Washington Lawyer - January/February 2022 - 39

WORTH READING
never have happened. Either way, Press argues
that both groups had blood on their hands
while they claimed innocence or ignorance
and singled out scapegoats to rationalize their
own guilt.
Press examines war, prison, farm work, mining,
slaughterhouses, and other institutions to
offer case histories that develop his thesis. His
examples will shame readers. Journalists and
activists regularly expose the excesses and brutality
of our nation's jails (pretrial) and prisons
(after conviction), yet nothing changes. Courts
and legislators decree reforms, but they rarely
come. Prisoners aren't high on most people's
lists of causes, and the same goes for hapless
farm workers who have little political power
to change their lives in America's fields.
In the author's view, the public has little motive
(except on Sundays in church) to critique these
institutions because from Monday to Saturday
they benefit from the sponsors of these social
excesses. The public feels secure from harm
by criminals and is fed by farm workers and
slaughterhouse butchers, so they look the
other way. Asylums hide what society doesn't
want to see. If we don't really see it, then it isn't
happening. No one is there to advocate for the
sick and dangerous or exploited. Most people
have a " threshold of repugnance, " allowing the
public to see these " dirty workers " as " essential, "
Press says.
The administrators of these institutions have
little motive or training to deal mercifully with
these outcasts, and they operate in the dark.
" The public doesn't want to pay what it takes
to care properly for prisoners, " so the operators
cover for themselves when their shocking
behavior is revealed. How many Rikers Island
jail exposés must there be before conditions
change?
At a corrections conference I ran, author Jessica
Mitford (who spent a night at the D.C. Women's
Detention Center as part of her research) remarked,
" If we were to ask a small child what
they wanted to be when they grew up, few
would say prison guard. " Or field worker or coal
miner or slaughterhouse employee, she might
have added. So the " dirty workers " are untrained
or unmotivated to perform their unprestigious
and undesirable jobs.
Media regularly exposes horrendous practices.
Consider wartime torture, prolonged imprisonment
in inaccessible prisons like Guantanamo,
or even soldiers' day-to-day combat that
causes them to suffer physically and emotionally.
Press describes how PTSD follows soldiers
when the wars end. The public doesn't see
cyber warfare, but the soldiers who perform
it do, wondering, " Have we killed the right
people? "
Press describes " kill floors, " where low-paid
workers with no options and desperate immigrants
work in slaughterhouses killing cows
and chickens in bloody, brutal manners that
should curb the appetites of those who eat the
results. In one slaughterhouse, 2,200 cows a
day, 10,000 a week, were being killed. In poultry
plants chicken are electrocuted, scalded, their
throats slit. The industry has been labeled
" plantation capitalism. " As profits are protected
and the public gets its fast food, nature is
contaminated and despoiled and people are
dehumanized.
Press's book is depressing to read, all the more
so when the public knows (or should) and
looks the other way.
Ronald Goldfarb, an attorney, author, and literary
agent, is of counsel to Redmond, Peyton & Braswell
LLP in Alexandria, Virginia. His latest book is The
Price of Justice: Money, Morals, and Ethical
Reform in the Law.
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2022
* WASHINGTON LAWYER 39
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Washington Lawyer - January/February 2022

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