Barack Obama Says Prison Rape Jokes Are Never Okay
- July 15, 2015
Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., July 15, 2015 —Yesterday, in a speech before the NAACP in Philadelphia, President Barack Obama spoke out forcefully about the need to reform the U.S. justice system. In particular, President Obama decried sexual abuse in detention — as well as pop culture’s tendency to treat such abuse as a punch line. He said, “We should not be tolerating rape in prison. And we should not be making jokes about it in our popular culture. That’s no joke. These things are unacceptable.”
JDI applauds the President’s strong remarks, which are an important signal that the national debate about sexual abuse in detention is shifting away from harmful, flippant attitudes and toward respect for the basic dignity of all people.
“Strong leadership is key to ending the crisis of sexual abuse in U.S. detention facilities,” said Lovisa Stannow, JDI Executive Director. “In his speech to the NAACP, President Obama has shown exactly the kind of leadership we need, and JDI hopes that state and local executives across the country will follow his example.”
JDI is also heartened by Obama’s statements about the need to limit the use of solitary confinement, which has long been used as a tool for punishing prisoner rape survivors who report sexual abuse.
One opportunity for the Obama administration to put the President’s commitment into action will come this fall, when the Department of Justice hires a new Director of the Bureau of Prisons (BOP). Now the largest prison system in the nation, BOP is guilty of many of the offenses the President so eloquently highlighted yesterday. Hiring a proven reformer from outside the agency — and providing her or him with the support needed to reform federal prisons — will go a long way toward protecting the dignity of the nearly quarter of a million people held by BOP in a single year.
“Hiring a new BOP Director is a clear opportunity for the President and Attorney General Loretta Lynch to leave a legacy of reform,” said Stannow. “BOP used to be the premier corrections agency in the U.S. It can be so again by hiring a strong, proven leader who can turn the system around.”
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Just Detention International is a health and human rights organization that seeks to end sexual abuse in all forms of detention.