You Can Know Your Rights, But What If No One’s Listening?

You can memorize your rights. Recite them perfectly. Take every workshop. Say the magic words: “I don’t consent to a search.” “I want a lawyer.” You can be calm, compliant, well-documented, and still—it might not matter.

Because what happens when no one’s listening?

What happens when the rules are rewritten mid-game?

You’re told you have rights. But if the cops don’t care, if the judge sees your past and not your present, if the shelter staff decides you’re “non-compliant,” then your rights are just theater.

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And for the people we serve—criminalized survivors, trans folks, sex workers inside and out—it’s always been like this.

They’ve been told to know their rights in a world that’s never honored them.

We say “follow the rules”—but what if the rules were never meant to protect you?

What if you’re denied housing because of a ten-year-old charge? Fired for surviving abuse the “wrong way”? Locked in solitary during childbirth, then punished for asking for help?

Our communities aren’t breaking the rules. There are no rules.

Not when safety depends on a CO’s mood. Not when trauma gets labeled “aggression.” Not when your survival is criminalized and your voice erased.

So yes, people know their rights. They’ve shouted them through holding cell bars. They’ve taught them to each other in prison libraries. But knowing your rights doesn’t mean shit if no one’s accountable.

We’re not saying rights don’t matter. We’re saying rights without enforcement are performance.

At SWOP Behind Bars, we help people navigate the wreckage—where courts ignore precedent, prisons rewrite policy, and survival becomes a liability.

We don’t just hand out pamphlets. We teach people how to document, resist, and create paper trails that might save their lives. We show up when the grievance disappears. When the parole officer threatens housing. When the judge rolls their eyes.

And when rights don’t protect you? We build backup plans.

Mutual aid. Exit strategies.

Survival guides for people the system was designed to disappear.

We don’t wait for justice to arrive—we build systems that don’t collapse when marginalized people try to stand on them.

Because we believe you. We’ve been you.And we are not done fighting. Not even close.