The Southeastern Sociology Association (SSA) brought the controversial topic of prisoners’ rights, specifically in Louisiana, into focus through an in-depth, all day conference.
The conference, entitled “The Business of Incarceration in Louisiana: Do Prisoners Have Human Rights?,” was held from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m. Friday, Sept. 14 in the War Memorial Student Union. The conference included guest speakers, breakout sessions, planning work groups and lunch.
“Every human being has the right to be treated with human dignity,” said Bill Quigley, keynote speaker. “We need a radical revolution of values. We are not talking about ‘prison reform.’ We’re talking about the system itself. It’s toxic. We have to uproot this system and do something different.”
Quigley is a Professor and Director of the Law Clinic and the Gillis Long Poverty Law Center at Loyola University-New Orleans and an Associate Legal Director at the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York City.
“We’re very fortunate to have gotten him for this,” said Rebecca Hensley, instructor of sociology and coordinator of the Prisoners’ Rights Conference. “He felt that this conference was so important that he volunteered to do this.”
Other speakers included Fox Rich, an ex-prisoner, author of “The One That Got Away” and Co-founder of  the L.R.N.D. Movement (Living Responsibly Never Deviating) and Andrea Armstrong, professor at Loyola University Law School.
Among the topics discussed were community re-entry issues, natural life sentencing, immigrant incarceration, the burdens of prisoners’ families and long-term solitary confinement.
“We hope that this conference can spark conversation and awareness about this issue,” said Laura Thompson, vice president of SSA. “The topic of prisoner’s rights doesn’t come up much around here, despite its relevance and importance. We wanted to spread information and provide a space and time to talk about prisoner’s rights.”
Hensley explained she has been all over the country looking into prisons and prisoners’ rights since her passion for the issue developed in 1971.
“We have to be honest with ourselves about the problems with the system and how to address the fact that any of us could wind up in a position where we are not protected,” said Hensley. “It doesn’t mean that it’s broken, it means it has problems, particularly since we are paying out a very great deal of money to incarcerate and to keep incarcerating so many more people than the rest of the world ever has.”
According to the conference flyer, Louisiana has doubled its prison population in the past 20 years and 70 percent of the state’s prisoners are African-American.
In attendance were students, professionals, advocates and a few ex-prisoners. Some students received extra credit for attendance.
“I’m really surprised at the information that I’m finding out,” said freshman Braylon Gros. “It’s not what I expected. I would definitely come again if they did this again, and I would bring more friends with me.”
According to NOLA.com, Louisiana’s incarceration rate  is nearly five times Iran’s, 13 times China’s and 20 times Germany’s, with almost 38,000 prisoners incarcerated in 2011.
“If you’re going to look at prisoners’ rights in the United States, this is the place to do it because Louisiana has the worst record of all,” said Hensley. “We have the most people incarcerated of any other group of humans ever in the history of the human race. That’s pretty huge. And we lock them up for longer.”
SSA membership is open to students in any major who has had at least one sociology course. Meetings are held every Tuesday at 4:45 p.m. in Fayard Hall Room 236.
“This is just the beginning and certainly it would build from here,” said Hensley. “Even if we never have another conference, the conversations that are begun here at the conference we hope will produce forward motion in the field out there in the future. That’s what our goal is.”