Just finished reading #ChainGangAllstars last night and I've been thinking a lot about our prison system in the US today. Everyone I know who has been incarcerated is pretty much fucked on some level or other because even if they’ve served their time and are out, the system NEVER allows them a chance to really live a normal life again. #incarceration#prisonindustrialcomplex@bookstodon#bookstodon
As a human rights activist, I cannot remain silent about the alarming situation faced by people deprived of their liberty. Overcrowding and overpopulation in prisons not only violate human dignity, but also make it impossible to guarantee minimum living conditions.
Together, we can and must promote a prison system that focuses on rehabilitation rather than punishment, a system that reflects the values of justice and humanity that we all deserve.
I'd say something about what happens next in a country that starts jailing people for having a book the government doesn't like, but we all already know.
"West Jordan Republican Rep. Ken Ivory introduced HB417, which would allow teachers and other public school employees to be charged with a class A misdemeanor if they keep materials specifically deemed “objectively sensitive” available to students.
If found guilty, they could be charged a fine of no less than $500 and could be jailed for a term lasting no fewer than 30 days, according to the bill.
... a single book would be removed from all Utah schools if at least three school districts banned the same book for being “objectively” sensitive, or at least two school districts and five charter schools did.
That means less than 10% of Utah school districts and charter schools combined could trigger a book’s statewide removal"
Today in Labor History December 18, 1865: US Secretary of State William Seward proclaimed the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment, prohibiting slavery throughout the USA. However, the thirteenth amendment included the following clause: “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States.” Jim Crow laws in the past and racial profiling today result in large numbers of African Americans and poor people being incarcerated and subjected to legal slavery. Some were even rented out to plantations that had used chattel slaves in the past. But with the U.S. having both the world’s highest number of incarcerated people (2.1 million) and the highest incarceration rate (665 per 100,000), there are plenty of people from all ethnicities who continue to be subjected to legal slavery.