Within the newest episode of our podcast collection Annotated, we have a look at what it’s like making an attempt to get books to folks serving time in jail. One of the eye-opening components of the story is the absurd outcomes when jail officers display incoming books.
If you’re a Recreation of Thrones fan in jail, you won’t be capable to get a duplicate of any of the books for an odd cause.
Many individuals in jail request books from nonprofits like Books to Prisoners, but when they’re requesting an installment in George R.R. Martin’s epic fantasy collection, they may run into bother.
In accordance with Michelle Dillon, a volunteer and board member of Books to Prisoners Seattle, they’ve had jail officers withhold Recreation of Thrones books due to…the maps.
These rejections appear to occur due to a really strict studying of the rules prohibiting maps from coming into prisons.
“Normally what that appears like is that you simply can not have maps which are of the native space,” Dillon says. If somebody in jail is requesting detailed maps of the world proper across the jail, then that’s thought of a risk to security and safety.
However generally “native” will get interpreted fairly broadly. “For instance, in Washington you may’t ship maps of Washington, Oregon, British Columbia, Idaho, and also you’re probably not positive how a fowl watching map of Idaho goes to assist any person escape,” she mentioned.
These at the very least are actual locations, although, and on Earth. It’s when maps which are clearly not helpful in any significant manner get flagged that the capriciousness of the system turns into clear.
“We’ve gotten situations the place Recreation of Thrones has been rejected as a result of they’ve the map of Westeros. By no means thoughts that it’s a fictional map. We’ve had prisons which have rejected maps of the moon,” Dillon says.
You possibly can take heed to the remainder of the episode utilizing the participant under, or discover episode 24 of Annotated, Books Behind Bars, in your podcast participant of selection.
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