Dom Rosario on Caging Deviance

   For our reading of Andrea Ritchie's chapter, Caging Deviance, there were many points that she made that I wanted to write about. The one point I think stuck out to me the most was the point made in the beginning of the chapter under the history of prisons that "prisons have always been steeped in religious morality, seeking to curb those deemed immoral and instill in them the proper rigidly defined sexual and gender roles" (Ritchie,  pg. 94). In this idea, the author states that prisons began as a place to contain what society saw as its deviants.

   The idea that society uses prisons to do away with the individuals that don't adhere to its rules and regulations is not a surprising one. For centuries, that has been their purpose. What stuck me as surprising, though it really shouldn't have, is how religiously based prisons really are, a point brought up a few times in this chapter. The basis of the laws that put people in prison are based in religious morals, which range from crimes many people would consider worthy of being behind bars such as murder and crimes that seem more of a personal choice (which can be debated somewhere else) such as sex work. 

    As time has past, people who have been considered "deviants" have somewhat changed. Before the early 2000's, people who engaged in same-sex acts were jailed and considered sex offenders, as it was considered "laws against nature". Because people claim that Christianity and other religions condemn the act of sodomy, it was seen as immoral and against what was "normal" in society and therefore written as against the law.  In reading this chapter and thinking further, I was brought to much more awareness of how much religion plays in what people consider moral/immoral and normal/abnormal, leading to what is legal and illegal.

    When I think of religions affects on the law now, the first issue that comes to mind is the issue of sex work. As someone with acquaintances who engage in voluntary sex work, I do not see the issue of someone doing what they please with their body. Yet since society sees these individuals as "Sexual deviants" because what they do for survival isn't something they see as moral or normal, these individuals are harassed by law enforcement and jailed. There is a nice chunk of the U.S prison population who are incarcerated because of laws restricting what people can do with their own bodies, more having to do with sex-related incidences.

Can anyone think of laws that do not have basis within religious morals? If so, what are these laws meant to do? If not, why do you think all of our laws are based in this kind of way?