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This is an interview with Michelle Alexander from April 2016. I re-watched it last week and I am surprised that more people don't know about it and that it still only has 59,000 views as of January 2019. In this interview, Michelle Alexander endorses the "political revolution."
It's a great interview and here's the clip if you want to watch the whole thing, but I will provide a transcript of the first three minutes to give you a sense of what she says to @chrislhayes. #BernieSanders #Bernie2020 #OurRevolution @OurRevolution
Michelle Alexander, by the way, is the author of The New Jim Crow, Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, and I highly recommend the book, too, as it provides a tremendous insight into the racial injustice inherent in the U.S. mass incarceration era. @thenewjimcrow
Here is what Michelle Alexander said in April 2016: “I am definitely endorsing the political revolution. I am reluctant to endorse any candidate, any Democratic candidate, any candidate in the current political system," Alexander says right off the top.
"I believe that we need to think very seriously, particularly as folks of colour and progressives, about building a new party or a new movement that can hold the Democratic Party accountable or provide a meaningful alternative."
"I could not be more thrilled with the movement that is arising all over this country to support the creation of a real democracy in the United States. I think Bernie Sanders is absolutely right to call for a political revolution. We don’t have a real democracy today."
"Our politicians are pretending to serve two masters; the people who elect them and then the people who fund them. Unfortunately for millions of people who cast their votes every year, ...
... they rightfully wonder whether their politicians are responding more to the people who fund their campaigns, including large pharmaceutical companies, big banks, pay-day lenders, and private prison companies, than the people who have elected them.” cc @justicedems
"The larger story about mass incarceration is really about how the interests of poor people and working people of all colours — how people are divided along racial lines in order to advance the interests of a privileged few."
"That is really the story of American democracy since its founding; how the privileged few have used race as a way of driving a wedge between poor and working people in order to advance their own interests."
"It was certainly the case with slavery, it was certainly the case with Jim Crow. Jim Crow emerged in large part in response to a multi-racial populist movement for economic justice.” #MLK cc @RoseAnnDeMoro @ninaturner @AOC @SenSanders
@threadreaderapp please unroll
