Are Prisons Obsolete Analysis

“When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, and you knew exactly who they were. It was us versus them, and it was clear who them was. Today, we are not sure who they are, but we know they’re there” (George W. Bush). The words of the former President Bush clearly highlight the fear of the enemy that it is often referred to as the “other.” The fear that someone threatens safety makes people constantly surveil those around them, especially those who are different from them. It is fear that makes people gullible to believe in the negative stereotypes that revolve around the “others.” Thus, making the oppression of this group to be acceptable for the sake of their security. In “No Justice for Trayvon: White Women in the Jury Box,” Monica
In her article, she comments that “on the whole, people tend to take prisons for granted. It is difficult to imagine life without them” (Davis 15). Going back to Grewal’s argument, prisons are built with the purpose to ensure the safety of society. For security reasons, people tend to blindly trust the justice system, in the hopes that crimes will stop. One perfect example that shows the blind trust towards the criminal justice system is when Casper asks a white woman about the unfairness of the Zimmerman verdict, and in response the white women comments, “We need to trust the justice system” (Casper). George Zimmerman was found not guilty for the death of Martin Trayvon, a seventeen- year-old African-American high school student, who didn’t do anything other than looking suspicious in the eyes of the law enforcement. This again, goes back to the binary system of the “Us” versus “Them,” portraying delinquents as people of color. The mentally that criminals are people of color allows law enforcement to use racial profiling or suspecting of someone having committed a crime based on their race and ethnicity. Thus, people of color who live in poverty end up being the victims of
This is when privilege determines who is the “Us,” and who is the “Them.” In “A Question of Class,” Dorothy Allison shares her struggles as a lesbian coming from a low-income background. She expresses that being poor label her as the “other.” However, her white privilege makes her have more opportunities compared to her black peers. Allison argues that “The horror of class stratification, racism, and prejudice is that some people begin to believe that the security of their families and communities depends on the oppression of others, that for some to have good lives, there must be others whose lives are truncated and brutal” (Allison 35). Based on her experience, she observes that people, in order to keep or protect their privilege, have to oppress the