Lots of people have some type of mental health issues, I am no exception to this rule. I have struggled with anxiety my whole life, although for the longest time I didn't know what it was. I thought there was something wrong with me and that if I was like this around others I would ruin their mood and they would hate me. During this time I felt extremely isolated and that made a worse impact on me than anxiety itself. At school and home I would be quiet and keep to myself, that wasn't like me. I'm an outgoing and blunt person. During this time I had created my own personalized jail cell. That was all in my head, but these people are in an actual jail cell. More isolated than I hope to ever be, when in prison people are still allowed to go around and talk to their  jail friends but when in solitary confinement  they are locked in a room by themselves. Solitary confinement causes types of mental problems that can not be fixed no matter how great the medication and its been shown to cause more harm than good, so at what cost are we locking people up? Which is why I don't think solitary confinement is a good option especially when there are other punishment options and we have seen the people they have affected like Albert Woodfox who has some of the long term effects. It's also good to know what kind of behavior is getting people put in solitary confinement and if it’s reasonable or not, it is also more common for black men to be isolated unfairly.

There is a range of punishments that we deal with as people and in prison it's a little different on the scale but it has the same premise; they have many similar punishments that a parent would give a child just on a more extreme level. For example, confiscation when having misbehaved to a certain degree an adult may take something that holds value to the child and they will get it back after a certain amount of time. But when in prison they often don't get the confiscated items back and more often than not it is a prison regulated phone that they use to talk to their family and other loved ones between visiting times although it can also be weapons that are used to try and escape or harm themselves . It also all depends on what type of criminal punishment they get according to the article “Types of Crimes and their Punishments'' by  Point Park University in May of 2021. There are also job changes where they simply give them a worse job which is generally working in the mess hall or they could get their courtyard privileges taken away, like a child would be given more chores or sent to their room and not allowed to play with their friends. The longest I have been sent to my room as a child was a couple of hours, but people in isolation can be there for weeks or months at a time.

Albert Woodfox was the longest serving solitary confinement prisoner in America, he was the last of the Angola 3 to be released from solitary confinement. The angola three was a group of three black men who were put in solitary confinement for longer than necessary. He was given solitary confinement as a punishment for killing a prison guard, this seems like a justifiable punishment for a limited time but for as long as he was held it did more bad than good, it was also found later that he did not commit the murder. For 43 years he was in a 6x9 room by himself and allowed one hour in the courtyard although he was still in shackles, but during his last year his courtyard time was reduced to only 3 hours a week. According to amnesty international in october of 2020 “Louisiana authorities had no legitimate reason to keep Albert in solitary as long as they did: his prison records were exemplary throughout and clearly stated that he didn't pose a threat to himself or others” he was released from confinement and prison all together on his 69th birthday. He didn't experience most of the long term side effects and now lives in a 3 bedroom house with his dog Hobo.

Just because he didn't experience  most of the side effects doesn't mean that most do; people that spend more than a few weeks often get some type of a side effect. Some of the mental side effects can include: anxiety and stress, depression and hopelessness, anger, irritability and aggression, hypersensitivity to smells, problems with attention, concentration, and memory. They may also get psychosis, a mental disorder characterized by a disconnection from reality,. Most people only recognize the mental strain on the prisoners as the media doesn't bring much light to the physical struggles that they have to deal with such as: problems with eyesight, digestive issues, extreme sensitivity to light and noise, genitourinary problems, and extreme weight loss. More than 100,000 people in solitary confinement have had some type of effect according to the ACLU in “Criminal justice task force releases first-ever federal blueprint for ending solitary confinement” on june 7th 2021. A death row inmate  Timmy Gibble was in solitary confinement and was waiting for his death penalty. He said that he would have rather have been killed already then be have to have the mental torture of thinking about it while everyone around me is screaming from the madness.

Between  the other options for punishments like confiscation and job transfer, as well as the long term effects it has on people both mentally and physically like anxiety and digestive issues ; we also have people who have been kept in solitary confinement for longer than needed like Albert Woodfox and the rest of the Angola 3. The good coming out of solitary confinement has been outweighed by the bad numerous times over. Researching and reading what these people have gone through really makes me think about my mental health and I realized that my self-inflicted isolation isn't all that alone at all . It doesn't necessarily make it any easier, it just puts into perspective how small my problems seem compared to others.