March 7, 2014 Leg. Stud. 185 Is solitary confinement torture?

One of the important issues one must consider when looking at the prison system is the practice of solitary confinement or also called SHU. The amount of prisoners placed in solitary confinement, the uncertain amount of time given, and the amount of damage it causes have been researched by various scholars. Whether you advocate abolition of prisons or not you should be able to take an objective stance on the practice of solitary confinement. Isnt it bad enough to take away a persons freedom by imprisonment? Why do we further the prisoners degradation through solitary confinement? The facts of the horrendous effects of solitary confinement are undeniable, we cant ignore them. Dr. Terry Kupers has been able to describe how placing a human being in isolation for long periods of time causes cognitive impairment. How is it that we criminalize individuals who chain and isolate their pets but allow prison guards to confine humans? Humans need to be able to interact with others, it has been proven by various scholars how necessary social interactions are. Yet, we deny prisoners in solitary confinement their right to human contact. Social interactions are a basic human right and depriving someone of that is taking away their dignity. Furthermore, those in solitary confinement are denied their right to do essential activities like learning, exercising, and proper medical care. Not only are the prisoners dignity not respected but they are tortured. The kind of torture they suffer is more mental than physical as Dr. Kupers has shown. Prisoners with mental illnesses come out of the SHU in a worst condition than before because the isolation only exacerbates the symptoms of their illness. Even those without previous mental illnesses can become traumatized by their experience in the SHU, causing a once healthy

individual to become unhealthy. The complete breakdown of a person inside the Shu is torture and it is inhumane. The practice of solitary confinement is not meant to rehabilitate a prisoner but to incapacitate. In an article by the guardian it states, You may remain in this place [the SHU] for months, years, or even decades. The conditions in which you live have been denounced as torture by UN officials and by a host of human rights, civil liberties, and religious groups. Others have recognized that solitary confinement is torture and yet we continue to allow it in the U.S. The article points to the fact that this practice remains invisible to those outside the prison and therefore nothing is done to oppose it. But now that there have been many various sources that expose the truth about solitary confinement it can no longer be ignored. Those among us, myself included, who have never even been inside a prison, may not have personal experience to open our eyes but we have the experiences of others who have been less fortunate. To make matters worse those in California have to deal with the fact that California's super isolation facilities are an outlier in a country that is already a global outlier in its reliance on these inhuman prisons (Jonathan Simon). The Golden State is at the top of the list when it comes to the practice of solitary confinement. As a Californian I like to brag about all the wonderful things this state has to offer but the SHU is definitely not one of them. Those in charge of the prison system and many legislators who defend the practice of solitary confinement claim that it is the only way to separate the bad apples from the rest. But by degrading these prisoners arent we just making them worse so that if they are released they will only be a greater threat to themselves and society? It would make more sense to try to rehabilitate those bad apples to make sure they can have normal social interactions.

The facts are clear, solitary confinement is cruel and causes more harm than good. It isnt necessary to experience it for yourself to realize that it is inhumane. If you just try to imagine being placed in a small space deprived from basic human rights you can get a sense of the horrific effects it has on an individual. No matter what stance one takes the first step is to educate ourselves on what solitary confinement is doing. It may be hard to sympathize with a criminal, especially one who has committed a very serious crime, but we must remember that they are still human. Since they are humans we must ensure that their dignity is respected and that they are not tortured. As Sonya Shah has pointed out these systems didnt just come about naturally, we created the system and we can dismantle it. Change is possible if we really want it, we just have to work for it.