fuckyeahmarxismleninism:

By Sessi Kuwabara Blanchard

From January 1 until the end of the month, ADOC prisoners are going on strike from their prison jobs, work which they say “amounts to slavery.” They’re also boycotting companies that make a killing off of “exploitation” and “price gouging” through telecommunications service monopolies in prisons, as Freedom Alabama Movement (FAM), an organization led by incarcerated activists, announced.

As of New Year’s Day, at least 11 Alabama prisoners in segregation at Kilby Correctional Facility were also on a hunger strike to express their solidarity.

Dubbed a “30-Day Economic Blackout” by FAM, the boycott is making a range of demands. The top three include decarceration for public health amid the COVID-19 pandemic; ending corrections staff’s “culture of corruption and brutality”; and addressing drug use inside the facility as “a health and public safety issue.”