Please Stop Re-Incarcerating Us In Your Language
Rachel Maddow, I am a huge fan, but it is not okay for you to bust out the word “Felon” as pejorative whenever you want to suggest that someone is particularly odious.
Chris Hayes, I am a huge fan, but for God’s sake man, your new book is about racial disparities in the criminal justice system, it is NOT okay for you to bust out the word “Felon” as pejorative whenever you want to suggest that someone is particularly odious.
Stephanie Ruhle, I am a huge fan, but we pay our debt when we serve our sentences and it is not okay for you to use the word “Felon” as pejorative whenever you want to suggest that someone is particularly odious.
And Yes…I have heard all of you use the other “F Word” multiple times on your shows.
We Are NOT Your Felons
So what’s the problem?
When you say we are felons, you reduce everything about us down to only the worst thing we have ever done.
You construct us in language as always incapable of anything fully trustworthy or fully worthy of humanity.
You say we will never have the right to socially exist in a world where we have transcended our crimes.
We are NOT felons (no matter what dictionary definition you send me, constructing people in language is a choice).
We may have engaged in felonious behaviors but when you use the other “F” word you reduce EVERYTHING we are ONLY to the worst moments in our entire lives.
This week, the 23rd Exhibition Of Art By Michigan Prison’s starts at the University of Michigan’s Duderstadt Center Gallery and if we were to believe you, the artists who participated wouldn’t be allowed, in language (in your language), to have possibilities beyond this label.
Sure, he may be an “artist” (wink wink) but let’s be honest, he is a “convicted felon” so, who cares.
Sure, she may be a political activist, but we know it’s a hustle, I mean come on, he’s a convicted felon.
Sure, they may have mental illness, but they committed a crime and were convicted, so it’s okay to put them in solitary for years.
Reducing people to caricatures in language has always been one of the primary ways that powerful people have reduced human beings (that they don’t like) to things, monsters, “less-than” beings that people can do violence to, be horrible to, or deny humanity to.
All of you on MSNBC have a huge platform to speak social justice into the world.
I know you want to eviscerate some of the folks you are talking about and I understand that you have huge issues with the crimes people commit but we earn our chance to reenter society and live our lives by serving our sentences. Until you spend a few weeks (or years) in prison, I would suggest you reserve your judgments.
At the very least, check out “The 13th” (Ava Duvernay’s excellent documentary) Shaka Senghor’s book “Writing My Wrongs,” or Bryan Stevenson’s book “Just Mercy.”
Or just talk to some formerly incarcerated folks struggling to make a new life after returning with no money, facing employment and housing discrimination, and usually carrying massive criminal justice debt (and all of this while dealing with PTSD from living locked-in one of the most violent and scary places on earth).
The last thing we need is for people like you to co-sign on the dotted line of the incredible disadvantages that we face as returning citizens.
Stop locking the doors on the second prison we live in with your words.
#LanguageMatters
Josh is the co-host of the Decarceration Nation podcast, a blogger, and a freelance writer. Please consider following him on Twitter, throwing a tip into his hat on Patreon, showing your appreciation using Paypal.me, or adding OnPirateSatellite to your feeds.
