photo courtesy of NPR
"We have predators on our streets that society has, in fact - in part because of its neglect - created. They are beyond the pale, many of those people. We have no choice but to take them out of society" Senator Joe Biden, addressing Congress in 1993
WTF?!
I was walking in my beloved Mount Olivet Cemetery today, listening to NPR's Code Switch podcast when I fell into a hole. Biden said . . . what?! My stomach turned. I listened to it again and again. The episode featured a new NPR podcast, Louder Than a Riot, and the story was centered on hip-hop and mass incarceration. In 1993, Biden had the gall to say that to the American people. He probably said it because he needed to push the 1994 Crime Bill, win over his opposition; but he said it – 'those people' need to be taken out.
I'm not an academic or politician, but I know a few things about what isolation does to an individual and, moreover, to the communities from which they're deprived. Nothing good. That's why agencies like the Insight Prison Project (IPP) exist. Their Victim Offender Education Group (VOEG) project works to provide the mental health support prisoners need to reenter society successfully. Thank goodness for efforts like IPP.
My listener experience today was, I guess, emblematic of my experience with news every day. There are many important issues, lots of opinions, regretful politicians, lies, lies about lies. I'm tired of it all. We are a complicated species and I appreciate that about us. Most days.