Emotions are a Strength Not a Weakness

“I don’t like showing my emotions. I would rather keep things neutral. If I let my emotions get into it… control can all fall away. Being able to control, that is my real strength.”

This was a quote I really connected with. I used to be really ashamed of my emotions growing up. Thinking that having any would make me seem weak and stereotypically girly, I used to bottle up my emotions and push them away. I wanted to be seen as stoic and independent to my family and friends, and I still do sometimes, but I have come to realize that pushing those emotions back doesn’t get rid of them. In fact, pushing them back is what makes them worse. That’s why it really upset me to read that this incarcerated youth sees bottling up his feelings as his real strength. “Controlling” his emotions, as he sees it, isn’t what is helping him, in fact it’s what’s killing him. If he would just let out his emotions as they come instead of letting them boil up inside of him, he might not be in the position he is in now.

I also found it very powerful that the faces of the youth were blurred out or covered in most of the shots. While this was probably for legal reasons, I thought it added a lot to the artistic value of the pictures as well. The fact that they are faceless, at least for me, emphasized the fact that incarcerated youth aren’t usually seen as individuals to the outside world. They are typically clumped together and stereotyped as “bad kids” who are in the situation they’re in because of the dumb decisions they made.