Through citizen videos, different Colombian organizations share their unique perspectives on crime, violence and armed conflict, where it’s hard to tell apart the good guys from the bad.

False positives

First, mothers and family members show up to march against the armed forces impunity on the deaths of young men due to what has been called False Positives. In the latest false positive situation, it seems that military lured young men with promises of work to rural areas where they were then assassinated and passed off as guerrilla members killed in action. However, the 17 accused members of the military were released when the trial deadlines were not met.

Landmines and indigenous people

The second group is the Nasa indigenous community, who through their YouTube channel have the opportunity to tell a side of the story usually avoided by mass media. In this case, the mines, mortar shells and other weapons left on their indigenous preserve, which is in the middle of the disputed areas between legal and illegal armed groups. The indigenous security service has to frequently “sweep” the area, including houses, to dispose of these weapons left by both the national army and the guerrillas. In the video, they ask the armed forces to please stop laying landmines and to at least come and pick up the unexploded ammunition before the members of their indigenous community stumble upon them.

A plea from police

In this third example, a neighborhood newspaper interviews the police to ask for the end of the year balance. In the interview, titled “Watch out for the bad neighbor” the officer mentions an incident where members of a criminal gang lived in a well-to-do apartment building much to the surprise of the neighbors, smuggling out weapons inside duffel bags designed to transport tennis raquets. But what is surprising is the recommendation the officer has for anyone: keep an eye on your neighbors and if you see young men with lots of money living on their own, eating out most of the time and bringing attractive young women into their apartment, particularly if they look like call girls, they might be members of the mafia.

Do you know of any other communities and organizations who are using video to tell stories not covered by mass media or to share different perspectives on the stories making the news? Please share them with us through the comments or write me a note!

This post was originally published on Global Voices Online on January 20, 2010.

Travelling and making videos of what we experience is a way to share it with the world. Following, a series of videos uploaded by user kdarpa on YouTube, featuring a group of volunteers and the people they met while they travelled to Rwanda and worked with local communities.

Among the videos recently posted is this one showing the final presentation of the drama workshop a team of students from Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry gave for genocide survivors:

The youth and adult groups also had a music workshop, here is a snippet of it:

A dance workshop was also organized, and here is their final presentation:

And the members of the writing workshop also danced to celebrate the culmination of their workshop:

This post was originally published on Global Voices Online on December 24, 2009.

The crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has flared up once again: 10 years of tension, on-and-off warfare and violence have taken their toll on the population, who are being displaced yet one more time. More than 5 million people have died during this warfare, thousands of women have been raped, and thousands of children have been recruited as children soldiers. On the following videos we bring you calls for action from the DRC citizens pleading with us to take a stand to stop the humanitarian crisis in the DRC.

Previous Posts on Global Voices has focused on this resurgence of violence: D.R. of Congo: Blogging From the War Zone and DR Congo: Fighting Continues, giving us an overview of the dramatic human rights violations, the clashes and fights arising between UN forces, government and rebels, and the internal displacement of people leaving their villages, cities and towns, running away from the violence.

Bukeni Waruzi, a DRC native who is the project coordinator for the African and Middle East region for Witness.org, writes an article in The Huffington Post about the crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and also posts a video commentary explaining the political situation, the historical roots for the crisis, and a call to action for all citizens to bring attention to this crisis, and try and force the authorities to intercede in benefit of the civilians taking the brunt of the conflict.

A campaign by Médicins Sans Frontiers (Doctors Without Borders) to raise awareness on the stark state of the DRC will start on November 20th. The Condition:Critical project will collect voices from the war in Eastern DRC, starting off with a documentary to be published on the launch date. The trailer is extremely moving, starting with the poignant testimony of a child born and raised during the war, who perceives his future as a bleak path leading only unto death.

A first-hand account on the impact of this war is told in this interview on the Virunga National Park blog where Ranger Benjamin from the Kalengera Patrol Post, tells how he witnessed rebels killing his father and murdering twenty other people from his village, shooting them one by one. He ran into the forest and then decided to walk to the refugee camp and tell his story to peers and authorities. He makes a heart wrenching call for action for the international community to pressure the CDR’s government to take action regarding the dire situation they are living in.

What can we do? Bukeni Waruzi has three suggestions for actions we can take:

* Write to President Kabila to urge him to stop mass rape, recruitment of children and bring an end to the conflict: http://hub.witness.org/DRCinCrisis
* If you’re a blogger — embed this video interview talking about the crisis: http://hub.witness.org/DRCinCrisis
* Urge your local media to cover this issue — write to the editor and write your own opinion piece

On Witness’ The HUB, there are many other videos providing different aspects of the humanitarian crisis: the violence, the refugee crisis and the epidemic rape of women and girls. The Ushahidi project has already deployed a taggable map to geographically locate and report incidents of violence and human rights abuses through SMS and web reporting

This blog post was originally published on Global Voices Online on November 15, 2008.

What is the connection between new media and the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo? That the black market trade of mineral components necessary to power our cellphones, laptop computers, mp3 players and digital cameras is also fueling the conflict and funding many of the armed groups. However, these same technologies are playing an important part in raising awareness about the conflict, and showing us that more than just a spot on a map, the DRC is full of people trying to survive and make the most out of their situation.

Using music to escape the violence

Take for example this video on Congolese rappers, and how street children are taking to music as a way to escape the violence. The video was uploaded by YouTube user mikayali and was featured on the Free Uganda blog. In it, young rappers speak about how the people are fed up by the violence, teachers haven’t been paid for years and are in strike, and children will grow up in the streets, with no education and no jobs available to them. So they turn to rap as a way to focus their anger about the situation they live in, to speak out about the issues like death and hunger, but with a bit of humor, they say, so the message gets across in a positive manner, with no violence or brutality and in the local language, Lingala,  since there are many who don’t speak French or English. The video audio is in French with English subtitles.

Spreading a positive message

It is this will to survive, live and hope to thrive that also inspires many of those who travel to Congo to become advocates for the situation, and try to spread the word about the conflict, and send out the message to make the world care. Such is the case with Emily Troutman, who made the following video: Why Congo Matters. She writes:

After spending a month in the Democratic Republic of Congo, I find myself speaking most often about the numbers: 5.4 million dead, 2,000 rapes per month, 17,000 UN soldiers, a war that started 15 years ago (or more?)….

And suddenly, the conflict seems impossibly huge, unsolvable, tragic, and remote. It is easy to forget that numbers are symbols, representing real people who take up an actual, physical space; who walk the down the dirt roads at sunset and carry water from the river, just as they did when I was there…

…For a number to be useful, it should have a beating heart and a face. It should collect names and remind us of something in ourselves. A number should challenge us to unravel it, to give it a smell (the earthy jungle undergrowth), a color (the black volcanic dust), a taste (papaya), and a sound (the ’snap’ of a green bean).

Why Congo Matters from Emily Troutman on Vimeo.

Protesting against companies supporting violence

So what to do about our gadgets and how they fund violence in a country already ravaged by war? Enough project joined YouTube to organize a contest where through videos, people could demand companies to provide transparent audits as to how they are obtaining their minerals and make sure they are “conflict free”. As they explained on the site:

“Much of the violence in eastern Congo is driven by armed groups competing to dominate the illicit minerals trade,” said Enough Project Executive Director John Norris. “These are the same minerals that ultimately end up in our personal electronics devices such as mobile phones, laptops and digital cameras. It seems only fitting that we can use something like YouTube and the huge creativity of its users to help end the scourge of conflict minerals.” Enough has called on electronic companies to pledge that they will certify their products are ‘conflict free’ and subject their supply chains to transparent audits.

The winner for the Come Clean 4 Congo contest was chosen just a few days ago, and will be present at the Hollywood Film Festival at the end of October. His name is Matthew Smith from the USA and he was also inspired by a recent visit to the Congo, where he and his team learned about the conflict and then decided to participate in the contest with Life Should be Free.

You can view other participants’ entries by following this link and clicking on “gallery”.

This blog post was originally posted on Global Voices Online on September 12, 2009.

Two different organizations in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories are using video tools to help both Arabic and Jewish youth to understand the conflict and bridge gaps between them,  creating spaces for interaction and communication where they can share their dreams, concerns and thoughts regarding the complex situation they live in.

One of the initiatives is Sadaka Reut, and this is what they say about their program:

With the majority of Palestinian and Jewish youth physically segregated from one another (in separate communities and schools) and fears, racism and prejudice the result, we look to build alternative models for interaction between the two groups. The ‘Building a Culture of Peace’ program seeks to create a space in which both Palestinian and Jewish youth may feel equal, respected and recognized as individuals and as national collectives.

The members of their program have also been participating in the One Minute Video Project, where they learn about video activism during a one-week workshop. Here are some of the results, and you can see the rest by clicking through to their site:

Arab:

AM/FM:

Few Love Singing:

Another initiative is the Windows for Peace project, which started back in 1991 as an effort to produce a bilingual and bicultural magazine for youth as a way for them to connect and learn about the conflict, promote equality and empower youth. However, it hasn’t been easy, as they explain on their site:

It is no simple task for Israeli and Palestinian youth to overcome the vast amount of misinformation and stereotypes they are taught about one another. The limited availability for interaction, a result of living in mostly segregated communities and exacerbated by the ongoing violent political conflict, perpetuates the historical fears, prejudice, and hatred that divide the two peoples. Windows is therefore dedicated to fostering large scale change in the way Israeli and Palestinian youth see themselves, “the other” and the conflict. Participants in Windows programs go through experiences that promote conflict transformation among both peoples, towards a peaceful reality with which both sides can live. We believe that a just and lasting peace must be based on democratic values, human rights, and mutual knowledge and acceptance of “the other.”

They are also working on a new initiative called Through the Lens, where 15 to 17 year old youth who “graduate” from the magazine continue developing skills to create short films, news pieces and other video productions to further “productive, peace-building dialogue and positive interaction”.

Here is a video where the participants of Windows speak about their experience in the group and how they have dealt with the challenges it represents to get out of their comfort zone and speak about difficult topics such as the conflict between Israel and Palestine:

Click here to view the embedded video.

As the children in the video state in so many words: they may have a hard time dealing with many of the opinions and perceptions other children express, but having the space to discuss issues in a safe and secure manner helps them understand the world they live in with a possibility to interact, learn and share with other children and youth and even change these perceptions.

This blog post was originally published in Global Voices on November 6, 2009.

UNIFEM, in the Say No to Violence channel on YouTube has already documented some of the actions being taken around the world to end gender violence. This first video shows the Ngara Girls High School in Nairobi, Kenya, where young girls are being taught to say No to Violence, to stand up for their rights and also how to deal with rape, assault, harassment and other forms of gender violence:

Also in Kenya, the Kenyatta National Hospital has a Gender Violence Recovery Center, where women and their children can go and receive care in cases of violence against them. In this next video, they tell of their experience running the center, the context they are in, and women who have been victims of gender violence speak out:

In Peru, the Flora Tristan organization is having a protest and mass gathering for another aspect they believe is related to gender violence: the denial of free access to birth control methods and the new law that determined that the day after pill (emergency contraception) wouldn’t be distributed free of cost. They will be doing an educational campaign in a park in Lima and giving out information about birth control, also handing out day after pills and birth control packets as a symbolic protest:

In the context of all Latin America and the Caribbean, UN-INSTRAW launches this video as part of an awareness campaign :

Latinoamérica y el Caribe es un lugar peligroso para las mujeres. Más de 50 por ciento de las mujeres de la región han sido objetos de agresiones. En la República Dominicana, por ejemplo, 1,453 mujeres fueron asesinadas entre los años 2000 y 2008. En el marco del Día Internacional para la Eliminación de la Violencia Contra la Mujer, UN-INSTRAW lanza un nuevo video sobre la seguridad de las mujeres latinas y caribeñas.

In Spain, women participated in the 5th Self-Defense seminar against gender violence, where they are taught how to protect themselves in case they face a dangerous situation. Training is geared towards enabling them to disable their aggressor momentarily so they can run away from danger.

And from Chile, Hip Hop Artist COFLA has made a song titled Femicide. Whereas hip-hop lyrics are often thought to promote violence against women, this artist has put out a song condemning how men go from promises of love and protection to violence, aggression and even murder:

Have there been similar efforts and activities in your hometown or country? Please let us know in the comments how your community is moving towards ending violence against women!

The Alzar las Voces (Raise the Voices) project in Nicaragua brings farmers in rural communities the possibility to speak out through video.

There are six organizations in Matagalpa Honduras who are working on this project including women’s collectives, Matagalpa Organization for the Blind, farmer organizations and an information center for Sustainable Development with the aid of Simas. The website is part of a project which will serve to showcase the work these organizations are doing with the members of the community.

Video: The importance of saving seeds

In the video above, Marcial Gonzalez, a promoter of the Farmer to Farmer program, explains how the program has helped them: first, they learned they shouldn’t burn their lands to clear them, how to build or grow ditches and barriers to help control erosion. Another lesson they’ve learned is the importance of saving and keeping seeds from national varieties of plants, since they are ideal to grow in their environment and why trees should be kept and not cut down, since they provide oxygen, shade and maintain the water sources.

Video: What it means to be a community promoter

Juana Urrutia, in another video, explains what it means to be a community promoter. A Promoter is in charge of a group or community, protecting the community’s interests, be it in fieldwork, production or socially. They also transmit knowledge which they received during workshops or activities, since it is their responsibility to put into practice what they have learned within their communities.

Video: A program to help women start their own business

Martha Elena Montenegro is a beneficiary of the credits and programs to help women start their own businesses. She makes some products using materials she harvests from her farm, however, after all the effort, she now has to pay back her loans, and she uses the video medium to ask how she should best distribute her earnings in order to be able to pay back her loan.

This story was originally published at www.globalvoicesonline.org.

These videos, by different human rights organizations, go beyond statistics to tell us the stories of women and their families as they struggle to understand why it is that so many women are dying during childbirth and what needs to be done to stop this.

First, the White Ribbon Alliance produced a four minute video titled Birth and Death explaining the seriousness of Maternal Mortality and how it can be stopped:

Click here to view the embedded video.

UNICEF also created a two minute video to raise awareness about this issue, with 5 steps that can be taken to diminish maternal mortality: education, respect, empowerment, investing and protection.

Click here to view the embedded video.

In this next video, In Silence: Maternal Mortality in India by Human Rights Watch, photographer Susan Meiselas and reporter Dumeetha Luthra traveled to India to follow the story of a woman who died after giving birth:

Click here to view the embedded video.

In Peru, as told by this piece done for CARE by Phil Borges, the Watchmen for Lives program to decrease maternal mortality has proven to be a success: by empowering and educating women from within the communities in the importance of healthcare during pregnancy and by making a chart for midwives with warning signs on when to send women to a clinic, more are going to clinics to give birth, dramatically reducing the numbers of deaths due to complications during labor.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Amnesty International has this documentary piece, 18 minutes long, about Maternal Mortality in Sierra Leone. One in 8 women die in Childbirth there: the inability to pay for medical attention, a practically non-existent healthcare system, lack of trained medical practitioners and understaffed and understocked clinics are the main reasons. As the women in the video tell: everyone there knows a woman who has died during pregnancy or labor.

Click here to view the embedded video.

And from Australia, students from the Nursing and Midwife program at the University of Sydney have created Birthing Kits that they’ve delivered to developing countries to try and prevent unnecessary deaths. It includes a plastic sheet to put under the mother, surgical gloves, scalpel blades, gauze, soap and string to tie off the umbilical cord. In the video, they tell of their initiative and the successful experience they’ve had in Bangladesh.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The adoption of a child either within your own country or across borders creates opportunities for children and prospective parents as well as risks for human rights abuses. One thing most people seek, is more openness and dialogue about a process with many consequences hidden from view.

Babygate: trafficking children to cover demand

Malinda, an adoptive mother of two Chinese girls, writes in her blog Adoption Talk about the lengths some corrupt individuals are going to ensure the steady flow of adoptable babies to people able to pay the pricey adoption fees. In her post Adoption Corruption: Trafficking in the news she highlights recent cases in Cameroon, where children are kidnapped in order to be placed for adoption.

Korea, where young parents put their baby on sale on the Internet. Guatemala, where the army abducted and sold more than 333 children for adoption and where recently babies and children were put up for adoption without parental consent. And Ethiopia, where unregulated agencies are convincing families to give their children up for adoption, promising them the children will later return to them or that the agency will help support the remainder of the family. Similar cases have been seen in numerous other countries.

Bego from Spain, adoptive mother of an Ethiopian child, defends her decision to adopt internationally, in spite of the possibility that it might have been a coerced or deceitful adoption. She mentions the lack of opportunities, violence and poverty, and how many of the children are genuinely placed for adoption in the hopes they will have a better life.

She writes: in a perfect world, every child placed for adoption would be a child needing a home… but that in a perfect world, no child would lack a home in the first place, and all women would be able to mother children. Regarding the new regulations placed in Spain blocking adoptions from Ethiopia, she insists that the government’s position of prohibiting is shortsighted: what is needed is to improve controls at ground level, so that this situation doesn’t repeat itself.

Mothers coming together to secure their human rights

Some adoptive mothers do what they can to ensure one woman’s right to motherhood doesn’t go against the reproductive rights of another mother.

One such option is open adoptions, a sometimes controversial decision where the child remains in contact with the birth mother and is aware that due to other circumstances, she wasn’t able to take care of them.

One woman in the United States, Leigh, writes a blog called Open Adoption Round Table about the challenges of giving her child up for adoption in a semi-open arrangement.

Another blogger and writer Dawn Friedman tells a story in her blog from the opposite perspective of adopting her daughter, Madison, while keeping an open line of communication with the birth mother. Friedman is also an activist for adoption reform in the United States.

She believes pregnancy counseling in unplanned pregnancies too easily pushes women towards giving up their babies for adoption without informing them adequately of how difficult it is. Friedman also recommends that the process of adoption counseling should include a post-labor session where women are accompanied through the decision making process and advised of their rights and possibilities after giving birth.

Birth mothers

Lorraine Dusky in the United States, who runs the Birth Mother, First Mother Forum had medical history that made her think that birth control pills she took during pregnancy could have affected the child she placed in adoption, but when she tried to contact the adoptive family through the agency to let them know, they refused to send over the information.

She relinquished her child with no particular coercion, but the laws for “closed records” in adoptions may have cost her daughter’s life.

But what about natural mothers in developing countries? Where are their voices? Some of them have written letters to the children they’ve placed for adoption, as Pam Conell of families.com tells us in her book review of I Wish for You a Beautiful Life: Letters from the Korean birthmothers of Ae Ran Won.

Others are telling their stories through documentaries, or after being reunited with their natural children. And there are some others who tell of women who don’t regret giving their children up for adoption, considering it was the best alternative.

However some women, like Malinda in the USA, adoptive parent of Chinese Girls who writes AdoptionTalk believes that these last representations have to be taken with a grain of salt:

These representations of foreign birth mothers allow us to divorce ourselves from the experience of these birth mothers, to minimize their pain, and to justify how much better off our children are with us than with them.

The voices of the adopted

Mary Grace in China by endbradley

The voices of the adoptees are varied. But they have something in common: The desire to know about their origins and the reason for their adoption and the hope that their birth mothers made an informed decision to part with them. They also believe in the right to know their history if they choose, to know about their adoptee status from early on and have it acknowledged as part of their identity.

For example Susan from ReadingWritingLiving, an adult adoptee born in the 1960’s, identified with TV drama Mad Men, particularly in their portrayal of adoptions in that time period, where women hid their shameful unwanted pregnancies until giving birth and how adopted children where seen as discards. She sums it up in her post Mad Men: A Window into my Own Past

Yes, it was painful to hear this but also WILDLY refreshing to have someone just come out and SAY it.

In the I am adopted blog [Spanish], David Azcona writes about his difficult childhood, adoption at the age of 6 and the instability and inability to bond with people [Spanish] he’s felt since. It is also a place for other adoptees to post their adoption stories, and to share their experiences. In the comment threads of his about page, stories about apropriated babies [Spanish] with no knowledge of their birth parents, twins separated at birth [Spanish] by nurses who told parents one of the babies had died [Spanish] and requests from birth mothers trying to contact their children as well as the other way around.

An adoptee answers a question asked on a website regarding love between adoptees and adoptive parents:

I was adopted as a baby by the two most loving, caring and supportive parents a child and young adult could ever wish for. I also have a younger adopted brother.

I don’t think my biological parents could have loved me more than my adoptive ones.

Other adoptees with similar experiences chime in, some with relationships with both natural parents and adoptive parents and others who have only known their adoptive families. In this particular thread, the experiences are overwhelmingly positive towards adoption.

Some adoptees advocate against adoption. Lost Letters, an adoptee herself who writes in the Anti-Adoption livejournal community believes that instead of using so much money to aid in adoption processes and fees, it should be spent in improving the conditions of the birth parents so they can take care of their family. She adds:

I understand that my actual position on adoption is going to piss people off because people want to believe that adoption is a win/win/win situation for everyone, because people think that middle class white women deserve children no matter what, because people think that our western society is so wonderful that all children should be bought up here.

AmyAdoptee who posts in the Adult Adoptees Advocating for Change forum writes:

The adoption industry intentionally pits us against each other. We are letting them do it. In fact, the adoption industry gets a wonderful kick out of this. Here is an article that supports generally our point of view but they ask that we refrain from attacking adoptive parents. There is nothing wrong with a healthy discourse.

PhilM, in the same forum thread discussing how adoptive parents perceive them, clarifies:

I’m angry at a society that ignores the problems of adoption, and the harm it causes. I’m angry that when I try to talk about these things, I am marginalized and dismissed with comments along the lines of “well, everyone experiences it differently” and “most adoptees I know love their adoptive parents” and others. I am angry that, because I speak out about adoption, people question my love for my adoptive family. And, I admit, I get angry when individuals parrot these messages.

I don’t need a lecture for how to behave in dialogue. I need people willing to engage in it.

The way forward

As with any delicate issue, it touches a sensitive chord for all those involved. However, it seems they all agree on one important point: Transparency in the adoption process is vital to safeguard the human rights for the mothers and the children, and discussing adoption openly encourages transparency.

Imagine a woman giving birth handcuffed and her feet shackled. Do pregnant women in prison deserve human rights, or can pregnancy become a way to avoid jail?

All over the world, pregnant women struggle for basic human rights.

In chains

In the US, pregnant women serving time have been routinely shackled during labor and childbirth, despite the danger to the mother and child, according to Malika Saada Saar, founder and executive director of the Rebecca Project for Human Rights. In a blog-post published at RH Reality Check, she tells us that the issue of shackling pregnant women is still being debated.

The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) in September 2008 ended shackling mothers as a matter of routine course in all federal correctional facilities. State legislatures and Departments of Correction have also responded to the sea change in shackling policy. Most recently, New Mexico, New York, and Texas have enacted laws prohibiting the practice of shackling pregnant women in nearly all circumstances.

Fighting the system

Malika Saada Saar features a video on her blog-post at RH Reality Check about a mother,  Shawanna Nelson, who was shackled during labor, but who brought a lawsuit against the Arkansas Department of Corrections for cruel and unusual punishment:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Malika Saada Saar says:

Thanks to [Shawanna Nelson's] courage and the common sense of a panel of judges, the 8^th Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled and the shackling of prisoners during labor is unconstitultional.

Pregnancy as a bargaining tool

Why are rights for pregnant women in prison so controversial? Different countries have different viewpoints about the debate.

In Russia Today, a Russian broadcasting channel,  the subject is mentioned:

Skeptics think some mothers deliberately get pregnant simply to ease life in prison. Hospital leave, then lots of scheduled time with your child – it is all better than sitting in a stone cell, they claim.

And there are women for whom it seems that pregnancy is the only way to escape a sentence, as was the case back in June, when a British woman incarcerated and sentenced to death in Laos due to drug smuggling got pregnant in prison and escaped being executed, since the Laos government would not execute a pregnant woman. The claims made according to the Daily Express, a British newspaper, are that she got artificially inseminated “to secure a more lenient term”.

Pregnancy as a get out of jail free card?

In Argentina, according to Ajintem, an information portal for  migration information, a law was passed last year specifying that pregnant women, women with children younger than 5 and those with handicapped children would benefit from spending their prison term at home under house arrest.

This law would benefit not only the mother, who in prison wouldn’t receive suitable health care during her pregnancy. It would also help the child, who would either be raised without a mother, or in prison, an unsafe environment.

However, the message is for magistrates to follow the spirit of the law and grant this permission to those women not involved in violent crimes. The rest of the civilian population shouldn’t see pregnancy as a get out of jail free card.

Children growing up without mothers

In the Canary Islands, according to Prisiones y Penas, a blog about the issues surrounding jails and prisons, women are allowed to keep their children of up to 3 years of age in their cells, but in the company of other inmates – an unsafe environment.

Thus, pregnant women or women with children under 3 are encouraged, upon entry to the prison, to send their child off to family members because it isn’t good for the child to grow up behind bars.

This is also the case in Peru and Russia.

Why doesn’t the US allow women to keep their babies in prison?

In the US, there are only two correctional facilities which allow prison inmates to keep their babies with them, in New York and in Nebraska, as told by renowned photographer Jane Evelyn Atwood in her 3 part photo documentary for Amnesty International,  called Too Much Time, where she visited dozens of prisons all over the world to record and document the lives of inmates.

Atwood explains that the reason the US correctional system does generally not allow women with babies to keep them, is due to the hostage situation. In the Prison Photography Blog they address this claim:

Children are excluded from all but a couple of US prisons. The security threat is cited as the reason: a child inside a prison is a constant vulnerable life and constant hostage target. The claim seems a little bogus when penal systems of other countries are brought into consideration.

The Atwood documentary in the Amnesty International site features both a section on the process of giving birth in shackles as told in Vanessa’s Baby and another on prison systems and motherhood.

Women speak out about their children and prison life

Geraldin Rodríguez, an Argentinean spending time in an Ecuadorian jail due to drug trafficking tells Marcos Brugiati, a writer who contributes with the art related online publication Plastica-Argentina, a story about getting pregnant in prison. She was allowed to keep her baby with her, but decided that the child needed to grow up free:

I decided he should leave to live, I was afraid he would suffer the same traumas I have today. After a year my brother took him away and is caring for him along with his wife.

A motherless child
Juvinete is in a Spanish prison, and was pregnant when she was incarcerated for drug trafficking. She tells her story to regional Spanish newspaper NorteCastilla. Three years after giving birth to her baby in prison, her child had to leave her side, and was sent to a foster family. Juvinete sees her daughter every 15 days and every two months she gets a 2 week leave to spend time with her.

However, things don’t seem to be looking up: there is a chance Juvinete will be deported to her natal Brazil, and she fears for the consequences this change would have on her child. She does have advice for any woman who decide to get pregnant while in jail:

I try to convince them not to get pregnant while inside because seeing a child deprived of their freedom is very hard, it’s irresponsible. They don’t have to pay for our mistakes.

“My family didn’t even know I was in labor”

In Woman and Prison, a website dedicated to women’s experiences in the correctional system, inmate Kebby Warner speaks of her own pregnancy while doing time in a US prison and having her child taken away from her. Here is an excerpt where she writes about the birthing process:

During the labor, no one is allowed in the delivery room. My family didn’t even know I was in labor or had her until after I left the hospital. During the three days some of the guards stayed in the room, but most of the time, when the nurses asked them to sit outside the door, they complied. I have heard horror stories of women being chained to the delivery bed. I am so grateful as to have not experienced this. Most of the nurses treated me as a human instead of a prisoner.

You can read more testimonies about growing up with a parent in prison in Women and Prison.

So what do you think?

There are a few questions that come to mind:

• What is it like to be pregnant and have a child behind bars?
• Should women in prisons be a priority when there are other women outside of correctional facilities without medical assistance?
• Should maternity overrule any other legal conditions to ensure a pregnant woman’s human rights?

Image used to illustrate post is “17 de noviembre” by daquella manera.