H O W D O E S T H E

S Y S T E M

W O R K ?

Think, Think

Think about the air invisible as it uncurls a wave of toxins. Think about how its fingertips trace the skin as a baton falls on the flesh merely seconds later. Think about how heavy metals brown the water and we are told to drink. Think about how many of us wonder when the roofs over our heads will be tongues evicted from the languages of home. Think about how every person needs a doctor, but everyone doesn't get one. Think about how savings mean nothing to the crazy fine print circumscribed like obsolete glyphs. Think how law books fall open and hopscotch for anyone who keeps writing checks. Think, think, think like Aretha Franklin belting what you tryna do to me? Think how the law keeps shuffling the numbers to fit some constant where acknowledging who is human is posited in some philosophy or some mathematical equation that pretends that logic is its function, when blood needs to find something superior, something that denies how human is defined by a much wider net cast by some divine fisherman, or perhaps an African goddess in a gown laced with sea foam, but place markers for faith are constantly moved toward a crucifix. A human can find more than one path, I hope. Think about how, every day, someone is hoping for some simple thing like fresh bread lightly toasted, the ability to walk without pain, a chance to shower, a moment free of fist and jeer, a moment singing victorious as if we could level the wrongs and leave the world upright, like a gospel-drenched woman singing freedom, freedom after forgiveness, after you change your mind, ' cause you need to think (and act) to be free.

We now know how the creators of prison systems described their function. Now we will see how abolitionists describe prisons as they exist today.

Functions of Prisons according to Davis

Facilitate economic exploitation

Facilitate racial subjugation

Repression of political resistance

Conceal intractable social problems

Abolitionist organizing group, Critical Resistance uses the term, prison industrial complex (PIC), to describe "the overlapping interests of government and industry" which use "surveillance, policing, and imprisonment as solutions to economic, social and political problems."