State-sponsored torture
Published 2:50 pm Tuesday, June 16, 2026
Lately I’ve been imagining this…I’m locked inside a 6’ x 9’ cell with the ‘luxuries’ of a cold, metal toilet, a dirty sink and a musty cot. There are no windows, only a slot for delivery of my wretched daily meals. I have no phone, no internet, no books or magazines to read, no sense of the world beyond this space.
The lights stay on all night, but I can’t get an eye mask so I can only sleep fitfully on my cot’s slice of bread thin mat. I’m cold, but I dare not ask for a blanket. I can smell my own stink because my underwear is only refreshed weekly — yes, I’m here for weeks, maybe months…I don’t know. I’m allowed outside to walk, maybe even stretch for an hour a day in a concrete human sized kennel by myself. My only human contact is either the raving screams I hear from others or with guards who may or may not consider me subhuman and deserving of further punishment. There’s no possibility I’ll see or hear from friends or family, and I’ve no idea when this will end.
As you read this, more than 122,000 people in the U.S. are living it. It’s called solitary confinement for us lay people, administrative segregation for employees of U.S. prisons and “the hole” by inmates of our correctional institutions. And those numbers don’t include the people held in solitary in immigrant detention centers around the country.
International human rights groups call solitary confinement torture. Researchers at the UW are not allowed to subject lab rats to the conditions of solitary confinement because they’re “too inhumane.” So, they study bees. Bees are social creatures much like humans, and when they’re placed in solitary for even short periods of time, they return to the colony either depressed, violent or suicidal…much like humans.
I have been privileged to meet people who’ve lived in solitary confinement for months, some even years at a time. Once these folks were released from prison, they reentered their communities with incredible strength and the energy to build new lives. These survivors are surprisingly calm, personable, ready to laugh and remarkably candid. Many have dedicated themselves to reforming or ending solitary confinement. These activists are, unfortunately, the exception. Most people emerge from solitary confinement with new or exacerbated mental illness, some with physical illnesses created by intense anxiety. Some are suicidal. Yet, according to their own data, the state’s Department of Corrections admits that, since 2023, the use of solitary has increased almost 30%.
So, since we know it destroys all but the most resilient individuals. And we know it’s the most expensive form of incarceration. Yes, it costs more to keep a person in solitary than in the general population of a prison. Why do we keep doing it? What do we gain from continuing to torture people?
Our so-called correctional institutions claim they use solitary to protect vulnerable inmates from harm in the general population or to protect the others from their potentially violent behavior. However, records for 2023 show that of the 6,120 solitary confinement cases in Washington state, just 4% were carried out for safety or security reasons. Washington is just one example. So, what’s going on?
No surprise — most folks in solitary are Black or brown. In fact, most folks in U.S. prisons are Black or brown! The brilliant survivors I’ve met are Black and brown, and I am humbled by their kindness, their lack of bitterness, their capacity for joy.
I believe there are many elements behind the continued practice of solitary confinement — money for correctional departments for one. Washington state’s DOC has gotten $5 million to $7 million every year since 2023 to “reform” solitary, yet nothing has changed and they are not required to report how they’ve spent that money. Is it racism? Is it our fundamentalist roots that see prison as punishment first and rehabilitation later if at all? Is it revenge?
Every one of those thousands of humans is a story, a person with a life filled with hopes, loved ones, talents and a need for help to escape whatever got them into prison. But we’re wasting them. They are being tortured in my name — in your name and with your tax dollars. As a society, we could gain so much if we help these individuals regain their self-respect, educate them so they can contribute to us all. It’s not rocket science. It’s simple humanity. They are us. I believe that when we raise others up, we elevate ourselves.
To learn more about solitary confinement, visit civilsurvival.org and endsolitarywa.org.
Susan McCabe is a writer living and working on Vashon. She volunteers with a nearly 10-person team of SURJ activists working for criminal justice system reform.
