Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #PrisonAbolition

Most recents (12)

Prison Abolition may seem like a radical idea to some people but it is quite an easy and simple concept to grasp!
It is more than closing down prisons, it is dismantling the systems that create oppression, violence and inequality (to name a few)!
To decolonize something in Australia means the undoing of colonialism & all that it represents. It means unlearning the settler colonial behaviours, language, attitudes, racism, discrimination, violence and so on.
All of the above relate to Prison Abolition and until we dismantle the structures that create & enforce those representations from colonialism will we truly never understand what it is like to engage in meaningful equality for everyone in society.
Read 10 tweets
Welcome to the S&P 30 Days Challenge #TowardAbolition! Take 2 actions every day until July 4 in solidarity with communities everywhere resisting fascism, state violence, gender-based violence and racial capitalism! Use #TowardAbolition to let us know you're participating.
DAY 1 Action 1 #TowardAbolition

Support @supporthosechi #FreeLeLe campaign! In honor of #PRIDE and #IWD2020, let’s get #AlishaWalker free. "LeLe" is a Black sex worker who was criminalized for self-defense against sexual violence.

Toolkit w/ directions: bit.ly/AlishaAdvocate
Like many, Alisha Walker is being punished, criminalized for surviving. There are countless others just like her.

Use: bit.ly/AlishaAdvocate for numbers, sample tweets, scripts & call/email/fax/bombard @GovPritzker to demand he #FreeLeLe #FreeThemAll!

#TowardAbolition
Read 66 tweets
A Black tgnc person named #TonyMcDade was killed by police in Tallahassee, FL on Wednesday. I think of #LayleenPolanco dying in her cell at Rikers Island the first week of #PrideMonth 2019.

#TransLiberation demands #Abolition news.wfsu.org/wfsu-local-new…

https://t.co/IWLOH593uS
BLM organizers have long noted that while masses turn up in the wake of police murders of Black men, it's a struggle to get a small crowd to turn up for Black women. It's hard to get any attention at all when Black TGNC people are killed. #TonyMcDade #BlackTransLivesMatter
It's more complicated than mere homophobia and mysognoir in Black communities--though that's part of it. Yet it's also about entrenched discourses about who police target and kill that leaves out survivors, women, TGNC people, and many others. #TonyMcDade #BlackTransLivesMatter
Read 6 tweets
I want to remind you that we are winning.

It may be hard to imagine from quarantine, but there are millions of people who, even in their confusion and fear, are considering radical new ways of structuring our world to protect each other and the planet. #COVID19
People in power are pushing fascism. They're pushing hyper-policing, militarization. They are forcing us to go back to work, to "normal," by threatening benefits. They are actively allowing us to die.

This is all because they know we're winning. #COVID19
Now is not the time for hopelessness. Now is not the time to believe you are powerless.

Now is the time to grieve. Now is the time to feel the same rage that led millions into the streets for #BlackLivesMatter, #WomensMarch, and so many other demos only years ago. #COVID19
Read 9 tweets
“'It’s not advertising. It’s not propaganda. It’s not going to be closely controlled,' he said. 'It’s going to do the powerful things that art can do.'”

Plus, he emphasized, no taxpayer funding will be used."

I'm disturbed by this article/story... inquirer.com/news/philadelp…
More power to this brother and the opportunities he is receiving as an artist, but the arts SHOULD be publicly funded, IN PLACE OF and not alongside the work of the DA's office. #PrisonAbolition
For the body that sends people to jail to have an artist residency waiting for them when they get out might sound healing, but it in reality it seeks to legitimize the work of that office, not replace it. #PrisonAbolition
Read 5 tweets
Here's a thread for all the annoying repetative questions I get about #PrisonAbolition.

1. Abolish prisons?! Where will we put criminals?

A. Prison abolition is not strictly about removing prisons; it's the idea that the CJS as a whole must be rebuilt from the ground.

>>>
1B. There are better places for offenders than prison. Therapy and education programs do far better at treating "criminal" issues than isolation and incarceration (which actually make them worse).

>>>
2. So then, you're just going to release a bunch of dangerous criminals on the street?

2A. This is a loaded question, and it says a lot about the person asking it.

2B. Only ~1/3 of persons incarcerated are there for violent ("dangerous") crime.

>>>
Read 17 tweets
1) The appalling invocation of @prisonculture's work on #PrisonAbolition by a city council member IN SUPPORT of building new jails in NYC teaches us two important things:

#NoNewJails #CloseRikers
2) First, it teaches us that abolitionists' work of making a world without prisons enticing, exciting, and concrete has had a far enough reach, struck a deep enough chord, that the system is being made to respond at its highest levels

#NoNewJails #PrisonAbolition #CloseRikers
3) Second, it teaches us that the prison/police system is resilient, and can incorporate the language of any philosophy/stance to bolster its own expansion--EVEN ONE EXPLICITLY DEVOTED TO ITS PERMANENT TERMINATION

#NoNewJails #PrisonAbolition #CloseRikers
Read 7 tweets
I came out 16 years ago this month.

Thinking about this in light of #SCOTUS arguments about LGBTQ rights in the workplace--not because I am hopeful, but because I want everyone to think about what it means to have a governing body discussing your life without you in the room.
Our family with disabilities has taught us:

"Nothing about us without is for us."

As women, queers, Black, trans, poor, disabled, sex working, undocumented folks, the "rights of individuals" mythology of the US political system applies to corporations before it applies to us.
#PrisonAbolition is also about abolishing legal structures that even pose LGBTQ and workers rights as up for debate.

Our ability to live full, healthy, happy lives on our own terms is not a question, it is a right. #SCOTUS
Read 5 tweets
Some renewed conversations about #PrisonAbolition on here this morning, which is encouraging.

A few things I'd like to interject into the conversation, as someone who's been a part of hashing these conversations many times over:
#PrisonAbolition is not a utopian vision. Prison abolitionists aren't theorists removed from real implications of policing and incarceration, they are folks doing the most proactive and strategic work to address injustice:

jacobinmag.com/2017/08/prison…
To those who say #PrisonAbolition offers no concrete solutions for what comes after, it is most often those making that statement (the wealthy and the white) who already live in communities devoid of prisons and policing:

radfag.com/2017/03/24/you…
Read 6 tweets
Fuck. Just saw a tweet reminding us that Alabama is making abortion a felony & felons can’t vote so soon enough massive amount of people, mostly poor & black women, will be labeled as felons & unable to vote. Further expansion of the prison industrial complex & the new Jim Crow.
We often think of the PIC as targeting men of color, particularly black men, but these new laws in states with large poor black populations are clearly intended to disenfranchise & legally enslave more black people.
THIS is why we need coalitional thinking. THIS is why we need a #reproductivejustice framework that sees prison abolition & abortion rights & voting laws as all interconnected. Reproductive justice & racial justice will always be inherent intertwined.
Read 7 tweets
I finally forced myself to watch @ava’s #13th on @netflix. I know I am massively tardy to the party, but racial documentaries are hard for me. It was, of course, devastating, so I’m glad I’m grading at home today so I can process, seethe, mourn & completely avoid wypipo.
My first reaction was “Fuck, this [the systemic oppression of black people & destruction of black lives] is never going to end. Not until we upend every last piece of the existing systems.” Then I sat overwhelmed & crying bc the earth/humanity may not last long enough for that.
And let’s be clear, I read The New Jim Crow years ago (which is why I felt like I didn’t *need* to watch 13th), but watching the documentary tie these legacies to images/audio of #NotMyPresident brought it home in a new way emotionally for me rather than just intellectually.
Read 5 tweets
Wow, that last #thread really took off. Let’s try another. I want to think with folks about how we can talk about #SurvivingRKelly outside the logic of the prison industrial complex.
Many of the people who responded to my last thread engaged in carceral logics saying some variation on “his ass should rot in jail” if not calls for his death. Are there other ways we can imagine justice, accountability and healing?
Prison abolitionist Mariame Kaba has said, as ppl raised w/ carceral logics it’s hard for us to imagine or desire alternatives. The #prisonindustrialcomplex has limited how we think about justice—even though other nations do things differently.
Read 14 tweets

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