Martin Luther King Jr.'s Birthday is observed Today on a Federal level with schools and banks being closed, no mail or garbage pick-ups and liquor stores shuttered. But, what about on a Judicial level? Where it still seems that poor, often uneducated minorities, a vast majority being young black males, are fodder for a system that lured them into a world of drugs and money. An empty invitation at a better life than where they came from.
America's war on drugs has lasted for over thirty years costing many lives, millions of dollars and yet drug use is still rampant. Many claim that those that use or sell drugs are criminals. They chose that life and if that makes them bad people, then they must pay for their actions.
However, what if the system that houses these criminals was as unjust a predicament as to what put them there? Jails, Prisons, Penitentiaries. All constructed to make money. Someone has to share in the profit created by law enforcement and trial lawyers.
Someone to build these "houses", someone to keep the lights on. Someone to provide phone calls to loved ones. A vast network, an industry developed to keep criminals incarcerated. And that's not even talking about the economics of drugs. The black market, street values, undercover busts and front money needed to keep this underground economy flourishing.
Acclaimed Documentarian Eugene Jarecki ("Why We Fight") delivers his latest, entitled "The House I Live In". A fascinating expose on our long-term fight against drugs and how it affects us not only on the outside of this modern societal issue but, on our own inmates that have to live in these places. Dealers, police officers, prisoners and others affected by this crusade get a chance to tell a truer side.
Available to watch in Pittsburgh through Xfinity on demand or on iTunes. This Documentary is also the movie of the week on iTunes, so you can watch it for only $.99 cents as a way of showing your own activism on MLK's day.
It reveals the depth and despair of our catastrophic nature of racism and classicism in this country. Hopefully, another dream can be realized one day too, to change this egregious condition. To really make homes and families for the future, not to build housing units and holding cells.
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