ABSTRACT
In the fifth chapter, we examine the ways a sex offender tries to ‘pass’ as ‘solid’ or a non-sex offender. We demonstrate how a sex offender’s ability to pass is mediated by the normative masculinity and social hierarchy that exists among male prisoners. We show how despite their best efforts to pass, the true natures of their convictions are eventually exposed to the general prison population. Drawing on the literature on prison masculinities and Judith Butler’s work on gender, abjection, and precarity, we analyze the roles of prison staff, the institution in which the offender has served time, the media, and other prisoners in exposing sex offenders to the general prison population. Our premise is to elucidate the oft-violent implications of exposure of prisoners in carceral settings.
