4 March 2003

Life isn’t bliss, life is just this, it’s dying

I just watched a documentary about prison suicide. What can I say… I thought I knew most of everything there was to know about jails, and I was wrong. I always assumed the hardest thing for an inmate would be to commit suicide, because there are watches and patrols to prevent you. And in fact it’s the contrary: one suicide every three days in France, all you have to do is hang yourself, which seems to be quite simple. In addition, if you act at night, nobody in the house will be able to interrupt, because they don’t have the keys—so at least you’ll have the posthumous consolation of waking up the director in the middle of the night because he has to bring in the keys.

And that’s how they tell us the story of twenty-two-year-old boy who stole a jacket in a mall and kills himself in jail, although the store didn’t file a complaint, only because he resisted the arrest. Outrage and rebellion, it’s called. That thing allows them to send anyone they want to jail. Of course, I shouldn’t worry too much: I’m well-mannered, I’m as white as can be, I don’t look too menacing and, when I’m not alone, the people around me look even less so. But still. I hate this world. I mean, I should just despise and ignore it, but having to live in an environment you despise, and having no escape (other than, uh, hanging myself up, but I’ll wait for after I’ve been caught robbing a bank, thanks) is the kind of circumstance that leads you to hate, isn’t it?