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If I believe in prison abolition, and I do, I don’t get to shift my philosophy when it suits me
I’ve been listening to them talk about 40 years for Lori Loughlin, a person I don’t think I’ve ever spent 10 seconds thinking about before this. I understand the outrage and frustration. Black parents have been thrown in jail for lying about where they lived so their children could attend a better public school. I understand the vulgarity of privilege and have been hurt by it. Often white women who do not acknowledge that privilege have been the very heart of that harm.
But if I believe in prison abolition, and I do, then I don’t get the option of shifting my philosophy when it suits me. Either I have a principle, or I don’t. Either I believe in transformative justice, which centers the idea that no member of society exists in a vacuum or external to that society and addressing a harm must not be grounded in individual revenge but returning all involved, including the broader community, to whole. Prisons and jails are a failed, lazy response to social disruptions. No matter what the crime. All these people doing time and every harm still stalks us: sexual assault, murder, larceny. Whatever.
I’m interested in working with people who are less about turning up and more about turning in, considering what is needed to have a society where equity and health and compassion and safety and joy are the norm. And yet even from people who say they honor these things, I more hear anger and revenge, emotions I understand well, but ones that I refuse to allow guide any decision I make or position I take.
(Image Credit: Empty Cages Design)
The latest bandwagon of anti-abortion bills in the US: Heartbeat or heartless?
The “heartbeat bill,” a euphemism for a fetus endowed with life, conjures in people’s minds the villains of mother and, in some cases, the State, murdering the person in the womb. Since Roe v Wade, the anti-abortion movement in the U.S has launched strategies to establish the personhood of the fetus. Numerous initiatives over the […]
Stop championing New Jersey as progressive: State and local politics are still a catastrophe
The state of New Jersey sure is getting a lot of hype to it; I haven’t been able to look at news articles about the state without some praise from progressive media about the great things New Jersey is accomplishing, now that Christie got the boot and Murphy got the in. There’s the minimum wage […]
What happened to Cherdeena Wynne? Nothing. An Aboriginal woman died in police custody
Cherdeena Wynne In Western Australia, yet another Aboriginal woman died in police custody. Cherdeena Wynne was 26 years old, mother of three children, living with mental illness. According to Shirley Wynne, Cherdeena Wynne’s mother, at 3:30 on April 4, eight police officers entered Shirley Wynne’s home and, in the dark, wrestled Cherdeena Wynne to the […]
Death and teaching in Paris
Après les angoisses du début d’annéeT’as travaillé trois mois, toujours pas payéeEt les heures supprimées, pas rémunéréesT’auras pas de contrat, c’est l’EtatN’attends pas le syndicat, il est pas làGare à toi, sois toujours sympaC’est le règne de l’arbitraire, du pouvoir discrétionnaireSi ça te plaît pas, tu peux rentrer chez ta mèreTu comprends pas, ouvre le […]
Don’t Bogart this country!
Don’t Bogart this country! No more room in the inn? Conservative Christians know just what Jesus would do, They just ain’t doin’ it. I mean: they just ain’t doin’What was done for Jesus. Dorothy Day, and Father Daniel Berrigan we miss you. We miss you and so many others. If I had a hammer. These angry […]
It’s time to talk about mental illness and police brutality
Andrew Casciano It was only supposed to be a simple call. Police in Paterson, NJ, were assisting in a phone call for a suicide attempt, and had met the victim at the St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Paterson, a little over a year ago. Later, as video emerged from the two police officers’ own recorded […]
Women’s Studies: A Threat to The Political Right-Wing?
On March 12th, the University Grants Commission (UGC), the statutory body in charge of determining and maintaining the standards of higher education in India, released new guidelines that drastically cut funds up to 40% for Women Studies Centers across the nation. Why is Women’s Studies (WS) the target of the current government? How does the […]
Neoliberals: stop co-opting our symbols!
Neoliberals: stop co-opting our symbols! Next thing you know they will be emulating the Last Poets, the progenitors of Gil Scott Heron. The Revolution Will Not Be Broadcast on Social Media; and, will not be represented by yellow stars on the arms of antivaxxers The revolution will not have very fine people on both sides. […]
Baby Jane Allas, Moe Moe Than, Milagros Tecson Comilang, Desiree Rante Luis: Today’s faces of abuse of domestic workers
Mary Ann Allas and Baby Jane Allas In 2014, former domestic worker Erwiana Sulistyaningsih stood before a gathering of women and gave witness to the horrors she had endured: “My name is Erwiana Sulistyaningsih. I am 23 years old, and come from a poor peasant family of Indonesia and am a former domestic worker from […]
Just like
Just like Just likea dictator-past(apartheid-military style)finger erect finger erect(a Freudian slippage)taking the moralhigh on power previously she warnedbeware the elderlya political hack competingfoot-in-mouth with others in election-time no doubt she’ll sayno journalist here wastortured or murdered (yet)as we’ve seen recentlyout at the Saudi consulate finger erectit can lose you votesyou might need greatlyin the hawking season […]