Blog 18

The job of a prison guard can often times can be viewed as a very masculine job. First of all women and men go through the same training for these jobs. They study the same curriculum and take the same tests. Some officers are trained in handgun use, self-defense, and strategies to deal with inmates along with a physical abilities test. These sounds like physical tasks that men might go through when entering the army, but women are there right along side the men training for these positions. One example given in the book is how trainees were given a violent training video to watch and that both men and women had been known to quit after watching this video. (however the men never admitted that it was the video that gave them second thoughts). Although throughout the NBC video violence between inmates and guards was not mentioned. The did go into the safety precautions that take place when dealing with individuals who are housed in the single cell units, such as shackling their hands and feet when escorting them anywhere outside their cell and housing them is confined spaces during there 45 minutes of outside time. Beyond the physical threats to prison guards in a female prison I feel that the emotional threats run much higher. As we saw in the interview with Devon who openly admitted to seducing and baiting prison guards to get money and other things she wanted. You also can have incidents where guards came become to emotionally involved in the inmates life problems. This can lead to sympathy for the inmate over shadowing the rules and expectations of the guard.