The Prison Abolition Movement
The prison abolition movement attempts to eliminate prisons and the prison system. Prison abolitionists see the prisons as an ineffective way to decrease crime and reform criminals. They also believe the modern criminal justice system to be racist, sexist, and classist. One of the many arguments made for prison abolition is that the majority of people accused of crime cannot afford to pay a lawyer. The Anarchist Black Cross was a key group involved in the prison abolition movement that still persists today. A variety of proposed alternatives to prisons arose from the prison abolition movement.
Read more about this topic: Alternatives To Imprisonment
Famous quotes containing the words prison, abolition and/or movement:
“All too soon these feet must hide
In the prison cells of pride,
Lose the freedom of the sod,
Like a colt’s for work be shod,”
—John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892)
“It was a marvel, an enigma in abolition latitudes, that the slaves did not rise en-masse, at the beginning of hostilities.”
—Rebecca Latimer Felton (1835–1930)
“Christianity was only a very strong and singularly well-timed Salvation Army movement that happened to receive help from an unusual and highly dramatic incident. It was a Puritan reaction in an age when, no doubt, a Puritan reaction was much wanted; but like all sudden violent reactions, it soon wanted reacting against.”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)