We're Alive (1974)

foreign foreign [Music] [Music] I can't have my freedom when I Rise there ain't nothing in the morning that comes as a surprise and I don't want no reason when I Rise I Rise [Music] I go to work in the morning when I Rise oh will I ever get away from prison time well it's for long years of living here and nobody to share the tear and that's just one less reason now to rise through rise good morning it won't make much difference when I leave [Music] when a heart his Stone locked up there is no green s and freedoms just a rusty word that somehow meant to tease will I ever feel another Summer Breeze please oh [Music] well I wish I had a reason now to die I haven't got the salt for tears to cry I am a stone that was a bird oh will I ever fly and when I get my freedom will I Cry Lord will I Cry [Music] I don't want no reason when I Rise I can't have my freedom when I Rise eyes there ain't nothing in the morning that comes as a surprise and that's just one last reason now to rise to rise whoa [Music] foreign [Music] this film was made by women inside and women outside working together every Sunday for six months we met in a classroom with the prison but we planned the film and photographed it on videotape everyone operated the camera and the songs were written performed and recorded by women inside about two years ago I was on felony probation for uh what Fortune check and I had an offer for a job working for crescent jewelers in the Executive offices working uh it's more like a receptionist to the president and uh in order to get this job I had to have a 25 000 Bond and my probation officer had to fine okay I had letters from the president the executive secretary was behind me she's the one that was trying to get me the job job was about 900 a month that's not take home but net pay and uh so I got a bondsman said that he would back the bond for me but I still had to have my probation officer signature so I went to her and I asked her would you please sign for me and she told me I'll flat no and I ask her the reason why and she told me that a person of my caliber did not deserve a high-paying job like that okay two weeks later I was arrested again for forgery because I wasn't qualified for welfare and I have two children and they come before anything and I had to feed them some kind of way [Music] you know most of the black women the majority of the black women in here come from you know ghetto you know the pride of the line of Education you know being you know being in the woods going on inside you know so when you go to the judge all the majority of the judges are white and if you try by jury like I was your peers they're white you know so you know it deep inside you have a lot of guilt you know budget you know against regardless even if you know I have quite a few white friends you know but even they're just so far that they can go I can see that it it's I think a romantic attraction to substitute a heroin problem for any other problem but what problems could you have you're not ugly and sick and [Music] environment and my family like you know it's really um rejected the black sheep you know one of the inside things and I've never had that communication with my family and I had to get feelings about that and I felt that I needed to make up for them and then then finally I said well just [ __ ] it I just get loaded but junkie doesn't care if you say drop dead they say hey [ __ ] you you know you dropped it because I don't care [Applause] [Music] that's your world this is it from the man and getting your connection then you don't care if Nixon's [ __ ] up and you don't care what's happening in China you don't care when when they put me on probation and when I was in jail for three days I realized how much I had been using these pills so I quit taking the pills and I was just going to take them once in a while um but that didn't work because my probation officer drops in and you know gives me a test every now and then so I decided Well I really don't need them at all you know but I want to go back to college and I want to learn to do this and I want to learn to do this and I I mean at my own mind and I decided it was time for me to do it and I could I knew where I wanted to go and what I wanted to do but I didn't know how to do it and I thought that was part of what probation would do you know they said we're giving you this chance you know and I thought instead of just putting me on a leash they were going to help me direct me that's what my probation officer led me to feel so I talked to him about it and he gave me these places to go then I went to The Vocational Rehabilitation and after talking with them I felt like well I really don't have a problem or they can't worry about me because they have too many people with heavier problems because I had never been addicted to heroin I had never been incarcerated for being addicted to heroin or like I had never been committed to a hospital for withdrawals or I had never gone to jail to prison or to a program like CRC and they just they didn't have enough funds they had to deal with just the Parolees because they didn't want to send them back to the institutions they wanted to help them in society and they couldn't do anything for me because I'd never been incarcerated now I've been incarcerated so maybe now I can get some help they don't they don't have anything set up from narcotics all for anything you know famous you know sometimes it's talking things what can they really set up you know I mean what what does except you know to isolate you from society I know three or four women that have used drugs have turned out to him since they've been in this institution and they never used heroin in the streets because they could see what it was doing to their friends and neighbors and relatives in Industries what they had went into them but since they've been here they have used because they feel the need to escape and they only use it for an escape I used to take 15 to 20 volume in one wax so I know I've got this I can't take no pills though not without thinking a bunch one of the only reasons that they're giving you bills now is because the institution doesn't want to cope with how you act not being on those pills right there's one psychiatrist and this institution who does not have time to see him because he's busy doing board reports okay so he prescribes the drugs he's got a good working knowledge of what medication makes people sit down and shut up well I take drugs to keep myself pass it by when I first came in I was just going up the wall with between a hostility and sexual frustration I was ready to do somebody in and I don't I don't feel those feelings quite as intentional now that I'm on them and I would much rather have the drugs cope with my problem those particular problems and have to face them every day that I was in here it makes it a little bit easier I sometimes think it's a college way out but I'm willing to accept it [Music] they um they told us hey get over to the clinic and strip those floors quick and you scrub your house I mean we worked our asses uh just for the health department to come in for five minutes and they go oh they stamped a little paper for the next 10 years and then it has and that place has not been cleaned since you know that that's right the health department is coming in to check on the facilities here they give them a notice will be coming in in other words they give them enough time to make sure everything gets done instead of doing a spot check right there and now we're out the door let us in this minute they would take that hospital and they would take us out in the garbage heap it is so filthy a year ago I was here and I went over to see I didn't get an iuds for birth control right to the clinic they gave me it and I got out and did to my release date and I got out a month later I started hemorrhaging and wow look at this so I go to emergency hospital and they tell me well this Quail was put in wrong or you've been balling too hard one or the other and I hadn't been doing none and this is well then it was put in wrong and uh what is this and they tell me that it had bacteria on it and it was dirty you know and just just the thought of it and now I have you know I gotta have cyst ovaries in the pill the whole my whole female albums were just completely rushed just uh sick I'm having sick for a year it's all healed up I don't have any more infection all I have is big heavy scars on my on my inside of my uterus and my ovaries and now I'm 24 years old I'm not having a complete hysterectomy okay well wait a minute we got people here from the outside and and you guys know from like women on the streets there are certain things that this Society teaches a woman that she is and one of them is Meek mild and submissive and all that garbage [Music] foreign okay like for instance when you're a housewife such as I was I never associated with other women the men they got together at work and they have a more Unity because they were together at work and working together women that never have worked together not even as Housewives they were separated they couldn't spend that much time together because they had their own little duties and I think this is one of the reasons why women are so divided because they never have worked together like me and they go out whatever they're doing if they're working on the construction job they're together they're working in a factory they're together you know but we were always separating our own little homes you had your home I had my home to Queen and we couldn't get that Unity my particular experience like this is my third time back and with you know until I realized all these all the issues of Music until I I came here this time I have never I've never really smoked down enough to take a look and say I've never known women I've never known women I've always been surrounded by men and this trip back it's it's fantastic you can reach out and you can touch and we're so far out for myself is that my experiences of unique it isn't all by itself like there's just what 700 hours okay homosexuality it's enforced by the administration or it's encouraged by the administration yet it's against the law literally you know like it's against the so-called rules here in the institution yet they realize that uh if they really enforced those rules that everybody would really say uh-uh we're not going to go for this homosexuality itself cool I mean so so I like it shocks this is um I think this is one of the hardest things that a person has to become a Justice to is seeing women uh couples you know same female couples uh lay on the grass or stand up against buildings or be um aggressive you know I mean in other words bring this you know just bring their whole thing right out into where everybody's at and I think that this kind of shocks a lot of people that this this this I think is the hardest adjustment to me now I've I've managed to have about 20 relationships in here in uh almost two years she's had a good time and the staff's always complimented me and the board and said that I I do pretty well and that I don't you know get any guidance or in or I'm not involved too seriously with anybody I don't go with somebody I don't go with anybody I've always told other women that I'm involved with that I don't want to go with them because I I want to go with a lot of ones I found with Donna I can just be the woman with the human yeah I can be human right I can be human and mother and I love it I really love it deeply and she I'm sure she knows it you know I don't write music for her you know I wonder you know it's really unique that I love it you are alone with yourself a lot more than other women because you're locked in yourself by yourself and you can Retreat into yourself you know by yourself and you do enough to handle everything your show and you have to do your own time yourself even in close relationships people will always be reminded you do your own time you know types of jobs that are available on ciw for women uh cosmetology manicures x-ray technician lab technician Janitorial Service uh yard work garbage crew kitchen workers Hospital AIDS maintenance I don't really have a runner on the streets you know so I have to work in here for whatever they pay me you know it ain't much but I mean I have a bad cigarette Jones and I have to smoke you know and you'll go to the board and they'll tell you to bring them some degrees you don't get paid for going to school what are the wages here it's no wages none seven cents an hour ten cents an hour um we pay our oppressor you know like we pay the wages like with our work with us getting up every morning and going to work it pays those people's salary that's locking us up people aren't guaranteeing nobody no job when they get out of here they say you do that they to go throw your ass out there for an hour and that they'll have a job for you when uh you get out I haven't seen one bride up north if they found a job for my friend tells me she's well go to this other place and tell them they're on parole and see what happens well we'll call you and I knew I had the ability to do the job and better than that dude did you know but still I was thinking about going to school when I got out to take uh some special courses to help handicap children but as it is here this place Ain't Got What I Need You Know [Music] foreign they have no conception that it's 1974 out there and that women are no longer simply interested in washing floors changing diapers smiling at patients in hospitals working at sewing machines or doing somebody's hair as their life's work and this institution offers them no other alternative at all who wants to learn how to come here you know uh who wants to be a janitor and they leave here and when I first started working with computers way back in 65 they told me oh Miss Wilson you can't uh work with us because you're a woman and this is a man's field so I had this to fight uh for longest [Music] the physical part of ciw is gassy but the mental there are a lot of locked doors um sometimes I don't expect them to be locked I go to open it because I think it's open it's locked it's annoying because I think we'll get somebody to open it and it's an unusual situation it might seem trivial to you but if you've lived with it for two years it sort of gets on your nerves they're giving them TVs and eyelashes and [ __ ] like that now they're doing more time too I've said a million times take those [ __ ] TVs take the makeup take the clothes give us back our state dress and quit threatening Us free in the dining room and I was going to put me forward to a table okay we may push the table together and then here come the pigs you know they tell us immediately so the same day we ate lunch with a group of white women that pushed their table together and he immediately came over to our table you know he wanted to get our names the numbers institution so we you know we just we just wrote on other table you know he said well he gave us some kind of remarks that uh I already know their names and I know I said well uh you know my name I really have a dress and then some thongs and some sales stores sell doors claiming all the time in the room to myself was to face open wash red and a release day on this day you will leave or if you are good we will let you go earlier [Music] foreign sentence was put in as a liberal means the whole idea behind it was so that they could judge people individually on what kind of person you were or not what your crime was for what happens to anybody who comes in here with any political background at all even juvenile records they're going to say well you're going to have to do more time because you're here because you finally did something criminal but you really want the establishment to fall okay and just because you were a demonstrator because you were a member of Instagram also because anything you're going to do as long as we can give you to do because you're a bad person now that's not the idea of the of the indeterminate sense [Music] foreign [Music] there's six members and it's the actual size of the room although I don't have it written down it's about 20 by 20. it should be long cable it's really plush like a courtroom and this is an inmate to the cops or act like a secretary the board and they talk with you and decide upon your time or your parole when you're eligible for parole or set your turn the major problem with the indeterminate sentence is the fact that the it puts all the power in the hands of the board and the board is neither a member of the legislature body or the judicial body it's purely an administrative function of the institution and the people who are on the board have no training in philosophy psychology phenology or criminology they're just friends of governor regans foreign [Music] what time does to people and how people end up in jail like people end up here basically because they're in an economic straight jacket that goes for any drug-related crime robbery anything the only reason people generally come to prison is because they're economically tight and they turn to a criminal means to make up for it okay when they get here they don't know how long they're going to do and the bench guides turn out to be the parole board and they don't have any conception of what people should do in order to get out now they've said they issued policy statements and on crimes which have any violence a lot of which carry a six-month minimum the board has come out with a policy statement in late 1973 saying that these people will do three years or more for various crimes involving violence okay now that is flat out illegal the board legally can't say that but they do and they make us do the hard time Behind These crimes which have a six month minimum and they've just arbitrarily changed the time to three month minimum they've also been able to say you have to get a divorce before you get a parole date when you get out you can't see your kids because we say so the major thing that the board does is they've got a bunch of non-religious fanatics on the board and they say we're going to give you a year review another year's time after you've already done three or four to meet your maker to find God you should go down on your knees and and ask the Lord for forgiveness now that's absolute [ __ ] what's the composition of the board just why just why there ain't no mentioning ain't no blacks ain't no pink say no greens ain't nothing but them whities up there breathing's talking to you like you a dog [ __ ] in a garbage can there's more whites in the United States than there are black but if you take the percentage as far as blacks and prisons and white in prison I feel that the majority would be black compared to the percentage of black in California foreign you know because you know you don't have enough money to buy you know for an attorney you know and uh if you get up on the defendant you know he he's not on his job and um you know you know with all this words inside of me you come here hating the white thank you two [Music] she told me that I was a guilt-rit and pathetic person I feel you know you know I really don't know they see me as Guilford and that means something to me why do they see me as guilt-rid I well I feel the system has to make guilt-ridden people in order to function do you think you could cope with them I make an idea for a while but can you nothing did you I said can you now can I do it right now I don't wanna because I like those pills right now and I'm gonna be I'm anti right now well do you think you could get here you think you get good feelings from drugs do you think you could get those good feelings from some other place I don't think I could it's like what have a little more faith in the Lord what the [ __ ] are they to get up there and say no you can't go back to living uh with this man or this woman or whoever you're living with your husband your wife you know whatever that you can't have kids they're they're controlling you all the way down to telling her she needs Christ now that's getting bit down to you know the power of that parole board from the beginning I used to promote to mice every Saturday here when I came here and then I realized one day that the priest is passing at least to the ball who goes to church and potassium now I stopped going to church five minutes parolee I've been to that place I know what it's all about listen to me I know what I'm talking about well so many police wasn't so I can keep some of these kids out of America if I have to trip them on the way in but I mean you get the goody tissues up there in the board any board board of directors Board of any any kind of a board the ones that are higher up that do the hiring and the firing they don't know what it's about they really do not know what it's about sometimes five to life you know so if I get I'm doing three you know two five to five seven five and fifteen and they happen to be rented together but should I really mess up these people have the power to keep me here for my life [Applause] [Music] is it going to tell you you've got to stay away from your kids some women want to marry someone but because they haven't lived common law when they use a little bit of morals on the street then they can't get married while they're in the institution or if uh you know okay like you say you want to get your kids when you get out and they don't want you to because they feel that you aren't a proper mother although the courts have not taken your kids away you can't have your kids you know you could that's some of the changes the changes of being away from the persons that you love only being able to see them twice a month you know this can really mess with your head sitting in your room wondering waiting you get that Restless urgent you've got to move on and you can't because you've got these walls around you you know those changes can really really mess with someone I've done two years so far looking at five more and then getting my time hey yeah that hurts I had a a run-in with the staff because I didn't come in with an H on my jacket and I immediately got very tight with a woman who came in with an H on their own jacket so um the fact was that I had had very close relationships with three other women and before I even got in here so and I enjoyed that very much and I'm still very close to all of them so I ran into various things about now you're you're a heterosexual you have a husband and I'd say yeah and I said what is he'd think about you're going around with this other woman I said he knows her and likes her and he knows the other women that I've been with and likes them and the fellow just sort of raised his eyebrows and said no this is impossible and I think maybe one of the things that prison started to do for a while was limit my conception of what's possible you take uh take a white girl married to a black dude they don't like that they don't like that and they're going to stop some time to her so I walked back in after I got my time and after I presented all these things that I could do on the outside much better than in here I said to them what do you feel this institution has to offer me my minimum is way overdone what does this place have to offer me well we've got college courses and we feel you have to get in tune with yourself and we feel it's your guilt-ridden person and we feel this we feel that and I said I got the college courses outside I got those organizations outside I can take I assume Jesus is outside I can take care of that Guild outside [Music] um what does this place have to offer me well would you like to answer that no you and finally one person came down and said this is a punitive measure now that's where it's at and why they don't just say that I could accept that a lot better than that other [ __ ] job training making as many cases as the D.A wins he's getting another year in his position is what we're doing uh you know we're giving them D.A the publicity we're giving the police and bust us publicity and we give them the judges that send us here publicity we're letting the big Crooks run for office of Governor we're letting the big president when they give you time I don't know if they realize this or if they don't realize this people do tell them you know don't give me time I'll become a criminal don't you realize that people who adjust to prison will become criminals and speaking honestly about myself I'm a working person and I always have been and I enjoy doing things with my hands but I've uh found it to be attractive to think about getting a gun getting uh some money moving off some rich people because of the system because of the people I've met in here because of how really easy it does seem to be as you know a way of life and it's a hard world out there in this country but thinking yourself I um I did have faith in myself something's happening to me in the last couple of months but I think ever since they started this 1168 things have been falling apart underneath me because you know you have to go back out there and face all the things that you left behind that you've been able to cope with because you're left with behind this and you didn't have to worry about observation now that you're getting ready to go back out there and you know you're going to have to start worrying about the bills and how money's going to get how your kids are going to get food how you're going to be clothed in the winter that's why people tell me that oh and I've had a few people coming in and I was ready to go home once but I was too afraid to go out there and try to cope with it again why should it be a friend my first thing when I went out there the first thing I did was grab for some drugs and I ended up getting myself a new case in another year here which isn't going to help because this year is going to come to an end too [Music] that was brought up on welfare I'm a state baby honey I wasn't just now been taking care of State I've been state has been taking care of me ever since I was one day old like the state brings you in here and all of a sudden you're totally dependent upon this day you know for everything you know if they don't cook your meals and uh open that door for you to eat you'd sit in your room and wait and wait and wait you know uh for food like the laundry if you don't get your laundry to get in all they have it so you can take your own on there but there was you know like you would sit and wait and if they didn't do all these things for you then you know you'd never you never get them done and and I think that subconsciously that they gear your mind towards having this all the time you know that um you don't have to worry about about your meals because you know someone over there is going to cook you don't have to worry about putting cheese on your bed because you know somebody's going to worship you never worry about anything you know but consequently it makes you too dependent on the state and we feel that you know she's just a great big Iron mother and uh you know you know and there's there's really no warmth from her there's no sincerity there's nothing you know and they totally destroy a person and since I've been here I've written about 30 songs and they're getting better and better and and I just know if I was on the streets I would be taking drugs you know I hate to say that because it's like saying well see it did meet you know it's doing some good I hate to admit that but it is true but you have to go back to these changes yeah [Music] um to tell you the truth I am really kind of scared through the workshops who have come in they've kind of give me a reason to know what's wrong all I knew is that something was wrong but I couldn't identify and getting together with women realizing some word some word called Sisterhood [Applause] has helped [Music] and what they do is they give you a t total picture of the whole United States of the whole [ __ ] system really you know how it is how it affects us the things that it does to put money in this one's pocket and consequently taking away something from me or somebody else like me you know are like oh let's you know it's um like if they build a shopping center okay maybe it's an area that would be a park for children everybody's kid you know but now it's gone to put money in somebody else's family it's all these workshops and I really have influenced me I wouldn't have thought about going to school because I'm afraid of competing with teenage boys that look like me and teachers that might not like me and feeling that I really don't belong in school and yet all all of the women that come in here have maybe it's not true I think that that's where what school is like there's a lot of those kind of people and the men they bring in two are nice too they don't seem to reset and log into education I'm making an appeal that I hope that everyone's watching this tape would uh some of the Chicano sisters out there in Chicago do black dudes black sisters Puerto Ricans Indians with all Indians you know any any minority group would all get together and try at least to bring Jews right up bring in again Brothers some workshops that the other minorities can relate to one of the major things that's hit with everybody in here is your own conception of your self-worth your self-respect and your dignity and if you're doing what you want to do and you're proud of what you're doing and of the way you move in the world you're a headache to the administration so sure they want to have you washing floors so in ancient shirts you know this kind of thing and it's it's to their advantage to keep us doing [ __ ] work yeah it's unbelievable this place will make you a break [Music] me being a woman and doping gay and a minority yeah I got I know I'm gonna have problems you know and since I couldn't cope with all of these energies inside of myself that say look at all this stuff and you're not doing anything I was a junkie you know but you know till now when I'm realizing that hey I'm a strong woman if you really come right down to it all I think everybody in the penitentiary is is a potential leader you know because we are in here for doing things that that uh yeah or or even if they do it's not every woman that does it you know so but we've just been channeled in the wrong as far as they're concerned wrong direction you know but if we had applied ourselves in in things that we could or wanted or or can do you know there's no no limit to what we could you know we stepped out of our places and as soon as people start realizing that they have some value in the world then you're going to get people to go wait a minute these are our legal rights these are our human rights and don't you [ __ ] with either one of those but women are very untogether in this prison they are all fight together regardless of color your religion you know fight against this system you know because this is first and we know what we're here you know a lot of them up here for some humbug you know but they ride on over there say well I want to go home well they should think about the future well instead of yeah you're gonna go home sooner or later but what about your son or your daughter that might be coming here you gotta try to have some other kind of prison Alternatives because this is not it we need us they cannot run this institution without the prisoners if we close down for three days don't you know they'd be running up the walls nobody in Industry nobody in the laundry but you know what the women haven't got the heart will come together and fight as a whole yeah okay now that's probably we were discussing before you got here the indeterminate sentence and the fear that people have because people a lot of people come in here with lifetime California's average sense most people in California are doing time with live top which gives not only the administration but the outside courts your whole life to [ __ ] with you and so people say well I'll just put my dignity in my back pocket and I'll kiss ass and maybe I'll get out of here and the problem is right you know the kiss and ass isn't going to get you out of here either yeah well what the thing is too okay now if we don't cooperate they're going to fold but what the women don't know is that if we all come together and we fight as a whole I mean all of us and fight as a whole for these issues we're going to be more free than we would be if we were if we go on taking this [ __ ] you know and if we do come together they can't slow us all they couldn't motivate or operate the institution without us that's it that's because I have a number behind me and I feel that that's going to hold me back you know because I'm black it's gonna hold me back because I'm a woman it's going to hold me back you know so uh you know I have three strikes against me but um I don't you know I'm gonna keep on pushing you know I'm not gonna let this hold me back you know I'm gonna go back out you know give me an education three or four weeks ago I was really into prison alternatives I thought wow anything would be better than um These Bars and these fences but the more I checked into it okay like I really did a lot of reading on uh some of the programs that are in use now and they're really nothing I mean it's just a continuing continuation of regimentation I was totally ignorant of politics uh what the United States consists of I was so into me you know in big self-pity trip that I never really looked around to see the rest of the world you know and that the whole world is in the same bag that I'm in but now I know the reasons that created it and I can correct it but I think the majority of the people really aren't aware of why they're doing what they're doing or why they're suffering you know in the way that they're suffering and the knowledge has to be given you know people just have to be become more concerned with people maybe somebody looking at this you know sometimes we'll be able to learn that um we're no different from them you know and that our problems are their problems you know and that any one of those people could be in my position right now the main the main thing is Unity I know within a prison setting the unity is much stronger because you're all in the same spot and you know you are when you're in the Free World it seems to be a little bit more selfish the people just don't seem to care that much for other people you know and so I really wonder who's really in prison you know is it really us and uh it all boils down to concern you know the whole the whole country has to be concerned for each other we can't place nobody above or below you know when you reach a handout you don't look at the hand first you know to see what kind of hand it is you just grab hold of it and pull them up you have to realize that prisons exist uh you have to realize that there's a lot of people out there with no education that have not had the opportunities to better themselves that want to eat who don't want to stand in welfare lines because that's been downed for so long you know um it thinks that it's a matter of Pride you know that they can't take anything from anybody else because that's part of the [ __ ] that they've brainwashed into us and you know like to have a socialist Revolution you'd have to organize you'd have to realize that these problems exist there are prisons there are people who go to prison because of economic reasons like 95 percent you know and uh so if you want to get rid of Prisons you know you've got to start organizing in your own communities and change your Society I wrote this song from a maximum security cell at ciw that I spent two years in warmer than warmer CE deeper than deeper colors of crimson we're here in prison we're alive we're alive we're alive we're here inside we are the people need their lives our hearts aren't casing concrete [Music] our connection is you when we're alive I'm alive I'm alive I'm alive I didn't die yeah what you gonna do about me sir what you gonna do about me what you gonna do with someone who sees you sir what you gonna do about me [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] deeper them deepest colors of crimson we're here in prison will be coming from prison we'll be coming watches will be coming from prison [Music]