To all reading this, what would go through your mind if, prior to meeting someone for your first date, they sent you an email or a text that says, \u201cBefore we meet, there is something I need you to know. I am an ex-felon and served three years in the Nevada State Prison.\u201d<\/p>\n
I had to do that when I was dating. It was always a hard choice \u2013 do I wait until after we meet so they might give me a chance, but then if I wait for a few dates and tell them, will they wonder what else I am hiding? Or do I tell them right away so they can make a personal decision? I had a profile on Yahoo Personals back in the day, so this was a real concern. A few women that I told politely said no, they couldn\u2019t go forward. I finally quit even trying and took my post down.<\/p>\n
Then one evening, I came home from church and turned on my computer. Lo and behold, there was a \u201cwink\u201d from the beautiful half-Korean girl who said hello. (A wink was a free way to express interest in someone). I had to sit for a moment to decide if I wanted to spend another $20.00 to sign up again and answer this person. I liked what I read on her profile and pulled out my credit card. So, I faced my dilemma again \u2013 when do I tell her? I decided to tell her before we met. And what was Nancy\u2019s response? \u201cHow have you changed?\u201d and when I answered her, she came back and said, \u201cThen it’s behind you; let\u2019s move on.\u201d The rest is history!<\/p>\n
If I am reading everything correctly, Mounjks’s book The Identity Trap encourages the reader to understand and contemplate their own beliefs and biases about the identities of groups, individuals, and organizations. Take what they come up with\u2014both the good and the bad\u2014and try to re-engage people with an open mind and heart.<\/p>\n
Mounjk writes: \u201cIn diversity trainings, for example, the focus has increasingly shifted from encouraging a form of mutual respect that aims for equal treatment to an awareness of the ever-present potential for implicit bias and microaggressions that encourages people to be highly aware of the specific identity markers of their interlocutor.\u201d[1]<\/a> That rang true to me. Heck, even I have biases around some of the felons I was in with. But most of them were good guys who got caught up in addictions or other family traumas and, truthfully, are not much different than most people we meet.<\/p>\n But oh, the stigma. I am not allowed to cross the Canadian border without applying for approval. I was embarrassed to check that box on a job application, leasing paperwork, or any other official documents for years. Many times, I have had to step back and politely smile when I am with a group of people who don\u2019t know me, and they start saying terrible statements about people in prison and how they should get the worst of food or living conditions, and how they have nothing coming. It\u2019s not always easy to bite my tongue, but I do.<\/p>\n What would happen if people didn\u2019t automatically assume the worst about people who have served their time and paid their dues? I was one of the lucky ones. Sadly, first, I am white. Second, I had a great support group around me, and third I had skills that I could use to get work.\u00a0 Mounjk writes: \u201cGroups that suffered the most extreme injustices in the past are especially likely to continue suffering from the most intractable disadvantages today.\u201d[2]<\/a><\/p>\n For people who spent time in prison, here are the grim statistics: 44% of prisoners released in 2005 were arrested at least once during their first year after release. 34% were arrested during their third year after release, and 24% were arrested during their ninth year.[3]<\/a>\u00a0 There are a variety of reasons for the recidivism rates that are high, but I can\u2019t help thinking what it would be like if there weren\u2019t automatic biases placed on their shoulders. What does it look like to embrace and welcome ex-felons back into society and give them a job and a chance? Mounjk writes: \u201cTrue solidarity would have two elements: First, each of us would listen to members of other identity groups with an open mind, empathizing with the forms of oppression to which they may be subject. And second, each of us would strive to remedy genuine injustices, not out of a misguided sense of deference, but because they violate our own aspirations for the kind of society in which we want to live.\u201d[4]<\/a><\/p>\n What a society it would be! Even in today\u2019s highly political divide in the US, if we could try to find some common ground and understanding, we would be much better off. If society were willing to extend grace to ex-felons to get them out of the circle of poverty and despair because of their past, the recidivism rate would plummet, and families could be healed, which may create fewer incarcerations in the future.<\/p>\n By the way, that decision I made 18 years ago to spend the $20.00 to re-sign up for Yahoo Personals was the best $20.00 I had ever spent.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n [1]<\/a> Yascha Mounk, The Identity Trap: A Story of Ideas and Power in Our Time<\/em> (New York: Penguin Press, 2023), 245.<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> Ibid., 10<\/a><\/p>\n [3] US Department of Justice: 2018 Update on Prisoner Recidivism: A 9-Year Follow-up Period (2005-2014)<\/em>. https:\/\/bjs.ojp.gov\/content\/pub\/pdf\/18upr9yfup0514.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n