“The wondrous world of drawing.
I have a friend who is serving a long-term prison sentence. At this present time he is only allowed 2 hours a week out of doors. Drawing now takes him much further, it unlocks his mind and spirit. Drawing is committing consciousness to paper, it brings recall in a way a photograph never can. The act itself, in its simplicity, is immediate, expressive and fulfilling.
It does not matter where you are. Once we see with creative eyes, there is enough before us to draw for the rest of our lives. It only takes the correct stance, and a sense of freedom is a natural result.
Out of this comes self respect, dignity, every individual’s birthright.” – Fiona Graham McKay.
Prison “cancels” women. The View is their voice. The criminal justice system systemically fails to address and tackle the issues faced by women. We believe that if we come together as a community and celebrate their creativity, we can help to create a more inclusive and fair justice system for women with convictions. We need your support to tell more people about the crucial issues women face in the criminal justice system, through their compelling histories, art and poetry. Now with the global pandemic, women in prisons are in more danger than ever. Family contact is almost down to nothing, many have not seen their children’s faces for over a year.
Help us fight for the human rights of women who have little or no support to fight this broken system.
How will your donation make a difference?
We PAY women for their contributions to The View for taking part in our surveys and our research. We PAY women with lived experience to design, produce, edit and commission articles for The View. We PAY for a trauma informed counsellor and renowned psychotherapist, Farah Naz, to provide counselling services for anyone connected to our social enterprise, should they need a bit of extra support.
We are calling for the safe and rapid decarceration of women who pose no risk to society or to themselves. Of 3100 women in prison today, perhaps 10% need to be in a secure environment. So why are we wasting £42 000 or more a year on keeping women in prison? That is just the cost of imprisonment, never mind the long term costs of police and crime, courts and social services and the impact on communities. We want to address the issues of racial injustice in the criminal justice system, which disproportionately impacts women of colour. Women currently represent 11.9% of the general female population in England and Wales but 20% of the women’s prison population.(Office of National Statistics, 2011).
Your donations will help fund appeals by leading criminal lawyers and fight for women in the criminal justice system who are not being represented at all or adequately represented.
Your donations will help appeal specific landmark cases and campaign for the rights of women in the criminal justice system. We raise issues with MPs, parliamentarians, policy makers and at the international level with the UN and Council of Europe.
Your money will help keep the magazine sustainable, because we do not rely on any government funding, in order to retain our own independence.
We print 8 000 issues a quarter, with 2 000 going straight into the women’s prison estate, free of charge. Women on license may also receive a free copy of the magazine. The remaining magazines can be purchased on 140 newsstands in England and in 30 countries internationally.
What your money can buy
We ensure women with conviction have a voice through their art,writing and poetry.
12 English women’s prisons receive the View magazine for free distribution.
£50 is paid to each woman per magazine contribution compared to the meager grant the prisons provide on their release.
NO MORE SILENCE
CHANGE STARTS WITH YOU.