The War On Drugs: The New Jim Crow

The War on Drugs is believed to help with many problems in today’s society such as realizing the rise of crime rates and the uprooting of violent offenders and drug kingpin. Michelle Alexander explains that the War on Drugs is a new way to control society much like how Jim Crow did after the Civil War. There are many misconceptions about the War on Drugs; commonly people believe that it’s helping society with getting rid of those who are dangerous to the general public. The War on Drugs is similar to Jim Crow by hiding the real intention behind Mass Incarceration of people of color. The War on Drugs is used to take away rights of those who get incarcerated. When they plead guilty, they will lose their right to vote and have to check application

boxes that say they’re a felon. Jim Crow was used after the Civil War to prevent African Americans from their legal rights as newly announced citizens of the United States. Jim Crow continued to make African Americans slaves under laws that they had supposedly broken. The War on Drugs is being used as a mass incarceration on people of color and lower class, this stereotyping on them is leading to people of color and minorities’ legal rights as citizens being withheld.

The War on Drugs uses methods of stereotyping colored people and minorities to fulfill the government’s desires and needs. Commonly, law enforcement are racially bias against people of color as well as the lower class of people by claiming they’re all criminals. They will go into certain neighborhoods to search the area for any small amount of drug use happening. News stations tend to be the most racially bias towards people of color, often describing them as less that white people. Many times two different races are described in different ways or thought of being something different for similar offences. It is stereotypically thought that many black men don’t have enough commitment and tend to leave their children at young ages. Alexander brings forward, in the chapter “The New Jim Crow” that “Hundreds of thousands of black men are unable to be good fathers for their children, not because of a lack of commitment or desire but because they are warehoused in prisons, locked in cages. They did not walk out on their families voluntarily; they were taken away in handcuffs, often due to a massive federal program known as the War on Drugs” (180). Alexander is uncovering that, despite people’s assumptions for the reasons behind a lack of a black father figure in a child’s life, the father didn’t choose to leave and was taken to jail because of a minor offence that he committed. This is important to see that the War on Drugs are hurting families and often leaving kids without one or both of their biological parental figures.

It’s believed that people who cycle in and out of prison are violent offenders. In some cases, it’s true, but not all cases. Many people are taken to prison for minor drug offences, often possession. Many of them are shown nothing by cruelty. Alexander explains in “The Cruel Hand” that “A wallet could be mistaken for a gun” (141). She mentions this because many innocent people are prosecuted and shot for being believed to have a gun. People who manage to get out of prison “… do their best to survive, even thrive – against all odds” (144). They try to live normally after being released from prison. It’s hard to get back up on their feet because of all of the applications that require someone to check the felony box. It’s important to understand what other classes and people go through. Some people may not realize what’s happening in the governmental system and some continue to willingly follow such systems. If people were to realize that people who cycle out of prison usually go back because they are unable to survive on their own with the oppression that they face and need to get past to start barely living as a citizen again. The War on Drugs is being used to control the population much like Jim Crow did.

The drug war is told as a war on the communities that sell drugs.

However, the main motive of the War on Drugs was to prevent a population of people from their legal rights as citizens. People believe that drug abuse was starting to rise when the drug war was issued. Michelle Alexander points out, in the chapter “The Lockdown” from The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Color Blindness that “Drug use and abuse is nothing new; in fact, it was on the decline, not on the rise when the War on Drugs began” (72). Alexander explains that the War on Drugs wasn’t started because of the ‘sudden rise of drug abuse’ but rather a different reason. The motive of the start of the War on Drugs was for income for many agencies to confiscate the goods and income that the incarcerated person had in possession. Understanding the actual motive is important because the War on Drugs needs to be further researched before people fully accept it as something that is helping everyone. Mass incarceration is the hidden motive under the War on Drugs and many people believe that the prosecutors are given fair and equal rights when facing a jury trial for their crimes. It’s common that it’s not the case and many times they are lead to plead guilty and often lose their rights to vote as well as having to ‘mark a box’ that labels them as a felon. Nearly all applications have the felon question. It leads many people who are trying to get their lives back together after going to prison nearly impossible. Many can’t affording housing and their families are skeptical on allowing them to live with them. Few can still get back on their feet after being prosecuted and released from prison, but it’s

difficult.

Mass incarceration is hidden behind the well-known title of the War on Drugs. It stereotypes people to convict them of felonies and to prevent people of color and the lower class of their rights as citizens. The War on Drugs also makes it nearly impossible for prisoners to ever fully leave prison and become living people again. If individuals were to research more on the laws of the War on Drugs, they may understand more about how the drug war is breaking up families and hurting citizens of America. Many of the misconceptions that people believe about the War on Drugs keep it from losing the profits that the government is making from other people’s loss of rights. It also utilizes certain people over others much like how Jim Crow did after the Civil War. The New Jim Crow is better known as the War on Drugs by preventing people their rights much like Jim Crow did in the eighties after the Civil War. It stereotypes and give people misconceptions about the War on Drugs to continue its funding. The New Jim Crow is used to prevent certain people from their legal rights as citizens by giving the government a reason to remove what they deserve as citizens. If more people become aware of what the drug war really does, then the New Jim Crow will no longer have as much power as it does now.