In the book The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison, author Jeffery Reiman states that the prison system in the United States is designed to fail in. It fails in the sense that the rapid expansion of the prison system fails to reduce crime, and instead is meant to create an image of a criminal class to keep the middle class in check. Reiman describes this failure as the ‘Pyrrhic defeat theory,’ as whereas a Pyrrhic victory is a victory where the losses make the victory pointless, a Pyrrhic defeat is instead a defeat where the gains even out the victory. And these gains go straight into the pocket of those controlling the institutions controlling the prison system. Reiman first introduces the Pyrrhic defeat theory by showing that several
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These crimes are just as deadly and have an even greater intent of wrongness than someone smoking a blunt on a corner, and yet they are not discussed. Lesser, petty crimes are instead propped up as the great moral decay of the United States, and are an excuse to give the poor harsher and longer prison sentences despite their innocuous nature. Some argue that this helps to keep a moral America, but if that were the case, Reiman argues, the government should be focusing on the corruption of businesses polluting the land, air, and water along with general disregard for the safety of the workers they employ. To not designate these as crimes shows how the prison system really operates as an informal form of social control that benefits the …show more content…
One of his charts of data show that Americans perceive the poorest 20% as holding 20% of the total wealth, while they actually hold only 5%, while the richest 20% hold 84% of the total wealth. I noticed some misconceptions in class, some of which I made vocal such as some of the class not believing that avoidable workplace hazards are a crime. If even students attending a school dedicated to social justice believe in such a narrative, then there is much less hope amongst the general population. While not focusing specifically on Karl Marx, as Reiman includes similar authors such as Emile Durkheim, Reiman’s main point is that through the application of the Pyrrhic defeat theory with a cover of historical inertia, the population has been subconsciously convinced what consists of the criminal class in the United States. Law enforcement would say that the perceived common criminal is young, Black, male, and poor, but a criminal class extends much farther beyond such simplicity. By creating a vague yet broad criminal class consisting of those that ‘deserve it,’ such as drug addicts, poor hoodrats, and welfare moms, we have allowed the existence of a prison system to continue. But it is really a cover to maintain a constant prison population to convince the general population of the need not for prison, but for mass incarceration. The morphing of the criminal justice
These crimes are just as deadly and have an even greater intent of wrongness than someone smoking a blunt on a corner, and yet they are not discussed. Lesser, petty crimes are instead propped up as the great moral decay of the United States, and are an excuse to give the poor harsher and longer prison sentences despite their innocuous nature. Some argue that this helps to keep a moral America, but if that were the case, Reiman argues, the government should be focusing on the corruption of businesses polluting the land, air, and water along with general disregard for the safety of the workers they employ. To not designate these as crimes shows how the prison system really operates as an informal form of social control that benefits the …show more content…
One of his charts of data show that Americans perceive the poorest 20% as holding 20% of the total wealth, while they actually hold only 5%, while the richest 20% hold 84% of the total wealth. I noticed some misconceptions in class, some of which I made vocal such as some of the class not believing that avoidable workplace hazards are a crime. If even students attending a school dedicated to social justice believe in such a narrative, then there is much less hope amongst the general population. While not focusing specifically on Karl Marx, as Reiman includes similar authors such as Emile Durkheim, Reiman’s main point is that through the application of the Pyrrhic defeat theory with a cover of historical inertia, the population has been subconsciously convinced what consists of the criminal class in the United States. Law enforcement would say that the perceived common criminal is young, Black, male, and poor, but a criminal class extends much farther beyond such simplicity. By creating a vague yet broad criminal class consisting of those that ‘deserve it,’ such as drug addicts, poor hoodrats, and welfare moms, we have allowed the existence of a prison system to continue. But it is really a cover to maintain a constant prison population to convince the general population of the need not for prison, but for mass incarceration. The morphing of the criminal justice