Unit C - Blog 17

Correction officers need to be careful about how they form relationships with inmates because emotions are hard to separate in such a different work environment. Britton says that officers either take a view that offenders are still human or they believe the offenders are given too many privileges. In the video, the officers did not really talk about their personal views but you can tell that most of them do not think that the prisoners are too pampered. In fact, at this prison they have many opportunities for the prisoners to work and learn and enhance their lives. They even allow women to start a cosmetology allowing them to work with scissors. It appears that for the most part the CO's in the video take Britton's first view that criminals are still humans that just happened to make mistakes.
According to Britton officers have a view of female inmates as being emotional and good at playing mind games. Most officers prefer working with males because their training consists of handling violent conflicts and not emotional outbursts. In the video I felt like the officers assume that they women there are to be regarded as dangerous until they prove otherwise. They are very harsh when it comes to violating any of the rules and lock them in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day. There were examples in the video of women crying and there was one time when a woman was waiting to hear how much longer she had to be locked in her cell when she starts crying because she cannot wait to see her prison girlfriend. The officer that is with her says some consoling words but generally looks uncomfortable which can relate to Britton's findings that most officers do not know what to do about emotional situations.
Britton mentions that Latino and African American officers did not face many differences than white officers when being placed in female or male prisons. Many people believed that the disproportionate amount of minority prisoners would cause minority officers to befriend their inmates. However, this is not normally the case and in the video it appeared it made no difference. There were white and non-white officers and all of them appeared to be treated with the same respect and/or disregard.
Officers in Britton's study go into their jobs assuming that prisoners are going to be very violent and trying to trick them all the time. Many reported that the way prisons have been popularized in media as war zones prevented them from considering the job in the first place. When they get into the system they are very cautious because they are waiting for violent outbursts, especially in male prisons. It is hard to tell what the officers assumed in the video because most of them have been there for many years.
The overseer in the video was very mild mannered and looked like a housewife from the 1960's with her nice matching suits and pearls. However, she did talk about being strict and handling problems with officers immediately. She seems to take everything very seriously which can be related to the African American guard who called an inmates ketchup packet "contraband" because they were not being handed out at lunch that day. I think many women of color play the rules by the book because they do not want to get in any sort of trouble. If all the rules are followed strictly there will be no problems for the prisoners or themselves.
Britton says that officers who become friendly with inmates may lose respect with other inmates because they appear to have favorites. It also can get them in trouble if other inmates become jealous. There was an example of this in the video where a prisoner admits that she would seduce officers to get money. Obviously this officer would give a lot of money to stay out of trouble, but other inmates are bound to find out and therefore you put yourself at risk.
Britton does not talk a lot about the social controls but in the video they spend a lot of time talking about the isolation chambers where the women are subjected to being alone for 23 hours a day and receiving 45 minutes of exercise time in an outdoor cage essentially. The threat of the isolation chamber generally keeps women in line. They also are rewarded for good behavior with jobs and education classes so that they will work hard to be good to receive these benefits.