The Prison Industrial Complex

By Ciara Smith

I have noticed that Black people in my community are incarcerated more than other people because of our status, race and our backgrounds. The prison industrial complex criminalizes minorities purposefully for profit. It is evident that it is a modern day form of slavery. The United States’ unjust system uses methods such as school pushout to target children in poor neighborhoods and push them into the prison system. Officers abuse their authority to help contribute to this injustice that is taken place. They provoke and punish people for no reason. They are trained to criminalize Black people to push them into the cycle of in and out of the prison system. Black students are put into this cycle of going in and out the prison system and as adults they are forced to provide free or low paying labor to their prison.

The prison industrial complex believes that some lives are more important than others. The complex separates families. It imprisons mothers and pregnant women. It targets people that are in foster care and people that are in poverty. People that are ill with mental disorders are imprisoned because they are not treated appropriately on the outside. They end up in different predicaments that leads the to be imprisoned which is unfair to them. There are also many immigrants that are criminalized by the prison industrial complex. They might not know certain laws, they might be framed or they might not even speak english so then it then considered fair to imprison them. For not knowing things?
The prison industrial complex is a way that the United States profit from innocent people that are in this country. After slavery it seemed imperative that they gain profit some way but they had to have a logical reason to do it. So they label people of color as criminals. The complex is justified by calling it a way to “rehabilitated” criminals that need it. The prison industrial complex is inhumane and is based on control.

I have many family members that have been in the Prison Industrial Complex. It has created up to destroy families. I have grown up without seeing my uncle very much. As a young child we were close and the complex ruined that. I wasn’t able to have healthy personal interactions with my uncle and when he got out it was clear that he changed. Isolation changes people.

I believe that the prison industrial complex is unjust and it needs to be stomped out. America is a place of recreation and is supposed to be built on a foundation of freedom but this is not freedom. People in chains and behind bars is not freedom! You can’t say that you’re a free country when there is not complete freedom. To improve this country we must get rid of the Prison Industrial complex and try other methods.