Please don't think me too harsh: while I respect the passion of exchanges
like that below, in my opinion a bit more precision is required for any
meaningful work (or discussion with people of different points of view) to be
advanced:
1) Please define exactly what/who is meant by the terms such as "police
state", "elites", etc. These are sociologically and economically meaningless
terms. What is one to make of a generalisation like "Local police forces are
a part of the larger world police force"? Such statements are clichés more
than tools to understanding the world system.
2) On the actual economic consequences of the current US prison population:
while I suspect that this industry is substantial, I cannot believe that
privatised prisons or prison labour is a primary driver in $9.255 trillion
(1999 est.) a year economy. For example, if it amounts to a $10 billion a
year industry - which initially sounds HUGE, then it accounts for %0.11 of
the American economy - about one-tenth of one percent! Even $10 billion
sounds high to me, but is about the size of the world's largest management
consulting firm, Accenture, so it is a useful point of comparison/reference.
Does anyone have DATA?
This is not nit-picking or minimising the suffering involved, it is about
understanding incentives and drivers so change can indeed take place.
Rigour is required to engage others and provide solutions rather than sermons.
Regards,
M Jones
-----Original Message-----
From: wsn-owner@csf.colorado.edu [mailto:wsn-owner@csf.colorado.edu]On
Behalf Of ecopilgrim@juno.com
Sent: 20 March 2001 16:54
To: wsn@csf.colorado.edu
Cc: tcomeau45@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: violent protests
On Sun, 18 Mar 2001 15:49:35 -0500 "Timothy Comeau"
<tcomeau45@hotmail.com> writes:
<Onca again, protests have occured over globalisation, and the police
have
been accused of using excessive violence. But as we all know, it's not
just
protests over globalisation where this occurs: it seems to occur whenever
and wherever a protest happens in the so called Western world.
What is going on? How come the cops always seem to overeact? What are
they
being told about left wing protestors?>
With little awareness that it has happened, the U.S. has become a police
state with our freedoms increasingly eroded in the name of globalization
which benefits the elites. Local police forces are a part of the larger
world police force. In the U.S. 25% of all African American men are now
housed in prisons; many of them for minor drug infractions which harm no
one except the user. At the same time, prison business has become 'big
business' as it has become privatised. Prison construction brings in
some money to local economies while at the same time putting the 'bucks'
in private developer's pockets. The prisons also offer other
opportunities for employment and income generating for local communities,
e.g. prisoners must be fed and guarded and both tasks open up avenues for
income generation. It is interesting to note that prison guards
generally make more than do teachers and it costs anywhere from $40,000
to $60,000 annually to house a prisoner -- the same amount that it would
cost to send someone to college for a year. Yet prison incarceration
offers litle or no hope for education or rehabilitation, only punishment
which may not even fit the crime.
Increasingly, large manufacturers are also using 'prison labor' to
manufacture products through contracting with prison management to pay
prisoners as little as $0.50 an hour to work on assembly lines in the
prisons. Thus allowing the undercutting of costs small businesses must
pay in order to produce the same products. Prison management says it
must do this in order to pay for 'housing' its inmates, but as tax payers
foot the bill for prison upkeep and warehousing, this seems to be
'double-dipping' with the proceeds lining the pockets of prison
management while at the same time competing with small business.
One benefit of this practice to prisoners is that they may acquire skills
training which they previously have not had access to and which may
permit them outside employment upon release. But another factor here is
that prisoners, under the 'Three Strikes Law,' may be serving lifetime
sentences for what could amount to minor infractions.
Nevertheless, it is incumbent upon the police force to keep the prisons
full and the prison as a big business growing and expanding. This can
only be done thru increasing the numbers of people incarcerated. Since
protestors threaten the stranglehold of the elites on the economy and
ability to push the American model forward thru globalization, they
present good targets for imprisonment also.
And yes, we may see some who become 'martyrs' like the students at Kent
State who were gunned down while protesting. But I have also been told
by some of these protestors that they are willing to lay down their lives
in the name of freedom and democracy which is seriously being eroded
around the world. If you read the few valid reports that are available
on the protests that are increasingly taking place against the WTO, IMF,
WB, you cannot help but know that the protestors have been demonstrating
peacefully for the most part -- it is the police force that is becoming
exceedingly brutal as the protests escalate in number and size.
It is our duty, as citizens of the world, to seek the truth and to report
it and support it -- not shy away from it in fear. If we do not, we will
all become enslaved.
marguerite
Marguerite Hampton
Executive Director - Turtle Island Institute
EcoPilgrim@juno.com
http://tii-kokopellispirit.org