**Where Hope Goes to Die**

“Where do you want your body sent?” Those are the first words you hear when you enter the State Correctional Institution at Pittsburgh, known as Western Penitentiary or “the Wall.” You’re thrown into a holding cell like cattle alongside others facing the same grim initiation. Then, you’re ordered to strip naked. The officer inspects every part of   showing no regard for decency. You’re forced into humiliating poses for his twisted satisfaction. Next comes delousing and fingerprinting, executed with menacing demands—the threat of punishment hangs over you, emanating from the officer’s foul breath like cheap whiskey and rotten teeth.

After this dehumanizing ordeal, you’re dressed in an ill-fitting uniform and reduced to a number that defines your identity for your stay.

You shuffle through the facility, watched by guards in the tower who show no mercy. Armed sentries wait, ready to unleash their anger on the powerless souls trudging through this concrete hell. Those inmates watch you with indifference, while some look at you like prey, eager to strip away any remaining hope. This place kills hope, mercy, and grace. Every stone and tool of confinement aims to destroy the human spirit. You lose your identity as a husband, father, son, or neighbor; you become just a number, sentenced to an arbitrary duration. Your time here is all they give you, but everything else is taken—what can’t be seized is willingly surrendered because holding on is too painful.

The system calls this “corrections,” but it’s really about destruction. Compassion is seen as weakness, and showing kindness can cost you dearly. Hatred becomes the currency; the ruthless rise to power while the weak are left to serve.

To survive here is to become unfit for the outside world. Your morals contort into a twisted version of what they were. People who once stood by you now look at you with disgust or pity; the person you were is gone. You’re marked as a felon, carrying an endless sentence for defying the system. It doesn’t matter if you disagree with it; law and order must prevail, whatever the cost. Our society is judged by how it treats its prisoners.

Most men in American prisons are victims of the war on drugs—eighty percent seems like a fair estimate. Many struggle with mental health issues. A small percentage—about ten percent—belong behind bars for heinous acts, while another ten percent made mistakes leading to someone else's death and show real remorse. Given another chance, most would live in gratitude, humbled by their experiences.

Men incarcerated for drug-related crimes usually return quickly. The prison system is designed to create repeat offenders. If they truly wanted to end recidivism, they’d find a way to make themselves obsolete. No organization willingly chooses to self-destruct, yet prisons are structured to fail. Even with declining crime rates, correctional budgets continue to grow. When four prisons close as a public relations move, new ones open, costing far more than any legitimate business would invest.