Class Warfare
I believe there is a war on brown people going on and they call it the drug war. The prison and legal industry prospers by keeping the status quo. Corrupt police, fake and shell businesses, corrupt bankers lawyers and accountants all prosper. I believe most of the people making the big money hate the customer.
I have never lived in a ghetto or in inner city housing or on a reservation. I have driven through these communities and I think that if I lived there, I would turn to alcohol or drugs shortly. I believe some artificial delusion would keep me from going insane in a hopeless place where the only future was the drug business or the military. According to the book, Freakonomics, most street dealers make less than they would at a minimum wage job and probably live with their mothers. According to the book Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market by Eric Schlosser, most of the people in jail for drug offenses are those that didn't plea bargain and betray their friends to get out.
I have never lived in a ghetto or in inner city housing or on a reservation. I have driven through these communities and I think that if I lived there, I would turn to alcohol or drugs shortly. I believe some artificial delusion would keep me from going insane in a hopeless place where the only future was the drug business or the military. According to the book, Freakonomics, most street dealers make less than they would at a minimum wage job and probably live with their mothers. According to the book Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market by Eric Schlosser, most of the people in jail for drug offenses are those that didn't plea bargain and betray their friends to get out.
posted by Flimsy Sanity @ 1:56 PM
3 Comments:
At 7:02 PM,
Anonymous said…
You know my views agree with yours, but I'm not sure it's so much a war on brown people, as a war on the poor. Certainly, blacks and browns make up the largest percentage of poor in America, and probably a high degree of racial intolerance among law enforcement workers helps tip the balance, but whites living below the poverty line are targeted as well. Let's be honest, the "American Dream" classifies poor people as failures in this country. You rightly point out that the places the poor are forced to live would drive anyone to drugs. As the US government only seems determined to force more and more people into poverty, instead of waging a war on drugs, perhaps they would be performing more of a civic duty by subsidizing the cost of street drugs for the poor.
At 11:30 AM,
Peacechick Mary said…
The prison industry is huge, especially since the Republicans have privatized it. To keep prison population up, and the money flowing, they have to enforce ridiculous drug laws that do not combat drug abuse, but encourage illegal drug sales. It's a big scam right now and it's undermining the health of this nation.
At 2:39 PM,
Not Your Mama said…
I think there are elements of both class and race warfare going on. I also think the middle class helped it right along by grabbing our piece of the pie and trying to join the elite club, now the middle is coming under fire. Boohoo.
Re: privatization of prisons: who do you suppose we're planning to replace all those agricultural workers that are being deported with? There is a method to the rightwings madness. Prisoners = super cheap labor.
So far America has swallowed it hook, line, and sinker.
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