Raymond Writes

Before the 'Mass Incarceration' boom, the purpose of criminal justice was rehabitation. This love-affair with 'tough on crime' and 'mass incarceration' should be disturbing not only because it is costly and often counterproductive, but because of the race and class disparities are morally unacceptable. In the 1950's Blacks comprised 30% of the prison population. 40 years later, Blacks and Latinos make up 70% of the prison pop. Blacks are incarcerated at a rate eight times higher than that of whites, a disparity that dwarfs other racial disparities. Most of those incarcerated are poor and uneducated disproportionately drawn from the other side of the tracks. In the US race has always played a role in constructing presumption of criminality. It is clear, that Black lives are considered dispensable in the "free world", but a major source of profit in the prison industry. The indirect consequences of such disparities, in the public's mind reinforce