Violence at Rikers at an ‘All-Time High’ Despite City’s Promise to Curb It

A federal monitor found that the number of times guards at the jail complex used force against inmates rose 54 percent, even as its population shrank. Mayor Bill de Blasio and leaders in the City Council have already agreed to close Rikers Island, one of the country’s largest urban prisons.Credit...Dave Sanders for The New York …

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Reading 3 – The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island

https://www.youtube.com/embed/SG3zoSn28Es High School students in the Sprungs on Rikers Island “The New Plantation takes us into the chaos of Rikers Island, giving us the vivid voices of young men–kids, really–caught in the unrelenting grip of institutional racism. I found it riveting.” –Monica Wood, author of When We Were the Kennedys, Ernie’s Ark, and One-in-a-Million Boy “It’s easy to forget …

Reading 2 – The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island – from Chapter 2

https://youtu.be/MPvUU1vFeRM Reading 2 from The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island “The New Plantation takes us into the chaos of Rikers Island, giving us the vivid voices of young men–kids, really–caught in the unrelenting grip of institutional racism. I found it riveting.” –Monica Wood, author of When We Were the Kennedys, Ernie’s Ark, and One-in-a-Million Boy “It’s easy to …

Reading of the Preface of The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island

https://www.youtube.com/embed/A7oJB0CaEE0 The New Plantation: Lessons from Rikers Island was published by Deerbrook Editions. "The New Plantation takes us into the chaos of Rikers Island, giving us the vivid voices of young men--kids, really--caught in the unrelenting grip of institutional racism. I found it riveting." --Monica Wood, author of When We Were the Kennedys, Ernie's Ark, …

The most urgent rap album of 2020? Drakeo the Ruler just phoned it in from jail.

Los Angeles rapper Drakeo the Ruler's new album "Thank You for Using GTL" was recorded entirely through the jail phone system. (Deawnne Buckmire) By Chris Richards, Pop music critic for the Washington Post. June 10, 2020 at 6:00 a.m. EDT “This telephone call may be monitored or recorded.” That brain-deadening phrase should sound familiar to anyone who’s …

Music Behind Bars: How BL Shirelle Helps Incarcerated People Craft Their Art

June 16, 2020 ( Courtesy of Dave Jones ) BL Shirelle describes herself in many ways: she is a black woman, a lesbian, and someone who was formerly incarcerated. But her identity and experiences all culminate in her work as an artist. BL is the Deputy Director of Die Jim Crow, the first non-profit record label for formerly and currently …

What I Am Thinking About

An Airforce General's Powerful Response to the George Floyd Murder: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NagDXVOmxNE

THE NEW PLANTATION: LESSONS FROM RIKERS ISLAND

https://www.deerbrookeditions.com/the-new-plantation-lessons-from-rikers-island/

13th (it’s about the Amendment)

Film by Ava Duvernay about the way the 13th Amendment has been misused. Rather than ending slavery, it has retained it through a loophole in the amendment about prison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6IXQbXPO3I

Letter from a Region in My Mind

From 1962: “Whatever white people do not know about Negroes reveals, precisely and inexorably, what they do not know about themselves.” By James Baldwin - November 10, 1962 - from The New Yorker James Baldwin, New York, September 17, 1946.Photograph by Richard Avedon / © the Richard Avedon Foundation Take up the White Man’s burden—Ye dare not …