Bronson: sort your head out

Bronson: sort your head out

Try wearing my shoes said Charles Bronson.

Other prisoners responded by stating he is too big for his boots...

Bronson: sort your head out

From: Richard Caswell - HMP Frankland

I've just read the contribution from Charles Bronson in your June issue going on about 'prisoners moaning over petty things'. He's a fine one to talk - words like ‘emptiness’ and ‘hopelessness’ had the lads here in stitches. He claims that if we had to live his existence we would know what ‘real porridge’ is all about. But that's just it, we don't have to live like that, and neither would he if he kept his head down properly and got back on a wing.

I've seen him in the Full Sutton block, every weekend on exercise it would be the same old routine; time to come in and he would rip his tee-shirt to make wraps for his hands and head and shout the odds at the screws for five minutes about what he was going to do to them; then the gate opens, he lands a couple of body shots onto a stab proof vest and then he's wrapped up like a Christmas present and escorted inside - what's the point? The man is a joke. There he is in the papers crying about not being able to progress; what does he expect? If it’s progression he wants then all he has to do is keep his head down; if it's fighting he wants, and a reputation, there are wings full of hate-filled lunatics who would gladly take him on just for fun; not me though, I've been schooled better than to draw hands with an old man.

What on earth gives Charles Bronson the right to criticize other cons for wanting to exercise our rights as human beings? Yes, I want a CD digital DAB radio, a decent pillow, a kettle in my cell, Reebok trainers sent in, gymnasium, to cook my own food on association and watch Big Brother on TV whilst gobbling down a tub of raspberry ripple. Why? Because I suddenly might feel the urge to! And I want to feel like a man when I go on visits with friends and family.

What I absolutely don't want is to go from block to block wearing prison tracksuits; sit in an empty cell crying about how badly I've been treated for the past 30 years. I don’t want an hour’s exercise occasionally and everything else he’s had for years. Charles Bronson is no more a man than anyone else.

And to think that I grew up reading his books and talking about him with respect sickens me. He’s never seriously hurt anyone or been in a 20-man tear up on the wing, been assaulted with a 12 inch blade and had to fight for his life. Granted, he could have a good scrap in his prize-fighting days but he’s a shadow of his former self; a glorified ‘block-rat’ who gets media attention because he’s witty and can tell a good story.

Charles, sort your head out and have the dignity to grow old gracefully. Don't be a hypocrite by saying we moan over petty things when you're using words like ‘hopelessness’ to describe your own life.

Bronson: sort your head out

From: Sam Day HMP Leeds

So Charlie Bronson has been hard done by; well, most inmates don’t start yelling and kicking just because they can’t have their own way, or taking hostages. It’s all about accepting your punishment and getting on with your sentence, and I’m sure I speak for a lot of prisoners when I say we can well do without this nonsense of being told we have it too easy; by Bronson or the POA’s Glyn Travis!

Bronson: sort your head out

From: Alex Potts HMP Hull

Charlie Bronson should perhaps be reminded that we are not all his faithful servants and have minds of our own which, incredible as it might seem to him, allows us to make decisions based on information and not by intimidation and violence. If he wishes to publicise his new book and the film about his life then he is perfectly entitled to do so; but not at the expense of other prisoners who don’t go about with knuckles scraping the floor, taking hostages and generally intimidating everyone in attempts to beat the system. We have chipped away over the years to stop inhuman treatment, so what on earth is wrong with being afforded humanity and respect?

Bronson: sort your head out

From: Eamonn Anderson HMP Bullingdon

I trust I’m far from alone in taking offence at Charlie Bronson’s sweeping generalisation about ‘snivelling cons’ complaining over petty things – has he conveniently forgotten that many of the ‘petty things’ inmates complain about were the very same issues which frustrated him and led to him ‘performing’.

I don’t’ wish to become involved in verbal confrontation with Bronson, however if he starts throwing stones he leaves himself wide open to criticism. There’s no denying he’s proved a handful, but in his foolish quest to be ‘somebody’ he embarked on a series of performances which were idiotic and self-destructive, and ultimately achieved nothing except isolation and massive sentences.

Many of us lived through the brutal systems of approved schools, borstals and prison, and participated in rioting against the old-style regimes; however a lot has changed over the years and time and people move on – including the prison system.