Jesse Jackson, Black Leaders Are Right About Ending the War on Drugs by Dr. Boyce Watkins in the Huffington Post
Powerful stuff:
Jesse Jackson said it best during the recent forum on the drug war.
“This is a crime against humanity. War on drugs is a war on Black and Brown and must be challenged by the highest levels of our government in the war for justice,” said the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson.
“This is government-sponsored terrorism,” Jackson said. “It raised the price on Black existence; it is an attack on the Black family; it has destroyed a generation. Those who are the least users have paid the most price because of race; those with money and attorneys have paid the least price. Those without attorneys remain behind bars today.”
“I’m here to tell you that one of the most fundamental pillars of what we see going on in our communities, this combustible caldron of genocide and death, is this war on drugs,” said Ron Daniels, CEO of the Institute of the Black World, which held the forum at which Rev. Jackson was speaking. “Why? It’s because it’s a racist war on drugs…I know many people are out there saying, ‘Why are you Negroes still talking about racism?’ That’s because we’ve been targeted for the police action – the war on drugs is a war on us.” […]
It’s time for all of us to wake up and attack the problem of mass incarceration and the drug war. If there were ever a set of realities that are reflective of the persistent racial divides that continue to plague America, this one would be it. As a man who’s biological father and older brother figure both spent time in prison, this issue is personal to me. I, like so many millions of black people across America, have experienced the hurt and pain that is caused by mass incarceration. It’s time for this system of Americanized apartheid to be brought to an end.
This is just part of a recent trend – Al Sharpton has been on news shows speaking out against the drug war. The fact that LEAP’s director Neill Franklin can speak as both a police officer and an African American is powerful as well.
Getting the black community to mobilize against the drug war is a potent step.
Wow. ’nuff said.
This is a HUGE deal. Blacks are the people getting screwed the worst by the drug war, yet have the least awareness of the problem.
When black communities start to speak out with ONE VOICE against this madness, only then will things start to really change.
I wish I could hear Ron Allen comment on this development!
Normally I am not a big fan of Jesse Jackson. I believe he makes a living by generating racial chaos. However, in this case, not only is is right, he is late to the party. But I will gladly welcome him and Al Sharpton into this fight, because the Drug War IS a war waged primarily, but not exclusively, on racial minorities, especially black and latino.
Anyone that does not believe this to be true should read Michelle Huffman’s “The New Jim Crow” for a detailed analysis of the Drug War’s impact on the black community and our country as a whole. Jesse is right… the Drug War is government sponsored terrorism!
The ‘tipping point’ was crossed two years ago…but the fall was slowed by the reluctance of minority leaders to speak out against their systematic and deliberate oppression.
That’s changed, and now the ones most adversely affected by the drug laws are finally looking in the right direction, pointing the finger and calling attention to the problem. And in doing so, they will prove to be catalysts for the elimination of the odious laws; challenging their credibility is to open one’s self to charges of racism…when the laws are, themselves, demonstrably racist.
WOW thanks jesse jackson.ruined it for me.i have no choice but to support the war on drugs now that, ippy negro had to open his baboon mouth.HE’S NOT THE EMPIRE OF BLACK PEOPLE. He just likes to stir up trouble and play the damn race card every chance he gets. He’s literally a money grubbing peice of shit.Jesse Jackson sucks and is not credible for this cause period. he just helped the prohibitionist,big time. I don’t trust that guy.speaking all types of racist jive talk . good day and sorry for leaving the cause.but thank jesse jack and al sharpon for that.their both completelly evil. i’m sorry but the cause is lost now people.
by the way i’m african american
…by the way, you’re also a troll. Leave the cause? You’re African American and you’ll just trip off, la-de-dah and stop opposing the mass incarceration of people JUST LIKE YOU? Ya know, I’m sure they can find room for you at the local commercial prison. Get a grip….You don’t like Jesse Jackson? Big whoop, you have a lot of company. There’s goons with flak jackets and guns and they want YOU.
darkcycle, telling me to get a grip? don’t go calling people off on shit you know nothing about.I have my personal reasons agesn’t Mr. King wannabe faker.My church didn’t want to go through his rainbow group to get donations,he got pissy saying we had to.and i found a way not to. so then mr. jackson starts spreading all this hate on me and my church,calling us racist,how we want to see the white man all perish and all that jibbajabba he be a spewing all the time.which is complete slander. Beocouse 1 my wife is white. 2. he attacked me in my church. he’s nothing but scum.. I’m sorry I’ma have to say the one word that defiles my brothas and sisters. as it is the only word to truelly discribe Mr.Jackson, and if Mr.King were with us today he’d well agree and be heavely ashamed of Mr. Jackson and our younger kids. Mr. Jackson is what we call a true Nigga
Sounds like I know as much about this shit as you, brother, my son is African American. I don’t care what personal gripe you have against Jackson, that shit your sayin’ is just fucked up.
Just because someone I don’t like supports a cause that’s important to me is no reason to abandon the cause.
Given the wide range of people who support drug policy reform, I’m sure there’s someone who doesn’t like Barney Frank, or Ron Paul, or Dennis Kucinich, or William F. Buckley, Jr., or Walter Cronkite, or Willie Nelson, or Jesse Jackson.
I find the former half-term governor of Alaska to be one of the most annoying and stupid people on earth, yet if she were to come out for drug policy reform, I’d be cheering, because then the idiots who follow her would finally hear a message of reform.
If your hatred is stronger than your principles, you’re nothing but a hollow shell.
Bang. Why did I bother? Thanks Pete.
The solution to the oppression of the black man is not to extend that oppression equitably to the white man.
Justin-kredable, you have aptly chosen your troll moniker, a you are indeed NOT CREDIBLE. As an African American myself, I seriously doubt you are black. That’s the beauty of anonymity. If you are, I hereby snatch your card! Bye-Bye…Self-Hating little sorry soul…
Quick correction to Silvermembers, the great piece “The New Jim Crow” is written by Michelle Alexander. I think you are conflating her with Alice Huffman of the California NAACP. Great Site Pete Guither, I am a fan.
whatever baboon mouth.haha great nah but yeah,Jesse Jackson is really a nigger.but hell if that race card player wants to help whatever i’m cool.but he’s still a jungle bunny spear chugger
Can we call “Bishop” Allen and see if we can’t convince him to stay on the other side?
Don’t you worry about that. Ron Allen is not a man capable of changing his mind about the EVIL of drugs.
So, Pete, howdayafeel about giving out the troll’s IP address? Heh-heh-heh.
😉
Day late and a dollar short. What pharmaceutical stock or corporation is the Jesse connected to?
Don’t care AT ALL for these two however, as Pete said, if they really support ending the drug war then they do have my support.
As long as they’re sincere and not doing it to get in good with the poisonous pharmaceutical companies.
Those “poisonous pharmaceutical companies” you seem to hate will be instrumental in the manufacturer and distribution of narcotics should drug prohibition be repealed. It was the pharmaceutical companies, remember, that produced heroin, morphine and cocaine back when those drugs were legally available and sold in corner drugstores and from the pages of the Sears, Roebuck mail-order catalog.
While, like any company, Big Pharma is interested in profits, most of the drugs they now produce are in response to the unhealthy lifestyles many, many people live. Want to lessen the role they play? Simple: lead a healthier life. And if you do, but then find yourself confronting a debilitating disease cured or made more bearable by pharmaceuticals, will you still consider them poisonous?
…….
FYI, pharmaceuticals are poisonous to me Daniel and no doubt countless others. And yes, I do have a debilitating disease, DIAGNOISED by M.D.’s, and all the pills the doctors threw at me freely made me sicker.
I have always felt that there was a bit of the charlatan about Jesse Jackson and Sharpton. However, any number of creditable, honest African American doctors, lawyers and former law enforcement types could scream to the high heavens and they would not get a fraction of the Media coverage as either of these two. They may see this only as an opportunity to make a buck and maintain power, I don’t know, but whatever the reasons, they may get mainstream to see just what this idiocy has to done to the AA and Latin communities (and poor Caucasians, as well)
I gotta say I’n not fond of either of those glory hounds but to stoop beneath the level of what you think they are… wow. Hope ya’ll reap what you sew 1000 fold.
I’ve always considered all medicine potentially poisonous to one degree or another. If it’s not very poisonous, sometimes the government makes it more so.
Marijuana is a phenomenon. It’s not poison by itself. (Coca isn’t either that I know of. Opium? I don’t know.) Cannabis does have a calming/feel better/analgesic effect.
It may even be good for you or protective to the health of your body and mind, in some form, in some way or another. I’m amazed at the plant and the implications in it, myself.
Whatever the “Big problem” is, it’s serious enough for some people, politicians, the self righteous, and the busybodies, to kill and imprison other people over.
Cannabis is the next big thing in the consuming history and normalcy of humanity… like coffee and tea and aspirin. I think.
Like sugar and salt.
It is already and the prohibitionists just have to stop doing harm to people over it.
I don’t know… There are a lot of good meds in the pharmacopeia and some bad ones and some that should be there but are not. The motivating factor for the folks who have final say in what gets approved and pushed seems to be more profit than health driven imho. I just look back at the early 20th when it seemed like medicine was making strong headway at cures and now all they seem to be able to do is find ways to maintain the conditions and ailments that didn’t get solved in the heyday of modern medicine and can’t help but believe that it isn’t by design.
Just leaves me disgusted that there doesn’t seem to be a single noble field that hasn’t been corrupted in this entire planet.
(pardon the despair)
Jesse always given me the creeps for some reason,but glad he’s on board here.
Don’t have link but recent story here in my neck of woods Utah,some years back a white guy arrested about 7 times DUI for Booze can not recall what county hardly received any jail time folks shocked. Yet recently young black woman gets DUI bad form of sickle cell anemia Doctor and lawyer asking if Judge could have her I think its first offense I think DUI and its a six month term in prison,if she could serve it home confinement cause of medical condition and another inmate died in prison neglected and or forgotten starved died in cell recently Judge refused but others I wonder had they been Caucasian and possibly Mormon would they have gotten home confinement maybe.
I hate to think this way but have lived in this state to long and seen crap like this happen before.
Yes Hope Marijuana is a phenomenon, thank God its there had one of my horrible headaches other day took usual muscle relaxant for it and prescription headache meds to no avail the pot took the pain away in 10 min.
Found the Link the driving under the influence,I guess under the influence and also assault charge that must have added the months to sentence, but still you can read the gravity of her condition judge could have had a little compassion.Look she still did threaten someone I get that. not asking for total leniencey.
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/52014870-78/askie-falcone-jail-court.html.csp
Jesse Jackson’s portrayal of prohibition as a crime against humanity—which it truly is—is a big turnaround for him. Abbie Hoffmann wrote that back in the early days of the civil rights movement he tried to convince Jackson to oppose the drug war, but Jackson refused to go along. Certainly there’s new hope for ending the drug war if theologians like Jesse Jackson can change their minds and reverse course on drug use issues.
What appears to have changed Jackson’s mind were the precise revelations of how the drug war works to disenfranchise minorities, since the methods aren’t immediately obvious without a bit of digging. Working to clarify for people how the drug war directly or indirectly affects them, regardless of their relatively drug-free lifestyle, we’ll see more conversions like that of Rev. Jackson.
The war on drugs is a massive crime against humanity.
The prohibition of drugs in America has its roots in racism. The oppression of minorities isn’t an “unintended consequence” of the drug war; it’s THE WHOLE POINT. And if it took 40 years for their so-called “leaders” to recognize that, at least they’re speaking up now.