Survivor Chronicles: Free Them All
Welcome to Survivor Chronicles: Free Them All, a podcast by Survived & Punished NY. We are a collective by and for survivors, organizing for the abolition of prisons and policing with the understanding these systems do not protect survivors, but further endanger them. Since 2017, we’ve been organizing with criminalized survivors in NY State prisons.
This podcast is part of our mass clemency campaign. Survivors who were criminalized for their acts of survival are now banding together to demand clemency from Governor Kathy Hochul, who can free anyone she wants with the stroke of a pen. Despite proclaiming herself pro-survivor, she refuses to grant them clemency, offering survivors nothing but policing and cages.
Together, we're saying: enough. These are the stories of survivors and their loved ones who have been abandoned and betrayed by the state of New York. These are also stories of resistance, resilience, connection across prison walls, and of refusing the logic of disposability underlying the US prison system.
Throughout the season, we’ll put calls to action in our show notes as episodes come out. We want you to learn about the harms of the carceral system and the re-victimization survivors are subject to, but we also want you to join us in the fight. Please look out for ways to get involved and follow our campaign on Instagram and Twitter at survivepunishny, or visit www.survivedandpunishedny.org/. Survivor Chronicles was made possible by the support of NYC Connect and Focus for Health. Writing and producing by Jade Abdul-Malik. Podcast art by Mon M.
Survivor Chronicles: Free Them All
Introducing Survivor Chronicles
We’re excited to introduce Survivor Chronicles: Free Them All, a Podcast by Survived & Punished NY. This podcast is built around the voices and analyses of criminalized survivors and their loved ones.
In S&P NY, we have been building with criminalized survivors—people who took some action to survive abuse and were criminalized for it—since 2017. Many of our beloved comrades inside have come home—but far too many remain behind bars in abusive state cages. And every single person still in a cage could be released today with a stroke of Kathy Hochul’s pen. Her refusal to act makes her personally responsible for continuing to leave our loved ones in the clutches of this racist, corrupt, and death-making system. We believe that freedom from sexual and intimate violence begins with abolishing prisons and policing.
This episode will give you some context for our work and political analysis. It’s also a teaser/trailer for what’s to come. Throughout this series, you’ll hear directly from criminalized survivors and their loved ones as they speak out against the cruelties of the carceral system—from state-imposed family separation, to the social and economic context that led to survivors’ criminalization, to the endless barriers to caring for a loved one across prison walls.
With each episode, we'll include resources for further reading. And over the course of the series we'll include lots of calls to action. For now, here are some materials to give you a fuller introduction to S&P's lineage and analysis.
- Here's Survived & Punished's analysis and vision statement.
- Here's a poem by Joan Little called "I Am Somebody."
- Here's a zine called "No Selves to Defend" about the legacy of criminalizing women of color for self-defense, by Mariame Kaba.
- Here's a curriculum guide on the criminalization of domestic violence.
If you want to stay up to date with calls to action and other opportunities to get involved, sign up here.
Writing and producing by Jade Abdul-Malik. Podcast artwork by Mon M. Thanks to Focus for Health and NYC Connect whose support makes this podcast possible.