thai news Women’s issues abound in today’s society. Working and raising children alone, dating in a cyber world, the glass ceiling, equal pay for equal work, women’s rights, and humanitarian issues, are only a few of the leading topics, in the discussions about things that are important to women today (DuBois & Dumenil, 2005). What seems to be forgotten, or is at least, rarely spoken of, is the issue of women in prison, and why the numbers are rising, at such an alarming rate (Sabol, Couture, & Harrison, 2007).
The American prison population is the largest, in the free world (Bartollas, 2002). Yet, America is still considered, to be the land of the free! How do we maintain our position, as the supporter of individual freedom, when we imprison more people than any other nation, in the Western world (Bartollas, 2002)? Hmmm, how does that work? The Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that, one of every fifteen people will serve some type of sentence, in a county, state or federal facility, at some point in their lives (2008). If you take the 23 May 2008 figure, of 304,153,715 people, in the United States, it means that at least 20,276,914 Americans, will be sentenced to a term behind bars, during their lifetime (U.S. Census Bureau, 2008). It is common knowledge, that the majority of the prison population, consists of African American males, but, the reality is, that women of all ages and races, are included in these numbers (Bartollas, 2002). news
