An recent, interesting article by Michael D. Shear from the Times related to our discussion last week on the large amount of deportations during the Obama administration, as well as our readings. The push for making the deportations of illegal immigrants more “humane” has been brought into the mainstream as individuals like Senator Robert Menendez, a leading Latino voice of Congress, pressure Obama to “do something drastic”. This is demonstrative of the importance of political representation and its ability to bring to light such important issues. It is also interesting to note arguments of the opposing side, that cite unemployment as a reason to continue deportation. Considering the complex network of influences and interests in deportation, do you think this increased pressure will affect the status quo?
The graphic I included above is a visual that nicely captures the relative clemency and sympathy of judges to immigrants in New York, which we discussed in class. This can be seen in the lower amount of people who are deported and greater amount who stay in New York, compared with the rest of the United States.
Link to article: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/14/us/obama-orders-review-of-deportations.html?hpw&rref=politics&_r=0
As requested, I’ll try to give a brief overview of the Prison-Industrial Complex (PIC). And I’ll add some links at the bottom if any of you want to do further research.
Most prisons in America are privately owned. The more prisoners the prison has, the more the prison companies profit. There are a bunch of reasons for this, but a big one has to do with labor. Prison labor is extremely cheap, since most wage laws don’t apply to prisoners. And then the company can sell the products of the prisoners’ labor, without giving the prisoners themselves much of anything. As you can imagine, this creates an incredible amount of profit.
Despite being “the land of the free”, the US has the highest number of prisoners in the entire world. While many countries focus on rehabilitation and education in prison, the US focuses on retribution and punishment. A retributive model is in the best interest of the PIC since it puts more prisoners in the system and keeps them in for longer. The PIC ensures that the status quo doesn’t change through two main mechanisms.
First, it uses its amount of money and power to influence the justice system. Judges and politicians can receive “help” so long as they push for retributive policies. So both the PIC and the politicians win at the expense of the population.
Second, it convinces people that retribution is necessary and moral. While the majority of criminals are victims themselves, the PIC tells people that all criminals are monsters who deserve their fate. It also plays on people’s fear of what’s different by demonizing racial and sexual minorities. Sixty percent of those incarcerated are people of color. Drug laws are a good example of the discriminatory nature of the PIC. White people account for 69% of drug arrests and black people account for 29%. Despite this, black people are 20 times more likely to be incarcerated for drugs. And nearly half of the prison population is black.
I’m assuming that virtual slavery, corruption, and racism are enough to make you hate the PIC. But there are even more problems that it causes. Most notably, despite the PIC’s claims that harsh, retributive punishments are necessary to stop crime, it actually creates even more crime. Locking criminals up treats the symptoms the cause. Lack of education is a major cause of crime. Seventy percent of prisoners haven’t finished high school. Over 50% are illiterate. An obvious solution to decrease crime would be to increase funds for public education, so people don’t have to turn to crime. The problem is, the PIC has consumed so much wealth pushing for retributive policies, there is much less to invest in education. Moreover, many rehabilitative programs involve basic education. But since the PIC favors retribution, there are very few of these programs. So once criminals get out, they often have no other choice but to resort to crime again. Thus, creating an endless cycle of crime.
So why isn’t this a big issue? Because no one cares. The PIC convinces people that retributive policies are needed for protection. And it primarily targets people that the majority are already afraid of (namely African Americans). And politicians don’t anything because they benefit from the PIC. And due to the PIC’s tremendous influence, speaking out against it would be political suicide. So all we can do is sit around and talk about how much it sucks.
If you want to read some more on this
http://www.publiceye.org/defendingjustice/overview/herzing_pic.html
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tio-hardiman/african-american-males-fa_b_2981163.html>
http://www.thetalkingdrum.com/prison.html
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/07/13/end-the-prison-industrial-complex-now/]
http://www.washburnlaw.edu/wlj/51-3/articles/fulcher-patrice.pdf
