There are more prisoners in the US than any other country in the world. With a mere five percent of the world’s population, we have close to a quarter of the world’s prisoners. 2.2 million behind bars, another 5 million on probation or parole. Our urge for vengeance and punishment has largely hit low-level drug users; only about a third of prisoners are in for violent crimes. And in a nation that refuses to come to grips with the issues of race, one in eight African American males between 25 and 29 are imprisoned.
What else? This all means our unemployment level is actually rather higher than the official number, since prisoners aren’t counted. What happens when these skill-less, often brutalized people get out of jail? What about all the families ripped apart? What about the future?
Additionally, in a truly sick throwback to Jim Crow, prisoners are counted in censuses, meaning their number boost often rural districts, but they are unable to vote in those districts, so essentially they are subsidizing more conservative representatives. The millions who are prevented from voting means the GOP, those perfect inheritors of Jim Crow polls, gets to win in places like Florida in 2000. No wonder the right loves “law and order” so god-damned much.
More here.
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