Instead of me and Joseph summarizing Chapter 4 tomorrow in class, here it is now:

• Brave New World
  •  Most of the time when someone pleads guilty to a minor drug charge he is unaware of all the consequences, such as that he will be excluded from juries and he may lose his right to vote. He also is often not told about the discrimination he will be faced with when he is officially labeled a felon.
  • A felon is stuck with the label for the rest of his life. This label can make him ineligible for some government health and welfare benefits, food stamps, public housing, and federal education assistance. His driver’s license can be suspended and he may no longer qualify for certain jobs. If he gets arrested for another crime he will be treated as a repeat offender, and he cannot enlist in the military or legally own a firearm.
  • Not all judges, prosecutors and defense attorneys understand the ramifications of calling someone a felon. Society shuts out criminals and doesn’t let them back in once released from prison.

• No Place Like Home
  • Many newly released prisoners have nowhere to go and have a hard time finding somewhere to live because they can’t get any public housing assistance and housing discrimination against felons is legal.
  • Clinton’s “One Strike and You’re Out” legislation along with the Quality Housing and Work Responsibility Act of 1998 gave public housing agencies the authority to exclude and evict drug offenders and other felons, as well as allowing the agencies to bar applicants who are suspected of using illegal drugs or being an alcoholic. To repeal these decisions, one would need a lawyer, but someone in need of public housing usually can’t afford a lawyer.
  • HUD encourages the agencies to screen applicants’ public records and create their own exclusion guidelines. As a result, people can be excluded for even the most minor crime.
  • Arrests are enough cause to be rejected by public housing officials whether the arrest resulted in a conviction or a fine or not.
  • If a public housing tenant, or guest of tenant, participates in any drug-related activity (in or out of the public housing unit) the tenancy can be terminated and the Supreme Court ruled in 2002 that someone can be evicted whether they knew about the illegal activity or not, so innocent people can be evicted and left homeless.
  • A study from the McCormick Institute of Public Affairs showed that nearly a quarter of people in homeless shelters had been in prison within the previous year; a California study estimated that 30-50% of people on parole in San Francisco and LA were homeless. Corporation for Supportive Housing in New York State did research showing that when people with criminal records were provided with housing, prison use went down over 40%.

• Boxed In
  • In 40/51 jurisdictions parolees are required to “maintain gainful employment” and if they don’t, they can be put back in prison.
  • Most states let private employers discriminate based on criminal history whether they were convicted or even only arrested. Also, many professions are being legally barred from hiring people with certain criminal convictions.
  • Only 40% of employers are willing to consider hiring an ex-offender but the number goes down to 25% when referring to drug-related felonies, down to 7% for a property-related felony, and less than 1% would hire someone convicted of a violent felony (can you blame them?).
  • Also hard for them to be self-employed because felons can be denied professional licenses.
  • Most offenders haven’t even finished high school, let alone college.

• The Black Box
  • In San Francisco, Ban the Box and All of Us or None got the city government to remove job discrimination because of criminal record by getting rid of the box on job applications for public employment positions. Employers will still be informed, but not until they have looked at the potential employees’ other credentials.
  • Some scholars argue that when criminal history is not included, black males will face even more discrimination than when it is because employers will use race and other factors, like education levels and gaps in work history, to discern who likely criminals are and they may end up treating all black men like criminals.
  • Equal Employment Opportunity Commission warns employers that flat bans on criminals may be illegal if the employer does not consider the story behind the criminal offense.
• Debtor’s Prison
  • Many ex-cons, even ones with jobs, have large debts. Throughout the US newly released prisoners have to pay several agencies. In some places they even have to pay for drug testing. Some service fees include jail book-in fees, public defender application fees, public defender recoupment fees, and fees put on people in residential or work-release programs. Some are charged monthly and failure to pay can result in community control sanctions or modification to the offender’s sentence. Some states have “poverty penalties”-penalties for not paying the other fees
  • A former inmate can be charged by multiple departments at the same time and can be forced to give up his/her entire paycheck.
  • In some places people “choose” to return to jail because they can’t pay the fees
  • Many prison inmates work for very low pay and their accounts are charged for things relating to their incarceration so they can’t save up for when they leave prison.

• Let Them Eat Cake
  • Clinton signed welfare reform legislation that ended individual entitlements to welfare and provided states with block grants. Temporary Assistance for Needy Family Program has a five-year limit on benefits and requires all people who benefit to have a job. This law also permanently bars people with drug-related felonies from getting federally funded public assistance. Only 13 states and DC have opted out. Most partially opted out.
  • Result is that there are pregnant women, people in recovery or treatment for drug abuse, and people with HIV/AIDS who are denied food stamps because they were caught with drugs once.
• The Silent Minority
  • 48 states + DC prohibit inmates from voting while incarcerated for a felony. Most states don’t allow voting while on parole either. Some states have a set amount of years that a person can’t vote after being released.
  • United Nations Human Rights Committee has charged that U.S. disenfranchisement policies are discriminatory and violate international law. Most democratic European countries allow prisoners to vote.
  • Each state has a different process for restoring voting rights but most require jumping through bureaucratic hoops and paying fines.
  • Following the 2000 election it was reported that had 600,000 former felons been allowed to vote then Al Gore would have won.
  • Some who can vote don’t because they fear that registering will bring them unwanted attention.
• The Pariahs
  • “We [black men] have three strikes against us: 1) because we are black, and 2) because we are a black male, and the final strike is a felony.” (p. 163)
  • People are nervous that it will become a badge of honor to have been in prison in some communities, but studies of some of these communities have shown the opposite.
  • Instead of returning home to people who love and care for them, people newly released from prison return home to people who look down on them and are embarrassed by them.

• Eerie Silence
  • Mass incarceration isn’t talked about in communities of color because it is so shameful, so many people don’t realize how many others are suffering from silent grief over incarcerated family members

• Passing (Redux)
  • Many family members of prisoners lie about their incarcerated relatives. They lie out of shame, to avoid stereotypes, and so it does not impede any social mobility.
  • Lying about incarcerated relatives brings about self-hate
  • Lying about mass incarceration and keeping it hidden prevents people and communities from healing

• Gangsta Love
  • Just because the prison label is normal doesn’t mean it is acceptable.
  • “Gangsta culture” is embracing the stigma, and while that is a good coping mechanism, the problem is that “gangsta culture” is embracing criminality. A stigma has been forced upon them, and when they try to embrace it then we condemn them for it and look down on them even more.

• The Minstrel Show
  • Minstrel shows were designed by whites to make themselves feel comfortable and entertained by black oppression. Majority of the audience by these were blacks.
  • Some say blacks attended them because they felt in on the joke, or some say that they were attracted by the remnants of African culture which were always suppressed.
  • Black minstrels were seen as celebrities, even though the basis of what they did was degrading.
  • Rap music changed after the start of the War on Drugs and the incarceration of so many young black men. Once that was the new stigma they embraced it in their music.

• The Antidote
  • Most people would pity the minstrel who is mirroring the contempt shown toward him by whites and portraying it for their entertainment.
  • If we were to hate the crime and not the criminal and show some respect to those leaving prison, mass incarceration may not exist today.