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DESCRIPTION:-\n\n\nI invite you to a reading and discussion of my pamphlet\n\n"On the 
 Need to Abolish the Prison System: an ethical indictment"\n\nby Steve 
 Martinot\n\nat \n\nThe Green Arcade\nA bookstore in San Francisco\n(in 
 Hayes Valley)\n\n1680 Market St. @ Gough\n(near Market & Octavia / Central 
 Freeway exit)\n(415) 431-6800\n\nSunday, November 4, 2012\n\n5 pm\n\n\nThis 
 pamphlet is an extended argument for the abolition of prisons. Its argument 
 is made on ethical and political rather than sociological grounds. That is, 
 it addresses the logic of prisons as themselves criminal, and thus a source 
 of social violence, instead of simply demonstrating that prisons fail in 
 their allegedly intended purpose. Prisons do not reflect an oppressive 
 system or government. They are the technology of that system's criminality. 
 As such, the institutionality of prisons, and of the judicial machine that 
 runs them, is inseparable from a criminality inherent in the structures of 
 economic exploitation, the structures of racialization, an underlying 
 commodification of personhood in the US, wars of aggression, and a general 
 culture of contempt. Insofar as prisons are part of defining a crime 
 problem (under the mask of dealing with one), they serve to decriminalize 
 the criminality of the system that builds and uses them. \n\nThis pamphlet 
 does not wander into that pragmatic labyrinth of "how," or "what do you do 
 about x, y, and z." It points, instead, to the criminality of a cultural 
 and political ethos that can see its way to building prisons in the first 
 place (not far removed from the ethos that can think that building nuclear 
 weapons is a good idea). It uses the violence of imprisonment itself to 
 look into the present cultural ethos of this society, and poses some paths 
 back to a humanity, and to a social structure that can take responsibility 
 for the people in it, a vision that calls for a redefinition of crime 
 itself, as well as punishment and the judicial system that metes it out. 
 \n\n\nSteve Martinot 
 \n\n--------------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\nSteve 
 Matinot is the author of his recent essay booklet:\n \n"On The Need to 
 Abolish the Prison System: An ethical indictment"\n\nTable of Contents of 
 the essay \n\n· Introduction \n\n· The Criminality of Punishment \n\n· 
 Policing and the Structures of Racialization \n\n· The Cultural Effect of 
 Prisons \n\n· Toward the Abolition of Prisons \n\n· Endnotes \n\n 
 \nRecent lecturer on:\n \n"Trayvon Martin & the Structures of 
 Racialization"\nhttp://berkeley.patch.com/events/steve-martinot-trayvon-martin-the-structures-of-racialization\n\n 
 \nand author/co-author of a number of books including:\n \nThe Machinery of 
 Whiteness: Studies in the Structure of Racialization\n \nThe Rule of 
 Racialization: Class, Identity, Governance\n \nRecreating Democracy in a 
 Globalized State\n \nRacism\n \nMaps and Mirrors: Topologies of Art and 
 Politics (Philosophy, Literature, and Culture)\n \nForms in the Abyss: A 
 Philosophical Bridge Between Sartre and Derrida\n\n 
 https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/10/31/18724880.php
SUMMARY:"On the Need to Abolish the Prison System: an ethical indictment" - by Steve Martinot
LOCATION:The Green Arcade\nA bookstore in San Francisco\n(in Hayes Valley)\n\n1680 
 Market St. @ Gough\n(near Market & Octavia / Central Freeway exit)\n(415) 
 431-6800\n
URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2012/10/31/18724880.php
DTSTART:20121105T010000Z
DTEND:20121105T030000Z
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