Why I Can't Stand Orange is the New Black's Author Piper Kerman

Piper Kerman’s Orange is the New Black was a best seller several years ago, which spawned a popular Netflix T.V. series of the same name. Less than 50 pages into the book I couldn’t stand her. Her behavior and attitude later in the book confirmed that feeling.

The actual charge she does time for doesn’t bother me nearly as much as what kind of person Piper is – and isn’t. Among other things, Piper Kerman is a self-centered elitist snob, and I straight up do not like her.

One of the early defining moments was when Piper arrived at the Camp and chose to read Jane Austen from the Camp’s library, instead of the available popular fiction such as James Patterson or V.C. Andrews. Now, this doesn’t make her a bad person. But you’re in prison. It’s almost like she chose this book so the other prisoners would know she was reading it, and that would in their minds make her different. Better. Smarter. More educated than the rest. How many people in that prison actually read Jane Austen? Piper knew quite well: probably very, very few.

Admittedly, I once tried to read Jane Austen, and was bored to tears. I couldn’t do it. Of course, I only have a few college credits under my belt and am not nearly as educated as Piper. But it’s certainly not just the Jane Austen thing that makes Piper a snob and not a very good person, as we will explore.

Anyway, regarding her first night in prison and unfamiliar with her surroundings, Piper writes of choosing to read Pride and Prejudice:

“I fell gratefully into the much more familiar world of Hanoverian England.” What? I’m sorry, I just can’t relate, and I don’t think most people can. It’s her first night in prison and she’s going to escape into Hanoverian England? Put down the damn book and try meeting some of the women you will be spending the next 15 months with.

I know a little bit about jails and prison. I have not been in jail myself, but I have a daughter who has been in and out of jail. She is now a recovering heroin addict who at one time, around 2009, did 14 months in the county jail. So, I have a pretty good idea of what goes on in a woman’s facility. I know about the horrors of jail, and have listened to my daughter tell fascinating and unbelievable stories.

In Piper’s version of things, I don’t see much of the crudeness, ugliness, fighting and hatefulness, not to mention fighting over girlfriends, that goes on in jail or prison represented in her book.

Sure, there are a lot of women helping women and all that happy stuff. But it seems way over represented. The theme is almost, “Women in jail are great people and here’s the proof.”

I recall one instance when I went to visit my daughter one day and was turned away because she had gotten in a fight and was not able to have a visitor. I later found out she was jumped and ended up with a split lip. She went to the “hole” or the SHU (aka Security Housing Unit, or solitary confinement) until the matter was resolved.

Sure there are great women in jails, as Piper’s story recounts. I became friendly with some of my daughter’s friends in the jail. I wanted to help them, to mentor them. I visited some of the women, talked to them on the phone, wrote letters to them, and put money on their commissary accounts. Some of these women got out of jail and eventually ended up dead of overdoses. One woman, Janice, I am still friends with, seven years after her discharge from jail.

Also, in the interest of full disclosure, I am a Resident Supervisor in a small, all male, minimum-security prison; basically my job is the same as a Correction Officer, or “guard”, a term which Kerman uses frequently, and wrongly. I am thankful I work with men, knowing what goes on in prison with women. I really enjoy my job.

Unlike the CO’s in Piper’s story, most of my coworkers are kind, helpful to the men, and generally never speak down to them. I am well liked in my job by the residents (they are called residents not inmates). That is because I treat them respectfully. You give respect, you get respect.

It seems like most of the CO’s in Piper’s story are assholes. Yes, you get them in prison. But an astonishingly high number of the CO’s in her story are cold and cruel. I wasn’t there, so I don’t know what happened. I also don’t know how she acted towards the CO’s other than what she wrote.

Piper was educated in an all girls’ school and is from a family of “educators.” That’s fine. I have no problem with people getting a good education. What I have a problem with is her attitude. While Piper takes great pains in her book to appear likeable, funny, warm and caring, she really isn’t. She is a self-centered attention seeker. More on that later.

Somewhere in the book, she states she is “not a crier.” Whoa. Really, Piper? Because that’s all you did before you went to the Camp. She spends so much damn time crying before she has to go to prison, I just want to smack her. I really don’t get how she could state she is not a crier. She’s a damn crybaby, one of the worst I’ve ever seen.

I guess in her whole privileged life prior to going to prison, she has never had any real problems. She apparently never struggled financially, doesn’t have children, never married, and spent time traveling the world. At the age which she goes to prison, she hasn’t experienced any real hardships in her life: divorce, eviction, bankruptcy, illness and many other difficulties most of us have had to face before we turned 30.

Yo, Piper, you did something wrong, you got caught years later, and you have to go to jail for 15 months. Sorry, but I’m not feeling your pain. Do you have any idea what some of these women that are already in jail have experienced? No, you don’t. Because you have lived in your secure upper class bubble for years, and now that bubble has been broken. Welcome to the real world, Piper.

Here is a prime example of Piper’s self-pitying behavior when things weren’t going her way. She has gotten news that her grandmother is ill and not doing well.

Page 228: “In the following weeks I walked around in a state of tightly leashed fury and despair. I kept to myself, civil within the requirements of prison society, but unwilling to chat or joke. Fellow prisoner, offended, sniffed that I must be feeling “some kind of way,” as I was not my usual optimistic self. Then someone in the know would whisper to them that my grandmother was very ill. Suddenly I was the recipient of kind words, sympathetic advice, and prayer cards. And all those things did indeed remind me that I was not alone, that every woman living in that building was in the same rotten boat.”

Piper decides the best way to deal with her grandmother being ill is to be a grump; don’t talk, don’t joke around, walk around sulking and certainly DO NOT worry about anyone else and what they might be going through at the same time. Because, let’s face it: It’s all about Piper!

And what did these much kinder than her women do when she acted like this? Reward her with kind words, sympathetic advice and prayer cards. (Useless because Piper doesn’t believe in anything, God or otherwise.) Kudos to these women for being so kind to Piper when she really didn’t deserve it, based on how she was acting.

It really irks me that she acted this way towards these other women, in effect, taking out her anger and sadness over her grandmother on them, by acting almost hostile. But she knew what this behavior would get her: more attention. And that is exactly what she got. Shame on her. Like she was the only one who ever had a sick relative while imprisoned. Like she is the only one suffering in that place.

Piper tries to get a furlough out of the Camp to see her grandmother. Her fellow prisoners have pretty much assured her that is NOT going to happen.

“Still, I haunted the administrative offices…” Piper thought if she begged and demanded enough, she would get her way. Maybe because she is blond and blue eyed and doesn’t look like a typical prisoner (we hear that throughout the book) the powers that be would give in to her demand of a furlough.

Later in the same paragraph, regarding the furlough, she states, “I thought about praying, something I was certainly not practiced at doing. Fortunately, several people offered to do it for me, including Sister. That had to count extra, right?”

No, Piper, it doesn’t. The God you have shunned your whole life, whom you don’t believe exists, doesn’t give out extra points because you decide not to pray, but leave that up to your friends in the prison.

“I wasn’t inclined to formal prayer, but I was less skeptical about faith than I had been when I entered prison.”

This shows complete disregard for people of faith. Rather than ask questions, and possibly learn something about different faiths, she rolls her eyes and walks away – utter disrespect. How would Piper feel if she was talking about something an inmate didn’t like or understand, but rather than listen to her, they roll their eyes and walk away, insinuating she is a dunce and not worthy of being listened to? Because the women she is doing time with wouldn’t do that to her.

Piper is having a discussion with Gisela, a seemingly devout Christian who is being released soon.

Writes Piper, “Normally, professions of faith or discussions of religion in prison would win eye-rolling and a quick exit from me.”

But Piper decides to hang around and listen to Gisela’s proclamations about how God has helped her throughout her life.

“Gisela wasn’t talking about church or religion or even Jesus, though. She was talking about God. And when she talked about God, she looked so happy. She spoke so freely, and so easily, about how God had helped her through all the struggles in her life, and especially the years she had spent in prison; how she knew that God loved her completely, and watched over her, and gave her the peace of mind, the good sense, the clarity to be a good person, even in a bad place.”

It’s wonderful that Gisela was able to open up a dialogue with the non-believing Piper. God is love, and that is true. But there is so much more to the almighty. I am not attacking Gisela here. But the way Piper has interpreted God’s love is way off the mark.

Love, love, love. A loving God who dishes out gifts to His children like candy. This, Piper can relate to. This, she can understand. This, she will listen to, and this, like so many other lost people, she can believe.

Piper should probably become a disciple of “preacher” Joel Osteen, famous for reinterpreting the God of the Bible as one who can be manipulated to give us good things whenever we ask, as long as we keep a positive attitude and “speak” the things we want into existence.

Piper goes on to say of Gisela, “Some of her beliefs weren’t stated all that differently from the scuttlebutt I had heard from the holy rollers in the camp, but their protestations of faith were imbued with the need for redemption – Jesus loves me even if I’m a bad person, even if no one else does.”

Scuttlebutt? That is defined in the dictionary as rumor or gossip. Piper basically attacks certain people of faith in this paragraph, calling their beliefs scuttlebutt, identifying them as “holy rollers” and challenging their belief that Jesus loves them no matter what they have done. This is the core belief of Christianity. But Piper only wants to hear about a loving God. Do not talk about redemption or sin, or the need to be forgiven of one’s sins by God, because that, according to Piper, will earn you an eye-roll and an exit.

Piper states she thought she was an Episcopalian, but “I had really been raised to follow the ethos of Stoicism – the Greco-Roman answer to Zen.” Stoicism is defined as the endurance of pain or hardship without a display of feelings and without complaint. She quotes Bertrand Russell, an agnostic or atheist, depending on whom he was speaking to, and she states she was having a problem being a good stoic. And then, wonder of wonders, she makes this observation about herself on page 242:

“Do you have to find the evil in yourself in order to truly recognize it in the world? The vilest thing I had located, within myself, and within the system that held me prisoner, was an indifference to the suffering of others. And when I understood how rotten I had been, what would I do with myself, now that I was revealed as wretched, not just in private, but in public, in a court of law?”

“If there was one thing I had learned in the Camp, it was that I was in fact good.” Wait? What? I would point Piper to Romans 3:10. “As it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one…”

She goes on to say because she had helped people, (with writing papers – albeit having the prisoner claim it was their work – and fixing things and not charging them, this made her good.) She just tore to shreds her wonderful revelation about herself that she was indifferent to the suffering of others, by saying that she was “good.” By this point my dislike of her was even more intense. She felt it necessary to let us know that even though, by her own admission she was “rotten…wretched…” and replaces that with being “good.” God help her, really. How can one be rotten and wretched and good at the same time? You can’t be. No amount of fixing things for people or writing papers can change who you really are on the inside.

What is even more astonishing after these paragraphs is what happens next. One would think that after the little “God talk” Piper and Gisela had, Piper might lean towards consideration of others. In fact, the exact opposite happens.

The Camp has a track, which Piper runs on regularly. But they decide to close the track at 4 p.m. rather than later, as they used to do. Well, Piper isn’t having it! She writes:

“I had added frustrations, and my methods for dealing with them met with obstacles at every turn. The track was now closed after the 4 p.m. count. After work, I would race back to the Camp, change into my sneakers, and run furiously until count time, cutting it closer and closer and stressing out most of B Dorm. I would look up from the far side of the track and see Jae frantically beckoning me, and I would run at top speed up the rickety steps and through C Dorm to my cube, other prisoners urging me to hurry.”

Piper must get her run in. The hell with 4 o’clock count. You see, by virtue of her upbringing, she is entitled. She isn’t like the rest of you ladies in the prison, with her fancy education and her Jane Austen books. She’s Piper Kerman, and if she wants to get her run in, damn it! She’s going to! No matter the outcome. Even though that outcome could mean punishment for not just her, but the entire dorm. But self absorbed Piper doesn’t care.

“Pipes, you going to fuck up the four o’clock count, get your ass sent to the SHU!” Delicious admonished from the other side of B Dorm.

It’s amusing to me that this little story comes right after the God talk on the previous page. Clearly, Piper has no clue of putting other’s before herself, a core tenant of many faiths. Perhaps she had just completed an eye-roll and had left the room when the discussions about God centered on caring for others, and being considerate; putting others first before your self. This happens fairly late in the book. All that time and Piper hasn’t changed. She is still the same self-absorbed narcissist she was at the beginning of the book.

I will not watch the Orange is the New Black series as I’d planned to do before I read the book, and those numerous glowing reviews in it. I had thought for sure after reading it I would order Netflix and start binge-watching. After getting to know Piper, I don’t want to in any way add to Pipers richness and the money she has made from the book and the series. I have to wonder, though, with her newfound fame and riches, just how much has she helped some of her former prisoners/friends that she did time with?

I have been to many women’s prisons as a consultant and seeking employment once. The events you list occur regularly in my experience. Pedicures, holiday decorations, and such.

It was awhile back, 1974 or so. I was in Frontera at the invitation of a co-worker who had transferred there. Women were sunbathing with their tops off. I was 25 and trying not to stare. I worked in a CYA facility with young men from 18-14. I asked about the rule. “If the officer supervising doesn’t like it, they can tell them to cover up. No body ever does.” I saw a very large butch inmate, with her “girl toy” on her arm in pigtails, bossing her around and telling her what she was going to do to her body parts when they got back to the living unit. Women french kissed in front of us. probably for my benefit, but was told it was not a violation. Now this may reflect upon the warden at the time, but women traditionally have more latitude than men in prison. Especially in general population.

All that being said, the inmate and staff behaviors come to quick and are often “out there.” It is in the long run, hollywood.

What you describe, women sunbathing with their tops off, would never happen now. PREA (Prison Rape Elimination Act)is a federal law that prohibits sexual misconduct in correctional settings such as prisons, jails, lockups, juvenile facilities, and Immigration Services ⁄ ICE detention facilities. Things have changed a lot since 1974. Getting caught having sex with an inmate, whether it's staff on inmate or inmate on inmate, results in prosecution (if you're staff) and solitary confinement for inmates as well as charges. PREA has been beat into my head numerous times. Throughout the facility, there are signs reminding us that it is a serious offense. Of course, it still goes on, but topless sunbathing is surely a thing of the past, as well as many other behaviors.

I agree but not for that reason. I said it was probably something the warden allowed at that time.

Taking your top off and sunbathing is not necessarily sexual activity.

The overwhelming smugness of the author hit me like the smell of sun baked garbage right off the bat.

I really wasn’t familiar with the book or the author but it was recommended to me so I read it.

I don’t recall how I found out she was from Boston and a graduate of Smith College but really, I know any number of people like her being from Boston myself.

Such people are really quite run of the mill around here and really very difficult to deal with. Just insufferable.

They went all out to make sure every show had a homosexual character, to make it look common.

The lastest trend is to HIRE homosexuals, to play HETERO roles. They are trying to stock shows with fags and dykes. They have gone from shoving them down our throats to being an affirmative action program for homosexual actors.

Jesus can’t come back soon enough. Yes, I know I should be careful what I pray for, but still.

I certainly agree about Jesus coming back soon. We are living in a cesspool of immorality. In other articles I’ve written, I’ve taken a bashing for not being on board with the homosexual agenda. When I wrote this article (and even now) I have not yet finished the book, so haven’t gotten to the part I know is coming about Kerman’s lesbian affair; the later one.

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