Thread by @ScottHech

READ THIS: An NYC public defender's brilliant oped in Teen Vogue. Grappling w/ why even those who oppose mass criminalization keep believing in it. "Weve been educated by the same popular culture — taught to accept the same cruelty." A Law & Order mindset. teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

NYC Public Defender & movement lawyer, Olayemi Olurin (@msolurin) starts w/ this upsetting observation: The crisis on Rikers every one was talking about just a month ago has already "faded from headlines." This is a "familiar pattern." But she doesn't stop there. She asks *why.

Familiar pattern: "Extreme events of injustice generate public outrage & awareness. Then stories fade, everyone forgets, & the status quo prevails. It’s as if this crisis isn’t happening." And the very systems that caused & created these injustices continue to expand. Again: Why?

Why does a legal system *we know* fails & harms keep expanding? "The relationship between our country’s comfort w/ mass caging & its depiction in popular culture seems more than coincidental. Media consumption is what we all have in common." 100% right: teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

One amazing part of this public defender's commentary are the real life examples of interactions w/ people in & outside the system. Across the spectrum of ideologies. Her mom to Queens DA. "Progressive" friends to court officers. How they all seem to agree.teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

Powerful: "I think about one of many times I was misidentified as a defendant in court. When a court officer screamed at me to get out of the first row where attorneys sit. Ultimately said: 'My bad. I thought you were a defendant.' He thought that was a reasonable explanation."

"In his mind, it was acceptable to scream at a person accused of a crime. That even I, a criminal defense attorney, wouldn’t object. When I replied, “It would’ve been unacceptable even if I were one,” he looked confused. I think about that confusion…" teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

"I think about the Queens district attorney, Melinda Katz, who declined to charge an officer who kneeled on the neck of my client, SirCarlyle Arnold, despite stating that she “supported" an end to the NYPD’s use of illegal choke holds & neck restraints." nbcnewyork.com/news/local/que…

"I think about how self-proclaimed progressives have asked me how I sleep at night representing guilty people. Not thinking about how people are profiled, arrested, & incarcerated for crimes that wouldn’t be crimes if they weren’t poor people of color."
nytimes.com/2017/07/21/nyr…

"I think about allies protesting police brutality tweeting about how no innocent person would not talk to police & only guilty people get a lawyer. We’re taught to fear & dislike those caught in the system, rather than a system that inflicts pain on them." teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

We all learn to worship police & incarceration early. "We are taught there are bad people who were just born bad, who do bad things, & that the only way to keep the good people safe is for police to do whatever they can to lock the bad people away."teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

"Law & Order has run for over 30 years, showing all manner of police violence, coerced confessions, & blatant violations of the law & a suspect’s rights. People not only watch faithfully, but root for the police & the prosecutor." It's so deeply engrained. teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

"We need to move away from the Law & Order mindset, which taught us to root for prosecutors & despise defendants. Assume anyone accused is guilty. See those who break the law as evil or cruel, rather than the society that accepts poverty & inequality."teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

THIS ALL DAY AND NIGHT: "It may sound daunting to reconceptualize & reevaluate our views of the criminal legal system & the people it targets & abuses in answer to an immediate crisis, but that work is critical for the greater task of systemic change." teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…

"Until our most basic intuitions about the criminal legal system change, the system itself will never change."

So how do we do this? The author of the above important commentary, Olayemi Olurin (@msolurin) offers some solutions.

First: read.

https://twitter.com/msolurin/status/1455204848668917766?s=20

"Until our most basic intuitions about the criminal legal system change, the system itself will never change."

So how do we do this? "Scrutinize media coverage of the “justice” system & became more discerning consumers of "justice" news & culture. thenation.com/article/societ…

"Until our most basic intuitions about the criminal legal system change, the system itself will never change."

So how do we do this?

"Attending court & watching proceedings that are open to the public is critical for the greater task of systemic change."washingtonpost.com/local/public-s…

"Thousands of individuals — fathers, sisters, husbands, community members — are still languishing in Rikers’ cages because that is our societal status quo. For that to change, we must change first." Stop watching Law & Order now & forever & read this: teenvogue.com/story/law-and-…