you know what’s a real burden? a person that is so scared of leaning on other people that they try to be completely self sufficient and you end up either having to help them indirectly to save their ego or they have to break down in order to receive help, both of which are so much more heavy to the person that loves them than just being leaned on casually
shit, i don’t know. we need prisons as prisons are to A) withhold certain people from harming their communities, B) punish certain people, C) kill certain people.
uh, i guess i can kind of answer this. the criminal justice system still exists. why don’t we just leave those people in charge? they’re not cops! and we should definitely let people who have committed non-violent offenses go. drug charges are stupid.
ok, i feel a little more confident answering this. we need to change the prison model for the better and follow the example of countries with restorative justice practices. incarcerated people need better access to healthcare and education, as well as access to opportunifies post-prison so that they are less likely to face reincarceration.
wait. if we’re abolishing the police for upholding white supremacy and terrorizing marginalized communities, we need to abolish a lot of shit. restorative justice sounds cool, i agree with that guy above. but shouldn’t these efforts be run by the communities affected? wasn’t the problem a white supremacist state? wasn’t the goal community terrorism? wasn’t the power taken out of our hands, especially the hands of people being systematically criminalized? i think i have things to read about.
anyway, whatever your conclusion: here are some things to read about.
is prison necessary? an article featuring ruth wilson gilmore & explaining prison abolition to children who were very good at asking “but what about [x]?” questions
and here’s an FAQ about prison abolition by people against prisons aotearoa
if you have trouble getting ahold of any reading materials i can usually find you a pdf if you DM me. if you need epub i can’t guarantee i can get one for you, but i can try.
this is getting a lot of questions that could be solved with a google search into any of these topics, so i just want to respond with my own that isn’t: if you advocate for abolishing the police force but don’t support prison abolition for [x] reason—what happens to prisons in a post-police society?
so cops are dropping out because they can’t haul heavy equipment for 12 hour shifts while dealing with people screaming at them for a couple days? that’s just working retail thru the holidays baybee. no sympathy.
Seeing a lot of “Ben & Jerry’s are ‘woke’!! it’s not just coporate propaganda!!” on my dashboard again. If it isn’t coporate propaganda, why are they exploiting farmworkers? It took until mass legal action in 2017 (by migrant workers) to gain improved working conditions; where workers were getting glass injuries, and chlorine sprayed in their eyes amongst other things. In 2018, when asked how many farms complied with the changes in the code of conduct, the answer was zero. None of them had provided the basic changes the migrant workers had campaigned for.
Ben & Jerrys is a company like any other. No matter how much they market themselves as benevolent by donating money or changing labels, they are still advertising. They don’t care about doing good, they care about their image. Its still coporate propaganda.
