Pine Ridge Reservation be-
tween members of the American Indian
Movement and the FBI

Anarchist and feminist Emma Goldman is
torn.

‘The worker-run union Industrial Workers of
the World is founded.

Riots break out at the Stonewall Inn, when
members of the NYC LGBTQ communities
led by Uaris women of color decide to fight
tack against police violence and harass-
ment.



W, & 8, DuBois leads silent march against
lynching in NYC.



37
Book Reviews

Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis (2003)
Reviewed by S.J.

| was raised, as I would bet many of us were, with the
dominant societal understanding that bad people go
to prison. Some are innocent, and those people will
be released as scon as the court system knows that
they ate innocen:. Prison was for protection, even if
this truth was unspoken. The perceived safety of peo-
ple anywhere was due to the workings of cops and
prisons. Punishment keot us safe. Pzople who did
wrong went to priscn. Systems kept us safe, ochets
did harm. But, who is the “us”? Who are the “others"?

Did police Keep you safe? Have priscns kept you
and your families safe? Have they prevented harm? Hes
criminelization resulted in a society wit less Farm, es-
pecially for those of us who are Black/Brown/Indigenous,
queer, and poor)? In Are Prisons Obsolete? Angela Da-
vis dives into these contradictions and more. Davis suc-
cinctly covers much ground in her six-chapter, 103-9a9¢
bock. In this book, Davis outlines a lot of semi-complete
thoughts, Inad had before reading it in 2018. Ayear, where
I hed spent a lot of time thinking about living in a soci-
ety where prisons are opsressive, but did not really un-
derstand what my place was in helping change society.

| believe that Are Prisons Obsolete? is a tremen-
dously important starting point for thinking atout how
our society uses prison as a contradictory method of
“harm reductio,n" and how it is colored by the United
States’ history of settler-colcnial slavery, theft, and ex
ploitation, how there have come to be 25 million people
caged in prisons, ails, and detention centers, and most
urgenty, what the alternative might look like.





Radical simply means "grasping things at
the root.” - Angela Davis

38


Assata: An Autobiographyby Assata Shakur (1987)
Reviewed by S.J.

Love is contraband in Hell
‘cause love isan acid
that melts away bars.

But you, reandtornurrow
hole hands and make vows
that the struggle will multiply.
= Assata Shakur

Assata, the self-titled autobiography of Black Panther
Assata Shakur gives me hope.

It is a beautifully written narrative jumping
back and forth between Assata's upbringing, ideolog-
ical transformation, Incarceration, sham trial, wrong-
ful conviction, and bruzalizaticn by the police. Bul
ite message gives me hope that | can de something
to change this world, where prisons seem like = giv-
en, exploitation of most a rust, and where decey
is a result of imperialist settler-colonial capitalism.

While these structures that oppress us, includ
ing the prison, seem so strong and so static, there is so
much that goes into fortifying them and keeping them
strang - in schools, in churches, in media, cn the lips of
“our” elected politicians. Bul as Assata Stiakur writes.

And, IF Tknow anything at ail / It's that a wail is just a wall
And nothing more at al/Itcan be broken down.



These structures exist because the people of our society
allow them to exist. Our society sees prisoners as others,
those that can be thrown away, those who can be dis-
posed of, thosewho are irredeemable. land |hope you will
Join me, say that no, every human being is capable of love
and a priscn is not a place that repairs anyone. if aryone
grows inside, it's in spte of the system, rot because of it.

In Asscta, Shekur shows us her ideological de-
velopment in dpposing capitalism, imperialism, settler-
colonialism, cis hetero patriarchy, and incarceration,
which are Just a few of the systems that oppress us.

Furthermore, Assata Shakur was able to find joy
and maintain her hope and faith in a better world, even
uncer the most brutal cenditions. | would be very curi-
ous to hear, how you are able to experience joy even un-
der the brutal conditions of incarceration? Sending love,
light, and peace to you whenever you are reading this.

And if not now,
wh hen?
— Hillel the Elder

If not today, then
tomorrow.

- Khadra Muhammad
Hasan al-Zuwaidi



Have you read a good book or an article re-
cently that you would like to review from an
abolitionist perspective?

Let us know, and submit it to In The Belly!

40


Brick by Brick, Word by Word

Here's a passage from A Hrnabook For Abolitionists

In order to shape a new vision of a better fu-
ture, every social change movement discov-
ers the need to create its own language and
definitions.



Language is related to power. The world is
differently experienced, visualized and ex-
perienced by the powerful and the power-
less. Thus, the vocabulary coined by those
who control the prisons Is ‘dishonest.’ Dis-
honest, because it is based on a series of
false assumptions.

In creating a new system, we need to con-
sciously abandon the jargon that camouflag-
es the reality of caging and develop honest
language as we bulld our movement.

What coes"crime’ mean to you?
What coes"sa‘ety" mean to you?
‘These are not rhetorical questions - tell us, and we'll print

it in the "Brick by Brick, Word by Word’ section in the
next issue of In The Belly!



aL
Wasted

by Stephen Wilson

Sprawled,

smeared across the couch,
heavy, half-closed lids,
glassy eyes reflecting

light from the T.V.

Bart and Lisa

watch the wreckage:

his regularly scheduled descent

into cancellation.