A Friendly Reminder About Slavery

I just wanted to remind you that slavery is still legal and in practice here in the US through our criminal injustice system. Codified into law through state constitutions and the federal 13th amendment’s infamous exception clause. I know war is hell. But so is slavery. And it’s happening right here right now.

This past Sunday on our broadcast of Abolition Today we spoke with a man on Rikers Island who has been in a living hell for 3 grueling years. Unconstitutionally held without trial and denied basic human rights. Tortured, beaten, railroaded, and standing under a guillotine every day. Everyone in merica knows Rikers is a hell on earth where people are treated as disposable commodities. A viscous money laundering scheme that puts bounties on citizens heads upwards of $600,000 annually. That’s the cost to incarcerate one person for one year on Rikers.

More than half the people there are held for petty crimes if any crime at all. Dr Stewart, our guest caller, was in for allegedly stealing a cell phone and a pack of cigarettes from a drug dealer.

Much like Kalief Browder’s “backpack theft” accusation. Which cost him his life after 3 years of torture. We’re spending more than half a million each to warehouse men, women, and children in a domestic warzone over alleged $20 crimes. In the same way George Floyd was killed over $20. Make it make sense.

Are we but sheep paying to be slaughtered?

It’s not something that affects all New York residents or all mericans equally. In that same plantation jail named after a Judge who sponsored fugitive slave law bounty hunters, over 90% of inmates are black or Hispanic. That’s how it is in Louisiana, Alabama, and in every other state. Black and Brown citizens are criminalized, hunted, captured, warehoused, and worked for free at rates as high as 19 to 1 per 100k. Placed under conditions that would get you prosecuted if you did it to an animal. Ask Michael Vick.

Rikers is just one jail in the nation that has more people in cages than any other country on earth during any time in the history of mankind. It’s brutal, horrific, bloody, deadly, unfair, and an outright crime against humanity that has been allowed to continue for generations.

By the end of this year (if we make it that far) police will have killed another 1,200-1,400 people and 2-5 thousand will die in jails and prisons as a direct results of prison staffs actions or inaction. 12 to 14 million will go to jails. Nearly 700,000 will go to prisons.
The vast majority caught and held for conditions and not crimes. People who needed help and instead got swallowed by an ancient demon called slavery. Decimating families and communities.

None of it will pause or even slow down while other crisis’s take center stage. The unimaginable suffering will continue. Right here at home to US citizens. Unless you do something about it.

So, here’s what you can do. Text “endtheexception” to 52886 on your cell phone right now and follow the prompts.

You can also go to www.abolishslavery.us to join the mailing list, make a donation, and explore the vast amount of information and resources available. Educate yourself.

Lastly, you can register to vote this November to end constitutional slavery for the first time in your state.

States that are already on the 2022 ballot include Tennessee, Oregon, Vermont, and Alabama.

States that still have a chance to make it to this years ballot include California, Ohio, New Jersey, and Florida.

Thank you for those who have done so already. You’re why we’re achieving these historic victories despite the national media silence.

“The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.” -Frederick Douglass

We have waited long enough and endured long enough.

Max Parthas 3/8/22