The effects of mass incarceration on ethnic minorities are the increased lack of economic opportunity, the discouragement of welfare for people of color, the worsening of racial biases, increased childhood discrimination and the toxicity of internalized stereotypes, and prominent racial disparities that are found in the criminal justice system. Mass incarceration came as a result of the establishment of the private prison industry. The U.S. has a school-to-prison pipeline where kids’ actions can be observed from a young age to help project the amount of needed prison beds. In the U.S., there’s a cycle of poverty and hardship that many Black and Hispanic citizens face. This cycle began when the War on Drugs started. The implementation of mandatory minimums, the predetermined punishments that come with drug crimes, greatly impacted ethnic minorities. The amount of minority single-parent households became more prominent in 1960s, where the War on Drugs was emphasized. Families with a single head are increasingly more likely to be in poverty than those with both parents. In the 60’s, Black families held the highest single-parent household population. Gregory Acs, who has a PhD in social work and specializes in social welfare, found that over 40 percent of single-mother families with children were in poverty. Those who are in poverty are defined as having an annual income lower than $22,000 (Acs, et al). The cycle of poverty ensures that those who are in poverty stay in
Mass incarceration has grown and developed so much, that it’s come to define and create fear in America’s minority communities. “America contains approximately 5% of the world’s population, but has 25% of the world’s incarcerated.” (DeVernay, 2016) There’s always been an underlying tension between minorities and authorities, and that’s due to the unjust discrimination they face in the eyes of the law.
The author discusses the price that US minority communities pay and the mass incarceration and the ideologies that fuel them. Interestingly, the author believes that mass incarceration only affects a certain group of people. Mass incarceration targets minority groups. These minority groups are characterized as low-income people. The author believes, that action has been taken to rectify the percentage of incarceration, because their low power compared to the majority. In addition, the authors go into percentages that depict that African American and Hispanic are targeted. Furthermore, the author looks at the ideologies that pertain to mass incarceration. Due to social injustice in the low-income communities presents negative ramifications
The United States is said to be the largest jailers in the world. Holding roughly 5% of the world’s population, the U.S. alone holds about 25% of the world’s total prison population (Lee, 2015). As the class has learned repeatedly in senior seminar, the prison population in the U.S. is overwhelmed and overcrowded. The class has also learned that the War on Drugs is a huge contributing factor for the increase of mass incarceration, but is that the only contributing factor? My theory to the mass incarceration rates in the United States is correlated with racial profiling. Nearly 2.3 million people are incarcerated in the U.S., of that population; 1 million are African Americans alone and one in six black men have been incarcerated since 2001
I conmplelty agree with you, as long as America keeps imprisoning people for betty crimes such as possession of small amount of drugs instead of actually rehabilitating
In conclusion, the United States consist of five percent of the world’s population with 25 percent in a prison setting. During the prison boom over half the prison population is African Americans although they only make up 13 percent of the population. Similar to slavery, mass incarceration uses a strategy for economic growth in many communities. As predictor race in the United States, inferior labor market opportunities, racial disparities, and the destruction of family units has helped to maintain economic hierarchy. There is no way to undo the damage that has been done but to target at risk individuals, we as a nation must look beyond our past and reeducate ourselves about race. Due to mass incarceration being so costly, it has gotten a great deal of attention due to economic oppression and the legacy of racism passed down will lead to the reinvention of Jim Crow.
In December 2013, President Barack Obama commuted the sentences of eight federal inmates. Each had been convicted of nonviolent crack cocaine offenses, and six of whom were serving life sentences (Miles 2014). The surge in the prison population of the United States of America can be attributed to changes in sentencing and policies that created stricter laws and harsher punishments for offenders. For the last half-century, America’s attempts to get tough on crime and wage a war on drugs have landed the U.S. the highest spot on the worldwide charts in regards to prison population; only in recent years has the rate of incarceration changed course, tracking a slow, steady downward trail. Incarceration is supposed to be punishment as rehabilitation, yet it has become the primary response to crime. It is simply punishment, greatly lacking in any true form of rehabilitation
The growth of incarceration in the United States Prison grew over the last four decades. The trend is historically unprecedented and is unique to the world. The majority of those incarcerated come from disadvantaged populations and comprises of main minorities below the age of forty. The communities have the number of people engaging in crime, drug abuse, alcohol addiction, physical and mental illness and lack of employment. The African Americans and Hispanics form the largest prison population compared to the non-Hispanic whites. The high incarceration has the huge impact on the American society since its inception in the 1960s and 1970s. The changed political environment led to policy changes. All levels of the government altered
The 36th annual Marion Wright Thompson Lecture Series on mass incarceration was great. I chose to attend this lecture because mass incarceration and experiences of it throughout history are important to me. In the Intro to Women’s & Gender Studies class that I previously took in the fall semester of 2015, I studied the relationship between mass incarceration and race for a bit. That inspired me to attend the Marion Wright Thompson Lecture. I had knowledge prior to the lecture, so I wanted to further understand how deeply mass incarceration affects society as a whole.
Without local jobs people are being forced to find other means to survive often times dangerous ones that could cost them their lives or their freedom. Many people have the mindset Rios explains, “ it becomes territorial. He’s trying to make a living, so he’s going to do whatever he’s gotta do”( qtd. in Rios 38-39), and that is where the trouble manifests. Pettit and Sykes explain that the, “black male employment rates have not seen significant gains since the early 1980s and evidence suggest that employment rates among young black men are now lower than they were in the first few years after the passage of civil rights legislation”(Pettit and Sykes). Instead of putting money into the prison system the government should start putting money
Preview: First I will explain the economic impacts of mass incarceration and how it negatively doesn’t “pay” and how it actually costs. Then, I will explain racial disparity in prisons and how it creates institutional racism.
Before enrolling in this class, I was unaware of the topic that would be introduced to us. Many of my friends have taken this class in the past and recommended that I check each course to see which topic the class focuses on. Instead, I neglected their words of advice and dove into the class blind. Although I was unaware of the topic to be introduced, once I heard it being about mass incarceration, I was somewhat relieved. The class I took as a prerequisite to Writing 39C was Writing 37 and the topic was about racial conflict in the past. Upon hearing the topic in our first session, my mind instantly linked together the racial conflict I had prior knowledge about to the racial profiling that was an incentive to the mass incarceration. Connecting these two broadened my view on the "New Jim Crow" and allowed me insight on where I wanted to start my research and how to branch off from it.
In conclusion, incarceration refers to a person who is housed in a correctional facility. This term is widely in compared to the word imprisonment. In addition, the time served as a inmate is determined by the law and judge. It is important to recognize that an inmate can be incarcerated based on his criminal action. He is then placed in a prison, jail or, Juvenile correctional facility. An inmate must serve either minimum sentence, maximum sentence, or mandatory
Incarceration can have multiple profound effects on a person. While the goal of incarceration is to rehabilitate the person to follow laws, the result is often isolation and loss of valuable resources that a person needs to maintain a positive role outside the prison system. Many people are affected by the incarceration of a person, from the family, to the community and employers, to society in general. Here is a brief look at some of those affected by a person's incarceration.
Mass incarceration in America has had monstrous rippling effects throughout the nation as well as in the everyday lives of people. The complications that have come with the broken prison system in America have come to define a generation of American people. The prison system in America has become so damaged that it only hurts rather than helping people, and excellent example of this can be seen in the story of Shaka Senghor. Both in his book and in life, prison not only isolated people physically from society, but also psychological changes them and their lives as a whole. In America, the prison system is broken and does more good than bad, something that can clearly be seen in the story of Shaka Senghor, “Writing My Wrongs: Life, Death, and Redemption in An American Prison”.
children ensuring that they do not get trapped in to the criminal justice system like their family member. The woman also develops the responsibility of paying for court-related costs and the costs of staying in contact with the individual who has been incarcerated. Incarceration may also cause the child to go to foster care. One in thirty parents in state prisons has children who are a part of the foster care system. The Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, was an act that authorized the termination of parental rights when a child has been in foster care for more than 15 months. So if an individual receives a sentence for more than a year, that means they will no longer have parental rights to the child that they birthed.