This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | 1 This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed: Experiences of Trans and Gender Variant People in Pennsylvania’s Prison Systems A Report by The Hearts on a Wire Collective Written by Pascal Emmer, Adrian Lowe, and R. Barrett Marshall This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | i This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed: Experiences of Trans and Gender Variant People in Pennsylvania's Prison Systems A report by the Hearts on a Wire Collective Written by Pascal Emmer, Adrian Lowe, and R. Barrett Marshall Cover design by Cristian Morales features a reproduction of a stamp manufactured by a Pennsylvania state men’s prison which reads “This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed.” Report layout and graphic design by Adrian Lowe. Artwork from Hearts on a Wire’s first flyer by Pascal Emmer. Design of the cover page of the survey by Aamina Morrison, and Jaci Adams. First published in 2011 by: Hearts on a Wire Collective PO Box 36831 Philadelphia, PA 19107 [email protected] © Copyright 2011 Hearts on a Wire Collective. Some Rights Reserved. This report is shared and distributed in the public domain under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. The authors encourage and grant permission to reproduce and distribute this report in whole or part, and further grant permission to use this work in whole or part in the creation of non-derivative works, provided credit is given to the authors and publisher. For the purpose of citing this report, the authors are Pascal Emmer, Adrian Lowe, and R. Barrett Marshall and the publisher is the Hearts on a Wire Collective. (For more information about this license, see the Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/us/> or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA. This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We are grateful to the people who contributed to this report, first and foremost our friends behind bars and those recently returned home. Without their guidance and participation this project would not have been possible. For safety reasons, we are unable to name participants, but we are honored by their trust and humbled by the opportunity to share their stories. We could not have started this project without the support of Sabina Neem and Hannah Zellman. We would like to thank our initial community consultants: Katrina Delancey, Neeko, Ashley Mercer, Miss Candi, Tyreef King, and especially Miss Terry who suggested the 'zine format. We appreciate the financial support we received from Project HOME, The Next Big Thing, and the Phoebus Criminal Justice Initiative of the Bread & Roses Community Fund, along with individual donors. We wish to acknowledge organizations that lent their support: The Trans- health Information Project (TIP), the Gay and Lesbian Latino AIDS Education Initiative (GALAEI), and Prevention Point Philadelphia. Their flexibility allowed two of us who were employees to devote work hours to this project. Their generosity kept us in photocopies and stamps. Thank you to the Institute for Community Justice for providing meeting space. Lonnie Grant, T. Reese, and Najee Gibson contributed invaluable outreach efforts with trans and gender variant people in women’s prisons. We are indebted to our survey editors. We gratefully recognize Miss Jaci Adams for her loving line-by-line editing of the rough draft. The women on A- Block at the Detention Center patiently test-ran the survey and gave us valuable feedback. Laura McTighe edited as an experienced prison health activist. Lee Carson helped us to turn the survey results into something useful. Thanks also to Heath Reynolds, Viviana Ortiz, Aamina Morrison and Jose de Marco, who edited early drafts. We are grateful for our technical support: Matt Miller, who donated webspace, installed limesurvey, and hosted the survey; and Emily Gibble who showed us how to use SPSS. A big shout out to limesurvey, the open source survey software we used. Thanks to Waheedah Shabazz-El for sharing the secret location of the free money-order store. We want to thank Devin-Therese Trego, Heath Reynolds, Adele Carpenter, Ramsey Younis, and Che Gossett for their feedback and critical analysis during the final rounds of edits. This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | iii CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS........................................................................................... iii CONTENTS .................................................................................................................. iv INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... 1 METHODOLOGY .......................................................................................................... 4 SURVEY RESULTS ...................................................................................................... 9 Participation ....................................................................................................... 9 Gender .............................................................................................................. 10 Race .................................................................................................................. 11 Release from Prison ......................................................................................... 12 Age & Incarceration ......................................................................................... 14 Types of Prison Facilities & Rates of Incarceration ........................................ 16 Charges ............................................................................................................. 17 Housing ............................................................................................................ 19 Bathrooms/Showers ......................................................................................... 21 The Hole ........................................................................................................... 22 Hormones ......................................................................................................... 24 Medical ............................................................................................................. 27 Institutionalized Discrimination & Violence ................................................... 29 Grievances ........................................................................................................ 34 Intimacy & Sex in Prison ................................................................................. 36 Relationships & Community Outside Prison .................................................. 38 Strategies for Resilience & Survival ................................................................ 40 AREAS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH ........................................................................ 42 RECOMMENDATIONS FOR CHANGE..................................................................... 45 Options for Housing Placement ....................................................................... 45 Addressing Health Needs ................................................................................ 46 HIV/AIDS Prevention ...................................................................................... 46 Programs, Education & Job Training .............................................................. 47 Gender-based Policy Change ........................................................................... 48 Institutional Accountability ............................................................................. 48 Education on T/GV Issues for Prison Staff ...................................................... 49 Advocacy & Community Organizing ................................................................ 49 Outside Support ............................................................................................... 50 Visions for Justice ............................................................................................ 50 AFTERWORD .............................................................................................................. 52 Challenges/Limitations .................................................................................... 52 Accomplishments ............................................................................................. 52 Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 54 APPENDIX A: The Survey ............................................................................................ a APPENDIX B: Research & Community Organizing ...................................................... l APPENDIX C: 2007 Transforming Justice Conference ................................................ p This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | iv INTRODUCTION We’re people too. No matter what gender… though, it seems like we get an extra sentence for who we are. - a gender variant person in a women’s state prison The inspiration for this report grew from our own experiences and the stories our friends told us. Since 2007, Hearts on a Wire has been building a movement to address the policing and imprisonment of our trans and gender variant1 communities across Pennsylvania. Hearts on a Wire is connected to transgender and gender variant (T/GV) individuals who are incarcerated, detained, and recently released. Accounts of prison What does the name Hearts on a Wire conditions from these contacts show the mean? A wire, as it intensity of discrimination, abuse, medical appears on the top of neglect, and punitive isolation that our prison fences, communities face on the inside. Incarcerated enforces a border. It keeps friends, lovers, T/GV individuals report dismissal, family members, and intimidation, or retaliation when attempting communities apart. to file grievances. But, a wire can also be an important channel for communication. In response to these injustices, formerly Our hearts abide in the incarcerated T/GV Philadelphians and their ambiguity of the wire – allies began a conversation about ways to as an instrument of address these issues. Chief among the separation and connection. Therefore, concerns raised were the ways that prisons the intention of our remove incarcerated people from their support work, including this networks and communities.2 Breaking the report, is to isolation of our incarcerated community strengthen that fragile connection on the line. members has been a critical step in addressing health and safety issues from the outside. 1 A note on terminology: In this report, the terms transgender and trans refer to people who have a gender identity or gender expression different from their assigned sex at birth. The terms transgender and trans are umbrella terms that encompass many different gender identities. Gender variant is a second umbrella term used in this report to describe people whose experience and/or expression of their gender is fluid, between, or beyond binary gender. Some communities prefer the  term  “gender-nonconforming,” while  others  prefer  the  term  “genderqueer.”  Hearts  on  a  Wire   uses  “gender  variant”  out  of  respect  for  the  preferences  of the communities and individuals to whom we have personal accountability. 2 This is particularly the case for low-income trans and gender variant people of color who are criminalized in Pennsylvania as in the rest of the US. The majority of trans and gender variant people of color live in cities such as Philadelphia or Pittsburgh, but are incarcerated in rural areas of Pennsylvania, often far removed from their communities. Physical distance and travel costs prohibit many prisoners from having visitors, as do punishments like isolation and denial of visiting rights. This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | 1 Out of a desire to meet these needs, a network grew and became Hearts on a Wire. The group’s first project was to gather community members on the outside to make and send Valentines to T/GV people incarcerated across Pennsylvania. The event was an opportunity for formerly incarcerated people and those with friends and family members inside to discuss how prisons affected our lives and the lives of our loved ones. Hearts on a Wire has held art-making and letter- writing events to build a network with T/GV community members locked in prisons around the state. Additionally, the group tries to respond to urgent situations, such as incidents where our members have been placed in the “hole” or have endured abuse within their institutions. In their letters, incarcerated individuals highlighted the critical health and safety issues they face. From this correspondence, incarcerated and outside Hearts on a Wire members determined the need to create this research project. In creating a community-based research project, we drew inspiration from two reports from outside of Pennsylvania: It’s War in Here,3 a report on the treatment of trans and intersex people in New York men’s prisons, and the Move Along report from Washington, D.C.,4 which discusses the experience of policing and lock-up for trans individuals criminalized by “prostitution-free zones.” Hearts on a Wire members Pascal Emmer and Sabina Neem participated in the first Transforming Justice Conference in San Francisco, California in 2007. Formerly incarcerated T/GV people, people of color, poor people, and service providers came together at this conference to strategize ending the criminalization and imprisonment of transgender communities.5 Conference discussions made it clear that many issues incarcerated T/GV people face are similar cross-regionally. To get a full picture of the conditions incarcerated T/GV individuals in Pennsylvania are 3 Sylvia Rivera Law Project. (2007). “It’s  War in Here”:  A  Report  on  the  Treatment  of  Transgender   and Intersex  People  in  New  York  State  Men’s  Prisons. NY, NY. Retrieved from http://srlp.org/files/warinhere.pdf 4 Alliance for a Safe & Diverse DC. (2008). Move Along: Policing Sex Work in Washington, D.C.. Washington D.C.: Different Avenues. 5 See Appendix C. This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | 2 subjected to, it was necessary to collect data on people’s experiences in the state's prison systems. Relatively little information is available on general prison conditions in Pennsylvania and there is a complete lack of statistical data on the experience of incarcerated T/GV people. The This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed report bridges the gap between community-level knowledge of our experiences of Pennsylvania’s prison systems and the need for documentation and statistical representation of those experiences. Our hope is to provide the information necessary to future organizing. By giving voice to our community members we can better determine the work that is yet to be done. We hope this report will serve as a resource for those who seek to: (cid:120) Organize community-led campaigns for transformative justice, decarceration, and prison abolition (cid:120) Imagine strategies for community safety that challenge the notion that imprisonment reduces social violence (cid:120) Bolster advocacy efforts by legal and health service providers (cid:120) Improve treatment toward incarcerated T/GV individuals (cid:120) Create effective re-entry planning and services for T/GV people exiting prison (cid:120) Employ harm reduction advocates to work with incarcerated T/GV individuals (cid:120) Inspire future participatory studies that approach research as a process of creating knowledge and relationships as part of social justice movements6 6 Recent examples of this research approach include: Young Women's Empowerment Project. (2009). Girls Do What They Have To Do To Survive: Illuminating Methods used by Girls in the Sex Trade and Street Economy to Fight Back and Heal. Chicago, IL. Retrieved from http://youarepriceless.org/; Queers for Economic Justice. (2010). A Fabulous Attitude: Low-income LGBTGNC People Surviving & Thriving on Love, Shelter, & Knowledge. NY, NY. Retrieved from www.q4ej.org/Documents/afabulousattitudefinalreport.pdf This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | 3 METHODOLOGY Hearts on a Wire collective members on the outside prioritized having the input and participation of T/GV people directly affected7 by mass incarceration in every step of designing the survey. Formerly and currently incarcerated community and collective members offered their own knowledge of Pennsylvania’s prison systems to shape the design, creation, delivery, and evaluation of the survey. We were inspired by the community-based research model of the Move Along report. That report involved community members affected by profiling, health workers, and academic professionals working together to conduct research and document the violence of “Prostitution-Free Zones” throughout Washington, DC.8 The process of completing participatory, community-based research was complex, difficult and rewarding.9 We began this process by interviewing formerly incarcerated T/GV community and/or collective members who identified key areas of research. Those we interviewed directed us to investigate housing, medical care, safety, support systems, and survival strategies. Based on their knowledge of the prison mail system the survey was formatted to resemble a ‘zine in order to assure delivery.10 Prison correspondence is inspected, and vital documents are often withheld from those inside and returned to senders. The ‘zine format is both user friendly and enabled us to stay under the radar of prison guards. Community advocate Jaci Adams strategically used her professional access and relationships in Philadelphia County’s jail system to gather feedback on the survey from incarcerated trans women. These women took the survey and recorded their feedback in spite of possible retaliation by the prison. They let us know that the survey was too long and revised some of the questions. Based on their suggestions, for every page of questions, a blank, lined page was included for 7 There are multiple ways imprisonment affects our lives and the lives of people we care about. When  we  say  “directly  affected”  we  mean  members  of  our  communities who are currently or formerly incarcerated or with histories of detention in jails, juvenile facilities, or psychiatric hospitals, as well as those with partners, parents, or other family and community members who are incarcerated. 8 “Unlike  some  traditional  academic  research,  [Community  Based  Research  (CBR)]  is  a  collective   project inherently centered on the needs and perspectives of community members. CBR does not value any one particular source of knowledge, such as academic articles or government statistics, over  the  wisdom  of  those  with  lived  experience.…  CBR  also  promotes  ongoing  thinking  about  the   findings  and  how  the  knowledge  is  distributed  and  deployed.”  Alliance for a Safe & Diverse DC. (2008). Move Along: Policing Sex Work in Washington, D.C.. Washington D.C.: Different Avenues. 9 See Appendix B for more details about our process. 10 A  ‘zine is  popular  publication  type  among  prisoners.  ‘Zines  are  small, self-published magazines often created in marginalized communities. This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | 4 participants to write about their experiences or highlight important information. We included several blank pages for respondents’ input on issues we might have missed or other ideas for reducing the harm that prisons inflict on our communities. Designing the survey from a community-based research model meant thinking critically about what questions to ask and how to ask them. We were aware that asking people to recall and describe their experiences of incarceration could re-traumatize participants. In developing the survey, we maintained awareness that the majority of respondents were in an inherently unsafe environment – prison – with little support, and risked retaliation by participating. We asked participants to answer the survey according to their assessment of their emotional and physical safety. Language was a key issue in soliciting information about participants’ experiences of incarceration. Formerly incarcerated community members wisely pointed out that the language of survey questions makes a difference in participants' level of trust in the researchers and in the amount of detail they provide. It was important to recognize how people cope with factors like sexual violence in an environment in which it is officially endorsed and routine.11 When we drafted questions about sexual assault we used “forced sexual situation” instead of “rape” to acknowledge survivors of all types of sexual violence. In this same vein, we did not ask participants to recall the exact number of times they experienced violence and abuse. At the direction of the incarcerated people who edited the survey we asked whether the abuse occurred once, a few times, or “over and over.” The survey was designed so participants could describe their own racial and gender identities. This was an important counter-measure to current Pennsylvania Department of Corrections population data which excludes T/GV and mixed race identities.12 Our philosophy for recruiting survey participants was based on the principle of gender self-determination. Gender self-determination in this context means that individuals name and express their unique identity. Applying self-determination to our recruitment approach was especially important given that Pennsylvania’s prison systems do not recognize our identities except as something to be punished. The choice of the prison system to reject gender self-determination translates to 11 Davis, Angela. (2003). Are Prisons Obsolete? Toronto. Open Media. 12 Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. (2007). Annual Statistical Report 2007. Retrieved from www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/document/915989/anrpt07_pdf. This is a Prison, Glitter is Not Allowed | 5