MELISSA GRACE KREIDER, WORTHY
“Worthy is a photographic investigation exploring the realities that criminalized survivors of intimate partner violence face in the U.S. carceral system after acting in self-defense.
Terrified and entrapped before using lethal force, criminalized survivors across the US are punished for acting in self-defense to escape their abusers with their and their children's lives. The same legal system that failed to protect survivors from abusers uses all their resources to incarcerate victims. When survivors are convicted, they are handed jail sentences that will ensure that they languish in prison for decades instead of sentencing options that would offer therapy and rehabilitation for the trauma they've endured.
How has this become the price of survival?
At the heart of the narrative of Worthy is a clear and direct questioning of why the power structures in place that are allegedly intended to help victims of abuse ultimately fail. For the majority of individuals who find themselves in these situations, they are punished for defending themselves or they die at the hands of their abusers when they don't: kill or be killed.
Worthy does not condone killing, but examines the legal outcomes spurred by a society where gender violence is not taken seriously, allowing toxic masculinity, misogyny, and the carceral system to run rampant. Who is worthy of being believed and receiving justice and com passion? What does justice look like for survivors of sexual and domestic assault when the concept of a "perfect victim" is a fantasy?” - MGK