Pretty Pink Prisons

Prison. Jail. The slammer. The lock-up. There are so many names for it that one already has visions when they hear the word jail. You see images of tough looking, violence-prone individuals staring at you. You rarely think of some of the cast of characters you see in films like "The Longest Yard" or anything like that. Movies like "The Shawshank Redemption" and the like provide you with a lot of motivation not to want to go to jail. Still, for those that are in there, there are quite a few who are looking to serve their time and then return to society. Jail is tough no matter what anyone chooses to say. Unfortunately, some of the officials over in Kansas City believed they had to give the inmates a little helping hand.

It seems that someone in the Kansas City Police department had read a report back in the 1990's that stated that pink supposedly helps to calm inmates. So, without much further ado, all of the jail cells were painted in various shades of pink to determine whether or not there was a calming effect on the inmates. Now I don't know about you, but to me this just seems like it would make the situation worse rather than better. Like I mentioned earlier, most of the visions you have of prisoners is that they are tough and mean; now we are going to have to envision them in pink cells? Something tells me that rather than calming them, this is just going to aggravate them further. I mean here you have a bunch of criminals looking to serve out there time and once they're released, do you think their peers are going to congratulate them on serving time in a pink room?

I would think that this would further motivate violence. I mean can you imagine the conversation between a newly released inmate and his old gang friends? "So Biff, we heard you served time in Kansas City. How were the pink cells?" Biff is probably quite embarassed and would seek to avoid the question seeing as how he's been largely rehabilitated. "Come on Biff, we know it must have made you quite the docile one." Biff would continue to evade the question but over time it would be difficult. Most guys love to tease other guys about their toughness and this inevitably leads to fights. With criminals it will probably lead to much more than that; even for rehabilitated ones.

There are certain things which we as a society come to accept; death and taxes are probably the most well known, but dingy jail cells is probably somewhere there too. To see pink jail cells would probably shatter many of the norms we as a society have come to accept. If we see pretty pink jail cells then what other societal norms will be shattered? No more waiting in line at the Department of Motor Vehicles? No traffic on the highways during holiday weekends. Politicians who actually do what they say they are going to do when they are attempting to get elected? The possibilities, the scary possibilities are just too much to consider. A person could go mad trying to imagine the possibilities. Mad! Mad! Mad! The officials in Kansas City came to realize that there was no real effect on prisoners and soon all the pink cells will be painted over. I just shudder to imagine what this could have led to. ;-)