The Liberal Paradox of Suicide in Prison

• In Event: Coffee & Lightning Round: Research in Five: Graduate Students II

Abstract

The U.S. is notorious for high suicide rates among prisoners. This should come as no surprise, as the U.S. holds the highest rates of incarceration worldwide, with more than two million individuals imprisoned at any given time, perpetuating a highly punitive and overloaded system. Behind bars, inmates often describe their lives as terrible, painful, unworthy to be lived, meaningless. This should also come as no surprise, as life in prison, deprived of any form of freedom, leaves merely no room for human agency. Yet, some have argued that agency, embedded in the freedom to, if not act, then reflect, upon one's condition, can never be annihilated. For yet others, freedom is to be found in the ever possibility to commit suicide while incarcerated. However, many believe that life in prison is neither about finding alternative forms of freedom, nor escaping the experience of incarceration by committing suicide. Instead, prison should entail pain and suffering, as embedded in the retributive adage “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life.” But then, how can we still expect inmates to not consider ending their lives under the deep duress of prison life? Why fight suicide behind bars, as the US has increasingly been doing in recent years? My research project plumbs this puzzle by examining suicide in prison and how liberalism tries to have the cake and eat it too: depressing life, removing liberties and freedoms, while fostering the imperative of the pursuit of happiness.

Author

• Shirley Le Penne, Cornell University