When we talk about crime in America, and when we talk about prisons, we are talking about power and powerlessness. We are talking about hopelessness and helplessness.
The one thing prisons do very well is punish prisoners, especially women prisoners. Prisons strip them of their dignity, their health, and whatever self-esteem they once might have had (Watterson 12).
There are over 90,000 women in prison today. The majority are in prison for economic crimes. The most typical convictions resulting in imprisonment for women are property crimes, such as check forgery and illegal credit card use. Of women convicted of violent crimes, the vast majority were convicted for defending themselves or their children from abuse. Average prison terms are twice as long for killing husbands as for killing wives (Women's Economic Agenda Project).
According to interviews conducted by the Human Rights Watch Women's Rights Project, findings indicate that being a women prisoner in United States prisons can be a terrifying experience (6). Sexual misconduct and various forms of abuse and neglect of women inmates so pervade the U.S. correctional systems that human rights violations are virtually a daily part of prison life (Rights For All). Incarcerated women in the U.S. prisons suffer far in excess of their state imposed sentence. At the hands of correctional officers they face widespread sexual abuse ranging from unauthorized body frisks to rape. .
Since 1980 the number of women entering U.S. prisons has risen by almost 400 percent. According to current estimates, at least half of all female prisoners have experienced some form of sexual abuse (Human Rights Watch). Custodial oversight of women is largely assumed by male guards. Male prison staff routinely conduct strip and pat searches, scrutinize women in showers, and monitor female inmates by video. The imbalance of power between inmates and guards involves the use of direct physical force and indirect force based on the prisoners" total dependency on officers for basic necessities and the guards" ability to withhold privileges.
Emotional Abuse (also known as: Verbal abuse, mental abuse, and psychological maltreatment), includes acts or the failures to act by parents or caretakers that have caused or could cause, serious behavioral, cognitive, emotional or mental disorders. ... According to a 1994 survey, physical abuse represented 21% of confirmed cases, sexual abuse 11%, neglect 49% and emotional maltreatment 3% (AAPC). ...
TO THE YOUNG WOMEN OF MALOLOS Among the three articles that I've read, this has been my favorite. ... The article " To the young women of malolos " discussed several important issues that the society is facing First of which is the teachings of the Spanish priests and friars. Rizal noted the women to be very vigilant and decisive to what priests say. ... We will still be maltreated and be taken for granted as Rizal described experienced in his time. In this article, Rizal is challenging the women to teach their own children about balancing, about true honor, about humanity...
The research from Flynn et al. (2014) focused on the effects of maltreatment throughout early-mid and mid-late adolescence. ... Childhood maltreatment includes a broad range of types, including emotional and physical; studies have concluded that forms of maltreatment result in low self-worth and cause children to be prone to have poor relationships throughout their lives. ... Subjects were assessed by asking to identify the type of maltreatment, were then asked to use a scale rating for the severity of the form of maltreatment, and finally asked to identify the developmental period in which th...
Women are just as naturally interested in sex, perhaps even more so. ... Hence, we find in many Bantu communities of Africa that the desire to have many wives is one of the leading motives in the life of every man; while the fact that in many Melanesian and Polynesian communities, polygyny is a prerogative and therefore the chief testifies to the social prestige attaching to it (Priso). ... While polygyny tends to be viewed by Western cultures as an instrument for the domination of women by men, the degree of autonomy experienced by women in polygynous unions varies within and among cultures. ...
Neglect represents the most common type of reported and substantiated form of maltreatment. ... The NIS found no race differences in maltreatment incidence. Poverty is significantly related to incidence rates in nearly every category of maltreatment. ... Battery is the leading cause of injury to women. Every 15 seconds a woman will be abused by her husband or boyfriend. 2,000 to 4,000 women are beaten to death annually. ...
They came to the conclusion that the "vast majority of maltreated children suffered from nonserious conditions." Only .1 percent of the cases resulted in the death of the maltreated child. Fifteen percent of the maltreated children suffered serious injuries. ... One of the studies examined the correlation between child maltreatment and sex, age, race, and family size. ... Family size also did not seem to affect the rates of child maltreatment. ...
It is the most common form of child maltreatment reported to child protective services. It is defined as a type of maltreatment that refers to the failure to provide needed age-appropriate care, such as shelter, food, clothing, education, supervision, medical care, and other basic necessities needed for development of physical, intellectual, and emotional capacities. ... Definitions of maltreatment vary from state to state and among agencies, making such statistics unreliable. Most provincial and territorial child welfare laws require those (including professionals and members of the public...
Introduction: Each year in the USA there are approximately one million reports of child maltreatment, about 25% relate to physical abuse and about 1000 children die of maltreatment each year (US Department of Health and Human Services 1999). ... Steele (1983) declared that " with few exceptions, parents or other caretakers who maltreat babies were themselves neglected (with or without physical abuse) in their own earliest years"(p. 235). ... These investigations identify maltreating parents and then interview them about their own childhood. ... Because these investigations don't have ac...
In "The Relationship Between Childhood Maltreatment and Adolescent Involvement in Delinquency" (Carolyn Smith and Terence P). ... (1) Was his childhood maltreatment a significant risk factor for official and self-reported measures of delinquency? (2) Was his childhood maltreatment a risk factor for various types of delinquent behavior, including violent offending? (3)was his relationship between maltreatment and delinquency spurious, or is it maintained when relevant variables are held constant? (4)Were this his measures of maltreatment - for example, measures t...