Mina Hartley Period Three

Michelle Alexander Videos

● Needs to be honest confrontation → TRUTH can’t be denied

● Chicago: racial caste...108 killed recently
● Reasons for warzones vs. non-warzones depends on infrastructure (education, jobs,
etc.)
● Those who are chronically jobless are statistically more likely to turn to violence
● 1987: deindustrialization → black men employment in factories dropped to slightly over
20% → felt disposable to the U.S. economy
● Mass incarceration in the U.S. is indicative of a new caste system → this system is
morally comparable to the Jim Crow laws (redesign)
● Justice system more about race and control than about crime and control **
● Finding a face for the movement against Oakland Police for racial profiling
○ Thought they found the one but he was a drug felon → record prevents a normal
life
■ “They’ve gotten to us all already”
● Despite title of “civil rights lawyer,” had to examine how she contributed to a racist
society → “no better than the police”
● A black child today is less likely to be raised by both parents than a black child during
slavery
● 30 year period: incarcerated population quintupled despite fluctuating and differing crime
rates → mostly drug convictions
● More people in prison today for drug offenses than for all offenses in 1980
● Drug markets are segregated by race and social class yet mostly black men go to prison
for it
● Poor and middle-class whites faced social demotion as a result of civil rights movement
→ resentment towards blacks
○ Manipulated by Republican Party as apart of the ‘get tough’ movements
● Clinton administration exacerbated the drug felony issues
● Politics are playing with people’s lives for nothing more than partisan gain
● Rewarded for capture of drug arrests → promotes unfair captures
● Stop-and-frisk is blatantly discriminatory but the court does not care...they ignore any
challenges against their systems
● Even getting a job at McDonalds is not an easy feat with a criminal record
○ People cant even get food stamps with a record
● For those who can get a job, 100% of wages can be used in order to pay for fines, fees,
etc.
● System guarantees unemployment and yet we are still shocked when people turn to
crime...what do we expect??
● A major social movement is necessary to rid the nation of the racist mass incarceration
system
 ○ The system would affect the entire nation socially, economically, and politically
but is still necessary
● Not just a civil rights movement; is a human rights movement ← Martin Luther King Jr.
● Differs from old Jim Crow as there are not blatant signs of racism→ have to deliberately
search for the signs
○ Pull the curtains on the situation (Underground Railroad)
○ Be willing to work for abolition
● End the war on drugs (doesn’t allow for the money to help, just hurts)
● Need a great awakening...need to recognize the humanity of all
● Racism is a business
● Racial caste has not been erased, only redesigned
● In urban areas, more than half of African-American men have criminal records →
permanent second-class position