The "Prison Industrial Complex" Slavery in the 21st Century: The Black Holocaust
By: Yasir Khalid
First let me say that I'm happy to write after my extended sabbatical.
I thank you for your patience, for reading the blogs that were previously posted and for looking at the ARC site in
general. The staff writers at ARC have committed to writing one blog every other month. We will do our level best
to honor this commitment: however, we need your feed-back. It's important to us to know your position on our blogs,
and we welcome any comments or criticism. Again thanks for your patience. I'm happy to be "write" with
you, and since I have the "write" of way, let's get started.
Although African-Americans
represent only 13% of the US population and 13% of the drug users in this country, African-Americans make up 38% of those
arrested for drug offenses and 59% of those convicted for drug offenses according to the Drug Policy Alliance, an independent
non-profit organization that monitors racial disparities in the "criminal justice" system. These alarming
statistics have led critics of racial policy as it relates to the war on drugs to coin the phrase the "New Jim Crow".
This observation lends credence to the reality that racial policies and the results of their implementation in this country
have created a "21st Century Black Holocaust". The higher arrest rates of African-Americans does not reflect
a higher abuse rate, it only reflects a racial disparity in the "criminal justice system" in America. African-Americans
in general are four times more likely to be arrested than Euro-Americans. Once arrested, African-Americans are less likely
to post bail, and more likely to be sentenced for a much longer time than Euro-Americans.
Recently, I had the unpleasant experience of accompanying a young African-American brother to a bond hearing.
This brother had an outstanding warrant that he sensed was floating, however when he did several searches it did'nt show up,
according to him. The charge was possession of marijuana with the intent to distribute. His apartment was searched
in his absence. Let me say this before I go any further: I do not endorse any criminal activity. What I'm
expressing here is how the deck is stacked against African-Americans when they enter into the "criminal justice system".
This brother was alerted by his roommate that the apartment had been searched, and that he (the roommate) had been charged.
Later the roommate's case was thrown out of court. The brother that I accompanied hired a lawyer, and the lawyer
was able to locate the warrant, and the lawyer advised the brother to turn himself in which he did the very next day. After
securing a bondsman, we were told to meet some detective at the courthouse and he had the warrant. The next step was
to go before a commissioner so the amount of the bond could be set. This young brother had no prior arrests. I
had a talk with the bondsman who gave me his opinion on related cases and what he estimated that the bond would be; he said
he couldn't see the bond exceeding $10,000. He was way off, for the bond was set for this young brother at $150,000.
The commissioner, a white woman, was overheard saying "he thinks he's going home, but he better think again" and
she had a smirk on her face. Thank God we were able to post bail (In case you don't know, a bail bondsman's fee is 10%
of the bond). How many people can raise $15,000? The amount of his bond was more than that of some people who
have been charged with double homicides. This is the US "criminal justice system".
The best known example of inequality in sentencing is the disparity between crack cocaine (the cheap drug
that was dumped into the African-American community for genocidal purposes, I suspect by Whites representing the US government)
and powdered cocaine, the drug of choice for the rich. Crack cocaine and powdered cocaine have the same active ingredients,
however crack is cheap and is primarily marketed in the lower income communities, better known as the "ghetto".
A five gram sale of crack cocaine receives a five-year mandatory sentence. This is the same sentence one would receive
for the sale of 500 grams of powdered cocaine. This is half-way justice. It's really telling me that Whites (who
represent most of the rich) get special privileges, and Blacks (who represent most of the poor have no value in America and
can be treated today like the slaves in the 1800s were treated. Will it be the return of the rope? America "the
land of the free" whose policies the world in the name of justice and democracy, has as a matter of policy put a system
in place that renders flagrant injustice to her 21st century slaves who are descendants of her 19th century slaves who built
America with their blood, sweat, and tears. Will the shackles ever be removed? The "Prison Industrial Complex"
is closely connected to institutionalized racism. Malcolm X said "Capitalism is racism," and I truly believe that
statement to be true. When we look at who controls the resources and how they use them to make sure the poor and the
uneducated never get an opportunity in this country. When you have a situation where the same people continue to perpetuate
"White Supremacy", then I have no choice but to agree with Malcolm.
Dr. Martin Luther
King warned America about three things that she should pay close attention to:
*
Materialism
* Militarism
* Racism
These
three institutions have caused and continue to cause undue grief in this country. The culture in America has become a "culture
of greed", and "survival of the slickest". In 1986 before the federal enactment of mandatory sentencing
for crack cocaine, the average federal drug sentencing for African-Americans was 11% higher than for whites. Four years
later, the average federal drug sentence for African-Americans was 49% higher, according to the Drug Policy Alliance.
The reason I'm giving information relative to the incarceration of African-Americans for drug offenses is because that's the
leading cause for arrests of African-Americans, especially African-American males. It has been reported in the media
that one in nine African-American males between the ages of 20-34 is in prison, compared to one in thirty of white Americans.
If this is not 21st century slavery and a Black American Holocaust, please inform me as to what it is. These statistics are
alarming to me. The question must be asked, are our black youth and black men becoming an endangered population? Let's
not forget that our future lies in our youth. Our brothers at these ages should be in college, starting families, and
making contributions to their respective communities and to society in general. Instead they are being cordoned off
and warehoused in the penal institutions and are being made 21st century slaves.
Before I elaborate on exactly how our brothers and sisters are exploited behind bars,
I want to mention a phrase that has been coined by some white"intellectual" that has tried to subtly suggest that
the incarceration of Black youth is inevitable. The phrase is the "dumbing" down of America's youth. The powers
that be, the policy makers, the lobbyists for private prisons, try to justify their policy of enslavement by showing a
relationship between a lack of education and crime. And since Black youth are the least educated they supposedly have a higher
propensity for crime. My position is this: if an educational system or any system that deals with the welfare and plight
of human beings is put in place that excludes their ethics values, norms, folklore, their culture in general, how can this
system adequately address the needs and aspirations of its intended group?
If one tries
to rationalize the idea that there's a direct relationship between a lack of education and crime, then half of the damn country
would be criminal suspects. Mis-education is as American as racism. The idea of using one's "lack of education"
as a justification for targeting African-Americans to become inhabitants of the "prison industrial complex" is incomprehensible
and should be repudiated. We must ask ourselves who are the
real criminals? We as African-Americans wouldn't be here if some White criminals had not kidnapped us from mother
Africa and brought us here. Remember Africa is the cradle of civilization and where education started. The real
criminals are those who engaged in the slave trade, the real criminals are those who used the whip or the rope on a slave
if he or she was caught trying to read or write. The
educational system as we know it today has failed in terms of reaching Black youth. The curriculum that our youth have
had to settle for has been developed primarily by Euro-Americans who could care less if the Black student is educated or not.
In many classrooms across this nation, Black kids are made to feel inferior, useless, and ineducable, and these are the major
reasons our youth drop out of school at an alarming rate.
What makes the
"Prison Industrial Complex" 21st Century Slavery: The Black Holocaust? Inmates within the "prison industrial complex" produce items or services for almost every
major industry. They sew clothes, fight fires, build furniture, and do a myriad of other tasks, basically for free.
Michael Vick the ex-Atlanta Falcon quarterback who signed over a $100,000,000 dollar contract, who was later convicted on
charges stemming from dog fighting and animal cruelty is within the "prison industrial complex" working for 12 cents
an hour. In Oregon, inmates aren't paid at all. I know you might say they shouldn't be paid, they must pay their debt
to society, this perhaps is true; however, there's no justification for inmates being enslaved, while major corporations earn
significant profits from their sweat. Corporations that appear to be far removed from the business of punishment are
intimately involved with the structural development and expansion of the "prison industrial complex". These
corporations remind me of little old white ladies dressed in bonnets during the "Jim Crow" era, who appeared harmless
and god-fearing. If you didn't know any better you would think that they were the keepers of the heavenly gates on earth,
however these same women cheered on their murderous and ruthless husbands, brothers, uncles, and cousins, as they watched
them hang a NIGGER. These corporations exhibit the same behavior: they're nothing but wolves in sheep's clothing.
We as black people must realize that everything is not necessarily what it appears to be. Racism
and injustice have put on new faces in America or should I say they have put on new clothing. The once avowed in-your-face
racists have traded in their white sheets and have donned blue pin striped suits. Some have chosen black robes; however,
they remain firmly committed to white supremacy. A classic example of 21st century racism and injustice at its best
was the fairly recent verdict rendered in the Sean Bell case. Sean Bell, a young African-American, was gunned down in
New York by three undercover police officers early in the morning on the day his weeding was supposed to take place.
He was shot several times by these undercover police officers who had been drinking. They fired some 51 shots into the
car of Sean and his friends, killing Sean and severely wounding one of his friends in an unprovoked incident. No weapon
was ever found on any of the victims. The case eventually was presented in front of a judge, not a jury of the young
man's peers (In New York the accused has the option to waive a jury trial and be tried by a judge). A judge, a
white judge, in a black robe tried this case and once again the killers were set free. Blacks go to jail, while those
who murder us remain free. I guess in some cases it's easier and less expensive to kill Black youth than to enslave
them in the "prison industrial complex". Lately these seem like the only two options our "uneducated"
black youth have.
I know that I've deviated a degree from my subject, so it would
appear. However, I would be remiss in my duty as a conveyor of truth if I neglected to mention the flagrant miscarriage
of justice in the Sean Bell case. Readers, please do not miss the point, that there is an inseparable relationship between
racism, capitalism, white supremacy, and the "prison industrial complex". The greatest weapon of the oppressor
is the mind of the oppressed. We must understand we are at war. We have been victims and casualties of this war
for over 400 years. This war is basically designed to render the Blackman totally impotent when it comes to being a leader
in his family and the society in general. The racialists have tagged Black men as being social misfits and threats
to national security.
Barack Hussein Obama was elected the first Black president of the
US; he has defied all odds. This is an accomplishment no other African-American has ever made in this country.
I congratulate him, and wish him all the success in the world. However, his agenda has nothing to do with those who
want to continue the Black holocaust. The end game has not changed. The war against the Black male is still being waged:
the weapon of mass destruction is ignorance. We must remember why we were brought to America as a people in the first
place. Has our mission been completed? Several years ago a book was written by Sydney Wilheim entitled "Who
Needs the Negro", he stated in his book something to the effect of the declining significance of the Negro. Think
about it. When something is no longer useful, what do you do with it? Usually you find a way to dispose of that thing,
whether it's a newspaper, a car, a clothing item etc. What is a way to dispose of a people no longer considered of value to
the general society? You entrap them in the "prison industrial complex".
The war we are faced with as Black Americans is not like any other war. It's a war that's being conducted against
us right in the country we help to build. The strategy is different from what's going on in Iraq, because the people are different.
They don't really know the Iraqi people, but they know a "nigger" because they made him. The main objective
of the slave master is total control and domination over his slave. One of the main players in the war is the media,
the TV. How much television do African-Americans watch? Dr. King warned us about the big three: materialism, militarism,
and racism. I'm going to use my own discretion and add one more, and that is "mediaism". The greatest
force that reaches the greatest amounts of people, and have the most influence in shaping the way people think is the media.
In America millions of people start and end their day watching ABC,NBC,CBS,CNN,FOX, etc. The owners of these media conglomerates want to think for you instead of allowing you to think for yourselves.
They want you to have their world-view instead of your own. The programming that these media outlets have, in my opinion,
contributes to the "prison industrial complex". After watching episodes of prime time TV, where violence
is the order of the day, it's no wonder crime is on the rise.
Have you ever
seen the documentary entitled the "War on Black America"? Have you ever heard of COINTELPRO?
These strategies were devised by the US government
and its agencies, mainly the FBI, for the sole purpose of eliminating any group or individual that was considered to be a
threat to white supremacy. The goal was to lock up Black leaders or any leader that wouldn't sell out. They would
either lock them up or kill them. They killed Malcolm X, Medgar Evers, Martin Luther King Jr, and many more unsung heroes
and sheroes. They set up H. Rap Brown, locked him up on trumped up charges, and gave him life without parole.
Wake up brothers and sisters! The war is not over: genocide on the African-American is still on the agenda.
Have you asked yourself why so many prisons are being built instead of schools?
Prisons are being built so that people can get locked up.
And who gets locked up the most? US! Genocide can be carried out in so many ways. The first steps are to trick
the masses of the people through mis-information or propaganda: gain the support of the masses of the people in order to justify
the actions without an outcry. The next step is usually to camouflage the scheme, the government re-enforces propaganda
and psychological warfare to accomplish this goal. Black youth are presented as thieves, robbers, gangs, dope dealers,
rapists, murderers, and menaces to society. Once the myth is sold, they can move on the Black youth without any close
scrutiny. They can introduce legislation that will justify racial profiling, that will justify the three-strike rule,
that will justify longer prison sentences; that will justify locking Black youth up in general without probable cause.
Our youth have been tagged as being a burden to society and a threat to national security. The overwhelming majority
of the over one million Americans locked up in federal and state prisons are Black. In Washington DC over 50% of Black
males between the ages of 18-35 are either in prison, awaiting trail, out on parole, or on the run.
Who are some of the beneficiaries of the "prison industrial complex"?
1. Wackenhut
Corrections Corporation, which manages or owns 37 prisons in the US, 18 in the UK and Australia(I guess they're going after
our Aborigine brothers and sisters trying to really put them "down under"). And they have one in South Africa, Wackenhut
recently tried to convert a former slave plantation in North Carolina into a maximum security prison to warehouse mostly Black
prisoners from the nation's capitol, according to the Drug Policy Alliance.
2. Prison construction bonds were one of the many sources of profitable
investments for financiers such as Merrill Lynch.
3. Norstorm sells a line of denim manufactured in an Oregon prison
called "prison blues".
Some other companies that benefit from 21st century slaves held
captive inside the "prison industrial complex" are:
1. 3 COM
2. Boeing
3. Compaq
4. Dell
5. Eddie
Bauer
6. Honeywell
7. IBM
8. Jostens
9. Kaiser
10. Mc Donald's
11. Microsoft
12. Nortel
13. Pierre Cardin
14. Revelon
15. Texas
Instruments
16. UNICOR (federal prison industries)
17. Victoria's Secret
Yasir
ARC
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