. >> aaron yost was 11 years into the latest sentence when we met him in kern valley state prison in california. he says his problems stem from a near lifelong abuse of drugs. >> i grew up with drugs. my parents were quote/unquote hippies. both my parents dropped acid. my mom's dead now from a dug overdose. when i was 9 years old, i was rolling joints for mom and dad. >> yost's life is now largely confined to this cell, he shares with another inmate. >> i'm not comfortable like this. i don't like men. i like women. and to me it's disgusting. i'm still irritated. if i wake up in the morning, i'm agitated because i have to live with another man. >> now the closest yost comes to female companionship is his tattoos, some of which too graphic to show on television. >> that's all i dream about. that's all i got. >> i remember when we met aaron, the man was absolutely tattooed. just incredibly inked. if one word describes him, it's intense. just full of energy. i remember when my producer asked him, what's the daily routine. he started right in on telling us what it was all about. >> one pe

. >> at kern valley state prison in california, we met inmate aaron yost. who participates in another illegal, yet very common, practice behind bars. tattooing. >> mine's artwork. i mean, i did this myself. >> where. >> huh? >> where. >> in a cell just like this. >> how? >> how? see this cassette player? got the motor out of it. attach a pin to it. spin a needle on the can, go back and forth. i'll make the ink. i'll burn plastic and baby oil. mix it with shampoo until it's thick, black ink. >> tattooing in prison is illegal and poses a variety of health risks. but we've met countless inmates who have gotten their ink both on the outside and inside. many tattoos represent gang affiliation and are documented by prison officials. most of the rest have a meaning all their own. >> what my trip is is physics. my tattoos represent it. on my back of my legs it says quantum physics. i got an atom on my hand. i study what the ultimate nature of reality is. it soothes me. it soothes me to try and figure out what i am, what all this is, what it's all about. you know, t

. >> aaron yost, serving 35 years to life for burglary and drug possession says the racial divide hass to do with gangs than it does human nature. >> a man's history is like -- is racial. you have all different groups of people that invade other people's country that take what they want, their resources. we're animals, we evolve. you have different ethnicities. it's inbread in us, it's genetic isn't it? you see something that's different. all animals are like that. why should it be any different here. but in here, have you to -- this prison, the conditions in here were set, you know what i mean? when prison first started, how is it going to change? >> how do you survive that? >> no one wants to change. >> two other kern valley inmates also claim they felt threatened by their minority status. >> what are your tattoos about? >> just white power. you know what i mean. you grow up in a situation like this, you got to do something, you know what i mean? everybody's clicked up. >> that's how the whole system runs. everyone's broken up into groups. theoretically, a lot of people think all th