In a grotesque manipulation of power dynamics, sexual and carceral violence combine to produce V-coding: Prison staff “pacify” incarcerated men by putting a trans woman in a cell with them to “offer” sexual favors. But this kind of sex, usually unprotected, isn’t sex at all. It’s facilitated rape.
Studies and testimonies over the past decades define V-coding as “a central part of a trans woman’s sentence.” One survivor, Kim Love, described being forced to take a “husband.” Prison authorities frame this as violence prevention.
“Without the sexual tension being brought down, the prisoners would probably overturn that place,” she said.
But the “order” achieved by distracting men with the objectification and exploitation of women to quell randomized attacks on guards or rebellions assumes that sexual violence isn’t violence.
Conjugal visits originated when prison officials provided sex workers to incarcerated Black men, believing they’d labor harder if sexually satisfied.
Outside prisons, the status quo is still that women are property. One in three are assaulted. Authorities claiming to protect them don’t.
The state’s solution? Punish 3% of rapists with incarceration, “gifting” them trans women and sending their other survivors to women’s prisons for resisting their abuse.
But this has not liberated our communities from sexual violence. The logics of carcerality and misogynoir, and the cultures and institutions that uphold them, must be dismantled.
