MIM(Prisons) is a cell of revolutionaries serving the oppressed masses inside U.$. prisons, guided by the communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Under Lock & Key is a news service written by and for prisoners with a focus on what is going on behind bars throughout the United States. Under Lock & Key is available to U.S. prisoners for free through MIM(Prisons)'s Free Political Literature to Prisoners Program, by writing:
MIM(Prisons) PO Box 40799 San Francisco, CA 94140.
Hello - Saludos y Respeto to all those in the struggle, the struggle
is real. I must weigh in on the events unfolding in Southern Califas.
Namely the two lynchings, the first in Palmdale CA, the second in
Victorville CA. What do they have in common? Answer: the Sheriff’s
Department! Both racist! Both departments have a long history of working
together and as a political prisoner held in CDCR these are the same two
departments that joined forces to try and silence my voice and bring
down the AV Brown Berets.
Both Departments have deputies that are card carrying members of the
racist Minute Men, the new KKK. And having shined the spotlight on this
fact earned me a life sentence for crimes I did NOT commit.
And in both cases there is no doubt in my mind there is Departmental
involvement. And nothing can surprise us coming from these two
historically racist departments.
In both cases these were meant to send a message to the BLM movement
against police brutality going across this nation right now, and to
discourage it! The evil and racist regime in Palmdale has a long history
of using these tactics to silence the voice of the PEOPLE. And if they
can’t kill you, they will bury you behind the wall. And this will not
stop until they are made to understand the world is watching and will
hold them responsible and accountable for their actions. But the racism
and prejudice is systemic NOT only in the Sheriff’s Dept. but
also in City Government in the Antelope Valley and Silver Valley (The
Sinister Valleys) to a mind-blowing degree.
My heart goes out to the families, friends, and loved ones of these
latest victims of these Evil Regimes. I spent years of my life trying to
expose the racist and criminal practices of these two partners-in-crime,
it has come at a great cost. My family, my freedom, not to mention all
my worldly possessions but I will NOT stop until justice has
been done, and the Evil has been exposed; because the needs of the many
outweigh the needs of the ONE. In the end the TRUTH ALWAYS comes out! We
must continue to move forward and not be discouraged!
LA LUCHA SIEGE!!! VIVA LA CAUSA!!!
(Justice for Ro Alvin Harsh)
MIM(Prisons) adds: Six lynchings, 5 of them New
Afrikans and one Latino, have been reported on the heels of the recent
uprisings against police terrorism.
Robert Fuller, a 24-year-old, New Afrikan man hung from a tree in
Palmdale, CA is under investigation
Malcolm Harsch a 38-year-old, New Afrikan man hung from a tree in
Victorville, CA has been declared a suicide by police and the
family
Dominique Alexander, a 27-year-old New Afrikan man hung in a
Manhattan park and was ruled a suicide by the police, who later said an
investigation continues
a 17-year-old New Afrikan boy was hung from a tree in Spring, TX
was ruled a suicide by police
a Latino man hung in Houston, TX was also ruled a suicide after
family stated he was suicidal
Otis ‘Titi’ Gulley, 31, a New Afrikan transgender woman hung in a
park in Portland, Oregon was ruled a suicide by police
More than 200 detainees began a hunger strike on October 18 at the ICE
Northwest Detention Center (NWDC) in Tacoma, Washington. The NWDC is a
private prison run by the Geo Group. The facility can hold over 1500
people and houses those swept up in immigration raids, transfers from
the U.$-Mexico border, and other migrants caught in the Amerikkan
system. This is one of the largest immigration prisons in the country.
Since 2014 detainees have launched 19 hunger strikes to protest their
detention and conditions behind bars. This latest protest is demanding
edible food and humane treatment, with many also demanding a complete
shut down of NWDC. Prisoners find maggots, blood, hair and other things
in the food. Kitchen workers report rats running around the food prep
area. Guards abuse the prisoners. And Geo group ignores these
complaints.(1)
U.$. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention centers mirror
conditions in other prisons in the United $tates. In fact, prisoners at
Clallam Bay Correctional Facility in Washington also went on food and
work strike earlier in October to demand better conditions, focusing on
food quality.
ICE officials issued a statement denying the existence of a hunger
strike: “Failure to eat the facility provided meal is not a stand-alone
factor in the determination of a detainee’s suspected or announced
hunger strike action. Commissary food items remain available for
purchase by detainees.” They followed up this statement with a press
tour of the NWDC, featuring spotless conditions, a well stocked urgent
care room, and nice library. It appears that no prisoners were
interviewed or even filmed up close in the tour.(2)
A majority of the 54,000 ICE detainees in the United $tates are held in
privately run prisons. And migrant detention makes up the majority of
the private prison population in this country. But this isn’t about the
difference in conditions between private and state or federally run
prisons. Conditions across the criminal injustice system are abusive,
dangerous, and inhumane. We’re not fighting for a different face on the
abuse.(3)
While federal arrests overall have gone up over the past 20 years,
between 1998 and 2018 federal arrests rose 10% for U.$. citizens and
234% for non-citizens. The most dramatic increase was between 2017 and
2018, a 71% rise in arrests of non-citizens. In 1998 63% of all federal
arrests were U.$. citizens while in 2018 that number flipped and 64% of
all federal arrests were of non-U.$. citizens. The portion of federal
arrests increasingly focused along the U.$-Mexico border increased from
33% in 1998 to 65% in 2018. 95% of this increase was due to immigration
detainees.(4)
The ICE detention centers make clear the purpose of prisons in the
United $tates. This is national oppression. These non-citizen detainees
are mostly being prosecuted for the “crime” of being in the United
$tates without permission of the imperialists. This “crime” represents
78% of the cases.(4)
Closed borders are a requirement of imperialism. The wealth is kept
within these borders for the lucky few who are born to this privilege.
That wealth is stolen from outside the borders; exploitation of labor
and theft of natural resources brings great profit to the imperialists.
And the imperialists share that profit with the citizens of their
countries to keep them passive and supportive. This wealth differential
is obvious, even between the poorest within U.$. borders and average
people living in the Third World. Those living outside those borders are
desperate to get in to access this wealth stolen from their homeland.
The role of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security is clear: keep
this wealth within u.$. borders exclusively for Amerikan citizens.
We support the just demands of prisoners in NWDC and throughout the
criminal injustice system. This system has sunk so low that people are
forced to starve themselves to fight the dangerous and inhuman
conditions. It will not be fixed by improving the condition in one
prison, or even by shutting down one facility. But these demands fit in
with the anti-imperialist struggle as we fight for open borders and an
end to a system where one nation has the power to lock up others just
for the crime of crossing an invisible line.
A modern-day example of New Afrikans building independent institutions
and public opinion for socialism is the groups carrying out the
Jackson-Kush Plan in Jackson, Mississippi and the surrounding area.
There are a number of different organizations involved in, and evolved
out of, this Plan, and its roots go back to the Provisional Government
of the Republic of New Afrika (PGRNA) in the 1960s. It is directly built
on the long history of New Afrikan organizing for independence, going on
since people were brought to the United $nakes from Africa as slaves.
The Plan itself was formulated by the New Afrikan People’s Organization
and the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement between 2004 – 2010. (1, p. 3)
The project has gone through many different phases, all focusing on
attaining self-determination for people of African descent in
Mississippi and the surrounding region. Sometimes the organizing has
been more heavily focused on electoral politics,(2, 3) sometimes more on
purchasing land, and currently the Cooperation Jackson project appears
to be at the forefront of pushing the Plan forward.
Cooperation Jackson’s mission is to develop an intimate network of
worker-owned cooperatives, covering all basic humyn needs, and more:
food production and distribution, recycling and waste management, energy
production, commodity production, housing, etc. The main goals of
Cooperation Jackson (C.J.) are to provide sustainable livelihoods for
its organizing base, which includes control over land, resources, means
of production, and means of distribution. Currently C.J. has a handful
of cooperatives in operation, and is building the Community Land Trust
to have greater control over its target geography in Jackson. This is
just a snapshot of the work of Cooperation Jackson, which is explained
in much more detail in the book Jackson Rising.(1)
The Jackson-Kush Plan is being carried out despite big setbacks,
repression, harassment, and roadblocks from the government and racist
citizens alike, for decades. This is the nature of struggle and the
folks working with the Plan are facing it head-on. C.J. and the other
organizations involved are doing amazing work to establish what could be
dual power in the state of Mississippi.
While the MIM has congruent goals with the Jackson-Kush Plan (at least
including the self-determination of New Afrikan people; control over
land, economy, and resources; environmental sustainability; an end of
capitalism and imperialism), there are some notable differences.(4)
We’re holding out hope that the Plan is being intentionally discrete in
order to build dual power, but the ideological foundations of some of
its structure point instead to revisionism of Marxism.
Cooperation Jackson’s plan includes working with the government in some
capacity. It needs to change laws in order to operate freely and
legally. This itself isn’t wrong – MIM(Prisons) also works on and
supports some reforms that would make our work of building revolution
much easier. But because of its relationship to the state, C.J.’s voice
is muffled. MIM(Prisons) doesn’t have this problem, so we can say what
needs to be said and we hope the folks organizing for New Afrikan
independence will hear it.
Cooperation Jackson’s structural documents paint a picture of a peaceful
transition to a socialist society, or a socialist microcosm, built on
worker-owned cooperatives and the use of advanced technology. Where it
aims to transform the New Afrikan “working class” (more on this below)
to become actors in their own lives and struggle for self-determination
of their nation, we are for it. So often we hear from ULK readers
that people just don’t think revolution is possible. Working in a
collective and actually having an impact in the world can help people
understand their own inherent power as humyn beings. Yet it seems C.J.
sees this democratic transformation of the New Afrikan “working class”
as an end in itself, which it believes will eventually lead to an end of
capitalism.
“In the Jackson context, it is only through the mass self-organization
of the working class, the construction of a new democratic culture, and
the development of a movement from below to transform the social
structures that shape and define our relations, particularly the state
(i.e. government), that we can conceive of serving as a
counter-hegemonic force with the capacity to democratically transform
the economy.”(1, p. 7)
This quote also alludes to C.J.’s apparent opposition to the
universality of armed struggle in its struggle to transform the economy.
In all the attempts that have been made to take power from the
bourgeoisie, only people who have acknowledged the need to take that
power by force (i.e. armed struggle) have been even remotely successful.
We just need to look to the governments in the last century all across
the world who have attempted to nationalize resources to see how hard
the bourgeois class will fight when it really feels its interests are
threatened.
Where C.J. is clearly against Black capitalism and a
bourgeois-nationalist revolution that stays in the capitalist economy,
we are in agreement. Yet C.J. apparently also rejects the need for a
vanguard party, and the need for a party and military to protect the
interests and gains of the very people it is organizing.
“As students of history, we have done our best to try and assimilate the
hard lessons from the 19th and 20th century national liberation and
socialist movements. We are clear that self-determination expressed as
national sovereignty is a trap if the nation-state does not dislodge
itself from the dictates of the capitalist system. Remaining within the
capitalist world-system means that you have to submit to the domination
and rule of capital, which will only empower the national bourgeoisie
against the rest of the population contained within the nation-state
edifice. We are just as clear that trying to impose economic democracy
or socialism from above is not only very problematic as an
anti-democratic endeavor, but it doesn’t dislodge capitalist social
relations, it only shifts the issues of labor control and capital
accumulation away from the bourgeoisie and places it in the hands of the
state or party bureaucrats.”(1, p. 8)
As students of history, we assert that C.J. is putting the carriage
before the horse here. National liberation struggles have shown the most
success toward delinking populations from imperialism and capitalism.
Yes, we agree with C.J. that these national liberation struggles also
need to contain anti-capitalism, and revolutionary ecology, if they plan
to get anywhere close to communism. But C.J. seems to be saying it can
dislodge from capitalism before having national independence from
imperialism.
The end of this quote also raises valid concerns about who holds the
means of production, and the development of a new bourgeoisie among the
party bureaucrats. This is one of the huge distinctions between the
Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin, and China under Mao. In China, the
masses of the population participated in the Great Proletarian Cultural
Revolution, which attacked bureaucrats and revisionists in the party and
positions of power. These criticisms were led from the bottom up, and
the Cultural Revolution was a huge positive lesson on how we can build a
society that is continually moving toward communism, and not getting
stuck in state-capitalism.
Another significant difference between the line of the MIM and of
Cooperation Jackson is our class analysis. Cooperation Jackson is
organizing the “working class” in Jackson, Mississippi, which it defines
as “unionized and non-unionized workers, cooperators, and the under and
unemployed.”(1, p. 30) So far in our exposure to C.J., we haven’t yet
come across an internationalist class analysis. Some pan-Africanism,
yes, but nothing that says a living wage of $11 is more than double what
the average wage would be if we had an equal global distribution of
wealth.(5, 6) And so far nothing that says New Afrika benefits from its
relationship to the United $tates over those who Amerikkka oppresses in
the Third World.
We can’t say what the next steps for the Jackson-Kush Plan should be.
There’s still opportunity for people within the project to clarify its
line on the labor aristocracy/working class, the necessity of armed
struggle to take power from the bourgeoisie, and the significance of the
Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. MIM(Prisons)’s Free Books for
Prisoners Program distributes many materials on these topics. Some
titles we definitely recommend studying are On Trotskyism by
Kostas Mavrakis, The Chinese Road to Socialism by E.L.
Wheelwright and Bruce McFarlane, and Imperialism and its Class
Structure in 1997 by MIM.
I read the article titled
“Whites
Can be Lumpen Too”. I do not doubt that. But let me give you some
insight on the race relations in Missouri’s prisons.
The Caucasians are given job positions that allow them access to more
resources, more mobility, more food and more canteen. While they turn
around and make a profit off of New Afrikans and others who need what
they have.
There is in particular one major racist “white” gang that functions in
the Missouri Department of Correcions (MODOC) and this gang works
directly with the C.O.s all the way up to the captains and case
mangaers. This is not exaggeration, there is a couple pigz who have this
gang’s tattoo on their forearms! Yet the administration turns a blind
eye to this.
So when it comes to unity how can you unite the population against the
oppressors when half the population works for the oppressor and
identifies with the shade of their skin over their prisoner status? They
enjoy privileges like drugs, cell phones, food etc. that makes them feel
closer to the staff than to the rest of the prison population.
Just last night me and six other comrades in the wing were having a
discussion about Amerika, Russia and China’s military bases spread
throughout the Caribbean when we were constantly interrupted by a
Caucasian prisoner banging on eir door. I am open to the idea of unity
amongst all prisoners but the MODOC has done a thorough job of
segregating us prisoners and forming a caste system.
MIM(Prisons) responds: Our response to the comrade who wrote
“Whites Can be Lumpen Too” agrees with this writer. It’s no coincidence
that white guards have racist tattoos or that white prisoners enjoy
special privileges from these guards.
This country has a long history of national oppression. It started with
the European settler nation, which has always been mostly petty
bourgeois, bringing in oppressed-nation slaves to build the
infrastructure of this country. The history of this national oppression
continues today in a slightly more subtle format. The result for whites
as a group is greater wealth, better education, better housing
opportunities, better jobs, and on and on. And so even poor whites who
aren’t currently enjoying these privileges can look around and see that
their peers, people who look like them, are doing well. And they
identify with these folks, aspire to their wealth, and have a realistic
shot at getting there. This is in contrast with the lumpen from
oppressed nations who look around and see lots of folks just like
themselves in the same shitty conditions.
Whites can be revolutionaries if they choose to go against their
national interests. And it makes it easier for prison staff to set up
white prisoners as the privileged group, helping keep the rest of the
population in check by getting in the way of organizing and unifying.
Organizers need to recognize these conditions and unite those who can be
united; in this case the oppressed nations.
[The following was written about the same time as we were writing
Intersecting
Strands of Oppression for ULK 65. This author echoes our own
discussion of the Brett Kavanaugh hearing while heavily citing MIM
Theory 2/3, as we did in our piece. This question of how gender and
nation interact, and how revolutionaries should approach these topics in
order to push things in the right direction continue to be of utmost
importance. - MIM(Prisons)]
On 27 September 2018, in the United States Senate’s Judiciary Committee,
the nation heard riveting testimony of an attempted sexual assault, and
the denial of that assault. A Crime that had occurred 37-years ago with
no corroborating witnesses.
In a he-say, she-say trial, who gets the benefit of the doubt? The
accused, or the accuser? In this era of #MeToo, is it guilty until you
can prove yourself innocent, or innocent until proven guilty? Could due
process be sacrificed at the altar of gender politics and why does it
matter?
In reviewing my in-cell library on feminist theory, these matters and
debates are not new, and the answers to these questions have long been
addressed. The first question that has to be asked, “Who speaks for the
feminist?” “Who has her girlfriend’s back?” The demarcation in the
feminist lines can best be exemplified by the research compiled by one
feminist researcher, Ealasaid Munro:
“The emergence of ‘privilege-checking,’ however, reflects the reality
that mainstream feminism remains dominated by straight white
middle-classes. Parvan Amara interviewed self-identified working class
feminists for a piece published on the internet magazine The F Word and
noted that many of the women she spoke to found themselves excluded from
mainstream feminism both on the internet and ‘in real life.’ Amara notes
that many women tend to encounter feminism at university. Women who do
not go on to further education face a barrier when attempting to engage
with those academic debates that drive feminism.”(1)
So if academia is where the debates that are driving feminist theory are
occurring, what does that academic debate look like if she is not white?
“Ignoring the difference of race between women and the implications of
those differences presents the most serious threat to the mobilization
of women’s joint power. Refusing to recognize difference makes it
impossible to see the different problems and pitfalls facing us as
women. Some problems we share as women, some we do not. You fear your
children will grow up to join the patriarchy and testify against you, we
fear our children will be dragged from a car and shot down on the
street, and you will turn your backs upon the reasons they are
dying.”(2)
Another theorist surmised, “Black women’s own views on rape can’t help
being shaped by the actions of their white sisters. That is to say, that
Black people cannot use a white supremacist justice system without
perpetuating white supremacy.”(3)
These other theorists have long been critical of weaponizing process.
This was recently on display in California. There, a recall movement was
taking place to remove a judge for imposing a light sentence on a
Stanford University student for sexual assault. The most vocal opponents
to the recall were Black women. The most visible, former California
Supreme Court justice, Janice M. Brown.(4) She argued, that punishing a
judge for exercising discretion will only harm defendants of color.
Statistics bear this out. Per 100,000 of the Black and Brown population
in 2010, 6,000 were imprisoned; while per 100,000 of the white
population in 2010, 640 were imprisoned.(5) Black and Brown persons of
color are in front of Criminal Court judges far more than whites.
Another theorist called this type of feminism Carceral Feminism, and
rails against the federal passage of the 1999 Violence Against Women Act
(VAWA). “Many of the feminists who had lobbied for the passage of VAWA
remained silent about countless other women whose 911 calls resulted in
more violence. Often white, well-heeled feminists, their legislative
accomplishment did little to stem violence against less affluent, more
marginalized women.”(6) And a further theorist noted, “If women do not
share ‘common oppression,’ what then can serve as a basis for our coming
together?”(7)
These other feminist theorist, the marginalized, had observed that the
debate was about rational-feminism versus emotional-feminism. This
feminist theorist argues that rational-feminism must prevail over
emotional feminism.
“The sisterhood line as currently practiced (but not in the 1960s and
early 1970s) is white, bourgeois, sexist propaganda. Women just turn
around from seeking approval from men that they never got; to demanding
unconditional approval from women. They put each other on a pedestal and
imagine each other to be flawless goddesses.”(8)
This same theorist argues, the root of emotional feminism is nothing
more than a chauvinist plot to keep women marginalized and caught up in
their emotions, rather than applying her faculties of reasoning.
“The root of this is the patriarchal socialization of women to restrict
themselves to the sphere of feelings, while letting men develop the
rational faculties necessary to wield power. Women are taught to read
romantic novels, major in English, or maybe psychology, if the women
seem like they are getting too many scientific ideas.”(9)
Is the rallying cry, “I BELIEVE HER”, the death nails to due process? Is
process going to be sacrificed at the alter of gender politics? Is the
new standard for America’s fathers, brothers, husbands, and sons
“GUILTY, UNTIL YOU CAN PROVE YOURSELF INNOCENT”?
One theorist’s 1992 writings used the 1986 rape convictions of white
women by the race of their rapist. 68% of their rapists were white; 22%
of their rapists were Black; 5% were Other; and 2% of their rapists were
Mixed. The theorist begs feminists to take a serious look at the 22% of
white women raped in 1986 who were raped by Black men.
The theorist goes on to state a general proposition that all feminists
can generally agree upon, “Three-quarters of all rapes are by
acquaintances, and the figures on rape should reflect that women are
raped by the type of people they date.”
In 1986, 12% of the men available to white women were Black. However, no
where near 12% of the sex white women were having were with Black men.
Thus the 22% of white women’s rapist being Black is disproportionately
high. Furthermore, the population of white women was more than six-times
the population of Black men. For every [1% of] white women who had a
sexual acquaintance with a Black man, it takes [6% of] Black men to be
those acquaintances. Out of those acquaintances charged with rape, the
22% figure means a very high proportion of Black men generally are
convicted of rape of white women compared to white men.
The theorist takes note, up to this point, the figures have been
examined from the perspective of the rape victim. But taken from the
Black man’s perspective, white women are a large group of the American
population, while Black men are a relatively small one. For Black men,
63.3% of their rape accusers were white women. If Black men had 63.3% of
their sexual interactions with white women, then the accusations might
be fair, but this was far from the case.
The theorist surmised we could get an idea of how skewed the accusations
were looking at “interracial dating.” The theorist could not give a
figure for what percentage of the dates people went on were interracial.
Instead, the theorist surmised we could guess that it was similar to the
figures for the percentage of people in interracial marriages. Black men
married to white women accounted for 0.3% of total marriages in the
United States as of 1989. In 1989, less than 4% of Black married men
were married to white women, so we estimate that less than 4% of Black
men’s dating were with white women. Hence, less than 4% of accusations
faced by Black men should come from white women. Instead, the figure was
63.3%.(10)
The history of that story is the other side of sexual politics here in
America. An America where the LAPD and Oakland-PD have had 100s of
convictions overturned, due to incredibly, credible, false testimony of
police officers. A land where 15% of the Black population in Tulia,
Texas, were incarcerated by the incredibly, credible, testimony of a
single racist officer.(11) According to the San Quentin News, 139
prisoners nationwide were exonerated in 2017.(12)
Credible demeanor in testimony has never been foolproof. The National
Academy of Sciences, along with the FBI, have noted eyewitness testimony
is the most unreliable testimony.(13) While this would obviously be in
reference to witnesses testifying against strangers, but the juries
which wrongly convinced these defendants were doing so from witnesses
who were credible and convincing in their testimony. In 2013, 153 of the
268 exonerations by the Innocence Project were for rape.(14) 72% of all
DNA exonerations are people of color. Of the 72%, 61% are African
Americans.(15)
Theorists can clearly see, “I BELIEVE HER,” with its lock-in-step
demands of sisterhood, is classic emotional-feminist theory. What is the
emotional-feminist rationale to do away with “INNOCENT, UNTIL PROVEN
GUILTY”? Nor could emotional-theorists surmise they are not doing away
with this unitedly, American, idea. […] “I BELIEVE HER” is a
presumption-of-guilt, rather than the presumption-of-innocence that the
rational feminist are standing for, and for years have been arguing
against the emotional-feminist assault on process. While
emotional-feminism, with its well-heeled, racial, social, and economic
status is having the loudest voice, their marginalized sisters, whose
rational-feminist approach, is the only voice of hope for fathers,
brothers, husbands, and sons; a hope the other side doesn’t win the
debate.
While expressing full unity with MIM(Prisons), I feel compelled to also
urge those who say they are engaging in the fight against imperialism to
expand their reach. We are living within a time where the public is
realizing that prisons and other oppressive methods are doing more harm
than good. Campaigns are being launched throughout the world on behalf
of the rights of prisoners and the oppressed in general.
MIM(Prisons) encourages those struggling against imperialism to be
united no matter the group one may claim as long as it’s against
imperialism. We have a justice system that perpetuates the institution
of racism in this country through its targeting of the most marginalized
communities: people of color, women and the LGBT community. As one we
are more than they are and it’s time we realize this truth and act on it
NOW!
The public generally associates torture with physical violence; they
sometimes have a hard time accepting that there are equally brutal forms
of mental torture. It’s interesting, though. Back in the 1940s and 1950s
when stories came out about communist regimes holding prisoners in
isolation for very long periods of time, we had no problem calling that
torture.
We all have family and friends who can be our voice as well as a way and
means to destroy the system from within. If our family and friends were
employees at these prisons they would expose the ill treatment we are
receiving, and misconduct of the other prison officials. Shutting down
prisons should be a prisoner’s main focus. We must stop funding our
imprisonment by buying things from these prisons.
If the state has to pay they will soon run out of money as they are
doing in Louisiana, and now Louisiana is forced to release prisoners due
to lack of funds and the feds refuse to give them any more money.
Many may not share my views but one can not disagree that picking up the
torch after someone else or starting one’s own movement will be
rewarding. As I think about all of the movements and campaigns that have
been launched on behalf of prisoners or other oppressed people, I wonder
why these groups have not thought to get prison jobs in order to expose
the system. If they are fired or harassed because of it they can bring
suit over it. We must encourage this. ULK 51 ran an article about
a
Louisiana
correctional officer who exposed Winn Correctional Center.(1)
Changes were made and the private prison group lost its contract with
the state. So what I am suggesting works.
We must keep our minds on decarcerating our states by educating
ourselves and others of the root cause for incarceration and working
with others to create the ideal community. Create opportunities for this
place, get family, friends, and the community to participate and play
the role of developers. Its been proven over and again that when we
invest in ourselves, plan and build for ourselves, people thrive with
virtually no crime. If we are true champions of human rights and mean to
fulfill our constitutional guarantees of a more perfect union, then we
have a moral obligation to end prison slavery, overhaul our criminal
justice system and decarcerate by fighting the system from within the
system.
MIM(Prisons) responds: We want to expand on this comrade’s
comment about educating on the root cause for incarceration. This is a
critical point to understand. It’s definitely not profitable to lock up
so many people. In reality prisons in the United $tates are a tool of
social control, used mostly to keep oppressed nation lumpen in check. We
can win some critical battles against the criminal injustice system, but
we aren’t likely to end the mass incarceration until we take down
imperialism as a whole. The prison system is too tied up in U.$.
imperialist domestic policies.
This comrade brings up the interesting situation in Louisiana where
prison and state officials were threatening to release a third of the
prison population (10,000 prisoners) if the 2018 budget cuts were
implemented. Although there was a lot of news about this potential
“crisis” at the time, since then we found no follow up. Presumably the
state found the money to keep people locked up. In 2017 Louisiana
officials made similar threats, though on a smaller scale. Obviously
funding is necessary to keep prisoners locked up, but it seems that
Louisiana keeps finding enough money to keep their prison infrastructure
intact. We fully support prisoner boycotts and other financial attacks
on the system. But, as we explored in detail in ULK 60most
of the funding is already coming from the state budget so we need to
approach these battles with a clear understanding of the potential
impact.(2)
We agree with this comrade’s evaluation that people can thrive with no
crime. It is the capitalist patriarchal system that creates the current
culture of crime, and puts the biggest criminals in charge of murder,
rape and large scale theft around the world in the name of the
government. And so we would extend our moral obligation beyond ending
the criminal injustice system and to ending the imperialist system.
Finally, we want to comment on the “communist regimes holding prisoners
in isolation.” This is common anti-communist propaganda but we’re not
sure exactly what the author is talking about here. In the 1940s and 50s
over a third of the world’s people embarked on the socialist road. And
there is no doubt the Amerikan propaganda machine told lots of stories
about those countries’ evil behavior. In hindsight a lot of these
stories have been proven false.
In the case of China, the prisons were actually an example of a true
system of reeducation and rehabilitation. In fact, the entire country
undertook a reeducation campaign to remould individuals and the society
as a whole to serve the interests of the people rather than the
interests of profit. One example is shown in the book Prisoners of
Liberation by Allyn and Adele Rickett, where we see that their
conditions of confinement were different from conditions in U.$. prisons
in significant ways. They were housed with other prisoners, and not
isolated. They were provided with literature and newspapers, not cut off
from society. They were encouraged to expand their perspectives and grow
together, not to just watch TV and withdraw into themselves. And
ultimately they came out of prison praising the communist government in
China.
We are caught in a system of competitiveness, manipulation, one against
the other, brother against brother, family against family, people
against people, gangs against gangs, ethnic groups against ethnic
groups, color against color, class against class, instead of minority or
lower class against the ruling class.
We focus too much on meaningless self-imposed politics that were
manipulated into our minds growing up. Like ditch school, destroy your
own neighborhoods, sell drugs to your own people, we gang bang, we fight
our own over colors and sides only. The only way you can make it is by
rapping about killing your own people or selling drugs to your own. As a
Chicano I grew up not only hearing this from my peers but that’s also
what the music I was told to like and listen to said. The television
also told me my people are only on TV as gang bangers, drug dealers,
etc.
As I grew older I started to realize something is wrong here, where did
I go wrong? What have I done for myself? For my family? For my people?
Nothing but self-imposed distraction. I am soaking in my own blood and
that of my people. I got a hunger for knowledge. Why is it things are
the way they are?
The more I studied, the more I realized this is not new but a very old
cycle set up by a system to manipulate my mind. A system that went after
Martin L. King, a peaceful man, a pastor on his quest for civil rights.
The government unlawfully wired his phones, tried to break up his
family, tried to unlawfully disrupt his movement by all means to an end.
We’ve learned how the CIA was helping Pablo Escobar flood our streets
with drugs. How they dismantled and unlawfully disrupted the Brown
Berets and Black Panthers because they were trying to teach and uplift
the people; telling them there is a system in place to oppress you, know
and understand your rights, bear arms to protect your neighborhoods from
pig brutality. After both Brown Berets and Panthers fell our children
were open to assault by this system, poor schools, no jobs, drugs. Then
record labels signed groups who furthered the system’s wishes singing
and rapping, “kill your own,” “sell drugs,” “it’s cool to go to prison.”
Regardless of tribe, set, race, if you are classified as Security Threat
Group (STG) you are on the same boat as me. STG is a Homeland Security
term for a domestic terrorist. First rule in war, identify your enemy.
We have been identified and classified as enemies of the state. What
else is there to be said? Are we to continue letting our self-imposed
politics disrupt reality? Such insignificant things and views like
colors and sides or race hinder our lives? They can stop one arrow not a
hundred. There’s nothing wrong with being part of groups, families, etc.
But it is wrong when those groups lose focus of the message and cause.
It is not okay to soak in the blood of your own people, period.
Learn from our oppressor, they are some cold operators, they understand
the power of knowledge and education. The ruling class in the United
States is composed of men and their families who use ivy league
universities and elite law schools as private schools for their
offspring and as training grounds for their corporate livelihoods. They
rule us with iron precision through the military, the CIA, the FBI,
private foundations and financial institutions. Their control of all the
media of education and communication comprises an extremely effective
system of thought control.
We must learn from someone who defeated this system. Ho Chi Minh
understood the power of education. His mandated policy for his warriors
and cadres was spot on. Fighting and violence is easy. You must have
balance. You must be able to read and write, be able to teach others and
most importantly fully understand and be educated in your political
paradigm and why you are fighting.
Chicanos in Colorado are currently in a struggle for our true history.
We hunger for knowledge because that knowledge has ended all violence
between tribes, shown us our common interests, not the blind mentality
of colors and sides. We are currently under assault by Colorado
Department of Corrections, not allowing us to receive our real
education, stopping all education or history on the concept of Aztlán,
Chicano unity, Mexica movement, claiming it’s STG. Since when is history
and education a crime? Well for us, always.
If there is to be a movement, then there must be leaders. Those leaders
must be judged by their ability to give not take. Leadership must convey
confidence, not egotism, one who sacrifices, not one who is an
opportunist. Leadership is the act of using power to free people, not to
control them. It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor
the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.
MIM(Prisons) responds: The destruction of the Black Panther
Party, the flooding of cities with drugs, and the rejection of
literature on Chican@ history in prison are all manifestations of the
same system. This system seeks to peacefully control oppressed nations
by keeping them from learning about the history of this oppression and
the many examples of resistance. And when that fails it locks up the
oppressed, or even targets activists for death.
What can we do about this system with so much more power and resources
than we have as activists and anti-imperialists? The truth is our side
has more power; we have 80% of the world’s population, which is
exploited and oppressed by imperialism, on our side. The imperialists
are paper tigers, that appear fearsome, but in reality are propped up on
a fairly fragile structure of power.
That said, dismantling that structure will take a lot of organization,
trial and error. As this comrade points out, we need to focus on
education and fight to get true history into the hands of the oppressed.
And then we need leaders to step up and organize and educate others.
There is no special qualification for this leadership. Anyone who sees
the problems in the world around them can take up organizing others to
fight back. United Struggle from Within is an organization for these
leaders, and MIM(Prisons) supports USW organizers with literature and
resources. Get in touch today to get started with a local study group or
campaign against repression in your prison or elsewhere in the world.
The example(s) set down by the “People’s Machine” still resonate
today…within the hearts and minds of captives in particular, and
conscious folk out in “minimum security” (Amerikkka!) in general.
The blood of our revolutionary martyrs still stains the ground in San
Quentin, Soledad, Tracy, Attica, Angola, Jackson, Walla Walla, among
others! Their spirits call out to us…“Avenge Us”, they say! Can we hear
them? Truly?
Today being the day, 47 years ago! that the “Dragon” spit fire and in
turn, ran out of the adjustment center…to a revolutionary death! The
Amerikkkans thought that killing Comrade George, they would kill the
movement…WRONG!
Granted…the system of capitalism has been quite active in circumventing
our quest(s) for revolutionary change! As we ourselves have internalized
“gangsta” delusional fantasies…and in turn, became cannibals of our own!
Between the two lives the poor and oppressed masses! The have nots!
starving for freedom…starving for justice…starving for equality! Just
unsure of “how” to go about obtaining it?!
The fact that every issue of ULK that i have ever read has had at
least one prisoner submission that referenced Comrade George, speaks
volumes! At least to those who are truly conscious…These Brothas
identify with strength in these torture chambers, where broken men
abound! They want to be about more than lip service…it is on those of us
who know, to teach! and lead by example!
Comrade George, W.L. Nolen, Bill Christmas, Khaiari Gualden, others
unnamed, sacrifice their very lives for the cause of liberation! They
waged struggle in service of all of us behind the walls and we owe them,
period!
Today, i am deep in thought…examining my conditions and the cats i find
myself imprisoned with. And I am working…regardless of what the
Amerikkkans do to me: indeterminate SHU, death row, out of state moves,
even death! i shall continually strive to be the example of resistance
to those around me! Way i see it, i have absolutely nothing left to
lose…but my chains! Life in a cage is unacceptable…to a “Black Cat”! i
salute all of you Brothas in struggle with a clenched fist held high!
Thinking of the beloved Comrade G. i have blood in my eyes! Power to the
People!
Reification is a term that refers to using the labor power of the
people and in turn using it as a powerful force to keep them under
oppression.
The only way Texas can afford to keep 150,000 people imprisoned and
continue to give parole “set offs” after they are parole eligible by law
is through the use of forced labor to offset operating costs.
Theoretically speaking if TDCJ were forced by law to pay prisoner
workers through a new supreme court precedent, or if prisoners quit
participating in enslaving themselves, parole would be presumptive and
automatically granted at first eligibility.
Our freedom is at stake here, friends. That is why this issue is
absolutely vital. In Texas, per a 1993 law which was passed in reaction
to the 90s crack-cocaine-fueled crime wave, violent or aggravated
offenders must serve 1/2 their entire sentence before becoming parole
eligible. And often times after decades of dreams, hope, hard labor and
good behavior, alas many are given the dreaded “set off.” So much time
has elapsed that their momma has died, their support structures have
crumbled, and they have become old men in terrible health due to poor
diet, unable to gain meaningful employment, dreams are dashed. All their
efforts seem totally futile.
It reminds me of the book Animal Farm by George Orwell and how
they treat the work horse, Boxer. They push the old work horse to work
harder and harder for the revolution, promising him great comforts and
retirement benefits one day in the future. However the day comes when he
becomes so old and unable to work they send him off to slaughter at the
glue factory. TDCJ’s treatment of its prisoners is very analogous to
this. When will we wake up?
MIM(Prisons) responds: This is an interesting take on a theme
that we hear about constantly from our subscribers in Texas. This writer
is saying that if prisoners didn’t help offset the operational costs of
their own imprisonment, that TDCJ would be forced to release them
because it could no longer afford to keep so many people locked up.
There is a contradiction between the high costs to keep people in
prison, and the pressure applied to the criminal injustice system from
citizens who want to keep oppressed nations in check. Texas is one of
the most racist borderland states and has a very long history of
national oppression and white supremacy.(1) The call for harsher
sentences coinciding with the crack epidemic is simply a manifestation
of this racism. It’s not about fear of violence; it’s about fear of
Black violence.
TDCJ certainly would have a harder time financing its prison operations
if it actually had to pay prisoners for their labor. But if it started
releasing people because of these financial problems, we’d be hearing it
from the citizenry. We aren’t sure what lengths the state would go to to
appease its white constituency.
In fact, we have also heard countless reports of what TDCJ does when it
has “budget problems”: it makes conditions worse for the prisoners by
skipping rec time, medical call, and other duties it has to prisoners.
We have yet to receive a letter from someone saying that TDCJ has
started releasing prisoners due to budget problems.
The battle here isn’t between the prisoners getting paid for labor, and
the TDCJ not paying them. The battle is between the interests of the
oppressed nations who are housed in TDCJ prisons, with their entire
lives stolen from them, and the Amerikkkan nation which has a strong
material, social, and cultural interest in keeping these oppressed
nations locked up. If that battle manifests in a struggle for work to be
paid for in TDCJ, or for TDCJ to honor good time - work time credits in
releasing prisoners, then we are all for it. But we can’t lose sight of
this bigger contradiction, which is what the entire prisoner labor
struggle rests on.
This contradiction has always existed since the beginning of the
Amerikan nation, and even prior to that when it was still in
development. And it has only been heightened under the Trump presidency.
We aim to build our power so that we can overcome the contradiction, in
unity with oppressed peoples all over the world. Any struggle for paid
prisoner labor should primarily be a struggle to build our internal
unity and organizing.
Throughout the numerous issues of Under Lock & Key (ULK), we
have read countless articles detailing the unjust and inhumyn conditions
of imprisonment across U.$. prisons and jails. Many of these stories,
and the compelling analyses they entail, help shape and develop our
political consciousness. From the hunger strikes in California to the
rampant humyn rights’ violations in Texas on to the USW-led countrywide
grievance campaign, through the pages of ULK, we have shared our
organizing struggles, the successes and setbacks. As a result, our
clarity regarding the illegitimacy of the U.$. criminal (in)justice
system has sharpened tremendously.
And yet, there are some political and economic dimensions of our
imprisonment that seem to evade our critical gaze. It is not enough that
we become familiar with each others’ stories behind the walls. At some
point, we must move toward relating our collective organizing
experiences in prison to much broader struggles beyond prison. To this
end, the anti-prison movement(1) is but a necessary phase of national
liberation struggles that has serious implications for anti-imperialism.
And in order for the anti-prison movement to advance we must analyze all
sides of the mass incarceration question.
Many of us already understand that prisons function as tools of social
control. We also recognize that U.$. prisons are disproportionately
packed with oppressed nation lumpen, ostensibly because these groups
organized and led national liberation movements during the late-1960s to
mid-70s. After these movements succumbed to repression from U.$.
reactionary forces (COINTELPRO), the U.$. prison population rose
dramatically and then exploded, resulting in what we know today as mass
incarceration.(2) Thus, we see, in a very narrow way, the basis for why
U.$. prisons serve in neutralizing the existential threat posed by
oppressed nation lumpen.
But understanding the hystorical basis of mass incarceration is only one
part of the question. The other part is determining how the systematic
imprisonment of oppressed nation lumpen has developed over time, and
exploring its impact throughout that process. Because while the question
of mass incarceration may seem as formulaic as “national oppression
makes necessary the institutions of social control,” the reality is this
question is a bit more involved than mere physical imprisonment.
The latter point in no way opposes the analysis that the primary purpose
of mass incarceration is to deter oppressed nation lumpen from
revolutionary organizing. In fact, the political and economic dimensions
of mass incarceration described and analyzed later in this article
function in the same capacity as prison bars – in some instances, the
bonds of poverty and systemic marginalization, or the racist and
white-supremacist ideology that criminalizes and stigmatizes oppressed
nation lumpen are just as strong as the physical bonds of imprisonment.
If oppressed nation communities, particularly lumpen communities, are
kept in a perpetual state of destabilization, disorganization, and
distraction, then these groups will find it that much harder to
effectively organize against a status quo that oppresses them.
The point of this article is thus to widen the panorama of our
understanding, to take in those political and economic dimensions of
mass incarceration that too often go unnoticed and unexamined, but are
nonetheless important in determining the line and strategy necessary to
advance the anti-prison movement.
Partial Integration Set the Table for Mass Incarceration
As pointed out above, mass incarceration deters oppressed nation lumpen
from revolutionary organizing. But what does this analysis really mean
in today’s context of the national question? How does the prevention of
oppressed nation lumpen from organizing for national liberation impact
the national contradiction; that is, the contradiction between the
Euro-Amerikan oppressor nation-state and the U.$. internal oppressed
nations and semi-colonies?
The lumpen-driven liberation movements of past were, in part, strong
rebukes against the integrationist Civil Rights movement (which of
course was led by the bourgeoisie/petty-bourgeoisie of oppressed
nations). Thus we see the partial integration agenda as an alliance and
compromise between the Euro-Amerikan oppressor nation-state (its ruling
class) and the comprador bourgeoisie of oppressed nations. It is meant
to answer the national question set forth by the earlier protest
movements (revolutionary and progressive) of oppressed nations, on one
hand, and to ease tensions inherent in the national contradiction, on
the other hand.
In exchange for open access to political power and persynal wealth, the
comprador bourgeoisie was tasked with keeping their lumpen communities
in check. To this point, it was thought that if Black and Brown faces
ruled over Black and Brown places, then much of the radical protest and
unrest that characterized the period between the mid-60s to mid-70s
would be quelled.
This is the very premise of identity politics, and, as
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor aptly notes: electing leaders of oppressed
nations into political office does not change the dire material and
socioeconomic circumstances of the communities they represent.(3) In eir
book, From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation, Taylor goes on
to describe the failure of partial integration (and identity politics)
with respect to the New Afrikan nation,(4) contending:
“The pursuit of Black electoral power became one of the principal
strategies that emerged from the Black Power era. Clearly it has been
successful for some. But the continuing crises for Black people, from
under-resourced schools to police murder, expose the extreme limitations
of that strategy. The ascendance of Black electoral politics also
dramatizes how class differences can lead to different political
strategies in the fight for Black liberation. There have always been
class differences among [New Afrikans], but this is the first time those
class differences have been expressed in the form of a minority of
Blacks wielding significant political power and authority over the
majority of Black lives.”(5)
Here we see Taylor describes the inability of partial integration to
remedy the plight of the entire New Afrikan nation and its communities.
Ey also articulates very precisely the internal class divisions of New
Afrika brought to light by such an opportunistic agenda, which serves to
enforce and maintain semi-colonialism. There is a reason why the
Euro-Amerikan oppressor nation-state allied with the comprador
bourgeoisie, as their interests were (and are) clearly more aligned than
conflicting, given the circumstances. Where the
bourgeois/petty-bourgeois integrationists wanted access to capitalist
society, the lumpen and some sections of the working class of oppressed
nations saw their future in their liberation from U.$. imperialist
society – two very different “political strategies” reflective of
somewhat contentious “class differences.”
Furthermore, Taylor highlights the moral bankruptcy of partial
integration (and identity politics) with the contemporary lesson of
Freddie Gray’s tragic murder and the Baltimore uprising that followed.
Ey explains, “when a Black mayor, governing a largely Black city, aids
in the mobilization of a military unit led by a Black woman to suppress
a Black rebellion, we are in a new period of the Black freedom
struggle.”(6) This “new period” that Taylor speaks of is nothing more
than good-ole neo-colonialism.
To elaborate further, an understanding of the Baltimore uprising, for
example, cannot be reduced down to a single incident of police murder.
Let’s be clear, New Afrikan lumpen (and youth) took to the streets of
Baltimore in protest and frustration of conditions that had been
festering for years – conditions that have only grown worse since the
end of the “Black Power era.” Obviously, the political strategy of
identity politics (i.e. “the pursuit of Black electoral power”) has not
led to “Black liberation.” Instead it has resulted in an intensification
of class tensions internal to the U.$. oppressed nation (in this case,
New Afrika), as well as increased state repression of oppressed nation
lumpen.
This latter point is evidenced by the support of policies from the
Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) that target, disrupt, and imprison
oppressed nation communities (lumpen communities).(7) At the same time
that these communities struggled under the weight of economic divestment
and merciless marginalization, conditions which in many respects
worsened under the political leadership of the comprador bourgeoisie,
the drug trade opened up, providing a precarious means of survival.
Predictably, as “crime”(8) increased so too did the creation and
implementation of criminal civil legislation that fueled mass
incarceration. To really get a sense of the true interests of the
comprador bourgeoisie of oppressed nations, we only need to look at the
positions taken by the CBC, the so-called champions of freedom,
equality, and justice, which “cosponsored conservative law-and-order
politics out of not political weakness but entrenchment in Beltway
politics.”(9) It is clear that partial integration has been “successful
for some,” but it is equally apparent who the victims of this
opportunistic agenda have been.
What is often missed in any serious and sober analysis of the CBC (or
any other political org. representative of the comprador bourgeoisie) is
the legitimacy it bestows upon the prison house of nations: U.$.
imperialist society. This legitimacy isn’t some figment of imagination,
but a material reality expressed primarily in the class-nation alliance
signified by the partial integration agenda. Dialectically, while the
comprador bourgeoisie is granted the privileges of “whiteness,” access
to political and economic power, the lumpen and some sections of the
working class of oppressed nations are deemed superfluous (not
necessary) for the production and reproduction of U.$. imperialist
society. Of course, the election of more members of oppressed nations
into office goes a long way in maintaining the facade that the United
$tates is a free and open society that respects and upholds the rights
and liberties of its citizenry. However, identity politics will never
obscure the sacrificial zones within U.$. society -– South and Westside
Chicago, Eastside Baltimore, Compton and South Central and East Los
Angeles, and many more deprived urban lumpen areas –- maintained and, in
many cases, made worse by partial integration.
Unfortunately, this is where we find the oppressed nation lumpen today
on the national question, held hostage by a set of identity politics
complicit in its further marginalization and oppression.
Politics of Mass Incarceration
In discussing the failure of partial integration to effectively improve
the material and socioeconomic life of the entire oppressed nation, we
can better appreciate the extreme limitations of such an anemic
political strategy that is identity politics. But if the legitimacy that
partial integration (and identity politics) provides U.$. society can
only go so far in actually pacifying oppressed nation lumpen, then by
what other means and methods are these superfluous groups controlled? In
the next two sections, we will explore and analyze this question.
Racism and white supremacy are constant ideological threads woven
throughout the founding and development of U.$. society. In each era, be
it slavery, segregation, or mass incarceration today, the primary
function of this political ideology is to rationalize and legitimate the
oppression and/or exploitation of colonized peoples, which throughout
these different eras invariably involved employing particular methods of
social control against these peoples or specific groups thereof.
Now, of course, we cannot compare the fundamental nature of slavery with
that of mass incarceration. And to be clear, this is not the point of
this particular section. It should be obvious to the casual ULK
reader that where the slave performed an essential economic role and was
therein exploited and oppressed, oppressed nation lumpen have no role
within the current socioeconomic order of U.$. society, as it is
systematically denied access to it. The point, however, is to show how
the ideological forces of racism and white supremacy, while they have
assumed different forms depending on the historical era, are mobilized
in service of the status quo. It is in this sense that political
motivations underpin the system of mass incarceration. And as we will
see in this section, these motivations are hystorically tied to the
oppression and/or exploitation of U.$. internal oppressed nations and
semi-colonies.
To be sure, the need to control oppressed nations has always been a
paramount concern of the oppressor (settler) nation since
settler-colonialism. During the era of slavery, slave codes were
implemented to ensure that slaves were held in check, while slave
patrols were formed to enforce these measures. We see here the emergence
of the modern U.$. criminal (in)justice system in its nascent form, with
its proto-police and proto-criminal laws. But it wasn’t until after the
abolition of slavery that we find express political motivations to
criminalize oppressed nations. For Angela Y. Davis,
“Race [nation] has always played a central role in constructing
presumptions of criminality … former slave states passed new legislation
revising the slave codes in order to regulate the behavior of free
blacks in ways similar to those that had existed during slavery. The new
Black Codes proscribed a range of actions … that were criminalized only
when the person charged was black.”(10)
While the Black Codes were created in large part to control New Afrikan
labor for continued exploitation, we are able to see the formation of
policies and policing designed for the specific purpose of repressing
oppressed nations. As a side note, irony doesn’t begin to describe the
enactment of the Thirteenth Amendment, meant to abolish slavery, to
disestablish one system of oppression only to provide for the legal and
political basis for another system of oppression -– convict lease labor.
Furthermore, Davis observes that, “The racialization of crime – the
tendency to ‘impute crime to color’ … did not wither away as the country
became increasingly removed from slavery. Proof that crime continues to
be imputed to color resides in the many evocations of ‘racial profiling’
in our time.”(11) In this sense, oppressed nation lumpen criminality
under conditions of mass incarceration is analogous to Afrikan
“inferiority” or First Nation “savagery” under conditions of
settler-colonialism. In both instances, there are narratives, informed
by racism and white supremacy, which serve the continued functioning of
the status quo.
Given that the criminalization of oppressed nations is not some modern
phenomenon, but one that originated in the hystorical oppression and
exploitation of oppressed nations, we now have a different angle from
which to view mass incarceration. Part of this view involves recognizing
that the criminal (in)justice system, law enforcement, and legislators
are not neutral arbiters of justice or “law and order.” These people and
institutions are infected by racism and white supremacy and thus
function to carry out ideological and political aims.
Therefore, it is important that we remain diligent in uncovering the
many guises under which racism and white supremacy lurk and hide. This
is no less significant today as it is in the cultural arena where
reactionary ideas and ideologies are propagated and traded. To be more
clear, when trying to rationalize why oppressed nation lumpen are
imprisoned at disproportionate rates relative to similarly-situated
Euro-Amerikans, arguments about lack of responsibility and no work ethic
are tossed around as explanations. Mainstream media go even further by
portraying and projecting stereotypes about oppressed nation lumpen (and
youth), that is to say, stereotyping the dress, talk, and actions, which
is really a subtle but sophisticated way of stigmatizing. Of course,
this stigmatization goes on to construct a criminal archetype, which
many of us see today in nearly every facet of U.$. media life.
All of these factors, taken into consideration together, shape the
public conscience on “crime” and criminality, laying the groundwork for
rationalizing the great disparities characteristic of the current
criminal (in)justice system. Unsurprisingly, this propaganda has worked
so effectively that even oppressed nation members find it hard to
ignore. So where there should be unity on issues/incidences of national
oppression, none exists, because the oppressed nation is divided,
usually along class lines. Taylor strikes at the heart of the
matter:
“Blaming Black culture not only deflects investigation into the systemic
causes of Black inequality but has also been widely absorbed by [New
Afrikans] as well. Their acceptance of the dominant narrative that
blames Blacks for their own oppression is one explanation for the delay
in the development of a new Black movement.”(12)
This is certainly the plan of partial integration, to divide the
oppressed nation against itself and thereby legitimize the
marginalization and oppression of oppressed nation lumpen in the
process. Naturally, this paralyzes the oppressed nation from acting on
its right to self-determination, from pursuing liberation.
To frame this point another way, take a Chican@ business owner. This
persyn has a business in a predominantly Chican@ lumpen community,
despite residing in the suburbs. This business owner sees Chican@ youth
hang out and skip school. Ey sees them engaged in questionable, possibly
criminal activity. Add in the scenario that local media frames crime as
a virtue of Chican@ lumpen youth on a nightly basis. And then say one
day one of those Chican@ kids is killed by the police. How will the
Chican@ business owner respond?
Before the era of mass incarceration, the overwhelming majority of the
oppressed nation would have viewed this scenario for what it was: a
police murder. Today, we cannot be so sure.
To sum up, the current criminal (in)justice system, law enforcements,
etc. are unfair and unjust not because these institutions are biased
against oppressed nations, but because the fundamental nature of
society, the basis upon which these institutions are built and set in
motion, is founded on the oppression of non-white peoples. We must
remember that slavery was legal and segregation was held up as
permissible by the highest courts in this stolen land. For us to view
mass incarceration solely from the social control perspective undermines
any appreciation for the urgency of anti-imperialism, for the need for a
reinvigoration of U.$. national liberation struggles. We need to be more
nuanced in our analysis because the system is nuanced in its
marginalization and oppression of oppressed nation lumpen.
Economics of Mass Incarceration
This nuance mentioned above is primarily played out on an economic
plane. And there are many economic dimensions and impacts of mass
incarceration that maintain a strangle hold on oppressed nation lumpen
and communities.
We can explore how contact with the criminal (in)justice system can
leave an oppressed nation member and eir family destitute, through fees,
fines, and other forms of financial obligations. We can look at the
impact of prisons located in rural communities, providing employment
opportunities and economic stimulus. We could even investigate prison
industries and how prisoner labor is utilized to offset the costs of
incarceration. However, the point here is that there are many things to
analyze, all of which, taken as a whole, disadvantage oppressed nation
lumpen and their communities.
The most consequential impact of mass incarceration is how it feeds the
cycle of poverty and marginalization characteristic of lumpen
communities. Basically, the criminalization / stigmatization of lumpen
reinforces its material deprivation, which in turn nurtures conditions
of criminal activity as a means of survival, further unleashing the
repressive forces of the criminal (in)justice system, which proves or
validates the criminalization / stigmatization of oppressed nation
lumpen in the first place. Thus, oppressed nation lumpen are inarguably
subjected doubly to the poverty and marginalization, on one hand, and to
the relentless blows of national oppression, on the other hand.
Todd Clear, provost of Rutgers University – Newark, who specializes
in the study of criminal justice, draws a stark picture of this cycle of
crime and poverty that lumpen are subjected to:
“A number of the men are gone at any time; they’re locked up. And then
the men that are there are not able to produce income, to support
families, to support children, to buy goods, to make the neighborhood
have economic activity, to support businesses … the net effect of rates
of incarceration is that the neighborhood has trouble adjusting.
Neighborhoods where there’s limited economic activity around the
legitimate market are neighborhoods where you have a ripeness to grow
illegitimate markets.”(13)
What Clear is depicting is not so much the fact that crimes take place
in lumpen communities. Clear is emphasizing that criminogenic factors
(factors that strongly tend to lead to criminal activity/inclination)
are really a reflection of the lack of socioeconomic opportunities to
social upward mobility. This is the essence that fuels the dynamic
relationship between crime and poverty. What Clear fails to mention is
that there are Euro-Amerikans who are in similarly-situated
circumstances as oppressed nation lumpen but are more likely to escape
them where oppressed nation lumpen are trapped. This is so for reasons
already mentioned in the above sections.
Furthermore, not everyone in lumpen communities are imprisoned; in fact,
most likely never see the inside of a jail or prison. But enough people
do go away and stay away for a considerable period of time that the
community is destabilized, and familial bonds are ruptured. When free,
the imprisoned persyn from the lumpen community represented some sort of
income, and not a liability weighing down a family, financially,
morally, etc, already struggling to make ends meet. Enough of these
families are part of the lumpen community that the cycle mentioned above
seems to be unbreakable. Kids growing up in broken homes, forced to
assume adult roles, only to make kid mistakes that come with adult
consequences; and the cycle continues.
To be sure, this cycle has been in force with respect to oppressed
nations since the end of slavery. It has just become necessary over time
to enact laws and policies that now target and disrupt these
communities. Both the politics and economics of mass incarceration work
to keep lumpen communities from organizing for national liberation as
was done during the late-60s.
Conclusion
Part of any strategy related to our anti-prison movement is first
recognizing these dimensions of mass incarceration, and taking into
account that we live in enemy society where enemy consciousness
prevails, even amongst much of the oppressed nations. We have to also
recognize that the interests of oppressed nation lumpen are not the same
as the other classes of the oppressed nation. There are some members of
the oppressed nations who have bought the bill of goods sold by partial
integration. They are fully immersed in the delusions of identity
politics, subtly sacrificing their true identity for the trinkets of
“whiteness.”
Understanding and recognizing these points means we can focus our
organizing efforts on building public opinion and independent
institutions, on a concrete class/nation analysis and not because
someone is Black or Brown. We need to be patient with lumpen communities
as they are in that day-to-day grind of survival and may not (or cannot)
see the merit in our movement. Ultimately, we need to step up and be
those leaders of the movement, so when we do touch we hit the ground
running.