This school-to-prison pipeline funnels kids out of school and into the criminal justice system
I don't want my topic getting too broad but this is another variable that I can look into adding to my argument. Showing how early it begins, making it difficult for those of lower socioeconomic class and minorities.
Per this chart from PBS:
Very effective chart. The visual representation here is strong and impossible to ignore.
In Alabama, just six percent of murders involve black defendants and white victims, but 60 percent of black death row inmates were convicted of killing a white person
Race shouldn't be a factor when determining punishment for murder. Murder is murder. One human ended another human's life. But I guess in Alabama, when it's a white person being killed by a black person it's the greatest offense there is.
What was a 100-to-1 disparity became 18-to-1 in a compromise measure. Already, this is affecting the sentencing of every offender going forward, and has saved 16,000 prison years for those who were able to receive new, reduced sentences retroactively. But the Fair Sentencing Act still does not apply retroactively to those sentenced to mandatory minimum sentences
This I can use as a counter argument. There have been steps to resolve issues but we are still falling short of a truly pragmatic approach.
In 2002, four out of every five drug prisoners in the United States were African American or Hispanic, even though they together only represent 22 percent of drug user.
Once again, effective logos on racial and ethic disparity within the criminal justice system. Showing how the numbers don't add up for the crime vs the sentence.
Black men receive sentences 20 percent longer than white male defendants who are similarly situated, the U.S. Sentencing Commission found earlier this year. An earlier Pennsylvania study found that young white defendants were 38 percent less likely to be sentenced to prison than young black men for similar crimes.
Specific logos to my argument in breaking down the inequalities within American prisons.
The New York Police Department city made more stops of young black men in 2011 than there are young black men in the city
If this isn't an effective argument against racial profiling, I don't know what is.
An extraordinary percentage of black men in the United States are legally barred from voting today, just as they have been throughout most of American history. They are also subject to legalized discrimination in employment, housing, education, public benefits, and jury service
One of the many negative consequences that fuels the incarceration cycle after people get out of prison. The problematic relationship continues on and nothing gets resolved if they cannot have their voices heard by voting or move up in social status and contribute to society.
These minorities are part of a total prison population that eclipses that of any other nation in the world.
Looking at the issue within a broader issue. This is what I need for the specifics of my argument. There's already a huge issue with our high incarceration rates, now to break down the inequality within who gets sent to prison.
apartheid
On the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, here are some of the many reasons criminal justice is in fact one of the great civil rights crises of our time:
I usually try to stay away from lists as a source because they lack an in depth analysis of each item listed. But I feel this list is a valuable source when looking at racial inequality because it provides statistics on every step of the criminal justice system in relation to race and ethnicity. The list provides a break down of each claim and has citations throughout.
"I think I did everything I could," says Candie Dalton, who says she spent years trying to convince doctors that her son's problems were more than typical teen moodiness. "The help just wasn't there. ... I'm his case manager. I'm his everything. And it's exhausting."
Powerful and compelling end to the argument that is pathos driven and wraps up the issue and pushes for a change.
More than 350,000 mentally ill people are behind bars. That's 10 times more people with mental illness in jail or prison than in state-funded psychiatric beds,
More and more logos. This is a health issue not being treated seriously.
A Georgia study found that providing comprehensive mental health services to mentally ill people involved in the criminal justice system cut the number of days that participants spent in the hospital by 89%, and the number of days spent in jail by 78%. In all, the program saved more than $1 million in its first year.
A very mportant aspect to the argument. Finding a cost effective, successful solution and show how the problem can be fixed.
About 15% of all state prisoners and 24% of jail inmates are psychotic, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics.
And what care, if any, do they get towards their illness while incarcerated?
The ambulance ride alone cost $3,600, one way. Medicare paid most of the bill.
And who pays for Medicare? Tracing the funds back to the American taxpayers would tie the reader into the issue, showing how it effects each person.
When Dalton returned home, her son was stabbing at his car with a kitchen knife. Four police officers were pointing their guns at him. One ordered her son to drop the knife, or he would "put a hole in him big enough to drive a Mack truck through."
Excessive force here. There didn't need to be four police officers pointing guns at a guy who was stabbing his car. He was more of a threat to himself than others.
the USA treats people with mental illness as second-class citizens. They're neglected not just by friends and neighbors, but by lawmakers, who slash cost-effective services and discriminate against them through federal policies that block access to care.
Strong quote here. Once again tying in logos and pathos to push the argument further.
Some people have even blamed Dalton for his illness: "One person said to me, 'You really need to start praying to God and asking for his forgiveness.' "
The damage of societal views shows itself here. If there is no empathy there is no care to fix the issue.
These losses are especially tragic, Insel says, because of growing evidence that early intervention can prevent mentally ill people from deteriorating, halting what once seemed like an inevitable decline.
It would've been nice to see a study done on this to provide some credibility behind this statement. Thomas Insel is a credible source due to his background but I feel that this statement could use some more evidence.
Insel notes that 44% of those receiving federal disability payments have a serious mental illness.
Relating back to the financial cost on the country.
Suicide claims the lives of 38,000 Americans a year — more than car accidents, prostate cancer or homicides, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 90% of suicides are related to mental illness, says Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health.
Suicide related to mental illness is creeping its way to the top of the list for the leading causes of death in America. It's not something to be ignored.
Her psychiatrist tried to have Kelley admitted to a hospital but was told there were no available psychiatric beds. Not in the city. Not in the entire state.
An entire state that has completely ignored the fact that someone's brain can get sick too. An entire country that doesn't care that it is ignoring the needs of millions of its citizens.
Karen Kelley knows those costs well, resorting to desperate measures to find care.
The first of many specific patients highlighted in this article who have experienced this injustice. It's important when working on pathos to put a face to it. A real story of a real person being affected by the issue is a strong argument.
human and financial costs that the country pays for not caring more about the 10 million Americans with serious mental illness
This ties in pathos and logos in the same sentence. Pushing further the widespread problem.
Although mass shootings focus the public's attention on mental illness
Mass shootings seem to be the only time that the media brings light to the problem of the mental health care system. And there is an apparent ulterior motive behind this because it ties into gun rights, which is a bigger issue that republicans are concerned about rather then mental health.
States cut $5 billion in mental health services from 2009 to 2012. In the same period, the country eliminated at least 4,500 public psychiatric hospital beds — nearly 10% of the total supply
Logos. If the money isn't there to support the resource, then it will fail.
We have replaced the hospital bed with the jail cell, the homeless shelter and the coffin
Strong pathos. Urges the reader to open their eyes to the problem ahead.
The mentally ill who have nowhere to go and find little sympathy from those around them often land hard in emergency rooms, county jails and city streets
This article lays out where the mentally ill end up in the beginning and then breaks that down one by one as the article progresses. Always staying focused on the argument and ties it back to the thesis.
A mental health system drowning from neglect
This is probably one of my favorite articles I have read before. Not only because it is a topic that I feel strongly about but it has great word choice throughout and provides strong logos and pathos.
The Department of Justice encourages judicial districts to adopt “diversion” and drug court programs that prioritize treatment instead of incarceration
Once again, it is important to pay attention to word choice. "Encourages" rather then "enforces". What is encouragement doing to push real changes?
Since the launch of the initiative, data has shown that prosecutors are being more selective and focusing on more serious cases with a positive impact on prosecutions.
I'd like to see some numbers to back this up. Logos will be important on pinning this down to see if it is truly a success or not.
eased the disparity in the amounts of powder cocaine and crack cocaine required to trigger certain penalties in the federal system
Focusing on one drug is still leaving holes for unfair sentences for prescription drugs and marijuana.
Department of Justice has raised awareness about how to petition for commutation to ensure that every federal inmate who believes they are deserving of this invaluable second chance has the opportunity to ask for it
How successful is this process at releasing prisoners from unjust sentences and how long does it take to get through this process? It is also important to look at the word choice in this section. "Raised awareness" and "opportunity to ask for it" are not concrete ways to end injustice. Those are ways to put a band-aid on a huge wound to make it look like they are helping.
The President has now granted 89 commutations to individuals serving time in federal prison.
89 is a minuscule number when talking about millions of prisoners. There are many, many more who are facing unjust sentences.
Meaningful sentencing reform, steps to reduce repeat offenders and reform of the juvenile justice system are crucial to improving public safety, reducing runaway incarceration costs and making our criminal justice system more fair.
Nowhere in this introduction do they speak about the privatized prisons who are making a profit off of the incarcerated. If this is not addressed, how will it be fixed? If there is money to be made, businesses will fight to keep the system the way it is.
The White House Office of the Press Secretary
It's becoming increasingly difficult to find a naysayer who believes the justice system in America is working because the evidence has proven that it is a huge failure. Obviously, this article is biased. Even the White House is trying to save themselves and say there is reform being done to fix the failed system. But have these reforms done anything at all to help?
rimes that in other countries would usually lead to community service, fines, or drug treatment—or would not be considered crimes at all—in the United States now lead to a prison term, by far the most expensive form of punishment.
I'll need specifics to back this up. Compare and contrast drug offenses in the United States vs. how they are handled in other countries.
In 1980 about half the people entering state prison were violent offenders; in 1995 less than a third had been convicted of a violent crime.
This will be key in combating the counter argument that these people are behind bars because they are violent criminals that belong there.
The rate is now 445 per 100,000; among adult men it is about 1,100 per 100,000.
The logos in this article is fantastic. Providing numbers that back up my argument and silence naysayers.
"We have embarked on a great social experiment," says Marc Mauer, the author of the upcoming book The Race to Incarcerate. "No other society in human history has ever imprisoned so many of its own citizens for the purpose of crime control."
A social experiment that is failing. It is not deterring crime or rehabilitating people. I'll need articles providing success rates for rehabilitation programs in jails which will provide proof that incarceration and punishment isn't working.
Simply to remain at double capacity the state will need to open at least one new prison a year, every year, for the foreseeable future.
The cost for this must be astronomical.
California now has the biggest prison system in the Western industrialized world, a system 40 percent bigger than the Federal Bureau of Prisons. The state holds more inmates in its jails and prisons than do France, Great Britain, Germany, Japan, Singapore, and the Netherlands combined.
Logos. Logos. Logos. It's not that we have more criminals than these other countries, it is what we are doing with them and who we are considering "criminals"
Among its roughly 3,800 inmates are some 500 murderers, 250 child molesters, and an assortment of rapists, armed robbers, drug dealers, burglars, and petty thieves.
The numbers could be slightly misleading here until you calculate it out. Murderers, child molesters, and rapists should be in jail. But they only account for a small amount of the 3,800 inmate population. Over two-thirds are in there for other crimes. Most likely non-violent drug offenses.
From 1984 to 1994 California built eight new maximum-security (Level 4) facilities.
It will be important to know the cost of this, need some numbers and logos to back this up.
Sure, in the occupational culture women and minorities are not treated well within the force.
I don't like how this is stated as an afterthought. Like it's going to happen either way.
a predominantly black community that had suffered years of social injustice, crushing poverty, a failing school system and high unemployment rates.
The deeper rooted social issues that are blatantly ignored until the frustration boils over and erupts into the riots and wars between cops and citizens we see today.
They often used such force to bring in suspects for nonviolent, low-level drug offenses such as marijuana possession. This extravagant response is high risk for everyone involved, he says.
It's just so over exaggerated. I just feel like the police doing this have an over inflated sense of ego and a feeling of entitlement.
This is not a war
The visuals of police being heavily armed creates a psychological impact to where it does feel like a war between the citizens and the police.
that people cannot be trusted and are dangerous, that everyone hates cops
Which in turn has made the citizens believe that the police cannot be trusted and are dangerous. Creating a self-fulfilling prophecy where people do hate cops and tend to avoid them.
“dangerous classes” of minorities
More stereotyping of whoever is deemed to be the "other"; which is a reoccurring theme throughout our history.
imbibing
Many point to the antiterrorism push to arm cops with military-grade weapons and gear following 9/11.
There comes a time where we have to step back and realize we are allowing our fear to create various negative outcomes. Militarization of the police isn't protecting us, it is causing deeper issues.
He cannot speak English,” she said. “He didn’t understand what the police said.”
And they previously stated that he gave "conflicting accounts" of his travel plans. He can't speak English, he was probably trying his best to tell them what he was doing. This is why a translator needs to be called in first.
It is about as fundamental a denial of their constitutional rights as I can think of
Couldn't agree more.
But a key reform was cut. It would have removed what some lawmakers called the “perverse incentive” to target cash — the sharing of money between the feds and locals.
This reform is a key component in making this injustice end. If there is an incentive to keep the money because it goes to the police department, then the cash seizures will continue. I believe making it illegal for the police to keep all of this money would lead to significantly less cash seizures from innocent individuals.
In doing that, you’re detaining the person without probable cause.
Everything they're doing is without probable cause. They're doing whatever they want to do to get the money.
Frye said that unless the driver agreed to give up the money, a prosecutor would “want to charge” him with a crime, “so that means you’ll go to jail.”
Disgusting. This shows the importance of knowing your rights and having knowledge of the system. The police will try to corrupt you into getting their way.
The dog arrived and the handler said it indicated the presence of drugs
Really? I'm sure the dog did its job properly, didn't sniff out any drugs, and the handler lied. Just so they could search the car.
They studied drivers for signs of nervousness,
I've never been pulled over before. If I had to talk to the police I'd be incredibly nervous even if I did nothing wrong. That's how they make you feel.
Happy hunting!”
This is disturbing word choice.
The Post obtained hundreds of Black Asphalt records from law enforcement sources with access to the system.
So this proves that the seizure records are in there for longer than those in charge of Black Asphalt led us to believe? If it is a "pass through" system, then how did The Post gain all of this information?
pursuit of the criminal element.”
And these criminals happen to be restaurant owners and people trying to buy used cars? Great job guys.
the majority were black, Hispanic or another minority.
No surprise here unfortunately. Racial profiling may be "prohibited" but this proves that it is still definitely happening.
Hundreds of state and local departments and drug task forces appear to rely on seized cash, despite a federal ban on the money to pay salaries or otherwise support budgets.
This reveals deeper problems in how the state and local departments are funded. It's a whole vicious cycle.
State and local authorities kept more than $1.7 billion of that while Justice, Homeland Security and other federal agencies received $800 million.
I had a flashback to "The Lonely Death of George Bell", agencies and those in charge just splitting up the little man's money. Whatever they can take.
without search warrants or indictments through the Equitable Sharing Program
So what they're doing is completely illegal. Previously stated in the article, the Equitable Sharing program is what allows police to take the money. So what they're taking isn't even run through the already flawed program that happens to make it legal.
A thriving subculture of road officers on the network now competes to see who can seize the most cash and contraband, describing their exploits in the network’s chat rooms and sharing “trophy shots” of money and drugs.
If this subculture is known of and has been documented, are there efforts being done to stop it and hold those police officers accountable? Or do they just pocket some share of money too and keep quiet about it?
suspicious people
All this does by encouraging the police to act towards "suspicious people" is fueling stereotypes and prejudice. The police are specifically seeking out minorities and those of lower social class.
It’s hard to imagine any greater disconnect between public good and private profit: the interest of private prisons lies not in the obvious social good of having the minimum necessary number of inmates but in having as many as possible, housed as cheaply as possible.
I feel at this point there needs to be a slight rework of my thesis to specify this disconnect:
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster focusing solely upon private profits rather than fixing complex social problems.
“If mass incarceration is considered as a system of social control—specifically, racial control—then the system is a fantastic success.”
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
It is all a well hidden system of controlling the unwanted. Simply lock them into prisons, whether they deserve to be there or not. And more importantly, lock them into privately run prisons, so corporations can rake in the monetary gains off of their lives.
There’s a lovely scene in “The Castle,”
The obsession with due process and the cult of brutal prisons, the argument goes, share an essential impersonality.
Strong word choice, love it. Calling out the problematic relationships and how that has lead to the current situation we are in now.
where accused criminals get laboriously articulated protection against procedural errors and no protection at all against outrageous and obvious violations of simple justice.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
It's all in the policies and procedures, no longer in common sense and judgement calls. "Well that's the law" should no longer be an excuse, if something doesn't feel right it isn't right. If people are getting thrown in jail for years for possession of minuscule amounts of weed, there's a problem there.
the growth of post-Rockefeller drug laws, which punished minor drug offenses with major prison time; “zero tolerance” policing, which added to the group; mandatory-sentencing laws, which prevented judges from exercising judgment.
All the policies focusing upon punishment rather then fixing the issue before punishment has to be enforced. These policies aren't working. They haven't been working. Is that the point of it all though? Keep funneling people through the system. Their motives aren't in helping people, just finding somewhere to keep them.
Every day, at least fifty thousand men—a full house at Yankee Stadium—wake in solitary confinement
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
I'm curious to know more about who ends up in solitary confinement and what they have to do to end up there. Is it strictly reserved for violent offenders? I highly doubt it. But more research is needed on this aspect.
In the past two decades, the money that states spend on prisons has risen at six times the rate of spending on higher education.
Before I ever found myself down the rabbit hole of trying to figure out the American prison system, I saw this picture
The photo is from an art exhibit from Manifest Justice
It's one of those pictures that speak louder than words. It's out of control. We are not investing our money into where we should be. Maybe if we invested more into the future and gave everyone opportunities to succeed, they wouldn't end up committing crimes later in life.
No other country even approaches that.
For a great many poor people in America, particularly poor black men, prison is a destination that braids through an ordinary life, much as high school and college do for rich white ones.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
The social problems I am getting at once again. Racism and inequality. The opportunities that present themselves are drastically different between these groups of people and that isn't taken into consideration in the justice system.
That’s why no one who has been inside a prison, if only for a day, can ever forget the feeling. Time stops.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
I had to take a step back after reading this sentence and reflect upon my own life. I don't know what it's like. I'm writing and arguing for those inmates inside prisons but no one ever really knows until you are in the situation.
What prisoners try to convey to the free is how the presence of time as something being done to you, instead of something you do things with, alters the mind at every moment. For American prisoners, huge numbers of whom are serving sentences much longer than those given for similar crimes anywhere else in the civilized world—Texas alone has sentenced more than four hundred teen-agers to life imprisonment—time becomes in every sense this thing you serve.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
Pathos. Pathos. Pathos. 400 teenagers to LIFE in prison? Young people who had a chance to be rehabilitated. These kids living situation and how they were raised were easily key factors in their actions.
Meet his kids
Pathos argument. How will seeing their father go to prison and not having him in their life effect their development?
It costs Florida roughly $19,000 to incarcerate an inmate for a year. So I ask you, dear reader, is keeping non-violent first-time drug offender John Horner locked behind bars in a jumpsuit really the best use of $475,000? For the same price, you could pay a year's tuition for 75 students at Florida State University.
Logos argument. Almost a half million to keep this man in prison for selling prescription pills to another grown man. It's madness. Someone who is not a threat to society and is merely trying to provide for his children. Sure, maybe he went about it in the wrong way by doing something illegal but at the end of the day he does not deserve to spend the next 2 and a half decades behind bars for such a small mistake.
Prosecutors offered to shave years off his sentence if he became an informant himself and successfully helped send five others to prison on 25 year terms. He tried. But "Horner failed to make cases against drug traffickers,"
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
What? Of course he is not going to be able to help find drug traffickers because he is not a drug trafficker himself. He is just a guy who tried selling his pills to get some money. The prosecutors failed to realize this.
"My public defender told me, 'They got you dead to rights,'" he said. "So I thought, 'OK, I guess there's no need taking this to trial.'"
To be forced into giving up so soon because going to trial wouldn't change the mandatory minimums is horrifying. These policies are what is keeping the prison industry thriving.
a 46-year-old fast-food restaurant worker
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
Right away, you begin to understand Horner's situation that he is in and why he sold the pills. He is working for, most likely, minimum wage at a fast food restaurant. This is an issue of poverty.
This perverse notion of how prisons should be run, that they should be full at all times, and full of minor criminals, is evil.
What I have learned: The privately run prison industry profits by wrongly exploiting those of lower social class, minorities, and those who committed minor offenses.
the many troubling characteristics of our so-called criminal justice system today -- racism, economic inequality, inadequate access to legal representation, lack of due process, etc.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
This list provides specific examples that can be looked into further and may add onto my thesis. Starting at the top with the corruption behind the prison industrial complex and then breaking it down into who is preyed upon by those at the top in the prison industry. I feel my thesis needs to be revised.
recidivism
CCA
caging humans for profit is a sure bet, because the U.S. population is growing dramatically and the prison population will grow proportionally as well, and more prisoners equal more profits.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
Pathos argument. Specific examples will push this disturbing "caging humans" sentence and give it a face.
Consider this: despite the fact that violent crime in America has been on the decline, the nation's incarceration rate has tripled since 1980.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
This statement alone can be the driving force behind the argument. People are getting incarcerated at higher rates although violent crimes have been decreasing. This asks the question of what are these people going to prison for? Mainly nonviolent drug offenses. The changes must occur in the policies first to end the increasing rates of people.
imprisoning Americans in private prisons run by mega-corporations has turned into a cash cow for big business.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
This article will help me to expose the ulterior motives of the prison industrial complex and further push my thesis that it has become out of control in the United States.
But in the moment, when all of those late-night planets align, there are few people who dance better than Felipe.
Felipe's confidence makes him a good dancer. Brings people together and brings a calm and fun vibe to wherever he seems to be. Felipe sounds like a friend I'd want to have. We all need a Felipe.
by his lonesome.
But not completely on his own. There of course had to be some sexualized women thrown in the mix as it seems to be a requirement in pop music today.
Dancing in a way that is often ridiculous, never threatening, and increasingly makes you feel fly-er than the song before.
Dancing should be fun and not always be burdened with the worry of having to "impress" people. The same goes with other art forms. If people want to sing or paint to enjoy themselves, they should be able to without ridicule.
Dancing in a way that is often ridiculous, never threatening, and increasingly makes you feel fly-er than the song before.
Dancing should be fun and not always be burdened with the worry of having to "impress" people. The same goes with other art forms. If people want to sing or paint to enjoy themselves, they should be able to without ridicule.
n New York there are 250 job restrictions on people who have been in prison. Public housing is denied to family members of people who have drug-related offences.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
This is making it increasingly difficult for people to have a "comeback story" and restricting the ability to get back up on their feet after making a mistake. We should make it easier for people willing to move on from committing crimes and make it easier for them to find money, housing, and help.
We do all kinds of things to try and communicate that the law has power, and it hasn’t had much deterrent impact.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
All this has done has made people more sneaky and creative in avoiding police. It makes me think of disciplining naughty children in a way. Kids aren't usually sorry that they did something wrong, they are sorry that they got caught.
One of the consequences of unstable intimate relationships is the higher rate of transmitting sexual diseases.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
This is something I would have never considered when looking into this topic of imprisonment. Interested to see where this goes and how this relates back.
Young black men are six times more likely to be locked up than young white men,
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
This relates back to my thesis as one of the social problems I was talking about. The issues of racism are ignored and covered up because we don't like to admit that we are still a very racist country.
And there are people in our neighborhood who if you locked them up we’d be better off, but mostly you’re locking up our sons and our brothers and our cousins, and they just need help. They need to get a job; they need to get off drugs. But they’re not dangerous to us. And when you lock them up, you know what? They come back anyway, and they come back worse.”
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
If we looked at these people as people who need help rather than criminals then the story would be completely different. When it comes to the issue of drug abuse, locking people up will not help. These people are suffering from mental illness and need rehabilitation. When people get out of jail, they don't find freedom, they find another list of struggles to deal with; the most important one being finding employment.
If you were a person running for political office at that time, the easiest, the lowest hanging fruit was to argue for tougher sentencing for people convicted of crimes.
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
The politics of this all is what annoys me the most. Politicians have always been more concerned about re-election then true beliefs. They'll regurgitate whatever sounds the best so they can win. In regards to the incarceration rate, this has been a failure.
You never lived in America in a year when the prison population didn’t grow.” …
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
Has the rate of violent crimes gone up or has it stayed the same? From my prior knowledge, I'm assuming the prison population is growing from the war on drugs and not from an increase in sex offenders or murderers.
We have six times the number of people locked up, and we have basically the same crime rate we had. …
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
Imprisonment isn't working to deter crime. This begins the question of is there an ulterior motive to incarcerating mass amounts of people?
Experiment
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
The choice to use the word "experiment" in the title of this article is what turned me towards it. It's unnerving to use such an uncertain word like experiment when you are referring to people's lives. But this is exactly what it was. America not knowing how to deal with the crime rate at the source and locking excessive amounts of people away for excessive amounts of time as a way to avoid the issues.
They are in prison for a couple of years or three, and then they’re back out again. In these neighborhoods where we have very large numbers of people cycling in and out of the prison system, you have this homeostasis of a bunch of missing men
The prison industry in America has become an out of control monster and a means to avoid more complex social problems.
The vicious cycle of men going in and out of jail will continue unless there is a better way to rehabilitate them and make them productive in society. The plan now leaves them to be thrown back into the same situation once they are out of jail. It will be interesting to look into how hard it is for you to find a job once you have a record.
Dumb pranks. Big George being Big George.
This part made me smile. Hearing a little about his personality and having a laugh with friends.
HIS LIFE BEGAN small and plain.
Finally we get to hear about his life and not his death!
They only needed to know him in the quietude of death, as a man whose heart had stopped beating in Queens.
All that mattered to most of these people is what stuff or money they could take from George. Didn't care about his life, only his death.
Tallied up, George Bell’s assets amounted to roughly $540,000.
This was more than I was expecting from what I've read so far. This must have been from what was in his bank accounts. Still curious to find out what he did for a living.
On a sun-kindled day a week later, six muscled men from GreenEx, a junk removal business, arrived to empty the cluttered Queens apartment. Dispassionately, they scooped up the dusty traces of George Bell’s life and shoveled them into trash cans and bags. They broke apart the furniture with hammers. Tinny music poured from a portable radio.
It took a very long time to empty out George's apartment. I can't decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Either out of respect they waited a while before doing this or out of laziness and forgetfulness about what has to be taken care of after George's death.
Bidding on the watch began at $1 and finished at $3.
The solemn mood continues as the only item deemed "valuable" from George Bell's apartment sold for a mere $3. Continuing on George's sad story and existence.
The volume on the radio was muted; the dashboard said Queen’s “You’re My Best Friend” was playing.
Ironic to have a rather upbeat song about best friends playing while at a funeral for a man who had no friends show up. Sad.
a downstairs neighbor complained to the public administrator that George Bell’s refrigerator was leaking through the ceiling and that vermin might be scuttling about.
Shouldn't the landlord have emptied the apartment out by now and cleaned it out for the next tenant? Why is it still sitting with all of George Bell's belongings, including his rotting leftovers in the fridge?