18 votes

Prisoners striking in seventeen US states over prison conditions

5 comments

  1. [2]
    demifiend
    Link
    As well they should. The prison industry in the United States exists for one purpose: to preserve and profit from slavery using the back door built into the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of...

    As well they should. The prison industry in the United States exists for one purpose: to preserve and profit from slavery using the back door built into the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States:

    Section 1: 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, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

    Section 2: Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

    The back door I'm talking about is in bold text. I don't know if this is a case of unintended consequences or not, but it doesn't matter.

    Incidentally, Raven Rakia has an article in The Nation explaining why the strike is happening.

    10 votes
    1. 39hp
      Link Parent
      The original text did not include that backdoor: The backdoor phrase, "except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted," was taken from a section of the Northwest...

      The original text did not include that backdoor:

      All persons are equal before the law, so that no person can hold another as a slave; and the Congress shall have power to make all laws necessary and proper to carry this declaration into effect everywhere in the United States.

      The backdoor phrase, "except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted," was taken from a section of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 that also enforced the fugitive slave act. I'm inclined to think it was intentional.

      8 votes
  2. [2]
    NessY
    Link
    I feel like prisons are going to be one of the biggest things from our time that future societies look back on and are just baffled by the disgusting medieval levels of inhumanity that we allow to...

    I feel like prisons are going to be one of the biggest things from our time that future societies look back on and are just baffled by the disgusting medieval levels of inhumanity that we allow to happen.

    Just looking at comments from people talking about how they deserve to rot in there and prisons should be worse really drives home how thin the line between "logic is the truest thing in the universe" and "literal chimps ripping each other's nuts off" still is in humans.

    10 votes
    1. [2]
      Comment deleted by author
      Link Parent
      1. NessY
        Link Parent
        Yeah it's really obvious with even a passing knowledge of the substances in question that the punishments are specifically targeted for certain groups. There's always the saying "it's expensive to...

        Yeah it's really obvious with even a passing knowledge of the substances in question that the punishments are specifically targeted for certain groups. There's always the saying "it's expensive to be poor" but no one realizes all the ways that relates.

        2 votes
  3. azulez
    Link
    If you guys remember this, there was a policy shift which would have begun to phase out private prisons until it was reversed after Trump's victory....

    If you guys remember this, there was a policy shift which would have begun to phase out private prisons until it was reversed after Trump's victory.

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-prisons/u-s-reverses-obama-era-move-to-phase-out-private-prisons-idUSKBN1622NN

    Prisons for profit are one of the largest ethical violations we have in our society. It's absolutely horrifying that people think a company with an ethical duty to maximize profit to shareholders can conduct itself morally when its entire existence depends on the incarceration of human beings.

    Many have literal quotas which require the state to provide them with a certain number of prisoners or pay large penalties, thus financially incentivizing the state and the tax payers themselves to convict and incarcerate.

    https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2015/jul/31/report-finds-two-thirds-private-prison-contracts-include-lockup-quotas/

    The whole thing is a fucking horror show.

    5 votes