Notes: Need Title, Also 180 words over count need to cut down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\u201cLife without liberty is like a body without spirit.\u201d \u2013 Kahlil Gibran.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
The old Jim Crow laws were a set of institutions set in place to limit the rights and freedoms of Black Americans after slavery ended in the states. Racial-based segregation, black voter disenfranchisement, and restrictions on Black Americans\u2019 economic and geographic mobility (Althoff and Reichardt 2280) plagued America for almost 100 years. Jim Crow\u2019s reign of terror persisted until the passage of civil rights legislation in the 1960s, which outlawed racial discrimination. Some believe that a New Jim Crow has risen in the form of mass incarceration. This can be seen in The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness (2010), where Michelle Alexander discusses how the seemingly race-neutral criminal justice policies unfairly target black communities. The parallels between the modern criminal justice system and the racial system of segregation of the past highlight how both systems work to marginalize and control a significant portion of the black population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I do agree that mass incarceration and its so-called \u201cracially-neutral\u201d policies are perpetuating racial hierarchy. The way the system unfairly targets black communities and the damage it has caused to the image of the community is obvious. The stain of the image and the tense relationship with authorities are still present today. My friends and I often make jokes about this tension. When we hear sirens we jokingly yell, run, or hide, or we freeze in place going through the motions of being pulled over. In this humor still lies the truth, one wrong move and we could be next whether we are innocent or guilty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
James Forman Jr. states, the \u201canalogy effectively draws attention to the plight of black men whose opportunities in life have been permanently diminished by the loss of citizenship rights and the stigma they suffer as convicted offenders.\u201d However, Forman and I agree that the analogy has its limits. The main limitation of the New Jim Crow analogy is that unlike the Jim Crow of old, mass incarceration affects a broader spectrum of people, not only Black Americans. The problem with the New Jim Crow is it neglects other marginalized groups besides Black Americans who are affected by mass incarceration, such as the Hispanic and Latino communities. After all, my friends who I joke around with are not all Black, and neither are their families or the other people in the communities they belong to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thus, I will primarily be critiquing Michelle Alexander\u2019s \u201cThe New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness (2010) due to how persuasive her argument on the New Jim Crow is. In the book, Alexander focuses on how the mass incarceration system affects Black people, especially Black men. However, she tends to use terms such as Black and Brown, people of color or POC, and statistics and recounts that include the Latino and Hispanic communities. This use of vague language provides grounds that the analogy of the New Jim Crow is not a good fit for the system of mass incarceration because it affects many groups, not just Black Americans like the Jim Crow of old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Its A Range:<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Michelle Alexander primarily disagrees that the criminal justice system is colorblind. The system supposedly processes people regardless of race. However, as the US has become the world\u2019s largest jailer, black men have been imprisoned at 6.5 times the rate of white men (Forman 22). Alexander adds that \u201c[one] in three young African American men will serve time in prison if current trends continue\u201d (Alexander 11). In addition, in some cities, more than half of all young adult black men are currently under correctional control whether that be in prison or jail, on probation or parole (Alexander 11). Once they are labeled as felons, African Americans are faced with legalized discrimination in their lives including employment, housing, education, and voting rights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Furthermore, the War on Drugs, which was originally meant to combat drug trafficking and drug abuse, disproportionately targeted communities of color and incarcerated them. The media campaigns for the War on Drugs were saturated with images of black \u201ccrack whores,\u201d \u201ccrack dealers,\u201d and \u201ccrack babies\u201d (Alexander 6). These images reinforced negative racial stereotypes of those in impoverished inner-city areas, maintaining a racial hierarchy by making these communities seem inferior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
All of these factors help to reinforce why the New Jim Crow analogy is so powerful and fitting. The shocking proportion of Black Americans affected in comparison to their white counterparts and the parallels of the old Jim Crow are ever-present. However, what makes the analogy lose its grounding is that much of the evidence and statistics go hand in hand with other marginalized minority groups, for Alexander it’s the Hispanic and Latino communities. When writing, using synonyms for words to be less repetitive is important, the context and meaning of these words can also be very influential to the argument. Alexander often uses people of color as a synonym for Black Americans or African Americans. While Black Americans do fall under the people of color term, so do Hispanics, Latinos, Asians, Native Americans, and many more. The term is not exclusively used for African Americans. The same applies to Alexander\u2019s usage of \u201cblack and brown people\u201d which can also refer to South Asian Americans, Middle Eastern Americans, Native Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Latino Americans. Although brown skin can refer to Black Americans physically, they are not the only group the term applies to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Besides the choice of words, Alexander uses many pieces of evidence, statistics, and recounts that include Latino or Hispanic people in tandem with Black people. Although when it comes to the rates and numbers of incarcerated in comparison to Black Americans, Latinos are still affected by the system of mass incarceration. Even so, Alexander stated that \u201cninety percent of those admitted to prison for drug offenses in many states were Black or Latino\u201d (Alexander 73). When talking about the War on Drugs, Alexander uses a story from Village Voice that recounts how, \u201c[dozens] of black and Latino victims\u201d were affected when describing how \u201cpolice ransacking their homes, handcuf\ufb01ng children and grandparents, putting guns to their heads, and being verbally (and often physically) abusive. In many cases, victims had received no follow-up from the NYPD, even to \ufb01x busted doors or other physical damage\u201d (Alexander 224). Then when referring to how those affected by mass incarceration end up in high-poverty neighborhoods, Alexander used a study from New York that found that \u201c70 percent of the city\u2019s poor black and Latino residents live in high-poverty neighborhoods, whereas 70 percent of the city\u2019s poor whites live in non-poverty neighborhoods.\u201d This statistic also revealed that nearly seven out of eight people living in high-poverty urban areas are members of a minority group nationwide. Once again showcasing how the effects of mass incarceration are not limited to African Americans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Just as Black Americans have become victims reinforced by stereotypes due to the War on Drugs and images of criminality, Hispanics and Latinos also have the same stains on their communities. In American media, Hispanic and Latino people were regularly portrayed in television roles as criminals and drug dealers. The only things covered were crime, immigration, and drugs rather than achievements (Dong 36). What does not help is that many of the drugs that were being smuggled to America came from Latin America, adding to the image of drug dealers and makers. Latinos and Hispanics also reside in low-income areas as shown in the New York statistics mentioned prior, they also are victims of the War on Drugs\u2019 targeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
James Forman Jr. reveals that Hispanic and Latino prisoners receive little attention together in the discussion of mass incarceration, although they make up 20% of American prisoners and one in six Hispanic males were expected to go to prison in their lifetime (Forman 60-61). They are often overlooked by those who support the New Jim Crow analogy. Although Alexander did mention Latinos and Hispanics, whether directly or indirectly, she did not truly address them as she did with the Black community. Although they were not explicitly the target of Jim Crow, \u201cduring the Jim Crow years, Hispanics in many jurisdictions were subject to forms of exclusion, segregation, and disenfranchisement not unlike those inflicted on African Americans\u201d (Forman 60). Some examples I found and that were present in Forman\u2019s footnotes were Hernandez v. Texas, (1954), which recognizes Mexican Americans as an independent racial group entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protections, Mendez v. Westminister Sch. Dist.,(C.D. Cal. 1946), 8 years before Brown v. Board of Education (1954) and struck down segregation of Mexican and Mexican-American students in California. Hispanic and Latino people also were affected by poll taxes and literacy tests, therefore they also overcame voting challenges as well. This narrative doesn’t end at Latinos, Hispanics, and African Americans either, numerous minority groups have faced similar struggles and have been affected by mass incarceration in different ways even if not on the same scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Verdict<\/strong>:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n
\u201cThe idea that the Jim Crow analogy leads to a distorted view of mass incarceration and therefore hampers our ability to challenge it effectively.\u201d (Forman 25)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\nThe problem that is the so-called color-blind criminal justice system is not something to pass up. The evidence and damage it causes are clear and something needs to be done to fix this system that so disproportionately criminalizes and incarcerates minorities. Alexander was not wrong to stress the need for this institution to be reformed and focused on, however, it needs to be reformed as a whole and not just focus on one group or community. If we want to stop more systems and institutions being riddled with racial bias and injustice we need to acknowledge all the pieces. Although \u201cAfrican Americans are incarcerated in numbers grossly disproportionate to their percentage of the overall population, the fact remains that 60% of prisoners are not African American\u201d (Forman 61). If these other groups are not in conversation, they are less likely to see a campaign against it as speaking to and for them. Meaning mass incarceration\u2019s harm will continue. This is why the analogy of the New Jim Crow does have leverage and grounding but fails to be the right one for the institution of Mass Incarceration. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
If they are so-called colorblind, then we cannot be colorblind to those who are being affected and stand up for all voices.
<\/p>\n\n\n\nSources:<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Alexander, Michelle. The New Jim Crow : Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, New Press, The, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central, https:\/\/ebookcentral-proquest-com.proxy048.nclive.org\/lib\/davidson\/detail.action?docID=5651869.
Althoff, Lukas, and Hugo Reichardt. \u201cJim Crow and Black Economic Progress after Slavery*.\u201d OUP Academic, Oxford University Press, 22 July 2024, academic.oup.com\/qje\/article\/139\/4\/2279\/7718111.
Dong, Qingwen. \u201cThe Impact of Television Viewing on Young Adults\u2019 Stereotypes towards Hispanic Americans.\u201d Academia.Edu, 13 Aug. 2016, www.academia.edu\/27755934\/The_impact_of_television_viewing_on_young_adults_stereotypes_towards_Hispanic_Americans.
Forman, James Jr. \u201cRacial Critiques of Mass Incarceration: Beyond the new Jim Crow.\u201d New York University Law Review, vol. 87, no. 1, April 2012, p. 21-69. HeinOnlineThesis Statement
“Hernandez v. Texas.” Oyez, www.oyez.org\/cases\/1940-1955\/347us475. Accessed 4 Dec. 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\nComments:<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Note:<\/strong> I did not have my draft posted in time, therefore my drafting group members were not able to comment on time. I asked them afterwards based on availability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Alston:<\/strong>
I really like your use of meta commentary, outlining your argument for the reader and adding concessions to your statements. Your use of personal experience adds passion behind the argument, as well as character to your writing. I LOVE how you cite a court case and compare it to a previous court case to make your argument. Great job!
When you first quote James Forman Jr. and Dong add a bit more background such as from which document the quotes from. Also maybe fact check me on this, but for the quotes you only need use the authors last name in the citation the first time you quote the author if you add Alexander states, \u201c\u201d. In your fourth paragraph under \u201cIt\u2019s A Range\u201d, you have a lot of good statistics and quotes but it feels like more quotes than your own ideas. I think you go one to explain the quotes later but I would add more of your own ideas after quotes specifically in that paragraph.<\/p>\n\n\n\n-Pledge VVB<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Notes: Need Title, Also 180 words over count need to cut down. Introduction: \u201cLife without liberty is like a body without spirit.\u201d \u2013 Kahlil Gibran. The old Jim Crow laws were a set of institutions set in place to limit the rights and freedoms of Black Americans after slavery ended in the states. Racial-based segregation, … <\/p>\n