#bendthebars

This film is a good introduction to the topic of mass incarceration. We'll support it with a group discussion of the prison industrial complex, prison abolition, prisoner resistance, and prisoner support. We are hoping to show the film outdoors on M.I.N.T.'s new projection wall, so bring a blanket and some bug spray. Meet at 8pm and hear about the upcoming prisoner support convergence Bend the Bars. We will screen the movie as soon as it is dark enough to see and resume discussion afterwards. This will be a great low-stakes opportunity to discuss perspectives on the prison system before Bend the Bars kicks off on the 26th. No prerequisite knowledge necessary. From the film's website: The documentary centers around the theory put for­ward by many, and most recently by Michelle Alexander (who appears in the movie), that mass incarceration has become "The New Jim Crow." That is, since the rise of the drug war and the explosion of the prison population, and because discretion within the sys­tem allows for arrest and prosecution of people of color at alarmingly higher rates than whites, pris­ons and criminal penal­ties have become a new ver­sion of Jim Crow. Much of the discrimination that was legal in the Jim Crow era is today illegal when applied to black people but perfectly legal when applied to "criminals." The prob­lem is that through subjective choices, people of color have been tar­geted at significantly higher rates for stops, searches, arrests, prosecution, and harsher sentences. So, where does this leave criminal justice? Register for Bend the Bars, here: https://bendthebars.noblogs.org/ Share our FB page found here: https://www.facebook.com/events/1719446224934725/ RSVP to the public demonstration against prison slavery here (August 27th): https://www.facebook.com/events/1135080513228708/

This is a rally and march to support the Sept. 9th Prison Workers Strike! We plan to take to the streets to show our solidarity with all prisoners taking action on September 9th. We'll meet up at the Ohio Statehouse, where we'll hear live from prisoners on the inside about why support from us on the outside is so important for the success and safety of prisoners during the strike. Then, we'll march to the Franklin County Jail, and from there to the state headquarters of the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections (ODRC), where we will stage a mass call-in to express our unwavering support for the September 9th strike and those organizing it. In the past several years, thousands of convicts across the country have already been putting their lives on the line to end prison slavery by leading work stoppages and hunger strikes inside of their institutions. Meanwhile, most Americans are blissfully unaware that prison laborers produce food, furniture, pharmaceuticals, lingerie, ships, baby formula, uniforms, and military aircraft for free or for pennies per hour. The phenomenon referred to as "mass incarceration" is not a mistake or accident produced by a misguided criminal justice system, but rather a relatively conscious injection of capital into the infrastructure of forced labor as a means of production, as well as a relatively conscious commodification of the bodies of disproportionately black and brown convicts. This isn't just irresponsible opportunism on behalf of corrections corporations and state corrections departments, but a literal reconstruction of the material conditions of a slave: someone who has experienced a social death, who produces wealth for their owner (through forced labor), and whose body is, in turn, worth money to their owner's class (to trade or sell). Meanwhile, as per Michelle Alexander's recent book "the new jim crow," some forty million ex-cons find themselves struggling to survive without hope for economic advancement or even a reasonable chance of subsistence in a job market that discriminates heavily against felons, just like in the Jim Crow South. For more information about nationwide prisoner resistance: https://supportprisonerresistance.noblogs.org/