Here Are 25 Shocking Truths Behind The Biggest Misconceptions About Life In Prison

One of the biggest misconceptions is that people from completely different backgrounds can’t get along.

My fiancé is a nerdy white guy and has been in a notoriously rough jail for the past seven months. I never thought I’d be able to say this, but he started a Dungeons & Dragons group there and became the Dungeon Master. People of all different ages, backgrounds, and life experiences came together. He taught everyone how to play and create their characters, and now they run campaigns every day with basically no resources. The jail is as bare bones as it gets, so I’m on the outside constantly looking up rules, lore, and mechanics and sending him whatever he needs so he can build campaigns. Somehow I’ve become a long-distance DnD support person, despite having never played DnD in my life. Recently, his federal charges were dropped, and now the other inmates are worried he’s going to leave without teaching them how to run their own games. So now he’s teaching them how to be Dungeon Masters too.
Since he started the group, the amount of frustration and violence between inmates has noticeably gone down.

You would be surprised at what we were willing to do to avoid boredom..... I never thought I would see a spelling bee in a county jail, but we did one.

We would also get encyclopedias and farmers almanac and make our own who wants to be a millionaire games.

I only did 1 year, but I had a bed, food, heat/ac, electricity and radio and television for entertainment. Now I work 56 hours a week and can't afford all those things.

The very sad reality is that for many people life inside is way better than outside. People reoffend so they can come back.


I'm in healthcare and worked in corrections and that experience really changed how I view people and life in general.


There are a lot of sad situations and people living very difficult lives out there. So much untreated mental illness, low IQ, people who are easily taken advantage of, and those who just got the end of the stick in life.

Secondhand on this, but there is a lot more compassion from inmates than you’d expect.

Not everyone in prison is a bad person. Many of them are just people who are being held accountable for the worst mistake they’ve ever made.

My cousin did a few years, and he said the biggest shock was how incredibly polite everyone is. In the movies, everyone is bumping chests and starting fights, but inside, you say 'excuse me,' 'please,' and 'thank you' constantly. He told me you learn very quickly that being rude or disrespectful is the fastest way to get hurt. The manners are literally a survival mechanism.

I've been home for a little over 6 years after serving 6 years. Honestly, there aren't any misconceptions. It depends on where you are. Orange is the New Black actually did a pretty great job at portraying it. So did Shot Caller. Yet, both have entirely different dynamics. All the horror stories you hear actually go on somewhere. Advising on misconceptions is difficult. But the number one rule for survival is respect. Show respect and hold yourself in a respectable manner, and you can make it anywhere.

I did 6 years, state and federal.

Imo, the biggest misconception is that is awful 100% of the time. Humans are incredibly adaptable. After the first 6 months or so, it's just life. You get up, go to work, hang out with your friends, rinse and repeat. Ya, there are awful things about prison - but its mostly just boring sameness with occasional bouts of excitement.

I’ve worked inside prisons, not sure if that’s quite what you’re looking for.

The biggest misconception is it’s like on TV, with constant drama soap-opera like moments.

In reality, one of the most excruciating parts of incarceration is how tedious and boring daily life is.

I've never been an inmate, but I did a rotation in a prison during medical school.

I was shocked to learn that prisoners have to pay for medical care, just like on the outside. (This is in the US, obviously.) If you're extremely sick, you better hope you have $30 saved up in your commissary to see a doctor and pay for prescriptions. Oh, you need a specialist? Better hope you have family willing to send you a few hundred dollars so you can be seen in 10 months.

People always make references to prisoners getting "free healthcare, food, room and board at the taxpayer's expense!" It isn't true.

I don't care what the crime was. Everyone deserves access to medical care at no cost.

I think it probably depends very much on which country you are in, and which jail you are in.

I was in Silverwater jail in Australia the 80's and it was pertty bad.

There was a women's jail next door and they used to do the laundry....ours as well as theirs. This was a long time ago but even then I thought that seeemd wrong. I wonder what the women thought of this...

There were a lot of violent., scary people. But I remember at night possums used to come down out of the trees...and the prisoners would gently hand feed them little bits of bread with honey on them. Nobody hurt the possums and I think if you had you would have been very sorry very fast.

I was a short timer, so I stayed in a little house or barracks inside the prison. Lower security and more relaxed than the more serious criminals. I didn't actually stay in a cell, instead there were maybe 20 of us in the house each on our own bed laid out in rows in one big room......kind of like you see in the army. We had inspections too.

After cooking duty we had to lock the knives inside big steel freezers which were then padlocked shut. The first time they told me this I thought the guy was lying so I just looked at him, Then he told me one time a knife went missing and they found it later in somebody's back.

The prisoners would brew their own alcohol. We had metal tube frame beds and it was actually brewed inside the beds..inside the tubes.

Sometimes they picked people and forced them to wash the warden's car...I didn't like that. Felt corrupt.

The worst thing for me was knowing I could not leave. Unahppy at school? Unhappy in your job? Unhappy in a relationship? Unhappy with your parents? You can always leave. But here was one place I could not just leave and I absolutely hated it.I felt trapped.

On my last day the processing officer asked me what I thought of jail and I told him I hated it. He laughed and said "You'll be back". I never did go back..

Forty years ago now and I had a stroke last year so my memory is a bit rusty on some of the details.

I work in a prison as a psychiatric social worker. The first thing I tell people when I interview them for a position, is that it is nothing like the movies. Yeah things happen but in reality it’s on occasion and not every day all day. I have worked there for 6 years and not once have I had a problem. I work in mental health and a lot of the inmates and I are on a first name basis and we talk and they come to me if they have problems. Most of them just do their time and get out. It’s a good place for them to sober up and get clean. I don’t say great because people still get stuff in but in reality it isn’t as bad as you think.

My husband was a sergeant for almost 19 years. He says the thing was he treated people how they treated him and it worked well. The guys who kissed back the most and always were trying to get on his good side were the pervs. Most were just trying to get in and out. Oh, and he believes there really were some people who were innocent. He couldn’t give them special treatment.

I worked next to a guy for 4 years and he did 21 years in prison. He was cool with answering any questions I asked. He told me the best advice he was given for making his time easier is to leave everything outside of prison outside of prison. Don't try to focus on what he had before he got locked up, and to learn to be content with being alone. He told me solitary isn't much of a punishment if you are ok with being by yourself.

Shut up, mind your business, do your time. Although it's not that bad. I did1 month in county, 1 month in a max joint, and 13.5 months in a medium farm joint. The month in county was the worst. Nothing to do. I was in genpop with some lifers. Not bad people. Don't make them mad. The folks in there will hold you to your word. Be careful what you say. Don't take on debts, and if you have to take on a debt, pay it it off how and when you say you will. I could've escaped 100's of times with a 10-12 hour head start. But I didn't. Conviction of escape was an automatic 5 year minimum, and you did every day of it. It was a learning experience. There's things I'd go back for, but not many.

I’m an American who recently did 20 days in a South African prison called Pollsmoor, considered one of the most notorious prisons in the world. Other than not getting enough food, not enough beds, freezing temperatures with no blankets, no showers and the toilets mostly being broken it was pretty boring. Almost all the violence I saw was guards beating up inmates for talking back. I had one or two close calls.

Everybody is fighting and stabbing. In reality, it's just a bunch of people trying to do their time peacefully and go home.

That prisoners belong in prison. Hear me out

The overwhelming representation of Low IQ, Illiteracy, Intellectual Disability, Neurological Impairment, Drug Addiction, Severe/Prolonged Exposure to Trauma and Homelessness etc.

These are issues that can be readily dealt with within the community. These are driving, causal factors for imprisonment and yet none of them are illegal. One of the biggest predictors that you'll be incarcerated is illiteracy.

90% of inmates would be better served in the community with the funding that pays for imprisonment going to welfare programs and the like.

And for they nay sayers, would you prefer to spend $100,000 dollars a year AFTEr someone has committed a crime against your neighbour or your child, or would you prefer it spent to avoid it?

I did six 1/20 years straight, and I want to say that it was horrible but in all honesty it really wasn't. I actually had a good time. Of course I missed my family and friends don't misunderstand but I did keep busy, I got a college degree, we started the Central Virginia food Bank in Virginia, they had started in program back in '96 I believe, and we were outside workers, we are contracted to clean the national guard building, we tore down a building for the fire department in Hopewell Virginia, we were all over the place it was actually a great experience. I learned a lot especially when I first got there. In goochland the women's prison, that was the only facility for women back in the '90s, we lived in little buildings there were five of them and 30 days after I got there I was assigned to my first job, because it's mandatory that you work, and I was sent to the bakery and back then we made all of the bread for the entire institution and the cookies and cakes whatever, and then I got assigned to a kitchen and each building had their own kitchens, and I did that for a year and a half then I got assigned to the laundry folding laundry for UVA and MCV in Virginia, you stayed very busy actually. I don't know what it's like in other states I can only tell you what I experienced. The women were actually great, I made a lot of friends I miss a lot of them, we played cards together I think the roughest time was when they locked down the institution to shake it down for contraband. Because back then they locked down the entire institution for days, and we weren't allowed out of our rooms we could only go to the bathroom and get our meals and that was it. Back then we could smoke so that helped, I worked my way all the way up to work release and got a job and made parole and went home. I actually had more hard of a Time adjusting to the outside again that I did to the inside. I wish I could tell you all some of the stories because they were funny as hell, a huge misconception is, that everyone wants to fight or is violent, entirely not true. Women want to go home they want to get back to their lives they didn't want to have to stay there any longer than what they did, and institutional infractions would give you more time if you got charged and convicted of it. Most of the women will really cool people to be around and I had a great time with them, the officers were not overbearing and they actually had compassion for the people and they helped you in any way that they could. I would say that it was the best learning experience I could get. I guess my advice to you is get involved in everything that you can, get a job and move up, do everything that you can to improve yourself, I've read a lot, I was actually reading a book a day, most importantly though I learned how to be with myself. I'm in less face it when you're going through the court process and you're in a holding cell waiting to go to court for 8 hours you can't do nothing but enjoy being with yourself. Sometimes you'd have people in holding cell waiting with you but the majority of the time you don't. What did I hate about it all the food in the jails was awful, but down in the penitentiary it was awesome. Oh my God some of the girls they could cook their backs off. It was great. I wish you the best if you have any other questions hit me up..

Did 18 months in a UK Cat B.

Okay, so the biggest misconception from my PoV is that you're rehabilitated when you're inside. Just doesn't happen. Not enough staff, no-one 's really qualified etc. Obviously this contributed to reoffending. Similar story once you're out and on probation. It's all stick and no carrot.

The concept of prison in itself is an interesting one. Ask yourself, what is prison actually for? The loss of freedom as a punishment? For public safety? For rehabilitation? Why would you want a person who has broken the law to get locked up? If it's so you feel safer, well that prisoner is likely to be released at some point and if they haven't successfully rehabilitated them they're probably going to commit more crime.

The prisoners who rehabilitated did so the way I did, we read a lot, talked a lot, were open and honest about our fuckups with one another, with our families and friends, with any pastoral workers or volunteers. We set plans for our futures, established support networks we could be accountable to. We created our own carrots! Because all the authorities have are sticks.