Prison Labor is the New American Slavery (Image by YouTube, Channel: LIVEFREE ORDIE)
Whitney Benns tells some truths for The Atlantic in the article "American Slavery, Reinvented".
[here's] proof of a truth that America has worked hard to ignore: In a sense, slavery never ended... it was reinvented. Convict leasing was cheaper than slavery, since farm owners and companies did not have to worry about the health of their workers.
In this new era of prison industry, the criminal “justice” system, the state determined the size of the worker pool. Scores of recently freed slaves and their descendants now labored to generate revenue for the state under a Jim Crow regime.
More than a century later, our prison labor system has only grown. We now incarcerate more than 2.2 million people, with the largest prison population in the world... Our prison populations remain racially skewed. With few exceptions, inmates are required to work if cleared by medical professionals at the prison. Punishments for refusing to do so include solitary confinement, loss of earned good time, and revocation of family visitation. For this forced labor, prisoners earn pennies per hour, if anything at all.
More than a century later, our prison labor system has only grown. We now incarcerate more than 2.2 million people, with the largest prison population in the world... Our prison populations remain racially skewed. With few exceptions, inmates are required to work if cleared by medical professionals at the prison. Punishments for refusing to do so include solitary confinement, loss of earned good time, and revocation of family visitation. For this forced labor, prisoners earn pennies per hour, if anything at all.
The major issue, among the many issues involved, is that the phrase "The criminal justice system of the United States" has absolutely no relationship to the concept of "justice". No matter what other things that can be said about this system, justice is not any part of the system.
When a normal human being things of the concept of 'justice', one envisions something on the order of 'fairness'.
In the United States of America, justice only refers to the administration of law, nothing more. The various legislatures, national and local have written laws that need interpretation regarding their application in practical situations within the society. Any idea about 'right' or 'wrong' is, in many instances, not even allowed in the deliberations before the courts. The only factors that count deal exclusively with what the 'law' states or does not state and whether or not that 'law' takes precedence over some other 'law'.
The United States Supreme Court allows jail time for minor offenses.
5-Year Old in California Nabbed for Selling Lemonade without a License.
Someone spotted a law-breaking 5-year old selling lemonade and snacks without a license in Porterville, California. The little girl, Autumn Thomasson, worked to earn enough money for a new bicycle. Her mother said, “It meant so much to know she earned her own money. She got to bring her own wallet and buy it herself and pay at the cash register.”
5-Year Old in California Nabbed for Selling Lemonade without a License.
Someone spotted a law-breaking 5-year old selling lemonade and snacks without a license in Porterville, California. The little girl, Autumn Thomasson, worked to earn enough money for a new bicycle. Her mother said, “It meant so much to know she earned her own money. She got to bring her own wallet and buy it herself and pay at the cash register.”
A man died following a brutal arrest in which NYPD choked him and slammed his head against the sidewalk. Police say they suspected him of selling cigarettes without government permission.
Eric Garner begged for air 8 times before falling silent. (Source: Ramsey Orta)
The Vast Divide Between Too-Big-to-Jail and Too-Poor-to-Fight-Back in Reason and written by
Matt Welch shares the facts with us about Matt Taibbi's "The Divide", primarily concerned with the grotesquely unequal application of American justice, between the too-big-to-jail Wall Street elite and the too-poor-to-fight minority underclass. "The cleaving of the country into two completely different states--one a small archipelago of hyperacquisitive untouchables, the other a vast ghetto of expendables with only theoretical rights," Mr. Taibbi maintains, "is a terrible story, and a crazy one."
Matt Welch shares the facts with us about Matt Taibbi's "The Divide", primarily concerned with the grotesquely unequal application of American justice, between the too-big-to-jail Wall Street elite and the too-poor-to-fight minority underclass. "The cleaving of the country into two completely different states--one a small archipelago of hyperacquisitive untouchables, the other a vast ghetto of expendables with only theoretical rights," Mr. Taibbi maintains, "is a terrible story, and a crazy one."
The banksters ripped us off for trillions of dollars... and nobody went to jail. That is worth repeating... we witnessed the largest bank heist that could be imagined, the crooks didn't even attempt to claim innocence... and nobody went to jail.
Fairness and American justice are completely unrelated. Things are so bad that the word "justice" cannot be used to describe any situation within the American legal system. There is the 'law' and nothing else. Good law or bad law cannot be distinguished in our system of 'laws'.
Those stuck working doing prison labor are simply those who are victimized by the 'law'.
Since it has no meaning, the word "justice" should be stricken from the language, and that's the truth !!!
Those stuck working doing prison labor are simply those who are victimized by the 'law'.
Since it has no meaning, the word "justice" should be stricken from the language, and that's the truth !!!
Prison Labor Camps Are Not Progressive
from OpEdNews By John Kiriakou
In the DARP program, prisoners work full-time jobs in factories and chicken processing plants, companies pay a discounted rate to the rehabs for the labor, and literally none of that money is passed on to the prisoners, either as salary or for counseling. It's slave labor. If they refuse to do the work, they are moved from the drug rehab to a state prison.
Prison Labor is the New American Slavery
One of Arkansas's top politicians, State Senate Majority Leader Jim Hendren, a Republican, is using unpaid, forced inmate labor to work at his plastics company, which makes dock floats for Home Depot and Walmart, according to Prison Legal News. Shocking? Sure. Illegal? Well, it depends on whom you ask. Prison labor, where inmates earn nothing or close to nothing, is used to man call centers, manufacture equipment for the US military, and otherwise put small businesses around the country out of business because they simply can't compete with an entity that has few or no labor costs. It's the American way of doing business.
The odd thing about the program that Hendren is taking advantage of is that many judges and politicians, especially in the south, consider it to be "progressive." For example, courts in Oklahoma and Arkansas send men to the Drug and Alcohol Recovery Program (DARP) as an alternative to prison, and there they are supposed to receive drug treatment and counseling. A recent investigation by the Center for Investigative Reporting, however, found that there is no treatment or counseling and that prisoners serve simply as free labor for private industry.
Indeed, in the DARP program, prisoners work full-time jobs in factories and chicken processing plants, companies pay a discounted rate to the rehabs for the labor, and literally none of that money is passed on to the prisoners, either as salary or for counseling. It's slave labor. If they refuse to do the work, they are moved from the drug rehab to a state prison.
Hendren, for his part, isn't shying away from what he's doing. He bragged to the press recently, "I've been creating jobs for over 20 years. A country cannot survive if it cannot feed itself and make things." He added that he's "proud to give kids in drug rehab programs a second chance."
A lawsuit may soon change all that. Mark Fochtman, a former rehab prisoner, filed suit in an Arkansas court, saying that he was forced to work in Hendren's company on a production line that melted plastic into dock floats and boat slips. In his affidavit, he said, "The environment was very caustic working around melted plastics. Because of the work environment, the turnover rate during my time was high." He said that if DARP workers got hurt on the job and couldn't work, they were kicked out of the program and sent to prison. Others just worked through the pain to avoid prison.
Another prisoner, Dylan Willis, who is also a plaintiff in the suit, said that his face, arms, and legs are still covered with burn scars from molten plastic that shot out of a machine. Willis said his supervisors shrugged off his injuries as "cosmetic" and gave him some Neosporin.
Hendren is well connected in Arkansas politics. Besides being the Senate Majority Leader, he is Governor Asa Hutchinson's nephew. His father, Kim, with whom he started the company, also is a Republican state legislator.
If all of this sounds illegal, it likely is. In 2014, the Arkansas Department of Community Corrections revoked DARP's license to house parolees after discovering that the program refused to pay workers the minimum wage. As a result, Arkansas prisons are no longer supposed to send parolees to the program. The courts, however, continue to do so in violation of the law, but with no consequences.
Of course, the same thing happens in the federal prison system, too. Federal Prison Industries, also known as UNICOR, a wholly-owned US government corporation, was created in 1934 as a labor program for federal prisoners. Like Hendren's company, it forces prisoners to manufacture goods for sale to a variety of US government agencies and departments.
When I was incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Institution at Loretto, Pennsylvania, we had a UNICOR factory that manufactured high-speed cable for the US Navy. So much of it was deemed to be substandard that the plant was closed twice during my short 23-month stay there.
The most obvious problems, then, are twofold: slave labor doesn't make for quality production, and private manufacturers can't compete with an organization that has a payroll of almost nothing.
Using forced labor in private industry ought to be illegal everywhere in the country. Indeed, society would be better off if prisoners were paid a real wage. They could then pay whatever restitution they may have, whether to victims or to the government, and they could save money that they then could use to get back on their feet once they're released from prison.
But that won't happen. There is no "prisoner lobby" on Capitol Hill. And no member of Congress or the state legislatures will win any votes by advocating that convicted criminals be paid even the minimum wage. It's a vicious cycle that will repeat itself until a courageous judge finally puts an end to it.
John Kiriakou spent 14 years at the CIA and two years in a federal prison for blowing the whistle on the agency's use of torture. He served on John Kerry's Senate Foreign Relations Committee for two years as senior investigator into the Middle East. He writes and speaks about national security, whistleblowing, the prison-industrial complex, and foreign policy, and is an associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and winner of the 2015 PEN Center USA First Amendment award. Twitter: @johnkiriakou
from OpEdNews By John Kiriakou
In the DARP program, prisoners work full-time jobs in factories and chicken processing plants, companies pay a discounted rate to the rehabs for the labor, and literally none of that money is passed on to the prisoners, either as salary or for counseling. It's slave labor. If they refuse to do the work, they are moved from the drug rehab to a state prison.
Prison Labor is the New American Slavery
One of Arkansas's top politicians, State Senate Majority Leader Jim Hendren, a Republican, is using unpaid, forced inmate labor to work at his plastics company, which makes dock floats for Home Depot and Walmart, according to Prison Legal News. Shocking? Sure. Illegal? Well, it depends on whom you ask. Prison labor, where inmates earn nothing or close to nothing, is used to man call centers, manufacture equipment for the US military, and otherwise put small businesses around the country out of business because they simply can't compete with an entity that has few or no labor costs. It's the American way of doing business.
The odd thing about the program that Hendren is taking advantage of is that many judges and politicians, especially in the south, consider it to be "progressive." For example, courts in Oklahoma and Arkansas send men to the Drug and Alcohol Recovery Program (DARP) as an alternative to prison, and there they are supposed to receive drug treatment and counseling. A recent investigation by the Center for Investigative Reporting, however, found that there is no treatment or counseling and that prisoners serve simply as free labor for private industry.
Indeed, in the DARP program, prisoners work full-time jobs in factories and chicken processing plants, companies pay a discounted rate to the rehabs for the labor, and literally none of that money is passed on to the prisoners, either as salary or for counseling. It's slave labor. If they refuse to do the work, they are moved from the drug rehab to a state prison.
Hendren, for his part, isn't shying away from what he's doing. He bragged to the press recently, "I've been creating jobs for over 20 years. A country cannot survive if it cannot feed itself and make things." He added that he's "proud to give kids in drug rehab programs a second chance."
A lawsuit may soon change all that. Mark Fochtman, a former rehab prisoner, filed suit in an Arkansas court, saying that he was forced to work in Hendren's company on a production line that melted plastic into dock floats and boat slips. In his affidavit, he said, "The environment was very caustic working around melted plastics. Because of the work environment, the turnover rate during my time was high." He said that if DARP workers got hurt on the job and couldn't work, they were kicked out of the program and sent to prison. Others just worked through the pain to avoid prison.
Another prisoner, Dylan Willis, who is also a plaintiff in the suit, said that his face, arms, and legs are still covered with burn scars from molten plastic that shot out of a machine. Willis said his supervisors shrugged off his injuries as "cosmetic" and gave him some Neosporin.
Hendren is well connected in Arkansas politics. Besides being the Senate Majority Leader, he is Governor Asa Hutchinson's nephew. His father, Kim, with whom he started the company, also is a Republican state legislator.
If all of this sounds illegal, it likely is. In 2014, the Arkansas Department of Community Corrections revoked DARP's license to house parolees after discovering that the program refused to pay workers the minimum wage. As a result, Arkansas prisons are no longer supposed to send parolees to the program. The courts, however, continue to do so in violation of the law, but with no consequences.
Of course, the same thing happens in the federal prison system, too. Federal Prison Industries, also known as UNICOR, a wholly-owned US government corporation, was created in 1934 as a labor program for federal prisoners. Like Hendren's company, it forces prisoners to manufacture goods for sale to a variety of US government agencies and departments.
When I was incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Institution at Loretto, Pennsylvania, we had a UNICOR factory that manufactured high-speed cable for the US Navy. So much of it was deemed to be substandard that the plant was closed twice during my short 23-month stay there.
The most obvious problems, then, are twofold: slave labor doesn't make for quality production, and private manufacturers can't compete with an organization that has a payroll of almost nothing.
Using forced labor in private industry ought to be illegal everywhere in the country. Indeed, society would be better off if prisoners were paid a real wage. They could then pay whatever restitution they may have, whether to victims or to the government, and they could save money that they then could use to get back on their feet once they're released from prison.
But that won't happen. There is no "prisoner lobby" on Capitol Hill. And no member of Congress or the state legislatures will win any votes by advocating that convicted criminals be paid even the minimum wage. It's a vicious cycle that will repeat itself until a courageous judge finally puts an end to it.
John Kiriakou spent 14 years at the CIA and two years in a federal prison for blowing the whistle on the agency's use of torture. He served on John Kerry's Senate Foreign Relations Committee for two years as senior investigator into the Middle East. He writes and speaks about national security, whistleblowing, the prison-industrial complex, and foreign policy, and is an associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and winner of the 2015 PEN Center USA First Amendment award. Twitter: @johnkiriakou
one of many examples - in 'our' country, the 'real' criminals are running the country...
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