Complaint: War on Drugs, Prison Industrial Complex

I may have to send in a complaint to Obama about this, but his political capital is pretty...well...Black right now.

The government can imprison you and sell the fruits of your labor to Starbucks.

On my booklist

The war on drugs is a system that ultimately feeds into the prison industrial complex. It's triplets are immigration legislation and the functional abolition of the 4th amendment (racial profiling). It began in the 20's with legislators promoting the idea that cocaine gives Blacks super powers, and manifested itself as "tough on crime" legislation. We had/have insane sentencing limits for drug crimes. I mean, like, absolutely egregious eighth amendment violations. Soon the war on drugs was in full force, and had Reagan and H.W. Bush preaching about  the "enslavement" of crack cocaine users (do I sense a hint of racialization?)—all while drug use steadily declined. Center-left governors such as Cuomo of New York (and Bill Clinton) started pandering to their conservative voters by claiming to be "tough on crime," with no reaction from the left.

Cuomo has no Black friends.

The Corrections Corporation of America wanted in, too, so they set quotas for how many people they need to imprison per year (how optimistic) and started making prisoners to work for under minimum wage (~40 cents/hour) so that they could make pretty things for Starbucks, Motorola and Victoria's Secret. (All while the CCA was also co-writing Arizona's immigration legislation and filling quotas full of deportees).

This makes the country ultimately love imprisoning Brown* people because it's easy to convince people of color that they deserve to go to jail and work for the White man, but imprisoning the general White population has political consequences. However, this should still scare you if you aren't Brown because desperate economic times do call for drastic economic measures, and if you're poor, you're more valuable to the U.S. government behind bars.

As someone who is afraid of beer, LEGALIZE DRUGS.

*When I say Brown, I mean anyone who is of color. Social tip: if you're White, just say "of color." 

BAM sources:

Edgar F. Borgatta. “Drug Abuse.” The Encyclopedia of Sociology: Second Edition, Volume 1 (New York: Macmillan Reference, USA, no date).

Judith A.M. Scully. “Chapter Two, Killing the Black Community, A Commentary on the United States War on Drugs,” in Policing the National Body: Race, Gender and Criminalization; Chapter Two, Killing the Black Community, A Commentary on the United States War on Drugs. (No Date): 55-72. Accessed January 2012. Url: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1649713&http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1649713)

Michelle Alexander. “The New Jim Crow.” This article is adapted from two speeches delivered by Professor Michelle Alexander, one at the Zocolo Public Square in Los Angeles on March 17, 2010, and another at an authors symposium sponsored by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Open Society Institute on October 6, 2010. (March 17 2010, October 6 2010): 7-26. Accessed February 2012. Url: http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/osjcl/Articles/Volume9_1/Alexander.pdf.

Eric Schlosser. “The Prison-Industrial Complex.” The Atlantic Monthly, (December 1998): 1-6, Accessed February 2012. Url: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1998/12/the-prison-industrial-complex/4669/.

Rose M. Brewer and Nancy A. Heitzeg. “The Racialization of Crime and Punishment: Criminal Justice, Color-Blind Racism, and the Political Economy of the Prison Industrial Complex.” American Behavioral Scientist Volume 51 Number 5 (January 2008): 625-644. Accessed February 2012. Url: http://minerva.stkate.edu/people.nsf/files/mina-82v5bl/$file/625.pdf

Earl Smith and Angela Hattery. “If We Build It They Will Come: Human Rights Violations and the Prison Industrial Complex.” Societies Without Borders Volume 2 (2007): 273 –288. Accessed February 2012. Url: http://www.wfu.edu/aes/pdf/If_We_built_it_Societies_without_borders_2-2007.pdf

Bartleby. Url: http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres63.html

History is a Weapon, url: http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/hisprislacap.html.