The question is: how do people in jail get to post videos of themselves dancing to the latest TikTok craze when no cellphones are allowed? It’s all thanks to contraband phones. Prison TikTok is an actual hashtag that lets TikTok users view videos shared on the app by people who are incarcerated, as Vox detailed:
The content depicted on prison TikTok varies; some videos show terrible living conditions inside US prisons, like overcrowding and flooding, whereas others depict people in prison uniforms doing renditions of trending TikTok dances.
But what’s surprising about prison TikTok isn’t that people who are incarcerated appreciate great choreography, just like anyone else. Rather, it’s that folks in prison have access to smartphones at all.
Cellphones are not allowed in American prisons. And people who are found with contraband in their possession can get hit with serious penalties.
“You can get charged with a misdemeanor or a felony depending on what jurisdiction you’re in,” said Nazgol Ghandnoosh, a senior research analyst at the Sentencing Project. “And at the very least, you’re going to lose good time credits or harm your chances of parole.”
So why would anyone run the risk of posting on TikTok or calling a family member using a contraband cellphone?
For Khan, having a cellphone while in prison, even for a short time, was a way to mend his relationship with his mother. It allowed him to have real emotional conversations with his family without being monitored by corrections officers and without having to deal with a 15-minute time limit or the large fees that typically come with using a prison landline.
image via Vox
nature finds a way
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