Post ABeRm3TYPo3AL8QUtc by Flick@spinster.xyz
(DIR) More posts by Flick@spinster.xyz
(DIR) Post #ABeRm2vATeXocUL2Ia by beccabei@spinster.xyz
2021-09-23T08:16:01.845095Z
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🇬🇧 Petition: stop sending pregnant women to prisonTo: Dominic Raab MP – Secretary of State for JusticePrison will never be a safe place for pregnant women and new mothers.1 in 10 women give birth inside their cell or on the way to hospital*, and in the last two years, two babies born inside prison have died. Even if the worst doesn’t happen, prison causes toxic stress and trauma to both mother and child. Short sentences can have a long-lasting, lifelong negative impact.The government can and must put an end to imprisoning pregnant women and new mothers by changing sentencing laws. Right now, there is no statutory duty for judges to take pregnancy or parenthood into consideration when sentencing. This has to change. The law needs to be strengthened so that judges legally have to consider the health of pregnant women and their babies, and avoid sending them to prison at all costs.
(DIR) Post #ABeRm3TYPo3AL8QUtc by Flick@spinster.xyz
2021-09-23T08:33:39.657584Z
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@beccabei I’m torn: I agree with this for the majority, the TV licences and so on, but it can’t be a blanket ban. (I’m also reminded of pleading the belly to get a hanging commuted to transportation, and the abuses that prison guards got away with because of it.)
(DIR) Post #ABeRm41aNHGw2gLfwO by HebrideanHecate@spinster.xyz
2021-09-23T08:35:10.991622Z
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@Flick @beccabei They need a specialist unit for women in this condition.
(DIR) Post #ABeRm4TwfpxPSdcK92 by Flick@spinster.xyz
2021-09-23T08:41:27.981613Z
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@HebrideanHecate @beccabei I don’t understand why, say, third trimester women aren’t automatically moved to the mother and baby unit. It’s difficult, though, because even with that cut-off there’s a risk that viable premature births will be excluded, but on the other hand going into the m&b unit at any stage of pregnancy really would encourage women to deliberately get pregnant to have an easier time in prison.
(DIR) Post #ABeRm4zUmXC72UNWK0 by grace_hawthorn@spinster.xyz
2021-09-23T09:00:47.630490Z
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@Flick @HebrideanHecate @beccabei the vast majority of women in prison aren't there for violent offences & arguably don't need to be there at all (the woman in this story was on remand, she hadn't even been convicted) & we know that women get much much harsher sentences than men for similar offences. I think there's a case to be made for women not being in prison at all, pregnant or not, and having alternative responses to women's crimes; women are in prison overwhelmingly for being poor or for having been abused. And the consequences for women & their children are disproportionately bad (when men are in prison, it's women who do the emotional labour, care for children, sustain the relationships. When women are in prison, first of all they're likely to be much further away bec so few prisons, and second, the men don't do the emotional labour & sustain the relationships with children, which means women may also lose their children into foster care etc). For the few women who have been involved in violent crime, there are secure psychiatric units that are much more relevant.
(DIR) Post #ABeRny0biCbRxonYnY by grace_hawthorn@spinster.xyz
2021-09-23T09:11:30.935402Z
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@Flick @HebrideanHecate @beccabei my absolute rage & grief in this story is how she, at 18, pregnant, with a known history of abuse, was considered "difficult" by staff, and that their response to 'difficult' was to punish & ignore her. She was terrified her baby would be removed from her, evidently no-one in this private prison system had the sense to wonder if her 'difficultness' might be a result of fear, and powerlessness and a lifetime of trauma, and they punished her.No-one is their best self when they're terrified. No-one, who is 18 and pregnant and in prison without having been convicted, is their best self.I feel utterly devastated at the thought of her calling for help and calling for help and being ignored, giving birth alone and then lying with her dead baby all night. How is it possible that staff in these sectors *still* don't have any training in trauma-informed practice, in fundamental human compassion, and in care?
(DIR) Post #ABeRoGAUCDCUHfYhhA by FeartnTired@spinster.xyz
2021-09-23T09:50:28.662506Z
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@grace_hawthorn @Flick @HebrideanHecate @beccabei because she doesn't matter. because the fact of her having committed any wrong - convicted or not - marks her as trash. her life is nothing, her baby's life is nothing. it's just numbers. shares. not even the statistics move them. she is just nothing at all.because if she mattered, she wouldn't have been there.