Modern Prison Madness and the Decline of Civilization

by Ricky Anthoney Young

—George Bernard Shaw.

This is the opening quote in the preface for Modern Prison Madness and The Decline of Civilization. This book was written by Ricky Anthony Young—a man incarcerated in American’s thriving prison system for the last 25 years for a murder of which he claims no knowledge. Young has used his incarceration experience, extensive research, and experience as a litigator in state and federal courts to constructively criticize what he views as the decline of America on various fronts.

Modern Prison Madness maintains a text best depicted by the author’s quote on the second page of the book:

“The greatest contradiction in America is that the U.S. Constitution is unconstitutionally vague; allowing the quasi-nobility of the three government branches to dictate rights and protections.

Under contemporary regimes America is unable to correct itself, and the only pseudo-controls available require a vast increase of the oppressive apparatus; including the torture and slavery called prison. These truths are self-evident; so are the solutions.”

Young discloses his view of the true causal elements for America’s governmental, social, educational, and economic enigmas; as well as methods of correction of these faults. He says that such methods cannot be acknowledged by American officials and authorities whose hands and mouths are tied by repressive protocol and tradition:

“The absolute conformism of the status quo can never bring racial, gender, or general equality, since the first principle inherent in the continuum, in contemporary free enterprise, is economic inequality. In any capitalist society, the first principle of equality must be economic inequality, since all facets of opportunity are economically dependent.”

Modern Prison Madness offers a simple to read, incisive view of the nature of the American system from an author who has first-hand experience in one of the symptoms of its growing malaise: the prison industry that seeks more and more human fodder in order to thrive.