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Cliff Notes version of The New Jim Crow
Last edited Tue Feb 28, 2023, 11:56 AM - Edit history (3)
https://www.tiktok.com/@dannyfcollins/video/7201489130516253998&t=10s
Convicted felon and former baseball player Danny Collins released from prison June 15, 2021, confronted his racism and that of others while incarcerated and now uses Instagram @confessionsofaconvict and TikTok to fight for prison reform.
TikTok: “What did I see that changed my perspective on our criminal justice system? …So a person of color in the United States during the (post-slavery) Jim Crow era faced: disenfranchisement, second class citizenship, barriers to: voting … education … employment and … housing. Then the United states passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act that said that we can no longer discriminate (regarding the barriers) based on skin color.
In 2021 what is the only label that we can legally discriminate … legally disenfranchise, relegate to second class citizenship and erect (supposedly removed) barriers to voting … education … employment ... housing? … convicted felons are the only people we are allowed to legally disenfranchise.
Now do you believe it's a coincidence that one in three African Americans males now carry this label of convicted felon as opposed to one and 17 white males?
… between the Jim Crow era and 2021 we've had a 700% increase in US prison population … from 300,000 inmates in 1970 to 1.8 million today and as high as 2.3 million. In spite of crime rates dropping, our prison population skyrocketed and it was because we had the Law and Order Agenda … increased police spending but decreased education funding … we created this school to prison pipeline. The war on drugs we now know was a war on people. In 1986 the Anti Drug Abuse Act differentiated between powder cocaine and hard cocaine which we now know disproportionately impacted people of color. We also had the 94 Crime Bill with the Truth In Sentencing Act which led to higher incarceration rates and harsher sentences for people of color.
Once I saw all this my perspective changed because I know the Jim Crow era never ended, racism never ended, it just evolved. It's … the new Jim Crow, modern day slavery.”