The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

Book Review: The New Jim Crow Associate professor of law at Ohio State University, a civil rights advocate and writer, Michelle Alexander and her book, The New Jim Crow is about how even in today’s society, racism is still very prominent. She writes about how instead of having direct laws prohibiting African-Americans from voting, the government is using the excuse that convicted criminals are not able to vote, to deny the African-American population from voting. What seems like a book that is about how racism is still highly active in America turns into a book about how our judicial system here is biassed and unjust. My English teacher suggested this book to me, so I thought I’d read it. Another reason I was motivated to read it was because there has been so much public attention on what currently is happening with police violence involving the growing rate racial profiling on the part of law officers. In Alexander’s book, the core message throughout heavily highlights the racial dimensions of the War on Drugs. The book argues that federal drug policy unfairly targets communities of colour. This keeps millions of young, black men in a cycle of poverty and behind bars. It is clear that Alexander is able to create such a scholarly piece of literature based on her legal background. The book is supported by relevant data and case law. While I believe that there is a large truth factor to her opinion, I do not think that the government is purposefully planning to be racist toward individuals. I think that after so many years of living under Jim Crow laws that it is more of a subconscious series of actions being taken. Saying so, it does not make it okay, and I strongly agree with her book in that we have to first realise what is happening to be able to make changes so that racial biassing will come to a complete end. At the very beginning of the book, Alexander tells us who the book is written for. It’s written for the people who are victims of the war on drugs and. It’s also for all the people who cannot speak out because they are being oppressed. Alexander’s background in law helps her arguments by using clear and undebatable evidence. The way it is written makes your stomach ache and all of a sudden all your white guilt creeps up. For me it’s crazy that it took a book for me to realize the mass injustice of our nation. Alexander repeatedly points out that the main issue is that we just let this happen. The prisons in America are being overfilled everyday and the amount of people who are there for no other reason than they’re getting arrested because they’re black. Now no one would ever say this directly to anyone’s face but Alexander had the courage to write an entire book about the injustice. This book has sparked so many people’s attention that the book’s goal is starting to be achieved. Alexander’s main purpose of this book was to make it so people are aware of what is taking in this country. While the book was amazing, I do not think there were many counter arguments in her book. Her evidence was strong enough where she may have felt like she didn’t need it. Overall, I truly enjoyed reading the book. While at times the book made me feel awful, it also opened my eyes to an entirely new perspective. I know want to learn more in how I can make a difference from the racial injustice in this country.

Slavery supposedly ended in 1865, at the end of The Civil War. So, we are told. Then, here comes Professor Michelle Alexander to tell us that simply is not true. Slavery's child was something called Jim Crow, a whole system of laws designed to thwart the lives of African-American people on so many different levels. In order to fight Jim Crow, The Civil Rights Movement waged war on many fronts, many of them legal. The thinking went that if the legal barriers were dropped, the lives of African-Americans would be so much better. Or, so it was thought. Then came Ronald Reagan into the office of the Presidency. A War was waged, the so-called, "War On Drugs." This has led to the fact that all over America, people of color, but particularly Black Men and the poor, are herded into prisons, with all kinds of drug charges and laws. These charges result in a whole system that selectively targets where it will be "enforcing" the drug laws. If a certain community has a predominance of drug activity, but yet law enforcement never bothers to scrutinize that community, then drug dealers from that community will never be charged. Studies have shown that there is no more drug activity in Black Communities than in others, but the Prison/Industrial Complex is set up in such a way that only certain communities are scrutinized, or disproportionally, scrutinized for them. Of course if the police never look for drugs in a certain place, they will never find them. When those who have been caught up in the system become released from prison, now it becomes "legal" to discriminate against them. Their "records" can be used to discriminate against them in employment, housing, education, in a word--everything. Welcome to "The New Jim Crow." Right here in America. Home of the free. A Democracy. Who wants to laugh? (to keep from crying?). In thumbnail sketch, this is what Michelle Alexander lays out in her book, the unfairness of it all, how it makes a mockery of the concept of justice and Democracy. It is Professor Alexander's opinion that the phenomenon that she spells out, The Prison/Industrial Complex, should become the basis for the next Civil Rights Movement. In this respect, I think that she is right. Although Professor Alexander is an attorney, what is most fascinating about her book is how she tells her personal story as basically being an oblivious, average citizen, who thought that when people said the war on drugs was a war on Black people, they were exaggerating. But, as she began to look into things, she saw the truth of this thesis and ultimately felt she had to do something about it. This, in part, led to her book. This book is written in a very readable style so that it is available to the average reader. I think Professor Alexander's book is excellent in educating and bringing to the spotlight what needs to be our next Civil Rights Movement. Words cannot really express my gratefulness to her for doing this. In talking about the Prison/Industrial Complex, there is another book that can be found right here on Amazon that complements Alexander's. It's called "The Anatomy Of Prison Life" by Charles L. Hinsley. It is the most honest and real account that one will ever find on what it means to be in prison, written from the eyes of a Black Man first/Former Warden perspective. It is well worth your time. One should mull over in one's mind, as one reads, the connection between the Alexander and Hinsley books. For those interested in the more general subject of Black Studies, there's a book called, "Reality's Pen: Reflections On Family, History & Culture," by Thomas D. Rush that gives some good background to the 2 books mentioned above. Rush's book can also be found right here on Amazon. In Rush's work, we get to see the "average Joe's" fascinating 1989 account of two very long conversations with what will eventually become the first African-American President in American History. It's good to get this account because it occurs long before President Obama is famous, between two people just going about the daily business of their lives. What makes the interaction even more compelling is the fact that Obama innocently lays out an image of what he hopes to see occur within his romantic life, a romantic life prior to the time of his introduction to Michelle. It is oh so fascinating, and can be found in the piece on page 95 of Rush's work called, "You Never Know Who God Wants You To Meet." Rush's book also contains additional Black Cultural anecdotes of richness, making it an overall, well-rounded book and worthy of your purchase.

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Era of Colorblindness is a masterfully written, groundbreaking book that belongs on everyone’s bookshelf. Michelle Alexander takes an extremely important and often misunderstood topic—mass incarceration and its devastating impact on Black communities—and makes it accessible to anyone willing to listen. This book challenges readers to confront systemic racism in a way that is both enlightening and, at times, uncomfortable. It’s a must-read for anyone serious about Black liberation and social justice. One of the most relevant and necessary books of our time.

A must-read that provides deep insight into systemic issues. Well-researched and impactful.

Alexander argues in 'The New Jim Crow' that the US War on Drugs (launched by Reagan and escalated under Clinton - years in which drug use was actually in decline) has led directly to the mass incarceration of the young adult male African American population in the US. She uses an impressive array of statistical data to support her claim that the rhetoric of the drugs war, though 'racially sanitized', has produced a "new system of racialized social control" and that this development has been facilitated by the courts (including the US Supreme Court) which have turned a blind eye to racial bias in law enforcement by police, prosecutors and judges. Some of the statistical materials that Alexander provides to support her arguments are scarcely believable. Take, for example, the fact that in major US cities up to 80% of all young African American males now have a criminal record; that in at least 15 US states the rate of imprisonment of blacks on drugs charges is 20 to 50 times higher than that of whites (even though the evidence shows that white youths are more likely to be involved in drug usage), and that over 31 million people have been arrested for drugs offences since the War on Drugs began. The savage sentencing powers of judges are also difficult to comprehend. For instance, a 10-year prison sentence can be imposed for possession of a small quantity of marijuana; a 5-year minimum sentence is mandatory for simple possession of cocaine, and life sentences are regarded as "perfectly appropriate" for first-time drug offenders. Even the death penalty is allowed for certain drugs-related crimes. Alexander also notes that the US now has the highest rate of imprisonment in the world, imprisoning a much higher proportion of its population than, say, Russia, China, Iran or even apartheid South Africa. The devastating consequences of imprisonment are compounded by what Alexander calls 'legalized discrimination' experienced by those who have been imprisoned, including lifetime bans on voting and jury service as well as restrictions on access to public housing, employment, education and welfare benefits. "For a minor offense", Alexander writes, "you can be subjected to discrimination, scorn, and exclusion for the rest of your life." Mass incarceration, she argues, has created a caste system whose members are "permanently barred by law and custom from mainstream society" on a scale "unparalleled in world history". In short, "mass incarceration, like its predecessor Jim Crow, creates and maintains racial segregation." This is a truly astonishing book and the writing is powerful and passionate. But this is not exaggerated polemic. There are over 30 pages of notes and references at the end of the book and Alexander is meticulous in providing chapter and verse to support her arguments. The New Jim Crow is shocking and makes very disturbing reading.

Great book.

Importante leitura para se entender um pouco mais de cono tudo era ainda pior há alguns anos.

Bien

A comprehensive outline of how racism and discrimination has been perpetuated through the American Legal system - this book gives you into how the USA is where it is today. It's particularly salient in the wake of George Floyd and other victims of this system