Blog #15

For a number of years prisons housed only men but when women finally gained access to the court system, and reformatories women began to also become incarcerated. When the population began to increase in the 80’s the women in prison also began to increase, however, the men did not increase as much as the women. Women were commonly thought of as non criminals even when they were incarcerated because they were not typical criminals. They believed that women were able to be taught how to behave and how to reform whereas, men were criminals and not likely to change. When prisoners were first housing women, middle class white women did not believe it was acceptable for women to house with men even if they were in separate confinements. The reason the women were held with men were because it was believed that the women were even worse than the male counterparts, so therefore, it was obvious that men were their appropriate guardians. Shortly after women were believed to be able to set themselves on the path of womanhood and women needed to be without men while incarcerated.
Prisons also gave white racists a place to display their racism and bigotry where they were also protected. Prison farms were where they kept the black male prisoners because they were believed to be accustomed to this environment during slavery. Male prisoners were always viewed as tough and violent and to be able to maintain and control a violent inmate it would require a masculine tough violent officer. The white prisoners were usually more protected due to the prominently dominant white officers in the prisons. Race was a huge issue in the prison sense because of the dominance of white.

As the rates of the population and incarceration continued to rise over the years, prisons had to include people of color into the prison houses. They would also need to add the women then they ran into the problem of overcrowding. Women were also now able to join the correction profession because of the very few officers to the prisoners. Now men and women are able to choose which facility they want to work in, either the men’s or the women’s.
Arizona does not change much as the others history over time. Arizona’s first prison housed men, women and children, as many of the other early prisons. The incarcerated ranged from a variety of individuals from minorities to people from foreign countries. The first prison in Arizona was built years after many other prisons but this is probably because Arizona was formed much later than other.