...Opinion Essay: Professor Michelle Alexander's speech The New Jim Crow (2010) In its broadest sense, The New Jim Crow (2010) provides a compelling analysis of how and why mass incarceration is happening in America. It offers an appropriate and original framework for understanding mass incarceration, its roots, link to Jim Crow, the modern caste system, and what must be done to eliminate it (Alexander, 2010). Alexander’s The New Jim Crow (2010) can be said to be a grand wake-up call in the midst of a long slumber of indifference to the poor and vulnerable. It also befits being described as a timely and stunning guide to the labyrinth of discrimination, racism, and propaganda policies cloaked under other names that comprise justice in America....
Words: 346 - Pages: 2
...December 1st 2015 The New Jim Crow "The New Jim Crow" highlights the racial extents of the War on Drugs. It argues that federal drug policy unfairly targets communities of color, keeping millions of young, black men in a cycle of poverty and behind bars. The book begins by challenging claims that racism is dead. Those who believe that full equality been achieved would do well to notice many African Americans' reality today. An extraordinary amount of blacks are still barred from voting because in nearly every state, as convicted felons cannot vote. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans have served time in prison as a result of drug convictions and are branded felons for life. Voting is also barred for those currently incarcerated. Alexander uncovers the system of mass incarceration: a system comprised of laws, rules, policies, and customs that control criminals both in and out of prison. The greatest instigator of mass incarceration is the War on Drugs. Rather than combat drug activity, the War on Drugs has served as a deliberate strategy to control people of color and remove them from the political process, which is racist in both application and design. Alexander suggests that the War on Drugs and mass incarceration constitute a "rebirth of caste" in America. Beginning with slavery and continuing with Jim Crow segregation, mass incarceration places entire groups of people into discriminatory positions in society, permanently. The War on Drugs began in earnest in...
Words: 1065 - Pages: 5
...The issue of mass incarceration sparked conversation about racial disparities within the prison system. Following the abolishment of Jim Crow, legal racial segregation in the United States appeared dead. According to civil rights advocate, Michelle Alexander this is not the case; racial segregation appears dead, but mass incarceration perpetuates a racial caste system that preserves this outdated practice. In Alexander’s book, The New Jim Crow, she points to the cause, enforcement, and victims of this system, but her arguments lack the depth to stand against counterarguments. Primarily, Alexander links mass incarceration’s cause of the War on Drugs. Her secondary cause for this phenomenon appears after this war begins; many defendants cannot obtain “meaningful legal representation” (Alexander 17), a claim which widely goes undisputed. Meanwhile, the argument that “convictions for drug offenses —not violent crime—are the single most important cause of the prison boom in the United States” (Alexander 102), a repetitive argument in her book, sparks controversy. Scholars, such as Pfaff, believe that writers distort the role of drug convictions due to focusing on only...
Words: 1261 - Pages: 6
...book, The New Jim Crow Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, Michelle Alexander discusses race-related issues specific to African-American males and mass incarceration in the United States, though Alexander notes that the discrimination faced by African-American males is also prevalent among other minorities and socio-economically disadvantaged populations. Alexander's central premise, from which the book derives its title, is that "mass incarceration is, metaphorically, the New Jim Crow keeping company with the final chapter of the New Jim Crow, “The Fire this Time,” this section is devoted to the question of where we go from here. Michelle Alexander argues that we, as a nation, have reached a fork in the road. Likewise, here at the end of our journey with her book, we find ourselves at a critical point of decision. What is required of us at this moment in history, a time when millions are cycling in and out of our nation’s prisons and jails trapped in a parallel social universe in which discrimination is perfectly legal? How do we show care and concern for the children who are born into communities where the majority of men and growing numbers of women can expect to spend time behind bars? What must we do, now that we know that the usual justifications do not hold water, and that a human rights nightmare is occurring on our watch? The New Jim Crow begins and ends with the assertion that nothing short of a major social movement holds any hope of ending mass incarceration...
Words: 1321 - Pages: 6
...viewed drugs as an important issue facing the nation. Immediately budgets of federal law enforcement agencies increased. The Reagan administration launched a media campaign that publicized the emergence of crack cocaine in inner-city neighborhoods that had little industry and high unemployment. Decline in employment opportunities in the inner-city increased incentives to sell crack. Crack hit the street in 1985 which lead to an increase in violence at the same time as anger from joblessness intensified. Joblessness and crack entered the inner-city at the same time a fierce backlash against the Civil Rights Movement was created through the War on Drugs.16 In the early 1990s, resistance to an introduction of a new system of racialized social control – mass incarceration disintegrated across the political spectrum. Law enforcement budgets increased, and prison and jail construction rose. Subsequently, prison population increased with increasing numbers of African Americans and Hispanic/Latinos. Legislation passed during the Clinton presidency, Garrett 7 enabled public housing to be denied or revoked from anyone convicted of crime which again negatively impacted African Americans and Latinoes.17 Crack and powdered cocaine are the same substance, but possession or selling of this illegal drug can result in different treatment by the criminal judicial system. The presence of 500 grams of cocaine can lead to five years in imprisonment, but five grams of crack cocaine results...
Words: 1305 - Pages: 6
...The New Jim Crow The New Jim Crow is a book that gives a look on how discrimination is still and at some post more prevalent today than it was in the 1850s. Author Michelle Alexander dives into the justice system and explains how a lot of practices and beliefs from slavery times are just labeled differently now. The labeling creates legal discrimination, but most people over look it because it is hidden with words such as “criminals” or “felon” in order to legally enslave and segregate a certain type of people. This discrimination is located in multiple areas of the U.S. government. Alexander goes through the ways of how discrimination is still prevalent in employment, the housing market, education, and basic voting rights. Alexander unveils these discrimination practices by comparing modern government systems to the old Jim Crow laws. Alexander believes that the racial caste system is mostly the same and the only thing that has changed is what we call it now. People of color are mostly the ones incarcerated, so if you use the label criminal you are able to mention people of color without directly mentioning them. Language is everything and how you label it changes the way people view it. Throughout the book her biggest argument and case on this new system is incarceration specifically. Alexander uses a few good points in order to justify her claims. Alexander talks about the “War on Drugs.” Alexander says that the War on Drugs, a policy put into effect through Reagan’s reign...
Words: 1185 - Pages: 5
...The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander I believe to be a wakeup call for the truly “blind” in today’s mass incarceration of black people. Alexander brings light to how the Civil Rights Movement brought upon a new implementation of racial separation. Her understanding of how Mass Incarceration is the opening to a New Jim Crow of how black people in particular lack any real rights of citizenship. Her book seems to overview the typical media covered topics of people being arrested for use and selling of drugs, rulings in the Supreme Court, and struggles of ex-convicts but of course not to the extent that is required. As the media coverage is not about the true facts but rather embellished and or...
Words: 428 - Pages: 2
...In the book, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, by Michelle Alexander—a Ohio State University professor, director of Racial Justice Project at ACLU of Northern California, and director of the Civil Rights Clinics at Stanford Law School—was the uncovering research about the system of mass incarceration, which are rules, policies, and laws that helped control the amount of criminals entering and leaving prisons. The author begins with slavery and continues to explain the Jim Crow segregation, which both represent mass incarcerations. Mass incarceration prevents discrimination towards groups of people. For example, the author states, “After the death of slavery, the idea of race lives on.” (26) This specific example...
Words: 2005 - Pages: 9
...behind our beloved nation. Before the industrial age and Roaring 20’s, there was the time of slavery and Jim Crow, where the land of the free was a cruel and discriminatory place for people of color. Slavery ended in 1865, the Jim Crow Laws took over in 1877 until 1954, and we see America’s regret for their actions after these time periods, until the rise of mass incarceration and “The War on drugs” in 1971; soon afterwards, mass...
Words: 679 - Pages: 3
...that many believe are designed as a set-up for failure and re-offense. The result of this influx of offenders is a growing racial disparity, as shown by Bobo & Thompson: In 2004. for example, black males constituted 43.3 percent of those incarcerated in state, federal, and local prisons or jails, though only 13 percent of the total population. Whites on the other hand represented 35.7 percent of the male inmate population in 2004, well under their 75 percent of the total male population (Bobo & Thompson, 2006). (p. 451) This ballooning disparity has become a trend of increasing concern among proponents of racial equality. Many view this trend as another cog in the wheel of covert institutional racism, even labeling it “The New Jim Crow”. Among the men and women of color now residing in U.S. prisons are the potential business owners, educators and leaders of communities that sorely need them. Immediate and results-oriented attention to the racial disparity in U.S. prisons will do much to repair the damaged, needful communities of color throughout the country. BLACK CRIME: CRIMINAL OR CULTURAL? “Black people and crime go hand-in-hand”, is an often debated stereotype that African-Americans have endured since slavery. Contributing factors perpetuating this stereotype include, economic, educational and familial shortcomings that have continually challenged and burdened Black communities for hundreds of years. In addition to these very real problems, American society’s...
Words: 1046 - Pages: 5
...lawyer, advocate, and legal scholar. In her book, The New Jim Crow: Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, Alexander discusses the legal systems that seem to be doing their jobs perfectly well but have in fact just replaced one racial caste system with a new one. In this book, Michelle focuses on racial problems in the past as well as the present and argues that the problems are basically the same, if not worse. Alexander’s research was very thorough and motivating to read. She paints a dreadful picture of the modern Jim Crow and how it functions in the world we live in. She uses images that make you cringe but at the same time persuades you that it certainly all true. In her book, Alexander explains that since the Jim Crow laws that legalized segregation have ended, new forms of a racial caste system have come into play. Mass incarceration aggressively targets black men in particular. There are now more African American adults under penal control today (prison, probation, parole) than were enslaved in 1850. This has happened during a time when crime rates have dropped, and not in spite of affirmative action or colorblindness but because of them. What drives the mass incarceration of blacks is the War on Drugs launched by Ronald Reagan in 1982 and supported by almost every politician since. No one wants to give the slightest appearance of being "soft on crime." Alexander identifies many causes of our new caste system. There's collective denial in our age of...
Words: 1320 - Pages: 6
...inequality, especially against African Americans. Kevin Kruse’s “Traffic” and Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness” offer important perspectives on how. Historically, seemingly beneficial laws have excluded African Americans, and increased segregation and economic disparity. Kruse reveals how creating the US interstate highway system, to expand economic growth, disrupted black communities and restricted their access to better jobs, healthcare, and education. Furthermore, Alexander’s...
Words: 1133 - Pages: 5
...Michelle Alexander, Civil Rights Attorney, details the occurrence of legalized discrimination in her book called "The New Jim Crow." The New Jim Crow indicates that even though slavery has been long abolished, systemized inequalities still exists. There is a strong existence in employment opportunities, educational systems, public assistance, and jury selections across the country. Without taking a closer look, one could easily believe that the prison system is designed to rehabilitate those who have had trouble with the law. However, there is a question as to whether those who are truly rehabilitated have access to equal opportunities when released from correctional facilities. One can further question whether those persons are given fair...
Words: 963 - Pages: 4
...The Mass incarceration of people of color and felony disenfranchisement is a tool that is being utilized to continue on with legalized slavery. Through Mass incarceration and felony disenfranchisement it is easier to control people of color and legally discriminate against those who have been convicted of felonies by implementing laws that enable them to be productive citizens upon their return to society. The United States has a very dark history or oppressing the minority, this has been done through many practices such as slavery, Jim Crow laws etc. Although America has made strides in certain areas regarding equal quality of living for all, America still has ways to go. The oppressive was and discriminatory nature of America continues as...
Words: 415 - Pages: 2
...Erin Gorman 11/11/13 Reflection paper 3 The New Jim Crow In the book The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, Alexander puts into perspective that racism still exists in society today. She explains that our criminal justice system is unfairly targeting African American men through mass incarceration with harsh punishment. When released from prison most of these men have less rights then when they entered. This is where Alexander’s idea of the new Jim Crow comes from. She argues that the rights being taken away from African American men are the same rights that they’ve had to fight for, for the past 100 years, and that they are constantly being denied their citizenship. The criminal justice system is using their crimes as an excuse to give harsh punishments and take away rights mirroring the old Jim Crow laws. There are a prominent number of African American men in prison. This is because the police are prejudice against people of color. They may not be doing it consciously but with the stigma that comes with being African American everyone watches them more closely than white men. With the blacks being watched more closely they are going to be getting caught more for their crimes and the whites will get off the hook more. This helps explain why there are so many black men in prison. Also with the stigma that African Americans are more violent and defiant they are more harshly punished for their crimes. If a black man and a white man commit the same crime the black man usually...
Words: 940 - Pages: 4
