Amie Ichikawa shares her remarkable transformation from incarceration to becoming the founder of the Woman II Woman organization. She opens up about her experiences behind bars, the emotional and psychological toll of prison life, and the difficult transition back into society. Through her story, Amie sheds light on the harsh realities faced by incarcerated women, the silent battles with PTSD, and the urgent need for mental health support.
She also dives into the complex and often overlooked impact of gender self-ID laws on the safety and well-being of women in prison. Her insights reveal the systemic neglect, lack of proper healthcare, and legislative apathy that continue to endanger vulnerable populations within the justice system.
Amie’s advocacy focuses on the need for reform, empathy, and accountability. She challenges the status quo, amplifies the voices of incarcerated women, and calls for stronger support systems and protections.
*Trigger Warning: Discussion of SA and other explicit content
*We support the trans community and respect their right to safety, identity, and inclusion! This discussion of concern is not directed at trans individuals, but at violent offenders who are abusing gender self-ID laws to cause harm.
Amie’s Socials
https://www.instagram.com/ichix310
https://x.com/ichinita310
https://www.facebook.com/amie.ichikawa
Woman II Woman Organization
https://www.womaniiwoman.org
https://www.facebook.com/WomaniiWomaninc
https://x.com/womaniiwomaninc
https://www.instagram.com/womaniiwomaninc
Amie’s Articles of Support
California rape case
https://www.foxnews.com/us/third-strike-trans-rape-suspect-prompts-rebellion-against-ca-law-after-attack-womens-prison
https://abc7chicago.com/post/pronoun-use-center-rape-case-involving-former-chowchilla-central-california-womens-facility-prisoner-tremaine-carroll/15696730/
Wisconsin
https://www.npr.org/2023/06/01/1179301244/minnesota-settlement-lawsuit-transgender-inmate-christina-lusk-prison
New York
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/investigations/man-posing-as-transgender-woman-raped-female-prisoner-at-rikers-lawsuit-says/5067904/
https://nypost.com/2022/04/09/trans-serial-killer-harvey-marcelins-first-prison-interview/
New Jersey
https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/nj-trans-prisoner-impregnated-2-inmates-transferred-mens-facility-rcna38947
Canada
https://torontosun.com/news/national/hunter-whos-pushing-violent-trans-sex-killer-on-female-prisons
It's a tough one.
She's with us from California and Amy was previously a woman who was incarcerated and she,after getting out, she just established an organization.
(00:25):
It's called Women ii Women.
So I'm gonna let her go into further detail and tell her story and tell us all about herorganization and everything else.
(00:49):
Thank you.
Hi Amy, we're happy to have you.
Thank you very much, I'm happy to be here.
Glad we...
We had some issues there.
Technical.
You overcame them, but...
Yes, we sure did.
Have some teamwork.
Yeah, always good to have a team.
So I was in prison.
(01:13):
I went for five years.
And those were five of the most formative years of my life, I think.
They were the most important life-saving years to date.
I learned a lot inside.
(01:35):
I was able to learn that the world doesn't revolve around me.
Right.
And it was necessary.
I was moving really fast and I was into a lot of unhealthy, unsafe, destructive situationsand behaviors.
So prison was definitely a lifesaver for me.
(01:55):
Wait, how old were you when you first went in?
I was 24 or I had just turned 25.
I had just turned 25 and you know, I waited late.
That's what all the cops said when I was arrested.
Why, what are you doing?
You're old already.
And, uh, I don't know.
I had gotten away with so much stuff my whole life.
(02:17):
And this was just the final thing that landed me finally in prison.
Uh,
I've always had some issues with authority.
My father's a retired LA County sheriff who was still actively on duty at the time of myarrest.
so that was, that was sad.
(02:38):
That was extra sad.
but it was actually extra helpful too, in the court system.
because pretty much everyone I've encountered who had similar charges is still.
in prison and might not come home.
(02:58):
What charges did you have if you don't mind telling us?
Originally, it was long, was kidnapping for ransom, false imprisonment with intent totorture, assault with great bodily injury and possession of a narcotic in a facility for
(03:24):
distribution.
It was really long.
There were so many
felony charges, two of which carried life sentences.
My bail was insanely high.
was like $2.5 million.
I had no idea.
I was just not dealing with the reality or the severity of the situation.
(03:46):
thought, you know, can I have to go to work in like four hours?
Are you guys done?
I need my charges.
I need to go.
And they were like, you're not going anywhere.
You're.
you are not going to see the light of day again.
And I was like, how is what?
So they started reading the charges and I was like, no.
(04:08):
okay.
I've never, those are very extremely serious.
So, you know, after hours of interrogation, I was tired and they eventually found apicture of my dad and I, and he was in uniform.
And they said, the main detective said, I know your dad and
(04:29):
that's sad that you're never going to see him again.
And I said, Oh, what do want me to say?
You know, what do you, what do you want?
And they said, roll on your code of defendant and tell us that this guy did everything.
And I was like, I can't do that.
Uh, they said, well, you know, he's in the next room telling everybody he's never met youbefore.
And I was like, Oh, so I'm, I have no idea of what to do.
(04:54):
All I knew is I,
I definitely wanted to see my dad again, so I said, do I have to say?
mean, this lady owed me $20, I picked her up, I beat her up, can I go now?
And they were like, her.
And that's how it started.
Was he actually throwing you under the bus or error just saying he didn't know you or werethey just making that up to get a confession and hear the whole story?
(05:21):
pretty sure he was telling them he didn't know me at all.
Was he a boyfriend or just?
Yes.
Well, in my world, that's what I, I was under the impression.
Right.
But, you know, even during when we were initially arrested, the first thing that wentthrough my head was, I have a clean record.
(05:42):
have no priors.
this one's on, you know, probation.
This is going to be very problematic.
let me throw the weapon under my seat.
You know, so that's smart, right?
no, but.
Obviously they knew that that wasn't mine, so we were both charged with that.
(06:03):
Okay.
Um, but that tells you where my head was at.
was definitely a codependent nightmare.
And even, I mean, even at our arraignment, this person was asking, when are you going tobail us out?
When are you going to bail us out?
And I said, well, I, I don't really know.
(06:25):
I don't know a lot about math, but I know I don't have 10 % of 2.5 million two times.
That's not.
you know, I get paid Friday, but I don't not like that.
So, you know, it was.
It was, you know, just not living in reality.
(06:46):
was neither one of us really.
and it, it just progressed the first time we went to court and the first offer was 25 tolife.
I was not even, I wasn't even there.
I, I can't imagine now processing something like that.
(07:07):
I don't know what, how detached I was from reality.
must've been.
extremely detached.
And it just, you know, progressed until people in jail would tell me like, just wait,don't freak out, honey, you're going to be okay.
They always start high.
And that was helpful because I had never been arrested before.
So I didn't know the road.
(07:29):
So you're still you're sitting in jail though why this is going on.
Okay.
And this was during the notorious LA County jail unlawful strip searches.
So this was during the years where women were being stripped out outside in front of menin groups of anywhere between 10 and 50.
(07:54):
And that was it for me.
That's when I was completely dehumanized and I just...
I knew nothing mattered anymore.
there were so many women that were used to this.
was blown away.
Like this is not, how come no one else is screaming in terror?
What's happening?
(08:14):
the first time this happened, there were, I think 25 people on either side of this outdoorparking garage where they pull the county jail buses in.
And when you're told to strip everything off, everything off.
if you're
If, if you're on your cycle, if you're on your period, you have to take your tampon outand walk it to the middle where the trash cans are and then walk back to your place.
(08:40):
And then you have to cough and squat until the officers are satisfied that you don't haveany contraband inside of you.
And,
This is in front of everyone.
This is in front of everyone, all these strangers and all these police.
there's at this point, there were male officers within the vicinity.
(09:01):
it was a big deal.
They had, it was a major settlement several years later, with thousands of plaintiffs.
And I was in high power because my father's, an officer.
they PC me up really quick and I had to get stripped out when I left that pod.
(09:21):
at least three, four times before I got on the bus.
So it's, it's, I, it just breaks you mentally.
You, how are you supposed to advocate for yourself or care about anything when obviouslyyou don't matter.
What was going through your head though that at that time like you're in Major trouble,you don't really you're only 24 You don't even know what the heck is really going on and
(09:46):
then you start facing that I mean did that throw you in like a deep depression or Like doyou remember what you were feeling?
I stopped feeling, think I stopped feeling.
I just went pretty numb because I knew I had to just make it through.
And the only feelings I ever really had during that period were fear.
(10:12):
cause the whole thing was scary.
I wasn't used to being in such a horrible environment and I.
I had never seen women fight before.
had never seen people, you know, beat each other till they were bloody pulps or, you know,have to listen to people's heads smashing on toilets or I'd never seen people have
(10:35):
seizures.
Um, and I had never seen just so many people that need help not getting help and comingback.
Even while I was finding my case, there were people that came back multiple times.
while I was still there on the same issue.
(10:56):
And you're in there and you have no idea what's happening yet because your case is beingtried, right?
And there were so many people whose stories were so much sadder.
They were so sad.
So the whole minimization process of everything, all of my traumas, everything I'd everbeen through, that's when it started.
I was like, well, wow, that is much worse.
(11:16):
Everything is much worse.
Oh, wow.
You're going to prison because you want to go visit your mom.
Oh my gosh.
You're committing crimes and you're happy that you're going upstate so you can see yourmom.
Okay.
I don't have a bad, um.
people with no parents, I mean, they put a cop in the cell with me at one point.
(11:39):
They picked her up on a cold case and I was like, you're a cop.
She was fighting life too.
I met some of the most interesting people ever and I really started to learn that there'sa lot of evil in the world and not everybody knows about it.
(12:02):
Uh-huh.
And if you haven't looked at it, it's hard to believe things.
Like when I explain what's going on in the prisons now, if you haven't been exposed tothat level of evil, it's unbelievable.
So I do use a lot of censorship and, you know, gauge what I do share with the publicbecause I know that they're not going to believe it because it's so ugly and it's so
(12:31):
unbelievable if you haven't been there, you know.
So it's not like what you see on TV.
No, it's not.
It's very misleading.
TV is very misleading.
And it's intentional, I think.
A lot of it is soft programming to get people in the mindset of whatever narrative they'retrying to push.
(12:55):
it's not, it's definitely not like what you see.
It's better in some senses and worse than others.
But jail is terrible.
It was on.
It was crazy.
you know, my dad, he would come see me as often as he could.
And he had, you know, special privileges being a sheriff.
(13:16):
So he would come in the middle of the day, he would come, you know, in uniform.
And then if anybody saw him come in, he'd get really nervous, like, no, they're going tokill, they're going to get you.
Well, that's what I was just going to ask you.
What did you face from people that knew your dad was a cop?
There was, there were people there who knew him from court because he worked in the courtsand nobody had a sad thing to say about him ever.
(13:44):
They were like, I love your dad.
He's my favorite.
They love, wow.
Your dad's really nice.
And I told him, it's cool, dad.
haven't made any enemies.
So everybody gets excited when they see you.
That's your dad.
I know this guy.
Good thing your dad was a good boy.
It could have went very different.
(14:04):
Yes.
And it just speaks volumes into his career.
He was always really nice to everybody.
There were several people I ran into that knew him from court.
And he was always a nice guy.
Is there a lot of the gang relations and all that kind of stuff going on in there like yousee on TV or?
(14:29):
Not in the women's side.
That's very, very male centered.
Women are super different.
Like once you get into prison, there's no separation by race, gang affiliation, county,anything.
Women are all together.
Security levels are all together from level one to four.
So you have, you know, people that are petty thefts and with serial killers and it's, it'sreally,
(14:58):
I didn't experience it as a security issue.
A lot of times people with shorter sentences are more active in criminal behavior, getmore write ups because they don't care.
with life sentences, they have everything to lose.
So they're much more careful when it comes to conduct.
(15:22):
They're not trying to get a violation or get in trouble.
get something on the record that would prevent them from getting a parole grant once theydo go to a parole review hearing.
I always preferred to be around people with really long sentences or life without becauseof just the way they conducted themselves and how they more serious.
(15:51):
It just
Even to this day, that's who I still talk to a lot.
prison is definitely a much better place than jail.
Jail is just like purgatory.
If I would have known the difference, I would have said immediately, just send me toprison now.
(16:13):
Really?
Yes, and it's really dirty and they're processing so many people on a regular basis justin and out, in and out constantly.
I mean, there's whole units that are dedicated to people with MRSA, all kinds ofoutbreaks.
It's really gross.
(16:33):
wow.
So you were there that whole time through the whole case until you were then once you weresentenced, you went to the prison.
Okay.
And that was, that was, that was a long bus ride.
they, you're shackled, you're in waste chains.
(16:54):
It's really, it, that part was like a movie, you know, we're shuffling, everybody'sconnected.
You get on this bus with no windows and you're, you're going upstate, you're catching thechain and,
You know, I'm a mark.
look like a narc.
I look like a square.
So there were people that had pegged me as, you know, somebody that they would takeadvantage of even while I was in jail.
(17:25):
So what does that look like?
Like, what are their behaviors?
Is there any any communicating with them?
you know, if somebody, you know, you see a weak link who's well taken care of and has afamily that, you know, is going to take care of them, it just be really, really nice to
them.
Take them under your wing and then take everything they got.
(17:45):
And that happened.
wasn't really expecting that.
And I was scared.
I wanted to have friends that had been there before and knew the ropes or
Yeah.
You know, we're going to give me that sense of security.
So I couldn't have foreseen that.
I was blinded by the, have, I know someone.
(18:09):
it made it a lot less scary.
Yeah.
I pretend.
Yeah, because the unknowns super scary.
And if you had people.
yes.
And then when you get to prison, have no idea how far you are from the highway or fromsociety.
You just get off the bus and it's 115 degrees and the dust rolls in and you're welcome tohell.
(18:36):
You get off the bus and you're no longer you.
You don't have your name.
You don't have...
You don't smell good.
Your skin is dry.
Your nothing.
Your, your woman head is gone and you just have a number and the strip searches in, injail were bad, but you get upstate and they put a mirror under you while you're coughing
(18:59):
and squatting.
The...
your...
it's...
I don't know how to describe it.
Like you just don't matter.
like dehumanizing like, yes.
Like you're not even an animal.
don't even, I don't even know people that treat animals like this, but I understand in asense, like nobody's there for singing too loud in church.
(19:26):
Nobody's there for, know, getting mom of the year award two, two times in a row.
but it doesn't, doesn't make sense to add on additional forms of dehumanizing punishment.
Was it women doing the searches in the prison?
(19:46):
Okay.
Yes.
Um, and they, know, you're naked, standing around a bunch of strangers, just naked.
And then they give you a moomo to put on and some flip flops and they start processing youin and they, they tell you, is your number.
This is your cup.
(20:06):
This is your spoon.
This is your lock.
You bring all this back when you leave and, uh, goodbye.
We'll see you in a little bit.
So.
That's it.
That's it.
That's what you get.
You don't get a handbook.
You don't get any lessons.
Actually, they tell you don't, what do they tell you?
Don't get a girlfriend.
(20:28):
Don't use anybody else's stuff.
Very basic things, but you walk out of this tunnel, it's surreal, and you walk onto a yardand there's grass and you can see the sun.
that's kind of exciting.
and there's other people and there's a bunch of stuff going on.
And then you go into the processing unit and it's really, you're really in prison.
(20:51):
They're really, really in prison.
And I, there were so many things going through my head.
It's like, I'm so thirsty.
And I went to get some water and I was like, this is poison.
can't drink this.
This smells like poison.
you know, years later I'm doing research finding out at the arsenic level is about 2029times higher than medically recommended.
(21:16):
It's full of hexavalent chromium and manganese.
And that makes sense now why everybody has cancer there.
They do, lot of people do.
And, I knew as soon as I got there, the water is, this isn't good.
Something is bad.
this is very, very bad.
(21:39):
there's other, the other, other factors that make the whole thing so crazy.
You're showering.
There's a shower and it's just everybody walking past and, and the office station is righthere and the showers are right here.
So there is no privacy anymore.
That's gone, as to be expected, but it's still shocking when you experience it.
(22:05):
and there were just so many different kinds of women.
I was like, wow, that's the tallest lady I've ever seen.
Hey, that person looks 13.
my gosh.
I'd call home and tell my parents like there's children here, but you know, are justpeople that had just, you know, turned 18.
and I saw my first really horrible fight during.
my processing time and I was just, I was crying.
(22:27):
I was mortified.
couldn't believe this.
Right.
People were like, what is your problem?
Are you really sad?
This is the first time you've ever seen anyone's teeth knocked in.
I'm like, and uh,
Is that actually like a norm, you know, or is it just like mostly the people that areknown to fight and to do those things or do they or do our people actually preyed on you
(22:52):
know, we're like, she looks weak
the, the, the weaker people, they're going to get as much out of you as they can before itleads to violence.
You know, you've got to get as much canteen or as much, you know, financial support as youcan get from someone through extortion or whatever before it leads to that.
(23:17):
But fighting isn't as prevalent in women's prison as, men's at all.
There's at that time there.
there weren't women fashioning weapons or anything.
And most of it was domestic too.
A lot of domestic issues.
I'm pretty sure that first fight I saw was a girlfriend thing.
(23:39):
But I still was shocked at how normalized this was for everybody else.
I'm just like rolling on the floor like, can't believe this is happening.
Right now when you went in did you?
How long did you think you were gonna be in there when you went in did you know?
Yes, I knew that I had five years, um, at 85 % or maybe it was 65.
(24:05):
I wasn't supposed to do the full five years, but I ended up doing the full almost fiveyears.
I, three months shy of my full five because I continued to screw around inside and wasunable to get the time back because I was still, you know, doing things, holding things
(24:26):
for people.
just wanting to not say no because I didn't know how to have boundaries.
And you were probably just trying to have friends and you were trying to survive.
lies, friends, you know, something.
Yes.
And there was, it was a, it was a great crash course.
(24:48):
I mean, I always think I do better under pressure, so maybe that's just what I needed,but, there are so much other stuff that's going on to the institutional level of abuse.
when I went to see my counselor for the first time, I asked if I could go down south tothe prison closer to my house, to my parents.
(25:11):
And she said,
No, you're lucky you're ever even gonna get out of here.
I don't understand how you got five years.
You should be dying here.
I said, well, how about fire camp?
She said we don't let violent felons out in the community to fight fires.
I said, okay.
(25:32):
So I have to stay here.
She said this is the only place you will be.
You will stay here in a level four because you're a level four.
I said, okay, thank you.
Thank you very much.
does that what is level for?
My point, because of the nature of my crime and the severity of the charges, whicheventually was reduced to terrorist threats with the firearm, after all that, that put me
(25:57):
at a higher security level.
And the women's prisons, you know, they house all levels together.
And after all of this process happens,
And you go see your counselor then you go over the wall which means you you go to yourpermanent housing you get your permanent housing assignment and People told me hey, don't
(26:20):
worry as long as you don't go to unit to D yard to unit 515 and room one you're gonna befine and I went to D yard 515 room
So what did that mean?
(26:41):
It was really intense.
There was a lady, a lifer, and that was her room.
That belonged to her.
And her program was that everybody wakes up at four o'clock in the morning and has toclean in the dark without making any noise.
(27:02):
So I learned how to be quiet.
So what is that?
You're in like one room?
And she's the like leader of the room?
Yes.
Okay.
It's an eight person cell, so there's four bunk beds, a toilet, a shower, two sinks, andit's really hard to not make any noise.
(27:24):
Er.
It's, it makes you like, have a lot of issues with noise now.
I doors slamming, people talking loud, people slamming things.
I'm always, you know, conscientious of, of noise.
I tried even when I'm just being normal at home, I still set things down without makingnoise.
(27:53):
she was very critical of sweeping.
I had no idea.
I was such a poor sweeper.
And when I paroled, found her, but the day before I paroled, I was like, I want to thankyou for teaching me how to sweep.
cause there was so much more.
Eventually.
Yeah.
It was hard.
It was very difficult.
She was hard on me.
(28:16):
she, she broke a lot of bad habits I had, and the whole sweeping thing, it's, it's justbeing conscious of, of other people.
If she's cooking, why are you sweeping?
That's.
not very thoughtful or, you know.
Well, yes, there's cancer food.
(28:39):
Everybody cooks in plastic bags.
And we have immersion heaters.
you can use that to boil.
Everything is boiled.
Somehow you can bake a cake with boiled water.
It happens.
It's amazing.
Wow.
in mop buckets.
Christmas is great.
(28:59):
I always miss prison tamales at Christmas.
People are very resourceful and you get really creative.
And when you have very limited options and you have to work with what you have and a lotof thought and preparation has to go into everything, it makes it kind of special.
(29:20):
And when you see people come together during the holidays, even people that hate eachother or people that would normally be at each other's throats, it's nice.
Yeah.
For the first few years when I came home, I was sad.
I really thought I wanted to be back in prison and I had like guilt that I was home andother people weren't.
(29:41):
But I don't want to go back to prison.
I know I just missed that like girl time just.
Well, and that was your routine day in day out for five.
That's a long time.
You know, it had to be scary to come out and like, then you have to deal with the world,which is probably way worse sometimes.
(30:02):
Yes.
Um, that's why I started my organization when I came home, even after just five years, Ifelt like if I'm having these issues transitioning, then what's, what's it going to be
like for somebody who's done 10, 20, 30, or 40 years, it's going to be very problematic.
(30:23):
I, I was freaking out cause the grocery store was gone and, you know, like,
My hamburger stand was gone and it was a Starbucks.
Everything was different.
Everything was different.
And people were driving so fast.
And I just thought, you know, this is a big deal.
(30:45):
We got to pay attention to this because
And life on the outside keeps on going even when yours is like, you're sitting there thatlong.
and having to accept the fact that the world kept turning while I was gone.
The place that I was in no longer exists and I have to really start over and carve myselfout a new place.
(31:08):
It was scary.
And I didn't really understand that.
I didn't even know I had PTSD until a couple years later, one of my good friends who's oneof my partners at Woman to Woman, she...
She called me and I was driving on the freeway and she said, hi friend, how are you?
said, I got that thing again.
I got the driver's Parkinson's, you know?
(31:30):
And she said, what are you talking about?
I said, sometimes when I'm on the four or five, my hands shake.
And she said, this is not driver's Parkinson's, Amy, this is, you have PTSD, you'refreaking out.
said, well, what would I have PTSD from?
She said, in prison.
don't know.
(31:50):
a long list.
And I had a I stopped and thought I was like really was it that bad.
She said it was horrible.
Yes It's PTSD get some help But everybody is is wired differently when you come home and Ithink I was more focused on just getting through everything than processing what was
(32:11):
really happening Because if you stop long enough to think about it, it's too scary.
Yeah, it's too scary and I
knew I needed to just power through it.
So there's moments when all of those things start to surface and it's freaking exhausting.
(32:32):
How long have you been out now?
12 years now.
12 years, so it's been a long time.
And I still carry around some of those weird things like I have to vacuum a lot.
(32:53):
Cleaning is a big thing.
I talk to a lot of women that are like, don't feel too weird.
I mean, I still have a mop bucket under my bed and I have to clean the walls every day.
It's just a thing.
hardwired.
Well, and you were in a smaller space and that's all you had.
Yeah, I mean that makes sense.
(33:15):
The bed has to be made really tight.
Everything has to be in order or else it's like debilitating sometimes.
If I'm in a rush, I can't stop to make sure all the clothes are folded.
I need to just go and a person, a normal person would just go.
Like I physically can't, like I could wig down and I have to make sure things right beforeI go.
(33:45):
And then there's, you know, the whole, I did feel guilty for a really long time that Icame home and I felt there were so many people that were more deserving of, of the freedom
than I was.
There are so many people who did less than I did that don't get to come home.
(34:09):
and I carried that around for a long time.
was.
still very much incarcerated even after I came home.
After home, know, were you staying in contact with all the women that you were friendswith?
Some, I did maintain contact with some and then once around 2021 when I started theorganization, that's when a lot more correspondence started.
(34:38):
I started to get like bombarded, things changed, laws passed during like the COVIDlockdowns.
There was some reconfiguration in the department and
They, California passed a gender self ID law.
So the way it reads, sounds healthy.
(35:03):
It sounds like a good move.
It sounds like these are rights that have been stolen and are being, you know, given backto a marginalized community.
But when no one in prison has ever had the rights that are being mentioned in the bill, it
it is really scary because it creates an untouchable group that is above everybody elsebecause no one has access to the rights that are provided under this law.
(35:35):
So when what year was this that the law?
And 20 man, but that's 21.
Okay, and and what it what is it exactly?
It allows for any incarcerated person in state custody to gender self ID and request totransfer to the prison of their gender identity without any other requirements.
(36:00):
So clearly in a prison setting, you would think that predators are going to take advantageof this being that there's only the requirement of self declaration.
There's no requirement of hormone replacement therapy, surgery.
So a woman could identify as a man, man could identify as a woman if they felt like it.
(36:27):
Yes.
and I, I didn't believe it because nobody had heard of this law.
It was pretty much kept under wraps.
I said, what are you guys nuts?
Give me a break.
So I look it up and I was, I got sick because it, as you read, it says anyone under thisbill or who's self-trans identified can request single cell housing.
(36:54):
can notify staff if they feel uncomfortable or unsafe with anyone in their room and theycan be moved.
I was like, you can't do that.
I used to have to go through like hell and high water to get a bed move.
I was like beaten for six months by a bunkie before I could get away from, get a bed move.
(37:15):
And even then it had to be coordinated by people that staff liked.
It was crazy.
So I'm reading this and thinking, can just say, don't feel safe in here.
Get them all out of here and you can have a eight man cell to yourself.
Yes.
So I would think everybody would jump on that train.
You know, just to be able to have those rights.
(37:36):
Right.
any denial of any request has to have a sound explanation in writing provided to theprisoner that is being denied.
And they can grieve that and just ask again in 30 days.
(37:59):
Now is this like, are they trans, are they trans like transitioning or is it literallyjust a statement of you wanting to be a man or a woman, the opposite of what you are?
There's a handful of people that, you know, in your head you would say, oh, that's a transwoman.
(38:22):
And there are a handful.
And there's some that are transitioned who moved to the women's prison.
But there are some who have no feminine attributes or intention of transitioning.
And they're over there.
And you can't deny transfer requests based on a criminal history, based on sexualorientation or physical attributes, which are things that you would assume would be
(38:53):
reasons to deny someone.
So you're a heterosexual serial rapist and you're fully intact.
Probably not a wise idea, but they were able to move.
This was happening.
is
is nationwide.
(39:13):
It's, and I thought it was just California cause California is crazy, but four yearslater, this is a national issue.
This is an issue from coast to coast and state and federal facilities.
But because this issue is so polarized, it's really difficult to get, you know, bipartisansupport or, anybody to listen because they automatically think, man, she's talking about
(39:38):
Laverne Cox or, you know, she's talking about these.
you know, at risk individuals who are in danger.
No, no.
I said from the very beginning, you know, I'm not talking about trans women.
I'm talking about men with their parts and just people couldn't hear at all.
(40:01):
They couldn't accept it because there is, it's such an emotionally charged issue.
I could see how it could be definitely a big issue and emotions would be involved if Idon't even want to say this without well even we have we have the issues with trans and
(40:26):
sports and all the things like that I would you would think that they would think of it asa safety concern
first.
And I thought if you could extend the same level of concern for women's safety as you arefor trans safety or if you could just care about everybody's safety and well-being, we'd
(40:49):
be great.
If you could lend just a little bit of that concern and investment of resources andeverything, it would be good.
Gosh, this is kind of crazy.
I didn't even know that this was a thing.
I didn't know that this existed and...
(41:10):
And I mean, it's led to pregnancies, sexual assaults.
A lot of women are just right back in the nexus of their crimes because these are expertmaster manipulators that have moved over.
And they knew that this was going to be a huge victim pool.
(41:33):
So they have all their parts.
They are not trans.
It's a man who has committed a crime, is in prison, wants to identify as a woman so he canbe housed where the women are.
Is that right?
Yes.
(41:54):
But at the same time, there's, there are a handful of people who are at risk in the men'sfacilities and I don't want to throw them to the lions either.
Right.
I'm trying.
I've, at this point it's taking years to get here, but I'm trying to, to be as fair andconcerned for all parties involved, even the predators, know, because they're not, they're
(42:21):
not able to rehabilitate when they're actively.
in their criminal thinking.
This isn't good for them, it's not good for anybody.
They're not seeing that when, and I'm assuming, is it mostly the men who, like say if aman identifies as a woman, he goes into the woman population.
(42:46):
If he was a rapist or murderer, whatever it might be, of women, or a woman, woman, arethey still committing these crimes while
being housed at the prison then against these women, against the biological women.
(43:09):
Yes.
When I was there, last, not my last year, the year before I left, there was a rapist whowas extradited from Texas to serve their life sentence in California for a double rape
they committed in the same county as the prison I was in.
So a lot of women up there were familiar with this person's case.
This person was acting like they were going to rent an apartment and they went to check itout and it was a mother and daughter and he...
(43:37):
raped and electrocuted both of them.
And, when this person got to the women's prison, you know, they were given their own celland everybody's obviously envious.
Everybody wants their own.
Sure.
It's like a one bedroom apartment.
So this person brought a lot of, you know, men's prisons, politics, a lot of the, the, therace stuff and women don't separate by race or
(44:07):
play that stuff, you know, about who makes the best coffee?
What are you making blankets?
Are we doing knitting today?
It's all kinds of other stuff, you know, to make sure the ladies understood you have to,you're black, you're going to watch TV in the back, get out of here.
And women weren't vibing with that because that's not, that's not how we conductourselves.
(44:34):
No, and
You know, the, the, the behavior continued and this is, think, an Aryan brotherhooddropout.
So this is somebody who's from a crime family, a validated gang member who's a defectornow, who's trying to take over the women's prison.
And eventually this person was beaten up and stabbed and moved to a lower security prison,directly into the honor dorm.
(45:05):
into a prison with no electric- Right.
This is somebody serving life without the possibility of parole.
Who's transferred to a medium security prison.
Living with their girlfriend.
Now.
You know, male presenting.
(45:27):
Yes.
Still-
No one's recognizing that this is definitely not a good thing.
You know, it's really controversial.
When I first started speaking out against this, I thought I'd get the support from mypeers and people I had done time with that are in the social justice arena who are like
(45:49):
the executive directors of organizations that are established and respected in, you know,in the legislature.
And they just told me that I needed to learn how to
speak the new language and somebody warned me, you know, you can't do it this way.
This isn't how it works.
(46:10):
You can't say this kind of stuff.
And I said, well, I'm going to keep telling the truth.
I'm just, I'm not saying my opinion.
I'm repeating what I'm hearing from inside.
All I want to do is make sure that they're heard.
And, I was in some cohorts.
I was involved with, with a lot of these.
(46:31):
other organizations and when I figured out what was going on and that this was reallyscary, I said, I'm going to do my own thing now.
I'm going to start my own organization.
And I was told, what kind of organization?
I said, I want to advocate for women.
And they said, well, what does that mean?
(46:52):
What are you saying, Amy?
And I said, I want to help women with women problems.
And they said, that's very exclusionary.
Are you going to be inclusive?
Is this going to be a gender inclusive organization?
And I said, no, they got you guys.
Everybody has their own thing.
Why can't I just make one that's for the ladies?
(47:14):
And I was told, you know, that's not even legal in California anymore.
And you're, putting your life in grave danger.
And I was like, is he, are you threatening me?
Yeah, like what part of what you were saying Did they not agree with just that you saidyou want to help biological women
(47:39):
Because I was being exclusionary.
And I said, it's not exclusionary.
Everybody is allowed to have their own thing.
You don't, you're not going to, you know, go to, you know, the transgender law center andtell them you have to try my case.
I'm a heterosexual Christian conservative and you have to represent me.
(48:00):
I'm not going to do that.
Right.
Cause that's not for me.
Uh, but it was, it was very,
They were very aggressive with it and
I had a Facebook group with like 3000 formerly incarcerated women from California and inthere and I was voicing my concerns and everybody was getting involved like, no, this is
(48:26):
terrible.
What's going to happen?
And then the other people from the other orgs were like, this is wrong.
This is transphobia.
This is hateful bigotry.
Um, and I was like,
What is happening?
I was so confused.
(48:47):
I don't even see how it's falling under that and why they're making it.
It was risking a lot of funding because a lot of people were starting to funding andgrants from being super inclusive and supporting this bill, supporting...
(49:09):
okay.
Okay.
they helped framework it as a matter of fact.
So my ranting was in conflict with that money.
interfering, yeah.
So I had to shut that.
had to delete that group because people started taking information outside.
(49:31):
They were sending screenshots to the Department of Corrections, trying to frame it towhere I was being aggressive and threatening.
And I was approached by one of the organizations, make this public, open up this group foreverybody.
And I was like, what?
(49:52):
But why can't we just make another one that's open?
We can model it after this.
We can even make it a sister private group, you or
like, why does it have to be a fight?
Why can't everyone believe what they want to believe, be who they want to be and fight forwhat they want to fight for?
I know what I kept trying to express.
I'm not being anti-trans.
(50:14):
Can I be pro-woman and just period be pro-woman?
I just want equal protection of the law.
all I'm asking for.
It's like safety, like it's to make sure they're safe.
And we don't always have to have a loser.
Respect and dignity are free.
So Californians should technically be able to afford that.
(50:35):
And you don't have to eliminate one person's safety for another's.
Right.
Which brought me to the conclusion that this is about so much more.
This is about so much more.
The lawmakers aren't that stupid.
This is done with intent.
And that led me to the conclusion that this is trying to usher in female erasure.
(50:59):
It felt like what's happening to the ladies inside is a test run for what they're tryingto do to us.
Just erase our spaces and
It's not because it's so aggressive.
This is so aggressive and anybody who questions it is, you know, blacklisted and thepushback, you know, that I felt from everybody was being a people pleaser, you know,
(51:30):
codependent.
I was devastated and it was coming from every direction and you know, women inside arelike, call the ACLU.
I said,
Okay.
And no, they, they're actually interveners in the lawsuit that was established againstthis policy, against this law.
(51:56):
They're intervening on behalf of, for, you know, biological male individuals.
One of which, one of whom was sent back to the men's prison for, for two rapes.
They're still representing this person.
they said, call Maxine Waters, call Diane Feinstein, call it.
(52:17):
I call Gloria already.
I did the whole circuit and the responses were all very similar.
and I,
It's like people don't want to touch it.
They're afraid.
Okay.
We're not going to...
This is going to...
We're going to have to go non-conventional routes.
(52:40):
And...
I was like, where do I look now?
So I Googled women that care about women.
This little blonde lady from the UK popped up and her name is Posey Parker.
And her name is actually Kelly J.
Keene.
And I just sent her a message.
(53:00):
on Instagram and I explained what was happening and she said, just like Mary Poppins, ohmy goodness, I'm on my podcast right now.
And I was like, really?
And that was the first podcast I ever did.
And she was, you know, eager to talk to me because we're about five years behind the UK onthese issues.
So they're already very familiar with it.
(53:22):
And she put me in touch with an organization the very next day.
And I was very ignorant about feminism, radical feminism.
didn't know anything about that either.
So I don't head first into that because they were the first people who stopped to listento me without, you know, telling me that I was wrong.
(53:44):
was wrong.
You can't say that this is wrong.
What about these poor people that are being savagely, brutally beaten in the men's prison?
And I was like, what are you talking about?
So
I was very appreciative that they cared.
They cried.
They said, we'll take the case.
(54:04):
We'll, we'll, we'll do this.
Let's do this.
And, I didn't, I really had no idea how politically charged this whole thing is.
So I'm still thinking, I'm not going to, the public's can understand.
And they don't, because the marketing and the programming has been so expertly done thatit's very hard for people to understand.
(54:28):
is.
gender self-ID is it's not kind.
It's not, it's not loving or fair.
It's creating absolute chaos because you can do and say whatever you want and with noconsideration to the impact on anybody else.
So we filed that we had a lawsuit filed and there's so many other things that arehappening at the same time.
(54:54):
I'm getting hundreds of letters and emails and calls.
and they're coming from women I hadn't even met before and no, they're terrible.
They're crying.
I'm having women call say, can you start a hotline?
There's so many people that need somebody to talk.
So they're like reaching out to you for help.
Wow.
(55:15):
And, know, I called the other organizations, I met with them, I said, we, I need yourhelp.
And I didn't get any and eventually it got to the point where organizations were like, wecan't work with her.
She's, we're, we're investigating her nebulous white supremacy or she's a
(55:43):
Christian nationalist.
was like, what kind of, what is, what?
Are you serious?
We used to go to chow together.
What's wrong with you?
Right.
People who knew that and would know that's not your intention, that's not where you'recoming from.
Right.
Yeah.
Looking back, I understand I was moving fast, talking loud, and it was very harsh.
(56:08):
And this was in response to the crying hysterical phone calls that I was getting everysingle day.
And I knew everything that I figured, I assumed would happen, it started happening.
The abusive relationships, the manipulating, the...
(56:29):
consensual sex that's going on because people are unwell and are you know desperate forany kind of you know validation from a relationship with man
And even if you're not a willing participant in a sexual relationship, if it's happeningin your room or in your hallway or in your unit, you then are participating in this
(56:54):
because there's no honeymoon suite for people to go to.
There's no privacy.
It's happening in, in, in your face, in your six feet of, of living space.
I mean, imagine getting up onto a top bunk in a nightgown and there's
you know, convicted sex offender under you.
(57:17):
And there were other things that started to happen.
The pregnancies, the violence, women started fashioning weapons at a rate that was unheardof.
That's never happened before.
And who do you think was teaching them how to make these things?
(57:40):
The transfers.
And then, you know, I thought, what, what, what am I going to do?
What, how are we going to, how are we going to fix this?
So I started speaking out more publicly.
and it wasn't easy because these are the opposition is very, and I don't like to evenconsider people opposition because I really feel like this is a human rights issue and
(58:07):
everybody's leading in this game.
But the opposition was really quick to, you know, further.
demonize me even the Attorney General was like that's a bogus organization that's onlybeen created to file transphobic lawsuits and I was like no this is crazy
(58:30):
Wow.
It makes me really sad though, that everybody's making it like an issue in in trans or inthe and that's not even what it's about.
It's about safety.
Like you know what mean?
Just safety, women's safety.
(58:52):
Not not someone's choice that they choose to be a trans or or whatever they choose.
Orientation, whatever.
It's like, it's a safety thing.
Right.
You know, they were left out of the equation when this legislation was formulated.
(59:14):
The senator who created it did so so artfully like the disdain for women is dripping offof this legislation.
I mean, to say one cannot, the committee cannot deny a transfer request based on
(59:36):
a factor that already exists in the prison.
What that means is if there's ever been a woman convicted of a sex crime in that facility,that opens the door for anybody else.
That opens the door for anybody from the men's prison that has a sex crime to come in.
So that was done very artfully.
That was done with malice aforethought, I think.
(59:57):
And in the midst of all this was that two years ago, they started installing condomdispensers.
in the women's prison and they were like, no, what's happening?
And then they weren't just like medical grade condoms, they were rainbow.
And then they put flavored dental dams in there too.
And, you know, there's been vaginas in the prison since it was built and you never gaveout dental dams.
(01:00:20):
What are you doing that for now?
And in the current climate with, you know, the integrated population now and all the staffsexual misconduct.
To throw the condoms in there, I was really thoughtless.
It was so mean.
These, I mean, women are calling me crying saying, are they trying to tell us with this?
(01:00:47):
Right.
That's that's scaring them even more because then there's not even, you're lucky if youwould have proof of something occurring, you know, especially if they're using protection.
And, and well, most people, don't think any bit.
Well, and the crazy part about this is it's in, it's against the rules to be, it's to havesex.
(01:01:13):
It's completely against the rules.
It's, it's the rules to have, if you, if you have an open condom somewhere on you, you'regoing to get a ride of, but they're providing them for you.
weird.
Suddenly these medical posters were up in the medical buildings that gave you the optionsyou have should you become pregnant while in custody.
(01:01:40):
You can get a Plan B pill, can have an abortion, or we will connect you with a socialworker so you can begin the adoption process.
Those were never there before.
Like that just shouldn't be happening to where you even have to worry about what to do.
(01:02:01):
It's, very disheartening.
It is, and there's...
I mean, when I think about the fact that 92 % of incarcerated women are survivors of someform of sexual abuse, and 38.8 % of the requested transfers are registered sex offenders,
(01:02:25):
um...
Wait, really?
So this is being used as an umbrella to allow people with predatory intentions to justslide in.
There has to be a way to gauge that to where this is used specifically for the people itwas designed for, which are at-risk people that are in danger because of their trans
(01:02:52):
identity in the men's prison.
Feel like everybody's having like tunnel vision, you know their thoughts their beliefs.
It's like this and This person's not good and they're making it trans and whatever.
They're not looking at the actual big picture of what's going on
that everybody's staff.
mean, like, staff now have to, you know, if one of these people come over and they need toget stripped out, if your job is to strip people out, you're going to strip this person
(01:03:23):
out.
with their original parts.
yeah.
So is this happening a lot?
This is, well, I thought California, you know, was, the lone state on this, but it, at thesame time, California did this Connecticut, New York, Washington, Oregon.
(01:03:50):
they don't necessarily have laws, but they have, they're just going with it.
They're letting it happen and using the, the federal guidelines and federal law, which isthe prison rape elimination act allows for this kind of prioritization.
So it is happening in every state.
If it's not happening in your state prisons, it is happening in your federal prisons.
(01:04:10):
And the women's federal prisons are even worse.
Much worse.
Some of their prisons have the toilets and the showers in the middle of the day room, inthe middle of the housing unit.
this is the transitional prisons where you're housed for a few months until you go to yourpermanent destination.
(01:04:34):
And there's the privacy is, is, you know, from here about breast down.
That's what you're doing.
You're showering and there's like 34 men in your unit.
that's, that's problematic.
That's not.
Really great.
It's awful.
(01:04:56):
And when you're in the federal prison, who do you call for help?
The feds?
can't, you have no one.
Right.
and
See, I was always under the impression that federal prison wasn't near as bad as regularprison, but
We thought they have carpet and they eat steak and lobster.
Right, it was supposed to be like, easy street.
(01:05:16):
No.
it's so not good.
the corruption, the rape culture in the staff and the corrections industry is crazy.
In California, Northern California, there's a federal correction institution, Dublin.
And the rape culture was so rampant there.
(01:05:38):
And there were so many, you know, incidents of staff sexual misconduct.
They shut it down and just transferred everybody because there was a court order for themto report to the judge every time a new staff sexual misconduct complaint was filed.
And instead of doing that, they just shut the prison down and moved everybody.
(01:06:02):
Their warden is in prison.
I think eight different staff members were charged and they're doing time.
And that's a pretty big deal.
for a warden to get charged and sentenced to prison.
It was nicknamed the rape club.
(01:06:24):
And the women, like the most prominent whistleblower in that case, she has a target on herback.
I mean, it's bad.
It's so bad.
had another pending lawsuit out of
the federal prison in Tallahassee and she was asking for injunctive relief against thetransgender offender manual, which allows, it's the same as the law in California
(01:06:50):
basically, because she wanted privacy when she showers.
And I flew out to Tallahassee to support this lady and I'd never seen, I mean, I'd neverseen a judge conduct themselves with so little concern for a person's life.
(01:07:12):
He said, you have shower curtains.
Like, what's your complaint?
What do you want?
know, he even, you know, stopped the court proceedings to ask one of the witnesses a bunchof side questions about some other case.
It was the warden of the prison.
was like, you know, I have some, you know, there's some issues with getting phones andlaptops in for some lawyer people that are going to your facility.
(01:07:35):
Who can I talk to about that?
And I was like, in the middle of this, this is so serious.
one of the witnesses on WebEx, you you could see their dog behind them and he was like, Isee your dog.
there was no sign of at all.
this woman's testimony was so compelling.
I'm sitting there crying.
(01:07:55):
She's saying, you know.
I don't hate anybody.
I don't have a problem with these people.
just don't want to take a shower with them.
a very modest person.
just don't want to take a shower with them.
Which is reasonable.
Right.
I mean.
They can choose to shower alone under this transgender federal law.
(01:08:16):
She's just asking for the same protections to be extended to her.
And I said, well, who's, what's the problem?
And the pictures that they showed as evidence, I was like, these are not the same showercurtains.
These are not even the same shower curtains.
what fraud is this?
and the judge at another point stopped proceedings to ask, you know, the department ofjustice.
(01:08:41):
lawyers, you know, I know you just had a baby.
Are you okay to go to 5 30 or you want to break now?
So he's acknowledging her capacity to potentially need special accommodations as a mother,as a woman.
But when he was talking to this lady, this prisoner, he just, he, the closing argumentswere insane.
(01:09:05):
I, I'd never seen a judge yell at lawyers like that before.
It wouldn't even let them come.
complete their sentences and then, you know, this is a more radicalized judge who'sdefinitely, I would consider them a trans radical activist because once I got home and I
did some research, I was like, my gosh, this whole court is unbalanced.
(01:09:32):
There was no way she was going to get a trial out of this specific court.
So she probably just felt like there was no hope after
she's been finding this since 2017.
2017 and they sent her to Texas after afterwards and they put her in a unit with 34biological Aryan Brotherhood member dropouts and the you know, the Aryan Brotherhood is
(01:10:01):
recruiting hard in Texas in the women's prisons.
And then that's that's like
There's just no consideration to her.
She, women have no, their lives have no value in prison.
And the stuff that's going on in these federal prisons, it's going unreported.
If the staff is like having sex with everybody, why would they care if other people areusing them for the same purpose?
(01:10:27):
These are like support holes now.
and the, the, the negligence, the medical negligence, when people are assaulted, there wasa woman that was.
raped in that specific prison and she was decimated and the staff didn't send her out tomedical because they didn't want to be responsible for what they let happen to this lady.
(01:10:50):
my god.
So by the time she got out to the hospital she had scar tissue that had amassed in herprivate area that she couldn't even walk.
And they denied her reconstructive surgery.
And the doctor was like, why did you get denied?
She was like, I don't know, maybe because I had a soda.
(01:11:11):
No, they're just giving you the blues.
She had to have complete like vaginal reconstructive surgery and rectal reconstructivesurgery.
And she's still not okay.
And that was nobody got in trouble.
No, they actually, and that wasn't, that was actually a trans man that was on T.
(01:11:34):
That was all hopped up on T.
And this happened to a couple of other women in the same facility and they transferred theperson and paroled them from another state.
So there's not any accountability because nobody cares what happens to these women.
And it's hard.
(01:11:56):
The tactic I'm using now is to...
help introduce people to who I see when I'm interacting with my friends.
Maybe if they saw who I see, they would care.
and
it would make a difference because you can't care about what you don't know about.
And maybe if they understood that these are still people and, you know, we're all just oneglass of Chardonnay away from, you know, vehicular manslaughter or one really bad decision
(01:12:30):
or accident away from being exactly where they are right now.
I know it's so...
out of some people's line of vision, they can't connect with it.
But there's people in there that are just like us.
There's doctors and lawyers and moms and grandmas in there.
(01:12:53):
and
It's not too far-fetched to think that you might not end up in there one day.
It's, I just can't, I can't let this continue.
It's, I mean, the calls we're getting from Illinois, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York,it's not stopping.
(01:13:22):
And it's not just here.
Canada, if you get bumped up with a biological male, they just automatically give you aplan B.
They did something so insane.
There's a young person who now identifies as female who's in there for raping andmurdering like a baby.
And it wasn't the first time they'd done it.
(01:13:44):
But when you commit a crime like that before you're 12 in Canada, they won't charge you.
So this is the second time this person's done that.
And where did they decide to
did it before he was 12 and then repeated after that.
So they put this person in a women's prison that has the nursery, the mother-infantprogram in it.
(01:14:08):
Why would they do that?
That's not normal.
Like, you know for sure that that's true?
It's so bad.
It's so bad.
I'll even send you the link so that you have the receipts.
It's very disturbing.
It's just like there was a person in Northern California that killed a family, a lesbianfamily and their adoptive son very brutally.
(01:14:36):
The judge said it was one of the most brutal crime scenes they'd ever seen.
And they put that person in there.
in the women's prison.
this is that that was a concern to me because, you are you got a problem with lesbians.
You hate them.
So is it safe?
(01:14:57):
I don't know.
I don't think so.
No.
It just blows my mind hearing some of this, just that this is going on because most peoplewould never know that this is happening.
Because most people, average individuals are detached from, they're not system impacted.
(01:15:18):
And I get it, you know, this isn't something that's generally on people's radar to careabout, but I need them to care about this specifically because this is going to come
knocking on our doors once they're done with the test run on this because prison is just amicrocosm of here.
(01:15:38):
This is.
So much socioeconomic testing goes on in there, medical testing, all kinds of weirdthings.
healthcare.
These, these people are able to get facelifts, breast implants, full body laser hairremoval, you know, facial organization in prison.
(01:16:00):
What?
Because it's under the transgender healthcare guide.
But women, women.
know, the prioritization in medical is very unbalanced.
(01:16:20):
You have to like petition and take things sometimes to like the ninth circuit.
You got to go really far through the courts to get granted surgeries for your back, foryour knees.
And you know, these are lifers.
They're not going.
But then if someone's a trans they come in and they're in there they receive a lot moreprivilege
(01:16:42):
And then these are very experimental surgeries.
So if they're still experimental on this side, the quality that people are getting inthere.
Not great at all.
People call it trans men.
My nipples, my, my, my nipple fell off.
(01:17:02):
What?
someone called and said, I got top surgery and I think they, they, you know, nicked anartery.
can't stop bleeding.
And they sent me home.
They sent me back to the and they won't give me, they wanted to give me a bandaid.
it's, it's really negligent and they, they're not telling people they're not, it's notfully informed consent.
(01:17:25):
They don't know what's going to happen to their bodies.
on, you know, when you're on cross-sex hormones, they don't.
Nobody fully knows.
Nobody's saying, you should definitely not use narcotics when you're on testosterone.
It's really going to make you, it's going to mess you up, buddy.
None of that.
(01:17:48):
even the trans women, they're not telling them.
Somebody was telling me the saddest story.
A trans woman in men's prison said her friend came back from getting bottom surgery.
And she said, her shine, her light is gone.
I don't know what happened.
When she went and got that surgery, she's not the same anymore.
(01:18:11):
And I was like, oh, what?
So there's no mental health, obviously.
it's definitely not adequate.
It's always sucked, but now it's even worse because like women will go in to see a mentalhealth clinician and if they're expressing any of their concerns related to this, they're
shut down.
(01:18:31):
One woman was told, I have to end this session because I feel unsafe.
And she was talking about somebody who was stalking her who happens to be, you know, likea...
Somebody who, who has done a lot of stuff, a lot of their body count is long.
It's a scary person.
(01:18:51):
It's, it's understandable for somebody to have reservations about them, but theirclinicians shut their session down because she was being, you know, transphobic.
and this, another very young, young lady, this person.
Probably is not even the case or any thought in her head about being transphobic oranything like that.
(01:19:13):
It's just again, safety.
They're the same individuals walking into the shower on this young lady, little tiny girl.
A person was like, nobody's going to do anything.
It doesn't matter how loud you scream, there will not be consequences for me.
And she was crying at school and her teacher is mandated to say, she felt comfortabletelling her teacher what was going on.
(01:19:40):
Her teacher told the lieutenant on the yard and the lieutenant said, keep your mouth shut.
and you know just set your own boundaries because this way it is.
So there.
Is your dad fearful for you?
Sometimes, yeah, because I'm with them.
(01:20:06):
But, you know, I, I try and stay positive and think, you know, you're to bring it, bringit, you know, bring it.
it's not hard to find me.
and I've, I've spoken out publicly for four years now.
So, and I've adjusted things.
I didn't always care about everybody, but I definitely do now.
(01:20:29):
Mm-hmm.
It, my heart changed at some point.
I actually was face to face with that person, the scary one that walked in the shower.
I was in the prison a couple of years ago for a special event and I had never seen thisperson before.
And, this is a killer and this person walks directly towards me and stands a couple offeet away from me.
(01:20:50):
And I was like, wow, I'm going to die.
But.
Right.
Something happened my heart softened and I was really sad because that person has been inprison for 40 years and most people even with life sentences aren't in there for 40 years
So I thought I guess you're still here.
(01:21:11):
You're here because you got nowhere else to go And you need someplace to finish your time,I just don't think it should be here but it definitely changed the approach that I
was taking with all of this because I, one of, a really good friend of mine inside told meyou can't make any moves that aren't in love or else you're not going to win.
(01:21:38):
I was like, shut up.
Shut up!
you're...
She's so right and it's to the point now where I am concerned.
I do care.
I don't want anything bad to happen to anybody.
Right.
(01:21:59):
But there's...
Well, actually today, Senator Shannon Grove out of the Tulare-Bakersfield area, who's theonly elected official in California with...
Who's brave enough to take this on, published a bill that we're sponsoring that's the, youknow, female protection.
(01:22:26):
thing, you know, we're focusing on safety and protection for all parties involved.
And it would require the department to house, trans identified transfers from the men'sprison in a separate, hallway or housing unit from the biological women.
And, know, the language is, is definitely inclusive.
(01:22:49):
It's concerned about the wellbeing of all parties involved.
it does have a,
that says anybody with specific sex crimes would not be able to transfer into the women'sprison.
Doesn't that just make sense though?
Yes.
I don't...
(01:23:11):
It's really such that we have
Everybody always wants to argue and fight and say someone's prejudice or they're this orthey're that or they're...
Make it about what it really is.
Because the women were told, you know, during the process of this, there's going to be astrong vetting process and you're never going to have to worry about sex offenders.
(01:23:33):
No rapists and woman beaters are going to be in here.
But when I got the list of the convictions of the first busload of transfers, was, youknow, rape by force, murder of an inmate while incarcerated, you know, child abuse, child
rape, forced everything.
(01:23:54):
Just everything that they were told wasn't gonna be allowed was allowed.
I mean, regardless of what you believe, you know, even as far as trans or just orientationin general.
that shouldn't even be relevant to what is going on.
(01:24:14):
know what I mean?
Like
The trans have told me, lot of trans women have said, why would they allow the people thatwere allegedly running from the same privilege and opportunity to transfer?
Why would you give the victims on the purpose the same choice?
Exactly.
Like how would they think people won't be, they are criminals, but they're violent andlike you said, sexual assault, whatever it might be.
(01:24:42):
That should be off the table.
They shouldn't be allowed, just like they said they weren't gonna do that.
That just blows my mind.
And the senator who authored that law, he was very clear there's going to be guardrailsand there's room for the department to make arrangements when safety concerns do arise.
(01:25:03):
And they have told me to my face, our hands are tied.
We cannot do anything because of the way this law is written.
Nothing.
So where's the accountability, you know, with the fact that there are terrible, terriblepeople that have done horrible things to women, that there are even a lot, that it's even
(01:25:26):
an option for them to do it.
I don't get it.
As a normal person, like outside or looking in, you would think, well, that's kind ofblack and white.
Like, why are they even being allowed to go there?
They're not supposed to be.
and the privileges that are coming with it, like, what are you doing?
(01:25:47):
What are you really like?
And there's people that are coming back with, you know, I want bigger breasts.
I want, you know, there's a person who wants to have a vagina and a penis and they'reactually exploring this with their doctor because there are no limits as to what
you know, are available under this healthcare model because it's always subjective andbetween the inmate patient and their care provider.
(01:26:12):
So what are you saying?
If they want a tail and that's what's going to, you know, affirm them, you're going to letthem get it?
You have to set limits.
You have to have boundaries.
You have to do things.
That one's pretty crazy.
Someone wanting a vagina and a penis.
Oh, I mean, I might get hell for like saying this, but I mean, when when everybody wantthat?
(01:26:35):
I mean, like, come on.
And this is, this is somebody who, who, you know, murdered their wife and then strung herup from the rafters to make it look like suicide.
This is somebody who mental health services.
This isn't somebody who, you know, needs an endless supply of elective surgeries.
(01:27:00):
It's getting really crazy and, and, you know, it's just, just be open and say this, theseare COVID facilities now.
Just tell the truth.
Don't hide it.
Call it what it is.
Yeah, but then, you know, that's going to bring attention to the pipeline they're creatingwith the endless supply of children for the foster system.
(01:27:27):
Because that's what's going to happen.
They're just going to make a baby factory.
Mm-hmm.
I was in the foster system and I can tell you.
Yeah.
It really makes me sad.
It hasn't gotten any better.
The same person who authored this law is the one who made the rainbow home laws inCalifornia.
(01:27:55):
you know, there's...
all the foster homes and placements have to have, you know, training on how tospecifically deal with kids, LGBTQI kids.
and
I, uh, I mean, there's a kid I know who's in, who had to go to one of those homes becausehis probation officer told him there was no place else that could take him.
(01:28:20):
And he said that there's kids that would come home from school and put on their, you know,little promiscuous outfits and go out on the street to sell themselves because that's,
they're hungry and they would come home and then Uber eats everybody pizza for dinnerbecause they're not getting freaking fed.
I, I could.
(01:28:41):
God, that's heartbreaking.
I told people this legislation, these legislators, these lawmakers need to be investigatedbecause these aren't laws that the constituents like or support.
This stuff's all being done behind closed doors without much involvement from thecommunity or those impacted by this.
(01:29:04):
The NGOs over here are too strong.
There's no transparency in this stuff.
Everybody reads the top of the bill and it sounds good, but down in the bottom paragraph,that's where all the bad stuff is hidden.
That's where they're doing things like ensuring all forms of prophylactics are readilyavailable in juvenile facilities, correctional facilities.
(01:29:28):
Why?
they having, are they having a lot of, they're doing a lot of sex in there with who, witheach, I don't, I mean, you're supposed to be learning and learning how to read and stuff,
not sexing it up.
Right.
But this is, this is California.
California is very, you know, sneaky, but I mean, there's other states that blow my mindtoo.
(01:29:53):
I'm sure I feel really like I'm so ignorant to all this like I had no idea
There isn't total media blackout.
You won't see this on any news outlet that isn't very conservative.
It's been really hard to get it even in centerist outlets.
(01:30:16):
It's always pretty Alex Jonesy.
No mainstream media will cover it.
Even when recently...
the individual who was transferred back to men's prison after the two rape charges, thejudge in Madeira County granted this person's request to be referred to with she her
(01:30:40):
pronouns in the rape case.
That, I mean, that was on the news for about maybe five minutes on the local news, butthat's a really big deal.
You're going to
force the DA and the witnesses to use she her pronouns in regards to two rapes that weredone with a male part.
(01:31:04):
probably done with a man with a penis.
that's got a beard and is about 6'2 and has never identified as a female until this lawpassed.
And that's newsworthy, right?
I mean, that's...
Yeah, you don't hear about any of this.
(01:31:26):
I mean, and it's the whole West Coast.
I'm in a working group with women in Washington state and it's horrible up there.
Even before this happened in California, they transferred a person who was a rapist whowas in Thailand transitioning to hide their identity.
(01:31:46):
They were on the run and they placed this person in the like developmentally delayed unitand they immediately.
the same day, you know, assaulted a female prisoner.
It's not a matter of if, but it's when in these situations.
(01:32:09):
Yeah, mean, and especially, I mean, people who are incarcerated and everything, theyprobably know of this and they can just plan it.
Well, surprisingly, a large percentage of the male population doesn't know.
Oddly enough.
you know, the people that I communicate with in there that are members of the transcommunity, they're pretty upset because this is giving everybody a really bad name because
(01:32:41):
this isn't an adequate, like an accurate representation of who they are.
Yeah,
I go over there.
They're like, we know that you guys have it worse.
know it's.
The programming is better here.
You know, we have built a community over here.
We don't want to go over there.
Please don't let them transfer us over there.
(01:33:02):
a trans friend of ours who is a lifer who went to the women's prison and requested to goback to the men's prison because this person after, after the horrible incident happened
in their unit,
They said, I can't be here anymore and watch these women get ignored.
(01:33:22):
If one lady walks up to me with tears in her eyes saying, please don't leave.
can't, we're not going to be safe.
know, nobody listens to us.
She just said, I can't do it anymore.
And this was after another transfer.
The one who's actually, you know, in the, the rape situation beat his girlfriend, beat hisgirlfriend to, to a pulp.
(01:33:43):
And, there had
the staff had to initiate an investigation and bring the dogs out to look for a possiblemiscarriage.
And it was unsubstantiated because they said there was a fetus buried on the yard becauseof that incident.
(01:34:06):
You know, they told me it's unsubstantiated.
take these things very seriously.
And I said, well, yeah, but you had to bring the dogs and the shovels out.
So regardless of whether or not you found something, you still had to do that.
And that's totally unacceptable.
So this transplant was, was present when that happened and was like, I'm done.
I'm done with this.
I gotta go.
(01:34:26):
Because based on like the things you're telling me, it's not it hasn't really nothing todo with actual trans individuals.
It's people playing the role or playing the part to just get what they want.
or you know, there's a conflation of so many different identities and personality typesunder the trans umbrella, which I think is intentional too, because there's transvestites,
(01:34:52):
autogynophiles, know, transsexuals, it's all under the same umbrella and it's not, that'snot really fair.
It's not.
healthy because you have people that are sexually unwell and deviant that are just slidinginto this and using it as their Trojan horse to get wherever they want.
Absolutely, they know what they're doing.
(01:35:15):
Yes, and honestly, if there's 2000 plus trans identified, you know, prisoners inCalifornia, how come only 800 are trying to transfer?
If it's so bad over there, wouldn't you say they all want to come?
They don't.
They definitely don't.
(01:35:36):
It's, it's unbelievable.
And it was overwhelmingly supported by the whole, like the California women's caucus.
like women's yes.
Yes.
They all voted yes.
There were, think nine elected officials who voted no for this.
(01:35:59):
like in their defense I want to be like they need to at least be educated in it they'renot educated or something.
I would like to hope that it was presented to them in a way, or I like to hope that theyat least read it.
And this is an opportunity for them to understand this is being not used in the, in thespirit that it was written in.
And I've told, I've contacted Senator Weiner and told him like the vision that you had forthis, it's not happening, but we can do things to make it happen.
(01:36:27):
And it's possible.
And his, his response was the only thing wrong with this is it's not being fullyimplemented fast enough.
And that was after I handed him a stack full of letters from, women inside and you know,
regarding the horrible things that are going on.
Yes.
(01:36:47):
Because he's convinced that trans women are brutalized and subjected to the worst livingsituations in the whole carceral system.
The whole carceral system is brutal.
I could see that.
mean, I could see that.
But that's not even, that's not what's happening.
(01:37:09):
Right.
Because the door has always been open for individuals in situations like that.
Before, there was a case-by-case policy where if you were at risk, they would transfer youover.
There's always been one or two, like a handful of trans women that were in the population,but not 40 people with penises.
(01:37:33):
Right that have been Horrific with their crimes and against women children.
I just it just this makes no sense to me
And then the justification behind that is there's women who committed those crimes too.
Okay.
(01:37:54):
But that's
It's still different.
It's different.
And even after, I mean, just.
And people know how to take advantage of the system.
If they know they can take advantage of the system and the loopholes and everything else,they will, especially violent criminals.
Yes, who've been, had nothing to do for the last 10 or 15 years, but perfect their craft.
(01:38:20):
Yes.
With, in partnership with the legislature because they designed it in a way that made itvery, very easy for this to happen.
Right.
But, you know, I'm...
Are they having a lot of like fights and people getting like women getting beat up bythese trans or just the men that they're taking over there because they say that that's
(01:38:45):
how they want to identify are obviously they're going to be bigger they're going to bestronger all the things.
A lot of times they don't really even have to, they don't have to touch anybody to scarethe crap out of them.
The psychological warfare is at a level that I could have never prepared anybody for, butjust to have somebody stare at you or listen to you while you're on the phone or stand
(01:39:11):
outside the shower or, you know.
That intimidation.
Yeah, but there is there are physical altercations.
It's mostly domestic issues and couples.
Okay.
But it's, it's, it's so bad.
was so bad.
And in one situation, there was a peer support specialist, an inmate peer supportspecialist who reported it.
(01:39:36):
And she had to, she felt like she, she had to because this woman was probably going todie.
And it was so bad, it was happening on a daily basis to the point where this person wasrubbing feces on this lady's face.
It was bad.
this is, and you're in an eight person cell.
every
Do other inmates not step in?
(01:39:59):
Is that like not a thing to do to where you can step in and like save her?
No, not even in women, on women relationships because nine times out of ten, domestics,they're gonna stay together and you're gonna be the bad guy.
And you're going to be the one that they're after next.
Yes.
Get that.
And, I mean, these, these are things people get traumatized.
(01:40:25):
They'll, they'll call and say, I totally zoned out.
was disassociating.
was shaking, just hearing, you know, the, the, the hearing him beat her up.
I, I freaked out.
I didn't know where I was.
And then that's when I started doing research on complex PTSD.
And I was like, this is not even regular PTSD.
(01:40:46):
Right.
This is you guys living in the same fear of your original traumas.
This is permanent.
And it's happening over and over and over.
Yes, this is permanently damaging.
And there's no mental health.
There's usually not a whole lot of help when they get out either.
Like our mental health crisis.
(01:41:08):
That's a whole, gosh, that's a whole few podcasts.
Right?
I mean, it got to the point where one of my partners was like, we have to send in, um, youknow, grounding techniques and how to box breathe and how to, you know, do stuff.
Because we put them on postcards and shot them out because it was so intense.
(01:41:28):
At one point we were like, there, this is a total mental health crisis.
Like, what can we do?
So we're, trying to send in any information.
Cause we knew if we developed curriculum, it would be, you know, they wouldn't.
I don't think the state would accept it.
So, they just send in postcards and, you know.
(01:41:48):
But even the individuals who are actually trans, they should have mental health help thewhole time.
They need that.
But now they're just like in there letting them have surgeries, letting them do this,letting them do that when nine times out of 10, even the reason that they're in there
(01:42:10):
probably had something to do with mental health issues.
know, like it just, this is just really sad.
And it's, costly.
It's sad.
I there's, there's, there's trans women that have told me I, if I would have had mentalhealth services, wouldn't have physically transitioned.
Um, go back now.
What am I supposed to do?
I mean, I'm like, I don't know, friend.
(01:42:31):
I don't, I don't know.
Mm-hmm.
I don't know and these are, I mean the botched surgeries, this stuff is not, it's notokay.
The fact that that's not being regulated, highly regulated, is bizarre too.
And this, this is, and something else is weird going, I don't know anything they do to,you know, prisoners.
(01:42:59):
I know is just not good.
Everybody's on Ozempic in there.
Everybody is, you know, yes, they get these crazy contracts and they'll just overprescribing everything.
When I was inside, it was Lexapro.
Everybody was on Lexapro.
Lexapro and Gabapentin.
even for like like for anything.
(01:43:20):
you got a backache?
Here's some gabapen.
Take some GABA.
And I was like, why, why are we all on this?
What are they doing?
why they're passing out Narcan instead of dealing with the opioid crisis in there.
Right.
Somebody some Narcan, just give them the naloxone.
It's okay.
We don't need to, you know, stop the heroin from coming in.
(01:43:43):
Just the fentanyl come in and give them Narcan.
Well shit, aren't they having a ton of ODs then if they're allowing fentanyl and shit inthere?
my god.
Yes.
And it's never been as prevalent in the women's prison as it is now.
There's, there's a lot of overdosing happening.
(01:44:03):
volume of narcotics is much higher than it used to be, quantities.
And they're not, they don't know about that, those kinds of drugs that are coming in.
used to just be, you know, basic old school stuff, but now it's fentanyl, the synthetic.
marijuana, one of the K2 stuff that makes them do things like pull their
(01:44:25):
Yeah.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
But this is, mean, I could.
But this all goes back to it's all safety.
No one's protecting.
Anybody.
The staff is at risk.
mean, there's been within the California Department of Corrections, I think there's beenlike 66 murders in, in just this year.
(01:44:45):
And what, what are we at March?
Just this year.
And this is the model that, you know, our lovely governor is going to try and carry acrossthe country.
So it's really important for me to make sure everybody knows this is a California failureand.
you know, be careful because this could be a nation-wide program that they could try andimplement because, you know, he's doing his circuit and positioning himself for 2028.
(01:45:13):
And if he failed us, he will fail the nation, you know.
Do you get a lot of backlash from the trans community because people are justautomatically thinking that you have an issue with a trans individual when really that's
(01:45:35):
not the case at all?
Are they feeling like you're attacking them?
And it's not really, it's mostly the lawyers and it's mostly lawyers that are financiallyrolling in the dough because of this.
for the most part, I get a lot of support, surprisingly, because this is a really commonsense issue and it's not, you know.
(01:46:07):
It's not that complicated.
Once I'm able to sit down and explain this to somebody, they're like, my gosh, you gottabe.
can totally understand and see that that's not your intention at all.
I mean...
I'm sure you're so frustrated.
It's super frustrating and then I want everybody to like me all the time so when there isthat, I can't get it out of my head.
(01:46:33):
It's hard, even the...
to that whole mental health thing, right?
The, the, the rapist that was transferred in when I was in prison contacted me a couplemonths ago and said, Amy, I agree with everything you're saying here.
You just have to take the transphobia out.
And I was like, okay, you know, I'm to be nice here.
(01:46:54):
I'm going to look, I don't understand what is transphobic about this statement.
You know, if you're agreeing, what part do I take out?
Richard.
Right.
You know, I, but I do have that level of communication with everybody inside, because Iwant to make sure I'm getting adequate feedback and a decent cross section of what
(01:47:17):
everybody's experiencing.
Because if I wake up tomorrow and I get a message from everybody saying, it's okay nowI'll stop.
Cause my main goal is to communicate their needs, anything else.
So what do want to see happen now?
Like what's in the works now that you're like crossing your fingers about?
(01:47:41):
Well, I'm hoping we can get this legislation that Senator Grove put up at least throughthe committees so that we can have some hearings and get some conversations started on how
this is impacting everybody.
And maybe we can find out one day why women were left out of the factor of who matters.
(01:48:05):
That would be nice.
Federally, would really...
I want to see the Prison Rape Elimination Act revised to make everybody a protected class.
can't just have one center of the incarcerated population with protections and nobodyelse.
(01:48:27):
And increase the risk factor for the risk assessment when analyzing transfers to go reallyhigh if you're going to house penis and vagina people together.
Right.
Right.
eliminate a lot of this and then I'll, I'll chill.
If we can get that stuff done, it would, it would be really primo and everybody wouldbenefit from it because rehabilitate when you're in this kind of environment, whether
(01:48:56):
you're participating, participating, participating or not, you can't focus.
You can't try and get better.
Right.
Are they leaning towards anything good as far as mental health in the prisons or is thatjust like something you haven't even touched on yet because there's all
Really weak.
lot of the clinicians are definitely...
(01:49:27):
They're like super woke.
They're not f****g anybody but people that are going to affirm all of these things and gowith it and embrace it.
And it's not fair.
It's just not right.
(01:49:48):
Like we can all cohabitate and get along.
It's happened for millions of years.
People have been all kinds of different.
And it's right.
But what they're doing with the mental health services is really crazy.
They're just gaslit into silence.
They just need fair outlets.
(01:50:11):
They need access to to, you know, outside support.
that is specifically beneficial to them.
Everybody else has it.
So let's make an avenue for women to have some support too.
I mean that in the nicest way.
don't mean that in a, in a ugly way, just let these women have somebody to talk to, tofeel validated, just somebody to listen and tell them they're not crazy.
(01:50:41):
But overall, everybody needs some serious mental health services.
And I would really, really like to see somebody care about men and the overwhelming,unreported childhood sexual trauma that occurs over there.
If anybody cared, that would probably have a major positive impact on their abilities torehabilitate.
(01:51:09):
Yes.
even, you know, it's kind of like whether it's addiction or a criminal or whoever it is,like when you commit a crime or you're using drugs, it all always stemmed, usually, I'd
say probably 97 % of the time, it all goes back to mental health.
(01:51:33):
You know what I mean?
It stems from there, you know, that people don't address things or they haven't dealt orthey have this issue and that issue with no help leads to this, this, this, this, and
that.
Yes.
No coping.
We have all these smart people making all these laws and rules.
Doesn't everybody see by now?
(01:51:53):
Mental health should be like right there.
And I feel like they know, I feel like they know, but there's not, it's not financiallybeneficial to help people, to help them be well, you know, so they're allowing everybody
to walk around unhealed, traumatized and,
(01:52:14):
hurting, whatever it might be angry, angry, some people are angry.
Yeah.
Wow.
I'm like an I'm sitting here.
Holy crap.
I can't believe all this stuff was going on is going on.
Yet I'll be sure to send you links because I always want to make sure that everybody seesthe receipts and knows this is real, unfortunately.
(01:52:41):
Yeah, well and we'll put it in the description, you know any links that you have orinformation, you know, because Obviously there's gonna be people that have an opinion
because everybody always has one But I would love for you to have that down in thedescription just so you have something to back yourself
(01:53:02):
And I love opinions.
I welcome them.
want people to speak their mind freely.
Just be respectful.
Yes, be respectful.
It's really not that hard, but most people have a really hard time with it.
I'm glad that they have you as an advocate, though.
I mean, they have to be so grateful that you're out here doing this.
(01:53:26):
I just love them.
I love them.
I got a link to the graduation, a lot of them were graduating from Fresno State with theirbachelor's because there's this awesome program.
And I forgot how much I love them and I logged in and I just started bawling.
(01:53:49):
And I was like, what is your freaking problem?
But to see so many ladies that I just love so much, one who just started chemo, one whojust had a double mastectomy, one who, when I was in prison, she couldn't give a crap
about herself or education.
She was so codependent.
All she cared about was stealing and wheeling.
(01:54:10):
And I was like, wow.
Do it and like hurt she was in survival mode.
Yeah
and she was up there giving a speech.
was like, wiping my eyes.
Is that my friend?
was just so amazing.
Seeing them invest in themselves and get to be like a part of academia, it was so awesome.
(01:54:33):
It was great.
And I just, I love them.
I can't stop until, you know, everybody's okay.
And
I just wish that your intentions were seen for what they really are and not the negativeor, you know, it's just.
I think it's getting better, I think.
(01:54:55):
educating them.
Yeah, I just have some-
You just have to keep talking and keep telling people.
Because it's really easy to just read one crappy article about me and you're sold on it,you know?
Right.
Right.
Well, I'm happy for you.
think you're doing amazing things.
(01:55:18):
I hope that this will help educate people a little bit on the reality.
Because like I said, I had no clue.
I know my husband reads the news like online all the time, watches it.
I never heard anything about this.
So crazy.
crazy because I've been, I mean, I've done so many interviews and it's like it's still asecret.
(01:55:43):
This is so crazy.
It's just not, it's not something that's normal.
It's not something that anybody would think would ever be an issue.
None of us ever thought we would have to argue about this or, you know, raise awarenessabout this.
this is how it's going to get fixed.
People
Yeah, somebody commits a crime and they have to go away and they're incarcerated for alittle bit They should just know that that's what it is Not I have the fear for my life.
(01:56:13):
I have the fear that I'm gonna get raped.
I have to fear all these different things There's like no protection
No, but I think there's a lot of wheels-
mental health.
Let's say that 10 more times or mental health.
Yeah.
I mean staff needs mental health services.
Everybody really needs mental health Absolutely.
(01:56:35):
It's really bad because these people are getting traumatized at work all the time.
This is not healthy.
Nobody's okay in there.
It's a nightmare.
But it's, yeah, that's me talking.
I'm like is that dog or is that a dog?
(01:56:56):
But that's, we're gonna really push it and, on, you know, we're just gonna keep sending inthe encouragement and letting everybody know, like, we're still working and...
Yeah, yeah, like even in six months or so we need to have you on again to see if there'sbeen any progress or anything good.
(01:57:17):
I should be able to give you a pretty good report.
My hopes aren't high.
Not too high, but I feel good.
crossed, girl.
Just keep doing what you're doing.
It'll get out there.
And it's shifting.
It's shifting a little bit and every little, little move that is much appreciated.
(01:57:38):
little winds,
All right, well thank you for coming on.
I do appreciate it.
And I do hope that it helps more people realize what's going on out there.
Me too, I think so.
I think it will.
Thank you.
Thanks for listening to me.
Yes, of course, of course.
And we'll make sure that we get all the links for everyone to go in the description.
(01:58:03):
All right.
Thank you.
It was so good talking to you.
can talk to you too.