Slavery In America Today
Slavery In America Today
Slavery still has effects that can be seen today. Although abolition has formally ended slavery, it can still be seen in many respects of our world today. Slavery is engraved into United States history and was one of the things that the United States was built on. Due to the end of formal slavery in the 1800s it found new shapes in the prejudice of segregation which lived on for another hundred years. There are people still alive today who can remember a time where such prejudice was institutionalized and can see how it is still rampant in society today. The wounds of half a millennia are not healed in the course of half a lifetime. Slavery can be seen in ways more obvious such as the prison system. Slavery can also …show more content…
Holding 25% of the world’s incarcerated people and only having 5% of the world’s population (Wagner, Prison Policy Initiative). This is mainly due to minor drug crimes. In the federal prison system 48.6% (207,847 people) of the incarcerated people are there due to drug crimes, most of which being minor possession (Williams, The New York Times). Generally the most dangerous part of the drug crimes is being caught with them. Once a person is incarcerated for a minor drug crime the odds are that they will become more involved with crime due to being imprisoned for it. An example of this in literature is seen in James Baldwin’s book Sunny Blues when the narrator says, “You mean – they'll let him out. And then he'll just start working his way back in again. You mean he'll never kick the habit. Is that what you mean?”(Baldwin, Sonny's Blues) .This quote is where the narrator is talking about Sunny and his drug habit and what will happen now that he is out of prison. This shows a man who is not faithful in the American prison system with rehabilitating his brother. The narrator sees the solution as sunny staying in prison rather than rehabilitation. It is that idea of thinking that holds back the prison system in the United States. Numerous other countries such as Spain have seen crime go significantly down since decriminalizing drug use. The prison system has been constructed as a trap for the impoverished. We see this in the 100:1 law where the possession of 1g of crack was equal to 100 g of cocaine which was made to single out the poorer communities for basically the same substance (American Civil Liberties Union). The trap of the system is most apparent when a person gets out of prison to find that they cannot get a job above minimum wage due to their minor infraction of the law which keeps you either impoverished or make them turn to crime. A dramatic representation of this is in the 1983 film Trading
Slavery still has effects that can be seen today. Although abolition has formally ended slavery, it can still be seen in many respects of our world today. Slavery is engraved into United States history and was one of the things that the United States was built on. Due to the end of formal slavery in the 1800s it found new shapes in the prejudice of segregation which lived on for another hundred years. There are people still alive today who can remember a time where such prejudice was institutionalized and can see how it is still rampant in society today. The wounds of half a millennia are not healed in the course of half a lifetime. Slavery can be seen in ways more obvious such as the prison system. Slavery can also …show more content…
Holding 25% of the world’s incarcerated people and only having 5% of the world’s population (Wagner, Prison Policy Initiative). This is mainly due to minor drug crimes. In the federal prison system 48.6% (207,847 people) of the incarcerated people are there due to drug crimes, most of which being minor possession (Williams, The New York Times). Generally the most dangerous part of the drug crimes is being caught with them. Once a person is incarcerated for a minor drug crime the odds are that they will become more involved with crime due to being imprisoned for it. An example of this in literature is seen in James Baldwin’s book Sunny Blues when the narrator says, “You mean – they'll let him out. And then he'll just start working his way back in again. You mean he'll never kick the habit. Is that what you mean?”(Baldwin, Sonny's Blues) .This quote is where the narrator is talking about Sunny and his drug habit and what will happen now that he is out of prison. This shows a man who is not faithful in the American prison system with rehabilitating his brother. The narrator sees the solution as sunny staying in prison rather than rehabilitation. It is that idea of thinking that holds back the prison system in the United States. Numerous other countries such as Spain have seen crime go significantly down since decriminalizing drug use. The prison system has been constructed as a trap for the impoverished. We see this in the 100:1 law where the possession of 1g of crack was equal to 100 g of cocaine which was made to single out the poorer communities for basically the same substance (American Civil Liberties Union). The trap of the system is most apparent when a person gets out of prison to find that they cannot get a job above minimum wage due to their minor infraction of the law which keeps you either impoverished or make them turn to crime. A dramatic representation of this is in the 1983 film Trading