https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru Caitlin C. + Stella T. en-us 2019-04-23 12:45:19 UTC 2019-04-26 12:17:25 UTC hello@padlet.com 20the2 https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/353338127 -The First Step Bill would only affect the Federal criminal justice system, which is a small 181,000 of the 2.1 million people imprisoned in the US
-This bill (now law), would ease the 'three strike rule.' The notion that someone with three or more drug convictions would automatically get 25 years to life in prison.
-Not everything about the logistics of this law are good. The algorithm of who gets the reduced sentence length could potentially perpetuate racial disparities.  ]]> 2019-04-23 13:06:02 UTC https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/353338127 20the2 https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/353341668 -America is the world's leader in mass incarceration, taking up 22% of the world's prison counts, that being said, we only account for 4% of the world's population.
-Black Americans are treated unfairly and this shows in the stats. Blacks are far more likely to be incarcerated than any other group of people, and are disproportionally arrested for drug crimes. Additionally, they tend to get longer sentences for the same crimes as white people who get much shorter sentences.
-Life sentences have become much more popular within the last 20 years, many of which include life without parole. ]]> 2019-04-23 13:12:51 UTC https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/353341668 19conners2 https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/354084461 - Very few Americans actually understand and admit to how biased and unjust the criminal justice system really is
~"If someone were to visit the United States from another country (or another planet) and ask: Is the U.S. criminal justice system some kind of tool of racial control? Most Americans would swiftly deny it." (pg 183)
- Is there a way to educate the public on the toxic side of the criminal justice system? Is their denial coming from a place of pure ignorance or a place of racial discrimination and apathy?

- I think that the biggest problem is that every person who stays ignorant to the fact that there is racial disparity in the criminal justice system, continues to add to the blanket we throw over the issue and toss under the carpet so that we don't have to face the truth.
~"It is a set of structural arrangements that locks a racially distinct group into a subordinate political social and economic position, effectively creating a second-class citizenship"
-How can we break this cycle, and start talking about these issues? What is it going to take for the entire system to change?

]]> 2019-04-25 12:58:41 UTC https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/354084461 19conners2 https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/354414461 - The U.S. is home to less than 5% of the world's population but 25% of its incarcerated population 
- Prison spending is rising 3 times as fast as education spending, and in some states it's as much as 7 times faster
- The whole idea of spending more on prisons is counter productive, seeing as though by investing the money in programs for at-risk kids, it not only drops the crimes committed but it is cheaper in the long run.]]> 2019-04-26 12:02:59 UTC https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/354414461 19conners2 https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/354415558 - Because the length of nonviolent prison sentences went up, the length of much more violent crimes also increased heavily
- About 54% of people in state prisons,  which house more than 86% of the US prison population, were violent offenders in 2012, and 16% were drug offenders, so nonviolent crimes aren't as prolific as we are told
- Many new laws to lower nonviolent crime sentences are aimed at congress who can only change the federal prison, which only holds 10% of the U.S. prison population]]> 2019-04-26 12:08:02 UTC https://padlet.com/20the2/r3cxn45zdsru/wish/354415558