In The Penal Colony

Glen Loury argues in his essay called “A Nation of Jailer” that the United States is a nation that follows a society that has been affected by racial bias. Loury claims that the people who are targeted by law are racial discriminated. Loury mainly talks about the “poorly educated black and Hispanic men who reside in large numbers in our great urban centers.” (1) Loury has made a clear and strong point. Loury shows his points in three main ways. Loury emphasizes his points by using ethos, logos, and pathos. Loury uses many well-known characters in his writing, and Loury uses strong phrases that impact the reader emotionally and questions to make sure the reader has some sort of connection to Loury’s evidence. Furthermore, Loury gives a lot

The purpose of this study is to expose the process of mass incarceration of poor black males, and females increasingly, within the context of a fabricated war on drugs which really is serving to keep the prison population booming by exploiting traditionally disadvantaged minorities in society. Alexander rightfully calls this a ?redesign? of the old racial caste system in America which was supposed to have been destroyed by the civil rights movement. The war on drugs in the 80s merely became the newest vehicle by which to exploit the black community in this country. The War on Drugs is really the rationale for racial control, which targets black men and women and relegates millions of citizens to what Alexander calls a ?second class status (Alexander, 2012).?

The criminal justice system in America is a system designed to work in three distinct steps. The first being to fairly identify those breaking the law, second, create a process through which to both punish and rehabilitate criminals, and lastly integrate them back into society. The current system typically goes unquestioned, as those in the system seem to be deserving of what ever happens while they are in it, even once they have served their prison sentence. It is only upon deeper inspection that we begin to realize the discrimination and unfair tactics used to introduce certain groups of society into the criminal justice system and proceed to trap them there. This is the issue addressed in Alexander’s The New Jim Crow, and it is through arrests, sentencing and further upon release from jail that this oppressive system is created and maintained.

Alexander’s main premises focuses on the large majority of African American men imprisoned today, as she reflects on the direct result of it that “young black men today may be just as likely to suffer discrimination in employment, housing, public benefits. And jury service as a black man in the Jim Crow era- discrimination that is perfectly legal, because it is based on one’s criminal record.” (Alexander, 181) Alexander points out not only how a significant portion of black men are ending up in prison, but how when released they face discrimination because of their criminal record making them unable to rehabilitate their lives and putting them back into the ghetto. Discrimination is a main factor which puts people of color in the penal system, and a main factor which when getting out keeps them from changing their lifestyle for the better.

In today’s society, discrimination is an issue that is considered to be a thing of the past. In a country with such diversity it is hard to believe that people living in the “land of the free” face issues of racism. This paper will focus specifically on the social problem of mass incarceration of minority groups and how the criminal justice system targets these groups. Although this social problem can be linked to specifically African Americans, the impacts of mass incarceration can be felt by almost everyone. I have chosen three articles that focus on how the criminal justice system is masking mass imprisonment a major problem in minority communities.

Though most citizens in the United States would agree that the prison system in the U.S. needs to be amended, do they see the prison system as a way to enforce the racial caste system? At first Michelle Alexander, the author of The New Jim Crow, did not see the prison systems as racially motivated until doing further research. After researching the issue, Alexander found the prison system was a way to oppress African Americans and wrote the novel The New Jim Crow. The New Jim Crow follows the history of the racial caste system and in the novel Alexander comes to the conclusion that the mass incarceration of African American is the New Jim Crow, or in other words a new system of black oppression. Though some might try to refute the idea of mass incarceration of African Americans, Alexander offers a well thought out argument with substantial evidence and data to compellingly link Jim Crow and mass incarceration and proves that it is an issue that should be on the radar of all U.S. citizens.

Mass incarceration became a public policy issue in the United States in the 2000s. Now in 2016, there are still many questions about America’s incarceration rate, 698 prisoners per 100,000 people, which is only surpassed by Seychelle’s at 868 for every 100,000. They concern the phenomenon’s beginning, purpose, development, and essentially resolution. In her book published this year, assistant professor of history and African and African-American studies at Harvard Elizabeth Hinton challenges popular belief that mass incarceration originated from Reagan’s War on Drugs. Mass incarceration’s function as a modern racial caste system is discussed in a 2010 book by Michelle Alexander, an associate professor of law at Ohio State University, civil

The U.S. prison system is one of many great controversies when compared to other correctional systems. America’s prison population has increased by 700% (2.4 million current inmates) since the start of the war on drugs in 1971. As a result of this “war”, people that fall into the racial minority have suffered as a direct consequence of unjust legislation. Our prison system is known for its overrepresentation of minorities such as Blacks and Hispanics. This unfortunately gives these groups of people a perennial negative stigma as a result. I argue that the U.S. prison industrial-complex emphatically displays signs of prejudice and racism and disproportionately incarcerates people of color at a rate higher than whites. Yes, there are skeptics who think “the left’s prison-complex” is wrong about their theory of mass incarceration but the statistical data and concrete facts in support of my argument are very compelling.

The New Jim Crow is a book written by Michelle Alexander that discusses the rebirth of a caste-like system and race-related issues in the United States specific to African-American males and mass incarceration. Racial Critiques of Mass Incarceration: Beyond the New Jim Crow, is a scholarly article that examines and critiques mass incarceration as well as the analogy of the Criminal Justice system being the “new Jim Crow.”

As Elie Wiesel once stated, “I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented” (“Elie Wiesel Quote”). Michelle Alexander’s book The New Jim Crow, which discusses criminal justice and its role in mass incarceration, promotes a similar idea regarding silence when America’s racial caste system needs to be ended; however, Alexander promotes times when silence would actually be better for “the tormented.” The role of silence and lack of silence in the criminal justice system both contribute to wrongly accused individuals and growing populations behind bars.

I had first heard about Michelle Alexander’s engaging, yet sobering, book about two years ago from a very good friend of mine, who suggested that I read it immediately. I would see it on bookstore shelves and at online stores and I would always tell myself that I would “get it next time”. But, after reading the introduction of the book, for this class, I immediately purchased a copy online and once it arrived I moved it to the top of my reading list. Michelle Alexander does a commendable job of distilling the abstract ideal of a Prison Industrial Complex into something palpable; exploring more about the societal implications of mass incarceration in our country as opposed to the political. It also raises important questions, such as, why do we as American’s feel comfortable with the incarceration of large groups of our population predicated along racial lines? The answer, while multi-faceted, can be

After a solid first read through Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow you are presented with an incredibly troubling issue that is plaguing America. Mass incarceration of minorities has become, as Alexander puts it “…metaphorically, the new Jim Crow”(11). The way in which Alexander presents her argument immediately in the first few pages of the book, may almost appear to be a sensationalist headline from a radical civil rights movement. However this is an intelligent move that acts as a hook for the reader, who is now interested and allows Alexander to develop her argument. By using the rhetorical strategies of a strong attention getter, followed by a concrete explanation on the development of mass incarceration, she creates the perfect lure

Adversity is condition all humanity must preserve through, so people can find their true selves. Fighting adversity is concurrent to American society; but, the criminal justice’s usage of mass incarceration affronts this American idealism. Due to big business standing to gain from African American labor, the usage of mass incarceration is reminiscent to American slavery which encourages an inequality which society does not acknowledge.

The Judiciary system encourages systematic criminalization of Blacks and mass incarceration as they contribute to keeping them in the cycle that oppresses them. In the 2016 Prison Policy Initiative article, “Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie” an attorney and advocate for social justice reform, Peter Wagner, summarizes the distribution of criminals and their convictions within federal, state, and local jails and prisons. 2.4 million people are incarcerated in the U.S., the highest amount of incarcerated people in the entire world. It is ironic given that

Only five percent of the world’s population live in The United States of America, but twenty-five percent of the incarcerated people live here. Our country has the highest incarceration rate in the world, and not because we are criminals, but because prisons operate under a corrupt system.“We only kill black people.’ Police Officer Says During Traffic Stop”. Yes, unfortunately, this is a legitimate news article published by Christine Hauser and Jacey Fortin on August 31, 2017. We are currently living in a society where wealth and race dominate exterminating any sense of justice and kindness remaining in our society. Bryan Stevenson’s book Just Mercy is a memoir about how our justice system is shaped in a way in which according to Bryan Stevenson, “treats you much better if you are rich and guilty than if you are poor and innocent ”(Stevenson, Bryan. "We need to talk about an injustice." TED. Feb. 2012. Lecture.). In addition to this, it also treats you better if you’re white. This memoir also tells us how the system treats the accused, the incarcerated, and the condemned many people based on their race and socioeconomic status. In other words, the system is shaped in a way that the broken get punished because the system wants them to remain broken. In Just Mercy, Stevenson successfully uses ethos, pathos, and logos to persuade his audience to see a different perspective of our justice system which I believe is the reality of our justice system.