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At least 41 people have died in the Lone Star State's unairconditioned prisons due to heat-related or unknown conditions this summer, according to the Texas Tribune.

Even so, it's hard to firmly establish how many have succumbed to heat-related illness, according to observers. That's because TDCJ's official stance is that no inmates have died of heat exhaustion since 2012 — the same year the agency began to be bombarded with wrongful death lawsuits from inmates' families, the Tribune reports.

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[-] Moc@lemmy.world 151 points 1 year ago

41 people have died

That’s 41 too many. Jesus fucking Christ, America.

[-] electriccars@startrek.website 39 points 1 year ago

Wow! That's going to save the state of Texas so much money! It's expensive to house people against their will for enjoying forbidden plants in their own homes. 🙄

[-] Baines@lemmy.world 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

what? naw, they have to meet the quota, they’ll just arrest some other poors

[-] lolcatnip@reddthat.com 36 points 1 year ago

41 victims of negligent homicide at the hands of the state.

[-] Sharkwellington@lemmy.one 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Forty. Freaking. One. Why has this country not been in an uproar since the first one? Why did we wait until this many? This is the first I've heard about it. Doesn't surprise me at all, but I had no idea this was happening.

Forty one!!

[-] Jaysyn@kbin.social 113 points 1 year ago

If you think this is on accident, then you don't understand Texas #fascism.

[-] Zombiepirate@lemmy.world 82 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I love that someone always downvotes the GOP being called out as fascist but will never argue the point.

They're absolutely fascists. Their enemies are the same as the Nazis: sexual, ethnic, and religious minorities & leftists. They want to dominate an oppressive monoculture that harkens back to a fictional past. Anyone denying that they're fascists either doesn't understand what that means or is lying.

[-] be_excellent_to_each_other@kbin.social 18 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I love that someone always downvotes the GOP being called out as fascist but will never argue the point.

Great thing about Kbin is you can see who that is. Just going to say I see one or two names fairly regularly.

Edit: LOL, unsurprisingly the same guy upvoted this comment from HazDaz.

[-] Zombiepirate@lemmy.world 21 points 1 year ago

Look, incel, not everyone who disagrees with you politically is a “Nazi.”

This comment is gold.

Also, love the "men's rights" shit they post. It all makes sense.

[-] agent_flounder@lemmy.one 8 points 1 year ago

Indeed. Also ultra nationalism, religiosity, authoritarianism, ...

[-] NewNewAccount@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

Most people don’t think of the meaning of fascist beyond a generic pejorative.

Arguably (IMO) there are far too many established uses of the word for anyone to "Well ackshully..." about it. :-)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_fascism

[-] NewNewAccount@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

You think fascists care about what some academic considers fascism?

No? Is this a trick question?

[-] AllonzeeLV@lemmy.world 83 points 1 year ago
[-] LeadSoldier@lemmy.world 41 points 1 year ago

I agree with you and have studied this from my role as an intelligence official and former interrogator. The lawyer who prosecuted the Nazis at the Nuremberg trials stated that the real problem wasn't the evil but the apathy of the masses that allowed a few evil people to do big evil things.

The fact of the matter is that human reactions to certain information are well known from our centuries of study of propaganda and marketing and psychology. At this point it is easy for the government to manipulate messaging so that the people are misled enough to allow evil.

It is the simple stuff and even smart people are influenced by it over time. It is a well studied phenomenon. No one is immune. For example, Trump saying that he has the most transparent government ever while specifically taking away rights and doing things in secret.

The propaganda tool has been efficient for our governments, especially since the advent of the internet. Also, keep in mind that roughly half of the population has a two-digit IQ. Some people will never admit that they are dumb and therefore will never admit that they have been deceived.

The fact that US citizens are scared to stand up to their government because the government police will abuse them shows where we are as a society. We are deeply fascist and the illusion of democracy hasn't been functioning in Congress for quite a while. The illusion of the checks and balances has worn thin as well.

So I agree with you. Our society is diseased. But it's not necessarily the faults of the individuals.

[-] Franzia 5 points 1 year ago
[-] AllonzeeLV@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

That's good. That's progress. Eventually you'll have no more tears to shed, you'll grow numb and dead inside, and then, finally, you'll be able to appreciate the morbid hilarity of humanity's constant, unflinching torture of humanity.

We really are the fucking worst 🤣

[-] SheeEttin@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago
[-] Fisk400@feddit.nu 48 points 1 year ago

Like with most things under republican control, suffering is the point. They like it when people they don't like suffers and they will pay money to see it happen. In this case they cause the suffering AND they save money so there is no way it's getting fixed while Texas is red.

[-] skulblaka@kbin.social 17 points 1 year ago

Texas can't even provide proper climate control to their regular unincarcerated citizens. The prisons never had a chance.

[-] captainlezbian@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

There’s a difference there. You can justify it under capitalism that unincarcerated people have access to air conditioning if they choose to prioritize it and work for it. Choice is one of the things denied to prisoners. It’s why they theoretically get access to medical care.

[-] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 43 points 1 year ago

Texans don't seem to care about hard-working people getting heat-exhaustion to begin with, let alone prisoners.

[-] MonkderZweite@feddit.ch 11 points 1 year ago

This isn't a human rights violation?

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Welcome to Texas, son.

[-] GhostFence@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Human rights violation?! THIS! IS! TEXAS!

[-] WhiteHawk@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Wait, is "unairconditioned" actually a word?

[-] stembolts@programming.dev 6 points 1 year ago

There is no rule dictating what is and what isn't a word.

Language is an ever changing object.

Was an idea communicated by expressing the sound? It's a word.

You didn't do this, but some people so firmly cling to the idea of rules (which as we have covered, do not exist) that they will feign ignorance at the introduction of an unfamiliar presentation. I find it odd.

This could lead into a topic about how everything around us, society similarly, has no rules. It's just a collection of ideas stacked haphazardly, any of it can be changed by any one of us. But I will stop there.

[-] Franzia 3 points 1 year ago

It is super important to communicate to people that it is not normal for prisoners to be struggling in the heat like this.

this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2023
532 points (100.0% liked)

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