Tuesday, August 2, 2016

Anonymous Witness: The LETHAL INJECTION Q&A An Interview by Leroy E. Mann



            If I had to guess, I would say the combined number of people having viewed of SERVING LIFE is north of 160. Coming from an onstage observation, I can assure you that no human emotion went neglected. 

Once the tears were wiped away and the laughter-subsided, most of the members of our audience extended their courtesy by congratulating our cast personally. Handshakes and a brief hug or two, from staff, volunteers, and of course fellow prisoners were gestures of appreciation, no doubt. But what happens next?

            In order to prevent such a monumental display of humanity from becoming a mere "prison project," people would have to take what they have witnessed back to their communities. Engaging, informing, and ultimately organizing movements to dispel this morbid influence of state-sanctioned murder as a proper course to reaching justice. Bringing death to capital punishment will require "party starters."

In my personal experience, there are two kinds of people that attend parties, the "party starters," and those who absorb their vibe. While bearing an irremovable stain of regret, I admit I was once the latter. Prior to developing a sense of immunity to the inevitable judgment of my peers, I was uncomfortable with being the first on anybody's "dance floor." I was content with absorbing the vibe rather than setting it.

            The following interview engages, informs, and invites community "party-goers" to meet at the intersection of our various disciplines in order to mobilize for change. This particular anonymous witness will help those in need of that first dance to understand that passion and drive breeds harmonious results on the "dance floor" of activism more effectively than authority and power.

            So let's get the party started!   
            This is the "two step" of defusing mass criminalization and diminishing capital punishment from the foreseeable future.

Without revealing how you came to witness the play, SERVING LIFE, paint a picture of the 90-minute experience for our readers.

                  Serving Life is one of the most creative displays of storytelling I've ever encountered. The play takes the viewer through the day-in-the-life of a Death Row prisoner such that the performance is bracketed by a 5am wake up call and a call to lights out. But throughout, the play is interspersed with multiple forms of storytelling (spoken word, monologue, re-enactment, and more) as one learns about the life journeys and circumstances that led to each performers living on Death Row.

The very design of the play maps these two realities onto each other so that viewers have a raw and intimate view into the memories, histories, experiences--which is to say, lives--that fill North Carolina's Death Row.

            The play has all the elements that make for a meaningful and moving performance: drama, wit, humor, and social commentary. But more than anything, Serving Life is full of energy and life force. It is art full of truth and is particularly urgent in this era of mass incarceration.

The work of art covers familial drug addiction, child abuse, police brutality, racism, mental illness, and countless traumatic circumstances that led to 6 death row prisoners serving life to a room full of strangers. What type of message should this send to a free society?

                  Recently, a colleague of mine, who had been remarking about the fact that a vast majority of female prisoners have a history of being physically &/or sexually abused (some stats say 90% or more!), asked provocatively, "How do we, as a country, respond to victims of sexual abuse? We put them in prison." I think Serving Life asks a similarly damning and provocative question: "How do we respond to victims of child abuse, police brutality, racism, exploitation, mental illness, etc.?" And, given that the stories told in this play are representative of larger realities, our answer may as well be: We put them on death row, which is to say, we eliminate them.

            In other words, I think one of this play's messages is confrontational; it forces us to ask hard questions of ourselves, our communities and this country, and it forces us to see the horrifying absurdity that is the death penalty.
           
The "N-word" is used several times throughout this production. So many people, in the "free world," have taken the position of banning the "N-word" from the vernacular of anyone considering themselves as decent human beings. How does the usage of this word affect you? Your answer does not have to be exclusive to the performance.

                  No doubt one of the most powerful aspects of the play was its insight and commentary on the power of words. One of the most memorable lines for me was, "He had what we all wanted: a name," which, in context, got at this deep desire we all share, that is, this desire to be known and loved.

            But the guys in the stories were often not known by words of love, but of hatred, disdain, bigotry. One memorable story, particularly as it relates to the "n-word," was about a man who was half-white and half-black who, as a young boy, was unwanted and rejected by white family members. The storyteller recounted a time he overheard one of these family members refer to him as a "n-word." And, tragically, this was a defining moment for him, making him feel unwanted by those who should have loved him most, placing him on a path of self-hatred and depression.

            As far as how the word affects me, well, as a white male, I can remember hearing people (friends, neighbors, relatives) use the word to describe "those black people over there"--I say it like that because, more often than not, these particular white people did not actually have relationships with any black people. Even folks that knew better than to use the "n-word" would use a word like "thug," which had similar, if not the exact same, intent--the purpose was to pathologize the black community.

What's scary is that, in some of these contexts, such language was normal; it was assumed. As such, the "n-word" had/has tremendous power in shaping the perception of others, that is, when used by one white person to other white people, the "n-word" will start to make people believe that "those black people over there" are actually less moral, less human than us white people.  So yeah, words are powerful, and Serving Life demonstrated this. They can make folks feel unwanted and unworthy of love, and they can reinforce white supremacy.

            As far as black folks using the word to express a bond between one another, I don't feel like it is my place to comment. I will briefly say, however, that I'm not at all interested in conversations where white folks want to prevent black people from using that word. Behind those efforts are a kind of respectability politics that, perhaps counter intuitively, reinforce white supremacy.


Mass incarceration seems to be a hot topic going into 2016. The legendary Bryan Stevenson has dedicated vat efforts to neutralize this ever growing force of injustice. Do you have ideas about strategies in which SERVING LIFE could be used to oppose the judicial practices that facilitate overcrowded prison populations in America?

            Serving Life is both urgent and disruptive. By demanding we listen to and know the stories of those behind bars, it brings the audience face to face with the stories of those we as a society have intentionally tucked away to some far away place and forgotten. And I think knowing your stories, and stories like these, can expose the evil of the sort of fear-driven "tough on crime" politics that have helped lead to mass incarceration, a politics that has, from the beginning, relied on narratives that criminalize people of color in general and poor black people in particular.

            I think one interesting strategy would be to invite public schools to put on a student production of this play. As just one example, it would be so incredibly powerful for students, say a student who has felt rejected and unwanted, to perform parts of the play mentioned above as it relates to the power of names/words. This sort of performance would also force people to confront, and hopefully disrupt, the tragic reality that is the school-to-prison pipeline.

            At a more basic level, though, I think Serving Life needs to be seen by anyone and everyone willing to watch. These intentionally forgotten stories are part of our national identity. They say something about who we are. And that urgently needs to be interrogated; the most vulnerable of lives depend upon it.            

Personally, I feel that SERVING LIFE is a feat that should be recorded. If this were possible, who would you suggest to be the initial viewing audience? Why?

                  I definitely think teachers and school administrators should see this for similar reasons I mentioned above. I also think faith communities should see it. There are some faith communities that just are not informed by your stories, and that is a tragic reality that keeps them blind to injustice.

I also think people of faith will be deeply moved and inspired to find folks living under constant threat of violence and death that have such life and creativity. That is a powerful witness and testimony that people of faith ought to reflect upon.

            And maybe police officers...the police, as an institution, are responsible for the type of social formation and control shape the stories represented in Serving Life.

What were your feelings when you rediscovered "freedom," after the experience of SERVING LIFE?

                  Man, watching a 90 minute production put on by 6 guys condemned to death, guys who affirm and even celebrate their own lives--as said in a memorable line of the play, "everyday is worth celebrating when you’re alive to see it,"--will mess with any previous simplistic understanding one had about freedom.

What does it mean that folks on Death Row, whose lives (and even deaths) are all controlled, can witness to freedom? I think, at the very least, it says that freedom is not something static; it is a way of being, a form of life-praxis. As such, there is a sense in which people can be free in fact, though not free in form (I'm thinking of Frederick Douglass here. He says in My Bondage and My Freedom: "I had reached the point, at which I was not afraid to die. This spirit made me a freeman in fact, while I remained a slave in form.")

            In other words, I think Serving Life pushed me to take the agency, creativity, wisdom, and insight of those on Death Row. On Death Row are folks who can and should be shaping our visions for a better world, a better future. On Death Row are folks who have something to teach us about what freedom actually is. Freedom requires us to take seriously the sanctity of life, and thus, inside freedom is a necessary refusal and resistance to any death-dealing regimes. So, for me, Serving Life was an invitation to participate in the work of resistance that freedom demands for the sake of LIFE--yours, mine, and everybody’s.


Copyright © 2016 by Leroy Elwood Mann

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