Human Rights
Coalition – FedUp! Chapter
5125 Penn Ave
Pittsburgh, PA 15224
412-802-8575
(no collect calls)
hrcfedup@gmail.com
http://www.thomasmertoncenter.org/fedup/
FedUp! is
the
Pittsburgh
chapter of the Human Rights Coalition dedicated to upholding the rights of
prisoners through providing resources and support, exposing injustices, and
building relationships with people in prison and their advocates. We are a
organization of concerned citizens, people in prison and their loved ones. Our
focus is on high level security facilities in Pennsylvania and Virginia.
The
following goals are taken from the Human Rights Coalition – Philly Chapter.
There is no need to rewrite something we think is written so well, although we
made some minor changes.
-
To provide a safe
place for family members of prisoners
where there is no embarrassment associated with having a loved one in
prison.
-
To build a coalition
of prisoner's family members
- because who cares more about a prisoner than his/her own mother, father,
wife, husband, partner, son, daughter, or cousin.
-
To make visible to the
public and end the injustice and abuse
that are common practice throughout our judicial and prison system across
the United
States.
-
To support and work
with other activist groups
in the abolishment of unjust laws and practices within the prison system and
justice system, for example: the death penalty, "Three-strikes" law,
juvenile justice, Post Conviction Relief Act (PCRA) amendment, life without
parole, police corruption, judicial corruption, inadequate health care in
prisons, and more…
-
To abolish Solitary
Confinement,
an inhumane and barbaric practice.
-
To encourage the
rehabilitation of prisoners.
HRC
understands that prisoners are human beings with problems that need to be
addressed and most, in time, will return to society. The majority of
prisoners are sent to prison for drug charges and acts which involve no
violence whatsoever. A large number of these prisoners have led horrendous
lives of drug abuse, child abuse, or neglect, in addition to impacts of
racism, sexism, classism and homophobia. We as citizens should demand that
the prison system focus on the rehabilitation of prisoners so that they can
return to society as productive citizens with the skills needed to take care
of their family.
-
To
abolish the Prison Industrial Complex.
The prison system is based on a foundation of exploitation, punishment and
corruption. People of color make up 70 percent of the prison population. In
a country with a declining economy, factories have moved overseas to exploit
third world labor. 80 percent of prisoners are there for non-violent
offenses (the vast majority of these drug-related), and the crime rate has
been declining over the past 20 years. Women are the highest rising
population in prison, and most of them are there for “crimes of survival,”
committed to feed themselves and their families. Most of the people in
prisons are poor, brown, urban, functionally illiterate, unemployed or
under-employed before they were locked down, and are there for non-violent
crimes, mostly selling or using drugs. Economically speaking, the charge to
tax payers is $35,000 per year to house a prisoner. The charge is $65,000
per year for an older inmate. It is less expensive to send a person to
Harvard for a year. Private corporations such as Eddie Bauer and Microsoft
employ prison slave labor. Contracts are signed with private companies to
provide food and clothing to prisons. New prisons continue to be built every
year and are filled. Private prisons (not state owned) are now being built.
These facts are evidence that the prison complex is a booming business
designed to confine "prisoners" for profit; it is a business that is
disguised as "get tough on crime." Obviously, the prison system is about all
the other social inequalities in our system, and it does not work in its
current incarnation.
HRC
supports its dismantling, and building in its place a system of
accountability that is truly based in the community and focuses on healing,
not punishing.