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'In The Belly Of The Beast' By Jack Abbot

1614 Words7 Pages

In the institution of prison there are many difficult Pains that the prisoners face daily. According to Sykes and Messenger there are five main pains of imprisonment. These views are also reflected in the book, “In the Belly of the Beast” by Jack Abbot. Although the three do agree on quite a few things about imprisonment, there are also some disagreements between them that will be talked about. “The Pains of imprisonment”(Sykes & Messenger 1994), leads into how the social system works in prisons. There is a very definite social structure to prison life, unlike the social structure outside of a prison. In The article by Sykes and Messinger we see a very distinct setup of how things work in prison. There are different points to make about this …show more content…

The guards make all of the decisions for the prisoners. From eating times to shaving the inmate’s hair, the guards had control. Abbot talks about how the inmates were told when to go shower and how long to shower for. The guards controlled how much time they could spend outside as well. The deprivation of security is the last pain of imprisonment that Sykes and Messenger talk about in their article. This pain discusses how prisoners experience a sense of no security or safety. They live with criminals every single day as Abbot also mentions. Abbot says that prisoners are always on edge and watch their backs because they never know if or when another inmate will attack them and challenge them. F. Points on which Sykes and Abbott disagree? ( may include if deemed …show more content…

In the article Sykes and Messenger talk about the different names for the different groups of prisoners. There are Rats, Toughs, Gorillas, Fags, Innocents, Square Johns and Right Guys. If an inmate breaks a certain code then he becomes known as the name that goes along with breaking that specific code. If I was called a Tough then that means I have broken the code of “don’t lose your head” (Sykes & Messenger 1994: 428). This states that an inmate should never go looking for a fight for no reason. If the code is broken multiple times then the inmate is given the title that goes along with breaking the rule. Abbot talks about multiple people who fit different categories of Sykes and Messenger’s. Abbot says one man in particular was always looking for trouble. This man got angry at a guard and killed him with a knife. This inmate would definitely be classified as a

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