#capable of doing so fairly. they look for signs of abusive behavior in race. gender. sex. age. class. sexuality. religious beliefs.

[gayvampyr]

Do you support prison abolition /paying prisoners a living wage / making being able to vote more accessible to everyone?

I like your stances and opinions and your jokes but I'm genuinely curious on this one.

(This is inspired by some of the comments under one of your posts talking about how we should just make democracy more livable under capitalism, and while I disagree with that being the ONLY thing we need to do, it does kinda make me think about how many people think we need to get better without abolishing prisons or at least treating our prisoners better than we are treating them currently.)

hi! i'm not sure which post you're referring to but I'm actually anti-capitalist. I think we need to dismantle capitalism as a system because it is inherently inhumane, working exactly as intended and therefore cannot be "fixed" without restructuring it entirely from the ground up; the devaluation of human labor and environmental destruction for profit is not a bug, it's a feature. i could delve into the kind of economic system that i think should replace it after dismantling it, however it's more of a thought exercise and until it becomes a plausible reality, i would rather focus on how we can make capitalism livable for the time being because we have no other choice. for example we could start by lowering rent, instituting a 4-day work week, and establishing support networks for homeless people. i'm not an economist so it's not like i have all the answers but according to the results from other countries who have applied these practices, it improves quality of life and the economy significantly.

as for prisons, i'm pro-abolition. you can check out my prison abolition tag for more information, but essentially prisons exist in this day and age as an industry that profits off of slave labor. many of our laws and their enforcers unfairly target minorities and lower class people, and the denial of convicts the right to vote is just another way our government strips vulnerable communities of their political power, autonomy, and supposedly inalienable rights. aside from the conviction of innocent people and people who did commit a crime but ultimately did no harm, i don't think it's the right of any individual (or government, for that matter) to imprison others. i think people tend to forget that "criminals" are human beings and deserving of the same rights as everyone else, and it is human nature to make mistakes. the important thing is the opportunity to do better. militarist propaganda has done an incredible job of convincing us that convicts are amoral and undeserving of our sympathy, turning society in general against them and destroying any sort of safety net they might have had or needed otherwise. and people are too busy clinging to the notion that criminals are subhuman and deserving of whatever punishment is dealt that they can't see that this is a slide into fascism, and that they can just as easily become "other" should they find themselves on the receiving end of the system. we are very close to living in a surveillance state, which means any minor offense or slip-up has the potential to completely decimate your chances at getting a job, applying for college, getting a loan, receiving housing, and especially being able to have a say in elections. it also makes you more likely to be arrested again on account of "suspected illegal activity", so your record follows you around for the rest of your life.

sorry this got so long but yeah, essentially capitalism and the prison industry are inhumane and should be abolished.

#voter suppression #prison abolition #militarism #capitalism #52018 #racism #classism #1312 #also before anyone brings up r/pe or other genuinely awful crimes that endanger people i have to posit the question: #how can we account for those crimes when the people arrested for them are are mainly minorities? #need i remind you that white women used to accuse black men of assault just to weaponize their white privilege? #to exert power over them out of fear or hatred? people convicted for violent crimes are disproportionately trans poor and POC #while the rest of people actually committing those crimes walk free because of the privileges of being cis/het/white/upper-class #and like. thats not to say that those crimes should go unrecognized. but the system we have and the people enforcing it are just not #capable of doing so fairly. they look for signs of abusive behavior in race. gender. sex. age. class. sexuality. religious beliefs. #very little investigation is performed and hardly any empirical data is used in ruling. if they cared about victims at all they would focus #on preventing abuse before it happens and giving us support and access to people and services who can help. as a victim and survivor #the gov did not give a shit about my abuse. we cant make a system built on suffering care about any of us. #and like. yall are so confident you'll be able to decide who is 'good' and who is 'bad' but you can't. its like the shit with amber heard. #everyone was so caught up in defending their favorite actor they disregarded a woman's account of her abuse and made her out to be crazy an #evil #and i know you think youre different and we can do it differently but it happens over and over and over again #tldr we cant use a system to prosecute the ''evil people of society'' that is built on defining those traits through a racist misogynistic #etc lens #if we could we wouldnt even be in this mess