Espresso: The Crazy Lessons Prison Teaches You About Life - Riordan Maynard

0:00What's the bit about humanity you learnt that you could only learn and understand by being in prison, like anyone in the outside world would not understand it?

0:10Riordan Maynard:I think the most amazing thing I observed is how natural hierarchy forms when you throw people together. You know, like Lord of the Flies. I was going to say Lord of the Flies. Just like that. and it is so interesting to watch because I mean obviously I was with men so I can I can only talk for a group of men in this instance but I don't know whether it's the same with women but you throw them in the room in the in the environment it's totally unregulated and these are all people who hate structure and rules and immediately what they do is they create structure and rules and in the form of a hierarchy.

0:55And that was the most amazing thing to see, was how structured it was.

1:03Riordan Maynard:Not by the system. The system has structure. You know, like you can only move every hour, 10 minutes in every hour. It has loads of rules about how you should operate. But the real structure in a prison comes from the prisoners. Yes. And the rules associated with surviving in that environment. and it's almost our human when you're when everything's stripped away from you and you're put together with a group of people and humans it's your it's our innate desire to be have like like ultimately like chimps like hierarchies and yeah leaders and followers yeah and it's um and so how does that actually work on a day-to-day basis is it like is it like you know fucking teabag with this really yeah i mean it is so how did it form at some level that is but the there's a in within the group you're you're assigned your group so what group were you in whites it's all basically race-based in the first one there was there were they did have in the first one because it was an immigration prison it wasn't an immigration prison it was a prison made up of immigrants yeah of which i was one because of course i'm not american yeah and um in that prison they had groups but all all of the mexican and south american gangs were they were groups and then uh then they had us which were the others we were called the others and that was like we were like a sort of merry band of oddballs right and you know we had some Russians, some Israelis.

2:38Riordan Maynard:Who else do we have? Basically, everyone who wasn't in the main groups were in the others. Yeah. But in the real prisons, it's basically done on race. Right.

2:56Riordan Maynard:And so you join the whites. Yeah. And how does the leader form? Well, I wasn't privy to that because I turn up and then it's already in place. And what was your leader in one of the whites? One of them, he was a fearsome man. Fuck it. Fearsome man. That's such a beautifully polite British way of putting it. No, he was... Lunatic. Everyone was shit scared of him. And I don't mean everyone in our group. I mean in the whole prison. So at least you had the good leader. He was brilliant. Yeah. But really edgy. I mean, unhinged. Right, okay. I need to know, is he tall, old? No, he was quite tall, but he was massive.

3:43Unit.

3:43Riordan Maynard:Big guy, yeah. Tattoos or? Lots of tattoos. Formidable. Incredibly strong. Like strong as in? Physically strong, yeah. And also used to do the most incredible yoga. I mean, he'd been in, his sentence was like 40 years. Do you know what he'd done that he didn't ask? Yeah, I think he'd killed six people. Fuck me. Of a rival gang. In somewhere in America? Yeah. I don't know that for a fact. What, like, this may sound like a really crazy question, but, like, what leadership lessons did you take from him, if any? I'm not sure I took any leadership lessons. I mean, maybe to be uncompromising. He was totally uncompromising.

4:40Give me an example of that.

4:41Riordan Maynard:Well, I mean, you never fucked with him for one, not even in jest, because the switch might turn and you would be pummeled. I mean. Did you ever see him blind? Yeah, I mean, he would – there was this one guy that refused to yield to him, which was so illogical. I mean, my instinct always, you've got to work out the lay of the land and then you fit in with it. You know, you sort of – your behaviour should reflect the lay of the land. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Mimetic, right? Yeah, because otherwise you're in for a really troublesome – I mean, this is true of life, not just prison. Yes. Anyway, so this guy, he refused to yield.

5:29And...

5:30Riordan Maynard:Who was this guy? Was he like a puckish little... He was a little Italian guy. And... No, he was quite big. I mean, he wasn't little. He was physically quite big. How old were these guys? He was about 40, I suppose.

5:47But he...

5:50Riordan Maynard:You know, some people just can't bear yielding. yielding as in sort of giving in giving way yeah to to someone else you know like it's it's like that sort of um so it's a weakness this italian guy want to be the head guy doesn't want to be the head guy no it's nothing like that no he just wouldn't give in to it yeah he just doesn't yeah so if if um the head guy would say i'm not going to use any names because it's not fair okay um but if the head guy would say um the the thing about being in the gang is you've got to do what you're told that's the whole idea so the quid pro quo is we'll stop you getting raped we'll stop your food being stolen we'll look after you if anyone causes you any trouble we'll we'll collectively we'll take care of it that's the deal but you have to do what we tell you that's the deal and so i accepted that happily as long as they didn't make me do anything terrible I I I wouldn't do I said on the first day I said I won't so we came up with a little agreement but what was the agreement well only that I would do the negotiation stuff rather than anything you'd negotiate with the other guys yeah rather than anything nasty I can't imagine you with like I can imagine you I can imagine you smooth talking your way out I can do that yeah and imagine you going into a cell with a knife no i'm not into that i just couldn't do that yeah i'm not into that no that's amazing wait so so yeah because it's just fascinating like if you prisons ultimately there's it's a great microscope to analyze humanity oh and it's fascinating yeah i mean yeah and i think some of the stuff you're saying ridden of like be uncompromising you know be understand the lay of the land and and that's ultimately if you pull this into business it's ultimately what company cultures are, founders are, we've got this innate desire to do these things.

7:47It's mad. So sorry, so this little puckish Italian geezer, right? So he's not yielded.

7:53Riordan Maynard:So every time, and of course, if the head guy finds someone that doesn't yield, of course he's going to really fuck with them, isn't he? So what did he do to him? Every day, this guy would turn up beaten up, face like, come for breakfast like that. And I'm like, for fuck's sake, just, you don't fucking tell me what to do look at you you muppet what the hell i mean poor little thing i mean he just yeah it's like mate there's there's uncompromising but fuck me yeah yeah so but for me they were amazingly good so what sort of stuff were they asking you to do Oh, nothing really. In the grand scheme of things.

8:38And then you just go around in the day with your gang, essentially.

8:40Riordan Maynard:No, I wasn't part of it really. But they do stick together, you know. And, you know, I would always sit with them. You sit with them at mealtimes. And I got very friendly with the Italians, who are a subsection of the whites. Yeah. And they were really amazing to me. Amazing. You know, they took care of me and they helped me and they let me work out with them in the gym. And great fun to be with. Yeah, they were really excellent. Excellent. What are the lessons you took from them that you now in the outside world think is useful? They're very loyal. They're incredibly loyal to each other. What's amazing about them is that it seemed to me, and these are only my observations, but it seemed to me that when we think about prison, we think of it as a terrible event, like unthinkable.

9:46Riordan Maynard:As in Brits? Or anyone who lives a regular life. When they think about it, it's like a sort of part of the job. It's sort of like one of them would say, I say how long are you in for it's 10 years and I say yeah he's 50 odd he'd say yeah I've been in four of my of my 30 or 35 years of adult life I've been in prison for 18 years and I'm like why why do you go out and do it again he says this is part of this is it and they're like in mafia gangs or something like that yeah they're in I don't know what they do yeah but they're accepting as part of the job it's part of their thing and then when they're in their families are looked after and then they come out and it's like it's it's a it's like going on a tour of duty i suppose if you're in the in the um army yeah yeah yeah you go away and you come back you go away you come back yeah that and so that was interesting to see but they they are very loyal and they're very um Um, yeah.