TIBOOL'S PICTURES by Joe Doe Although I don't do endorsements, I have enjoyed the pictures from Tibool on womenschaingang.com. Although the scenarios are a lot rougher than my stories, I have particularly enjoyed his two "voluntary incarceration" stories: the reporter who goes undercover on the "Southern Chain Gang" and the wife who "plays prisoner" in "The Mine." The link below shows my all time favorite picture of an undercover assignment gone dreadfully wrong: http://www.chainganggirls.com/images/tib36.jpg The man and woman were once peers, or nearly so. Did she flirt with him? Did he ask her out on a date, only to have her refuse? Did she beg and plead to convince him of the wisdom of her undercover assignment? No matter. Her power is gone, and now he is in charge. I love the contrast between the relaxed, confident pose of the man versus the tense, worried posture of the despondent female reporter, who is casually being informed that her undercover assignment is going to last much longer than planned. His clothes identify him as a successful professional, while her humiliating uniform marks her to all the courthouse spectators as a common criminal. He's clean and well-groomed, while she is dirty and disheveled. He is elegantly dressed, while she wears a tattered, revealing prison rag. He wears polished dress shoes, while she is barefoot, with her heels raised, as if trying to protect her dainty feet from the freezing marble floor. He wears dark socks, while her ankles are ulcerated with the sores from her chain gang shackles. His hands are free, with his arm resting nonchalantly on his briefcase, while she, her wrists humiliatingly restrained, fretfully rubs her hands together. He talks; she listens. He leans back, she leans forward. She looks up at him; he looks down at her. This is a great picture. Oddly enough, this could almost be a picture from one of Lakewood's most recent stories, "UNIFORMS." I enjoyed that story very much, and thought that Lakewood and Anonymous did a great job. Lakewood had said there was a "twist" at the end, so I was sort of hoping it was his wife, and I was glad that it was. If I had written the story, I probably would have written it from the point of the wife's transformation -- she starts off in the lofty position of the warden's wife, and whiles away her time observing the toiling prisoners. Her husband uses fake ID to get her admitted as a prisoner, and then watches as she is subjected to the humiliation of "processing." Of course, that would be a different story. Hmmmmm. Speaking of other stories, if Tibool is so inspired, here are some scenarios for him to consider. METHOD ACTING: A smug, famous Hollywood actress cast as a prisoner decides to cinch her Oscar by going undercover on a chain gang, ostensibly to "research her role," but in fact as a publicity stunt. A studio lawyer makes the arrangements with the Sheriff and accompanies her to the prison. Much to her embarrassment, her amused lawyer watches as she is stripped, shackled, and put to work. No one knows who she is, and, after a few days on the chain gang, she is surprised when her lawyer doesn't come back to rescue her. She sneaks off to use a phone, and discovers the lawyer who arranged her imprisonment was fired in a studio shakeup. She tells the Sheriff what happened, and he tells her that's too bad, because the deal was she was "to be treated like any other prisoner" until her lawyer came to release her. The Sheriff hangs her up by her ankles and paddles her for using the phone. GROUND BREAKING RESEARCH: A prissy, snobbish Harvard professor takes note of the large number of women arrested in a particular area, and decides to visit the prison as research for her book on female criminology. She is given a VIP tour. A law-and-order type, she approves of the chain gang's harsh methods, but is dismayed when the prisoners don't answer her demeaning questions. ("Can you read and write? How often do you bathe? Have you been deloused? Were your parents criminals? I noticed the marks on your back. What lesson did you learn from your whipping?") The prisoners know the Sheriff is watching and are just too frightened to answer. Little does the erudite college professor suspect that these women are not criminals or poor white trash, but well-educated young women no different than she.... The college professor returns to her hotel, where she ditches her professorial glasses, cuts her hair short, and dyes it back to its natural brown. She returns to the Sheriff's office with a radical proposal: incarcerate her for a week, so she can "really talk" with the inmates. The Sheriff objects that "prison ain't no game," but she arrogantly insists that this is the only way she can complete her "vital and ground-breaking field research." Finally, the Sheriff "reluctantly" agrees to lock her purse in his desk so he can arrest her on the trumped-up charge of driving without a license. Following the Sheriff's suggestion, the judge sentences her to a week for driving without a license. Unfortunately when she tells the judge that her purse was stolen and that she has no money or identification he slaps on the additional charges of vagrancy, grand theft auto, and (since she has no visible means of support) suspicion of prostitution. Her short sentence is now five years, at hard labor, and her "ground-breaking field research" will now require breaking ground in a field. HARSH JUDGMENT: A group of men and women traveling together on their way home from a judicial conference stop at a prison to have a look at "Southern Justice." Most of the women are older, and are the wives of the other judges, however the youngest woman is actually a judge herself, from Chicago. Her name is Ashley, and she is traveling alone. Ashley is shocked but fascinated by the harsh conditions. When she asks to see the processing of a new arrival, the Sheriff explains that there are no new girls today. One of the other judges jokingly suggests that they process Ashley instead, "since she is about the right age, and, if you put her in a uniform, wouldn't look much different than the rest...." This joke sparks a heated argument as the group debates whether a well-dressed and well-educated young woman like Ashley could ever blend in with a group of common criminals. To settle the dispute, Ashley reluctantly agrees to be "processed." To her shame and horror, she is quickly stripped naked, showered, deloused, given a uniform, and shackled, while the other judges and their amused wives watched. Ashley is humiliated beyond words as her fellow judges and their wives walk around her, surveying her as if she's a shackled animal, talking as if she isn't there. The group quickly agrees that Ashley is "still too clean" to look like an inmate and asks the Sheriff to make her to "work up a sweat" on the chain gang while they enjoy their picnic lunch. So Ashley toils while the men and women enjoy their wine, cheese, and finger sandwiches. Everyone laughs when the overseer paddles her for "falling behind" her quota, and, when the guard can't find a tool to unbolt the shackles on her ankles, the group agrees she'll have to "catch up later." The smiling judges and their jealous wives then drive off together, leaving Ashley toiling in the fields. FANTASY FULFILLED: A female FBI Agent visits the prison where an inmate's description matches a kidnap suspect. The agent quickly determines it is the wrong woman, but, as she is leaving, she is splashed with mud by a passing truck of prisoners, returning from their day in the fields. A matron who is going to transfer to a new prison the next day offers to clean the agent's clothes before she goes home, and the female FBI agent reluctantly agrees. The muddy agent is escorted to the prisoner's showers, and surrenders her clothes, badge, and gun to the matron, who says she will wash the clothes and leave them outside the door. The agent finds it strangely thrilling to undress in front of the uniformed matron, particularly when the matron wryly notes that "butt naked, you don't look no different from the rest of 'em." The matron leaves the agent stark naked in the prisoner's showers, and the agent fantasizes about what it might feel like to be a real prisoner, forced to shower in front of male guards. Unfortunately, her fantasies cause her to tarry too long, and the shower quickly fills with real inmates. The sexist male guards can't believe there is such a thing as a female FBI agent, and she is wrongly pegged as a new arrival. Meanwhile, the janitor spots the box on the floor containing her clean clothes and throws it away. Edited by C. Lakewood