Women in Prisons

Over my lifetime I have spoken to many corrections officers, both men and women, from New York City, New York State, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Arizona, and California. One truth stands out without question. The men in prison are violent and dangerous, and the worst of them end up featured on television shows about maximum security nightmares. But the women, according to every officer I have spoken with, are a different breed entirely, nasty, filthy, manipulative, and disgusting in ways that make violence look almost straightforward by comparison.

Every officer I have spoken to has told me they would rather work in a men’s prison than a women’s. In a men’s facility you know what you are dealing with. Violence is open, visible, and predictable. But in a women’s prison the filth is not just physical, it is mental. It is constant scheming, constant drama, constant attempts to weaponize lies and manipulation. The danger is not just in fists and blades, it is in the games they play to ruin anyone they can reach.

When seasoned officers, hardened by years inside the walls, tell you they prefer the company of male inmates over female ones, it should tell you everything you need to know about the reality of female behavior when the masks come off.