Let’s be real: the criminal justice system wasn’t created to protect everyone … especially not Black and brown people. As someone who’s lived through it, I know this truth isn’t just academic. It’s personal.
This system wasn’t born out of fairness. It was born out of control. And while we’ve made progress, we’ve still got a longggg way to go.
Throwbacks for your brain 💖:
A System Built on Exploitation
After slavery was “abolished,” the 13th Amendment left a loophole:
“Except as a punishment for a crime…”
That one clause allowed slavery to be rebranded … and the criminal justice system became the new machine.
From Black Codes and convict leasing to the over-policing of our neighborhoods today, the system has evolved, but the target remains the same.
“The Black Codes had one aim: to keep the Negro in a condition as near slavery as possible.”
— Eric Foner, historian and author of Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution
Today, Black people make up just 13% of the U.S. population, yet nearly 38% of people in jail and 33% in prison are Black.
And if current trends continue, 1 in 3 Black men will experience incarceration in his lifetime.
This isn’t about crime. It’s about control and power and who this country was built to protect.
Reform Has Happened … But Not Enough
There have been efforts from the Civil Rights Movement to sentencing reform laws like the Fair Sentencing Act … but they haven’t changed the core of this system.
Right now:
• The U.S. holds nearly 20% of the world’s prison population with only 5% of the world’s total population.
• Over 60% of people in prison are there for nonviolent offenses.
• Nearly 1 in 5 incarcerated people are locked up for drug offenses, despite similar rates of drug use across racial lines.
• 2 out of 3 people in jail haven’t even been convicted — they’re just too poor to post bail, which averages $10,000 for a felony.
These aren’t just numbers. These are real lives. Real families. Real futures lost.
We’ve come far … but farther isn’t far enough when people are still locked in cages for being poor, sick, or simply Black.
We don’t need better cages. We need a better vision.
A world that values healing over punishment, restoration over retribution, and people over profits.
The system was never broken … it was designed this way.
But we’re not powerless. And I’m not done talking.
Let’s go beyond the record.
Until next time,
S.D 💖
Beyond the Record 
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