The New Jim Crow
Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
by Michelle Alexander · first published 2000
73% recommend25% neutral1% critical
Why HN recommends it
A structural and legal account of how the drug war and mass incarceration disproportionately hit poor Black communities, backed by facts. For readers wanting to understand policing, sentencing and disadvantage.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness is a 2010 book by Michelle Alexander, a civil rights litigator and legal scholar. The book discusses race-related issues specific to African-American males and mass incarceration in the United States, but Alexander noted that the discrimination faced by African-American males is prevalent among other minorities and socio-economically disadvantaged populations. Alexander's central premise, from which the book derives its title, is that "mass incarceration is, metaphorically, the New Jim Crow". --wikipedia
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…Radical Acceptance, Tara Brach * The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs * Freedom Is a Constant Struggle, Angela Davis * Rising Strong, Brené Brown * Cleopatra, Stacy Shiff * The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander Fiction: * Anything by Ursula Le Guin * Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie * Too Like the Lightning, Ada Palmer * Citizen: An American Lyric, Claudia Rankine ... so many more
on “Summer Reading List” ↗…federal funds etc) and ideally get them the NIH training (see below for a reading list). me and white supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor, Layla F. Saad The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, Michelle Alexander United States and Racism Systemic: Explicate the systemic nature of institutionalized racism, Steven Turam How We Fight White…
on “Some of the forces blocking new ideas in science” ↗…DUI check points or being stopped by an officer with a dog in their patrol-car (which is just bad luck), I don't see that the police have a way around this one. I don't have any data, but I read in The New Jim Crow (good book, fyi) that this procedure accounts for an incredible amount of drug arrests. Good on ya, SCOTUS.
on “Supreme Court Rules Extending Traffic Stop for Dog Sniff Unconstitutional [pdf]” ↗…genre: Nonfiction: - A Short History of Nearly Everything - Fabric of the Cosmos - Dataclysm - The Righteous Mind - Merchants of Doubt - Dead Wake - Man's Search for Meaning - Evicted - The New Jim Crow - Night Sci-fi: - We - The Sirens of Titan - Hyperion - Stories of Your Life - Frankenstein - The Day of the Triffids - Childhood's End Fantasy: - The Stormlight Archives - The First Law Trilogy…
on “Ask HN: Which non-programming books are a beneficial read for programmers?” ↗…- The Art Of Happiness, Dalai Lama - Lies My Teacher Told Me, James Loewen - The Four Agreements, Miguel Ruiz - Man's Search For Meaning, Viktor Frankl - Understanding Power, Noam Chomsky - The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander - Good To Great, Jim Collins - Abundance, Peter Diamandis - The Mystery Of Capital, Hernando De Soto - Pathologies Of Power, Paul Farmer - Metaphors We Live By, George Lakoff…
on “Ask HN: book suggestions in non-tech fields (e.g. psychology, philosophy…)” ↗I love how piece could also be peace in that line. I am reading The New Jim Crow and it is fascinating. The author talks about how prisons were utilized as a means to get free labor after slavery ended and how laws in this country were/are designed to keep black people in jail. Good…
on “How for-profit prisons have become the biggest lobby no one is talking about” ↗…drugs. Private prisons are a symptom, not a cause. For a better understanding of the forces leading to prison privitization and a myriad of other woes and injustices I _strongly_ recommend reading "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander.
on “Columbia becomes the first US university to divest from private prison companies” ↗They're not the only ones who benefit from the drug war. It's a tool in order to allow for mass incarceration of "undesirable people". The book "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander really spoke to me as a resident of Philadelphia. I knew full well that if a cop found 1/4oz of weed or less on me, they wouldn't do anything...but if I was black, I'd be put in…
on “Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs” ↗…cycle where these realities feed off of each other. It's no wonder then, that all these facts contribute to a never-ending snowball effect on these communities. I really highly recommend the book The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander [4]. It does an amazing job describing this cycle. It's not that "other cultures need our help to stop committing crimes", it's that we all need to be aware of the effects our criminal…
on “Being a Developer After 40” ↗I don't think this conversation will be productive. Slavery is a completely different phenomenon than all of what you mentioned. I encourage you to go read up on this. You can start with the The New Jim Crow, by Michelle Alexander.
Peg Tyre wrote the classic book on this 10 years ago: https://www.amazon.com/Trouble-Boys-Surprising-Problems-Educ... It hasn't gotten a huge amount of follow-up traction in schools though. Also The New Jim Crow for a racial perspective that hits black men's employment prospects pretty hard. https://www.amazon.com/New-Jim-Crow-Incarceration-Colorblind... BTW for folks who are concerned that feminist or women…
on “Study shows salaries of young women 8% higher than men in peer group (2010)” ↗I recommend the book The New Jim Crow if you'd like to read more about this, particularly on how it relates to extending pseudo-slavery.
on “How convict labour increased inequality” ↗…black wealth back to levels of the 80s and 90s [2]. This is too large a subject to get into in an HN comment, but if you're curious, I'd highly suggest reading Michelle Alexander's excellent book The New Jim Crow[3], which focuses particularly on incarceration. [1]: https://www.vox.com/2018/3/5/17080218/school-segregation-get... [2]: https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2017... [3]: https://www.vanderbilt.edu/ctp/The_New_Jim_Crow.pdf
on “Third-wave antiracism makes sense, but it's a dead end” ↗…contribute to violence toward Black and brown people. It is also offensive because it is _so easy_ to educate yourself and contribute informed opinions instead of ignorant ones. One place to start is "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander. I really hope you take the time to read it and other books that explain what it's really like to be Black in America.
…on the topic. For example: - https://www.forbes.com/sites/chuckdevore/2015/08/21/criminal... - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25852784-evicted - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6792458-the-new-jim-crow - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38561954-american-prison But gosh, lets not attack and flag the comment. OP, I've left my up-vote. Sorry the shame brigade got to it first, instead of anyone interested…
on “Behavioral nudges reduce failure to appear for court” ↗