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Good evening. This is Radio
Free Beszel. I am

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Alphonse. Tonight: Shawshank
and professional

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myth. I'm going to have
spoilers for the film

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the Shawshank Redemption.
It's a story about a

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banker who is accused and
convicted - falsely,

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as it turns out - for the
murder of his wife,

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but who escapes from
the prison after

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20 years through a
tunnel he's dug

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and he ends up on a
beach in Mexico.

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I don't think this
is really a movie

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about a prison. I think
it's a story

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about work life in
an institution and

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about the values of the
professional class.

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It kind of works like Buffy
the Vampire Slayer,

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where Buffy takes the inner
turmoil of teenagers

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and their inner demons and
turns those demons into

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actual demons and monsters
that Buffy can fight.

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So the prison is really
a dramatized version of

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the institution in which
many professionals work.

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Now this is a prison full
of working class

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uneducated people who
have committed murder

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and other serious crimes,
but the main character

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here, Andy Dufresne, is college
educated. Clearly

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he's professional class.
He's different from

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them. Their ignorance is
pointed out several

1:09
times during the film. Now
this didn't use to be

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the case - if you go back
to the mid-20th century

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you have a lot of
films whose main

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characters are not
college educated.

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Westerns, for
example, or

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Casablanca, or It's
a Beautiful Life.

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But now, it seems to me,
most Hollywood movies

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most TV shows feature viewpoint
characters who are

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members of the professional
class - even though

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most of the audience members
probably aren't.

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In any case, in the context
of the prison this

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jumps out at me. One of
the first things that

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happens to Dufresne in prison
is he is repeatedly

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assaulted and raped by a
gang called the Sisters.

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But he's able to avoid
this after some

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time by using his skills
that he learned

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in school - his professional
skills - to

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aid the prison authorities.
Now the prison

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authorities are corrupt,
but by helping them

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to dodge taxes with his
accounting abilities

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Dufresne gains privileges,
including protection

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from the Sisters and working
in the library where

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he's able to lobby for
state funds and help

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to upgrade the educations
of other inmates.

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Education is a running
theme in stories about

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the professional class.
But secretly Dufresne,

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using a tiny hammer every
night, has been

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chipping away at the
wall of his cell,

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digging an escape tunnel.
After doing this for

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20 years he's ready to get
out. He crawls through

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his tunnel and then through
a sewer pipe through

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500 yards of shit. And then
he retires in Mexico.

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I think diligently chipping
away at a wall for

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20 years and then crawling
through 500 yards

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of shit is the best metaphor
for working

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at a bad employer that
I've ever heard.

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In any case, if all I
wanted to do is argue

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that the Shawshank Redemption
is about work life

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for a professional I wouldn't
bother. But as it

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happens, before I watched
this this time around,

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I just finished reading a
book, Disciplined Minds

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by Jeff Schmidt. What Schmidt,
a physicist, argues

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is that the job of professional
education

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is not so much to teach
professional skills

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like physics and math,
but to shape

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professionals into tools
of the system.

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The professional myth is
that professionalism is

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about intelligence and
education. The reality is

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it's about conformity and
submission to authority.

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And the shawshank redemption
shows this in spades.

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I mean it's really odd in
a way - if you think

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if you're Dufresne, and
you go to prison,

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and it's full of violent
men - and the thing

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that saves you is your
accounting ability,

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the thing that you learned
in college - what are

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the chances of that? It
seems like a fantasy.

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And I think it is - I think
that's probably part

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of why this movie appeals
to so many people.

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Now Dufresne faces two problems
in the prison. The

4:04
first is the Sisters. The
Sisters are attacking

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him and he needs to get away.
And what he finds,

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accidentally as it turns
out, is that by serving

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the authorities with his
professional skills,

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they give him protection.
In fact, the head guard,

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who's a sadistic murderer,
cripples the head

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Sister when the Sisters
attack him again.

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So by serving the system,
even though it's

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corrupt, Dufresne gets
protection. Now the warden

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is thoroughly corrupt - he
uses the prisoners for

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slave labor, and he skims
off profits for himself,

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and then he has Dufresne
hide the

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profits and launder
the money.

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Now Defresne's friend,
Red, in prison,

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challenges Dufresne's ethics
on all of this.

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And I think this is a
common problem that

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professionals face in their
institutions when they

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feel that they're doing
things that they don't

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believe in. And I think that
Dufresne's response

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reveals a guilty conscience,
which is that yes,

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he is indeed helping corrupt
authorities, but at

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the same time he's getting
money for the prison

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library and helping to educate
other prisoners.

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Schmidt says that professionals,
when

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they run into problems
with their jobs,

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when they see ethical
difficulties or they

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think things are being done
that should not be,

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that they blame their
managers. And that's

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what the movie does
because essentially

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it doesn't blame the system
itself, it blames

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the corrupt warden and the
corrupt head guard.

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In the end, Dufresne is
able to get the police

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to go after the head guard,
who is arrested, and

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the warden, who commits
suicide, but the prison

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itself is unchanged. The
system is unchallenged.

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In fact there's more evidence
of this, because

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Dufresne is not guilty
- but his friend Red

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is. Dufresne escapes early,
but Red only gets out

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on parole. So the message
of the movie essentially

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is that the system is doing
its job. Red was

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guilty of killing a man, whereas
Dufresne was not.

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Red says that in the
prison everyone says

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they're innocent but in fact
everyone is guilty.

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Dufresne is the exception
- the innocent man who

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actually is an innocent man.
Actually the reason I

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watched this movie is because
of a podcast episode

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by Brian McDonald, a
screenwriter. The podcast is

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titled, You Are a Storyteller.
He's also written a

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good book called Invisible
Ink, which I recommend.

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McDonald argues that the
premise of the Shawshank

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Redemption is actually
a line from the movie:

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"get busy living or get
busy dying." Well, I

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think the get busy living
supports what I've

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said so far - this is about
life, it's not about

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prison. But there are particular
instances and

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times in the movie when this
makes sense, because

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Dufresne is contrasted with
a man named Brooks

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who also works in the library.
But Brooks becomes

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institutionalized. He loses
his sense of freedom

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and individuality and his
ability to function

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outside when he is given
parole. He finds that

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he is unable to live
on his own and he

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takes his own life. And
Red is the same.

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He too, when he gets out
of prison, is unable

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to cope. So what makes Dufresne
different? The

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thing that makes Dufresne
different is something

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about his psychology. He has
an argument with Red.

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Red argues that hope in the
prison is a dangerous

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thing. But Dufresne insists
that it's essential.

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And one of the ways that
Dufresne sustains

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his hope is through art
- high art. Where Red

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plays checkers, Dufresne
plays chess from

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pieces that he's actually
carved himself.

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He listens to opera music
and he recites poetry.

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So he is able to keep hope
and freedom in his

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heart, and that's what allows
him to struggle for

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20 years to dig that tunnel
and finally to escape.

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Well, that's a nice
myth. But Schmidt

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says it doesn't
work that way.

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He says that if you are
in a graduate school,

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for example, and you find
that you're doing

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what's required of you,
eventually you will

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turn into that kind of
person. You may try

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to keep a part of yourself
independent from the

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system, but you will fail
- unless, Schmidt says,

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you get together with other
people, and together

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you resist and push back
against the system.

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The movie has shows no
hint of that. When

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Dufresne escapes red
actually thinks his

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friend is committing
suicide. He has no

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idea that he ever had
a plan to get out.

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The movie, in essence,
is conservative.

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It affirms the power
and the legitimacy

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of the prison institution.
The flaws in the

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institution are attributed
to corrupt individuals,

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and the way of dealing with
the institution is

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to serve it - even if the
institution is corrupt,

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it still benefits the
individual. And

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psychologically, salvation
comes through

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individual psychology.
There's another bit of

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evidence for this because
when Red gets parole

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it's because he himself has had
a psychological change of heart.

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The movie underlines that
the key characteristics

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of professionals is that
they are educated

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and that they are independent.
So the message

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of the movie is ultimately
conservative.

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As an individual professional
working in an

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institution your job is to
serve the institution,

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even if you don't share
its values, even if you

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find it corrupt. And if
you do find it corrupt,

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that's because of individuals
not because the

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system as a whole is flawed,
and you must work

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your way through as an
individual. And if you do

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that diligently for long
enough, in the end you

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will be able to achieve the
dream and retire. This

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is Alphonse for Radio Free
Beszel, www.beszel.ca.

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Good Night.