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The statement “We have not ended racial caste in America; we have simply redesigned it” is one that Michelle Alexander embeds in her introduction to her book. this statement is a very powerful one that holds true in many aspects. Michelle Alexander uses the example of the way the Jim Crow Laws oppressed the black community. She states that the new system uses merely just different ways to achieve the same oppression since the actual Jim Crow Laws have been deemed not a law. With the prison system having a large percentage of black felons, it is the new way to keep the black voices from being heard or represented in the government of the U.S. just as the Jim crows had denied generations of black families to vote back then, the same tactics are uses but this time disguised as “democratic ideals”. In this way, the jim crow laws have not been abolished, yet “redesigned” into a new form such as the prison systems and the unjust treatment of felons who are mainly black. In other words, racial systems in the nation have not been ended, they have simply been installed into different aspects of life, allowing racism to live in the core of the nation ages after the issues had been addressed initially.

“we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it.” A statement made by Michele Alexander illustrating the immutability of racism within the structures of American society. Alexander begins with an anecdote of an African American’s male family members and their inability to exercise their right to vote, from several generations back to the present, calling out how America utilizes different tactics to legalize discrimination. Each method used to initiate racism correlates to that era, for example, in the past it was slavery and now in the present it is the criminal justice system. African Americans as well as people of color are vulnerable to the systematic racism that is deeply in rooted in the foundation of America, creating what Alexander says a “racial caste system”. This system allows for mass incarceration and social control over minorities, deflecting their natural rights. America’s redesign of racial caste makes it easier for African Americans as well as people of color to fall prey to this incriminating system by ripping away their bill of rights and completing America’s picture of a perfect society filled with white collared workers.

In “Introduction to The New Jim Crow“, author Michelle Alexander states “we have not ended racial caste in American; we have merely redesigned it.” using the mass incarceration system in America to keep people of color in a permanent second–class status. She is trying to show that through the story of Jarvious Cotton and how through generation and generation there are constructs in place to keep African Americans from voting. It isn’t a secret that neighborhoods with predominantly POC populations are over-policed and the image of the black man is always made out as thug-like in America and there is direct criminalization of a skin tone. The racial caste system is very much prevalent in America, and now rather than Jim Crow laws enforcing literacy tests to prevent African Americans from having any civil influence in their country, a judicial system that targets people of color is present to keep people as subordinates. Alexander uses her first-hand experience working for the ACLU in order to back her claims and reasoning for why the system has just been redesigned to mask it’s true intentions.

“we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it.” – Michelle Alexander

Through this quote Michelle Alexander is trying to convey that even though times have changed and the Jim Crow era is long gone, the racial caste system still exists but takes on a different shape. The “New Jim Crow” involves and affects the African American male community of the United States. That is because they make up a majority of the mass incarceration in the country’s criminal justice system. As a result, they are revoked of some of their most basic rights, and without their most basic rights, Michelle argues, the African American male community loses its power in contributing to the nation’s politics and society. Michelle defends her claim by reciting her experiences while working as a lawyer and using evidence such as “people of all colors use and sell illegal drugs at remarkably similar rates’ – to prove her point on the racial discrimination involved in the criminal justice system which in turn disempowers the African American male community.

“we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it.”

Its obvious how the prison system is just a front to continue racially profiling black people, and by labeling them as “criminals” it makes it legal to discriminate against them. “Today it is perfectly legal to discriminate against criminals in nearly all the ways that it was once legal to discriminate against African Americans.” As proved in this article, the prison system sets criminals up for failure, it is not proven to work yet is still enforced.  My understanding of this quote is how the racial caste is more present then ever, but has just been redesigned in order to make it seem less racist. The system as a whole throughout the whole country is not in favor of black people, take the crack cocaine issue as example. As the author states, the media only showed black families, women, men and babies, and labeled them as crack women, crack men, etc. The media pushed this idea that black people are criminals and should be identified as such in order to give a solid reason to enforce racial caste. An important idea brought up is how Jim Crow and slavery are examples of racial caste, and it may seem dramatic to compare that to today, but mass incarnation is racial caste, and it important to recognize and acknowledge that.

“Once released, former prisoners enter a hidden underworld of legalized discrimination and per- manent social exclusion. They are members of America’s new undercaste.” Lastly I want to bring up this point the author addresses, which is the main way the author backs up the statement at the top. Addressing them as the “undercaste” is upsetting but true, the criminal justice system has no intention of bettering a criminals life after they have done their time. But only creating a reason to legally discriminate them, and exclude them from society just as it was during Jim Crow times.

The first law of thermodynamics states that energy cannot be created or destroyed, rather it can only be converted from one form to another. Similarly, racism in America has simply changed from labeling by race to labeling people of color as felons, albeit the part about whether it could be created or destroyed. Now instead of outright excluding and discriminating against African-Americans, they can achieve the same effect through disenfranchisement and racial profiling. In “Introduction to The New Jim Crow“, Michelle Alexander writes exactly that, that “we have not ended racial caste in American; we have merely redesigned it.”

And the worst part is that, we don’t see the criminal justice system as something comparable to Jim Crow. It’s flawed, yes. But Jim Crow-esque? That’s hard for us to wrap our mind around, especially for those who live in an era where Jim Crow laws haven’t been enforced since 1965 (on paper).

In her research, Alexander notes on the Drug War as a particular instance and a propagator of the New Jim Crow. The media enforces and spreads the idea that African-Americans were predominantly crack addicts and dealers, while our criminal justice system incarcerates them. And while studies do show “that people of all colors use and sell illegal drugs at remarkably similar rates”, our country imprisons more black youth than white youth. With this stereotype that our black population are more susceptible to drug use and distribution, we are dulled to the idea that there’s something wrong with the racial disparity among mass incarceration. We begin to think it’s normal. Moreover, even when felons are released, they still face series of challenges during their re-entry into society. They are barred from job opportunities, from voting, and from various other public benefits. This is a problem that goes further than just the system being flawed, it’s a problem with hidden sentiment towards people of color. Even in today’s time where there is overwhelming support for movements like BLM, there’s still a long way to go before we’ve rid ourselves of the ingrained racial caste that’s been in place generations before most of us were even born.

“we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it.”

The author of this reading is trying to convey to the audience how social divisions still exist in America today and have not been eradicated, rather they have been modified to seem less strict. Reality can often be misleading and this is what Michelle Alexander is trying to show us. The social systems in the U.S. were made to seem equal but when looked at closer actually resemble and perform many aspects of the Jim Crow time period in South Africa. This quote also shows the corruptness within the powerful officials of this country.

Alexander uses research to back up this statement by using her experience from being a lawyer who had dealt with several class-action employment discrimination-cases. She quickly understood how this form of racial stereotyping had subjective effects on cases and unfair consequences for victims. Alexander also mentions how during her time at ACLU that people who have been incarcerated are denied the right to vote due to the web of laws from a biased social system. Alexander does a good job in setting up the conversation about the role of the criminal justice system for the rest of the book.

 

Alexander’s introduction allows ample support of the claim “we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it.” She begins with an example of Jarvious Cotton’s exemption from voting and the fact that his lineage has suffered from the same issue. This immediately gives proof of how the racial caste is still present in modern America as the fundamental right of voting was restricted across multiple generations. Similarly, African Americans have suffered through the generational disadvantage of accumulating wealth. For example, there has been a specific instance in the past where black communities have became extremely successful in gaining economic freedom, but were destroyed by white mobs (Tulsa massacre). How are African Americans expected to succeed at the same rate as their white counterparts when the patriarchal lineage of white people were never restricted from basic materials needed to thrive (accumulating wealth or voting in elections)? Alexander also writes about the uncanny similarity between mass incarceration and Jim Crow segregation. Under Jim Crow laws, African Americans were expected to take a literacy test (practically impossible to pass) in order to vote. Today, after African Americans are released from prisons, “… they are often denied the right to vote, excluded from juries, and relegated to a racially segregated and subordinated existence.” and “they are legally denied the ability to obtain employment, housing, and public benefits—much as African Americans were once forced into a segregated, second-class citizenship in the Jim Crow era.” This correlates to the literacy test as it places unnecessary barriers that prevent African Americans from integrating into and succeeding in American society.

America is a nation that is supposedly built on many foundations. One of the biggest foundations of this is the equality of opportunity. The American Dream seems to have evolved into the amazing idea that anyone, from anywhere, can come to America and can accomplish anything. America seems to have built a name of dreams, as people travel from all over the world in order to accomplish their dreams and follow them, or so they have us believe. This may have been the case at one time in the past, but as many people have come to realize, is that America is not as open as presumed. America, although job saturated and capitalist, has some boundaries and exceptions that prohibit this so-called American Dream that is open to everyone. This idea excludes the likes of many minority groups as they are discriminated against and are put at a severe disadvantage. As the fight for slavery ended and people received “equality”, people assumed that life would be as they dreamed. Just because there is equality by law, does not mean there will be equality by society. Racism still occurs as it still occurs today. This is mirrored in the American Dream as black people now are set to believe that they have opportunities, but are merely being played as the facade of economic mobility clouds their minds. They are placed in towns with terrible educational standards and terrible crime. Children that are supposed to be equal, from birth, are taught that they need to work 3 times as hard for the same benefit as a white man. There is no space for economic mobility with the exclusion of education. This is done so the world does not complain about unequal treatment because by law that is what’s going on. “What is completely missed in the rare public debates today about the plight of African Americans is that a huge percentage of them are not free to move up at all. It is not just that they lack opportunity, attend poor schools, or are plaguety.” The goal of this action is to keep the minority colored community economically dormant, as they live in an America of disbelief and false confidence. They live in an America without the American Dream. The racial caste in America has indeed been redesigned as African Americans are extremely malnourished in countless of areas that are crucial to their success in America.