They thought I was his wife, his
fiancée, or, at the very least, his girlfriend.
Given that I sat there waiting from 11:00 am till 3:00 pm until I was
finally allowed to see him, I can see how that might have been an easy
assumption to make. The truth was that
I had never before laid eyes on the man I was there to meet, but, as I sat
there with a room full of women and children waiting for the chance to spend an
hour “with” their husbands and fathers—and I say “with” due to the glass wall
and monitored phones that stood between them—I found myself catching glimpses
of what life might look like were that not the case.
This past Saturday I had the
opportunity to tag along with a small van full of Emory students and Lutheran
Services employees down to Stewart Detention Center, the largest detention
center in the nation. Having designed
the Lumpkin-located facility to be a medium-security prison and yet failing to
secure a prison contract, the Corrections Corporation of America instead struck
up a deal with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement to serve as a detention
center for undocumented immigrants. Now,
mind you, in coming to the States undocumented, immigrants have committed a
civil infraction, which most definitely is not the same thing as a crime. In the case of undocumented immigrants, the
detention system was never intended to serve a punitive function; rather, it was
to be a holding place to ensure that they stay until their cases are reviewed
in order to have the opportunity to appear before the judge. Detention itself is not even legally mandated,
and some areas have used alternative methods such as electronic monitoring with
high rates of success. However, because
Stewart was built to be and continues to run as a prison, these men are treated as felons, when the truth is
that the vast majority have committed no crime, violent or otherwise! Many of the men were picked up through
unlawful racial profiling, trapped in the detention system for nothing beyond
having entered the country; others have done no more than rolling through a
stoplight or driving 10 over in a residential area. Yet here they are, men who most emphatically
are not criminals, tucked far away
from family and out of sight, forced into prison jumpsuits and limited to one
hour a week of contact with the outside world!
Lacking the ability to fund legal representation, most spend years of
their lives stuck in this system before being deported back to their country of
origin. While many of the men are what I
would call economic refugees—men who have migrated due to unbearable economic
straits and yet who are not afforded the rights and protection of UNHCR-recognized
refugees— quite a few of them came here as asylum-seekers, fleeing situations
of conflict, persecution, and torture in their home countries.
As I sat in the “waiting room” with
children made antsy by the anticipation of seeing their fathers, I wondered,
how many of these children don’t understand?
Given the heavily monitored gates, metal detectors, and the glass wall
separating them from their loved ones, how many are led to think that their
daddy is a criminal? Seeing as they have
to visit him in a prison facility,
that is? The 34,000 men filling beds in
detention centers across the country tonight are there for no other reason than
the (gargantuan) profit those running the facilities stand to make off of
them. These facilities cost tax payers
$166 per bed, not to mention prevent family reunification, create orphans by separating
children from their parents, and often deny asylum-seekers access to the
therapeutic services that they need. All
of which, clearly, is in direct violation of international human rights, not to
mention Christian ethics, and needs to be a status quo we’re willing to push
against and push against hard.
When I visited on Saturday, I was
there volunteering through El Refugio, a truly inspiring nonprofit ministry
that seeks to provide support both to families of the detainees, through offering
them a free place to stay, as well as to the detainees themselves, through
regular visits to those men whose families are unable to visit. While I cannot tell you much about the man I
was there to see, I can tell you that he’s a French-speaking scholar from
Africa and that, after an hour laughing together and sharing stories about our
travel experience, faith, and relationships, well, he reminded me a whole lot
of family! As much as I enjoyed and was
challenged by his hopeful attitude and perspective, even in the face of four
bleak years in the center, I was equally moved by the community I witnessed
among the families present that day. How
touching it was to see women who had been making the trek down to Stewart for
years reach out to those who were there for the first time, offering
explanations, practical advice, and perhaps most powerfully, arm squeezes of
comfort and understanding. “Are you
doing ok?” one of them asked me as we were herded out when the visitation hour
came to an abrupt end. Seeing the
concern in her eyes and feeling the warmth in her gesture, I couldn’t help but
tear up, so struck and humbled was I by the genuine fellowship these women were
ready to extend to me before I had a chance to clarify the reasons behind my
presence.
Making the three hour drive back to
our homes in Atlanta, I was thankful for the opportunity to reflect on the
overall experience of the day with a few of my peers. To be frank, even today I’m still unsure just
how exactly to talk about it, being a day all jumbled up with sadness,
laughter, camaraderie, and anger. But I
know it’s a day I won’t readily forget, a day that will push me to learn more,
to go back and back again, and, in so doing, hopefully come to speak more boldly and act
more bravely.
Pensively Yours,
Janelle
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