Stanley-Eric-Captive-Genders-Trans-Embodiment-and-Prison-Industrial-Complex

Maroon Abolitionistsindicates the transformation of society and an end to racism and capitalistinequality.We’ve seen abolition of slavery but the ramification of sanctionedapartheid still remains. Abolition literally means the end of something,whereas emancipation means to free or liberate. So how weunderstand that is critical to how we do anti-prison work. So a worldwithout prisons would mean a world with healing, it would mean aworld that had alternatives, it would mean forgiveness, it would meanjustice, it would mean the eradication of poverty….One limitation of the slavery–prison analogy is that it tends toerase the presence of non-black prisoners. This is problematic both inCanada, where First Nations prisoners suffer the most dramatic rates ofincarceration, and in the US, where Latinas/os are a rapidly growing incarceratedpopulation (Díaz-Cotto 2006). 19 While slavery was premisedon the black/white binary, maroon communities rejected this racist logic.Maroon settlements incorporated resisting Indians and exiled whitesas well as runaway slaves, and offered a radical multiracial alternativeto North American apartheid. 20 As such, marronage offers a model for“black-brown” coalitions and reminds black activists of the value of learningfrom indigenous knowledges. Women from the Native Sisterhood atGrand Valley Institution for Women, for example, taught Jamila about “aform of accountability, an alternative form of justice that is grounded inthe teachings from different Native nations.” Although some of the participantsreported not having worked with indigenous people or Latinos/as, activists like Jamila demonstrate the importance of non-black “outlyer”knowledges for contemporary abolitionist work.Maroon abolitionism is dedicated to the creation of a world inwhich prison is obsolete. 21 However, the participants did not limit theiractivism to this long-term goal. Instead, they were involved in challenginghuman rights abuses and advocating for the immediate needs of prisoners.For Bakari, this meant working to challenge overcrowding and medicalneglect in California women’s prisons:Of course we have to deal with what’s going on right now. So rightnow I want for people to live in humane conditions until we canfigure out a way to get rid of prison as a form of social control. Soright now what I want is all the beds off the day room. To have people305