No state has a longer, more profit-driven history of contracting prisoners out to private companies than Alabama. With a sprawling labor system that dates back more than 150 years — including the brutal convict leasing era that replaced slavery — it has constructed a template for the commercialization of mass incarceration.

Most jobs are inside facilities, where the state’s inmates — who are disproportionately Black — can be sentenced to hard labor and forced to work for free doing everything from mopping floors to laundry. But more than 10,000 inmates have logged a combined 17 million work hours outside Alabama’s prison walls since 2018, for entities like city and county governments and businesses that range from major car-part manufacturers and meat-processing plants to distribution centers for major retailers like Walmart, the AP determined.

https://apnews.com/article/prison-to-plate-inmate-labor-investigation-alabama-3b2c7e414c681ba545dc1d0ad30bfaf5

  • Omega@discuss.online
    0·
    2 years ago

    I thought slavery was bad for capitalism? is this a way to pay people less and have the government pay for their life instead of them?

  • AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    2 years ago

    Wait, could I move to the US and rent a sexy inmate for my mansion? To parade in front of my geek friends? And play video games with?

    (I mean I’d cruelly punish him of course, being in the US, like I wouldn’t put any toppings on his ice cream, or something unusually painful, or whatever the law says you have to do).

  • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
    0·
    2 years ago

    It’s legal per the 13th Amendment.

    Doesn’t make it right, and it says a lot about how little both parties value human rights that it’s allowed to stand.

    • ERROR: Earth.exe has crashed@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      0·
      2 years ago

      Government: "WELL ACHSHUALLY, They aren’t slaves because they consented…

      under the threat of 23 hour solitary confinement with zero amenities and nothing to do and shitty food and absolute boredom, and practically psychological torture"

    • pivot_root@lemmy.world
      0·
      2 years ago

      Oh, that’s nothing. Ever wonder who tough on crime legislation actually benefits, and who’s lobbying for it?

      • SmilingSolaris@lemmy.world
        0·
        2 years ago

        Cmon buddy. I get that the “both sides” argument is lame and tired when it comes to things like abortion and women’s rights but this is a perfect example of it being true. I know you identifying as a Democrat believe that they couldn’t possibly support slavery but they do. Slavery as punishment for a crime is universal in American politics as a policy neither side would ever go against. This is a real example of capitalism triumphing over morals that is prevalent in neo liberalism. The first step to making sure your party is better is to acknowledge that they ain’t being better when its pointed out. Aka, don’t defend the slavers

        • Jericho_One@lemmy.world
          0·
          2 years ago

          First, I didn’t say the Democrats didn’t support slavery for felons, I called out the fact that you think there’s only 2 sides. So, you know, maybe take a breath before making assumptions and responding next time

          Seconably, there’s a huge political cost to amending the constitution. You think the political party that just lost to a convicted rapist and multi-felon has the kind of clout to amend such an obviously terrible thing when they’re too busy trying to prevent anyone younger than 70 years old from fighting against billionaires? GTFO with that!

          Long story short: we know “one side” would do it if they had the power, but they don’t, because they suck up to the same billionaires the “other side” does…

          • SmilingSolaris@lemmy.world
            0·
            2 years ago

            First, the words you said have meaning. They have cultural history. It’s not assumptions it’s called context. Ain’t my fault if you didn’t mean what you was saying. Typically the response to that is “sorry, let me try again”

            Second. Slavery apologist in the year of our Lord 2024. You ain’t a strategist. Your a person. Have a soul. Be angry. That gives the “political capital”. Christ alive, don’t do slavery apologia

            • Jericho_One@lemmy.world
              0·
              2 years ago

              First, you have a tenuous grasp of words and language, at best, based on your assumptions and then your pitiful response when your false assumptions were called out as such. So please don’t try to lecture others on the subject. It is 100% your fault that you made bad assumptions, and the fact that you aren’t willing to own up to that proves that you don’t deserve a “sorry, let me try again” but instead a “hey dummy, why don’t you try again”.

              Second. It’s not “apologist” to call out the Democrats as failures. You’re showing your tenuous grasp of language again. I hope that you asked for some books from Santa Claus this Christmas, because you are sorely in need of some education, kid

  • TimewornTraveler@lemm.ee
    0·
    2 years ago

    “Safe enough to work” bruh half of them are probably there for parole violations for petty crimes 9 years ago

    • sik0fewl@lemmy.ca
      0·
      2 years ago

      You must not be American - the thirteenth amendment codifies slavery and involuntary servitude into the constitution.

      • can@sh.itjust.works
        0·
        2 years ago

        I’m not, but I am familiar with that but I didn’t know it went this far. It’s so blatent.

        edit: fellow canadian

        • sik0fewl@lemmy.ca
          0·
          2 years ago

          Ya, I’m hyperbolizing a little bit… But not really. The 13th amendment is what outlawed black slavery in the United States… But also explicitly allows slavery in the United States:

          Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

          Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

    • cybervseas@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      2 years ago

      I’m sorry to say the Prison-Industrial Complex is a huge problem, and part of why this country has some of the highest incarceration rates in the world 🙁

      • can@sh.itjust.works
        0·
        2 years ago

        I was aware but I didn’t know it was this level.

        I can only hope more and more Americans realise we’re looking over in horror.

        • orcrist@lemm.eedeleted by creator
          0·
          2 years ago

          Americans on average don’t think your looks of horror have weight. Clearly America is superior, so you’re just jealous and looking for something trivial to make yourself feel better, is the gut reaction. (Sad to say.)

      • FordBeeblebrox@lemmy.world
        0·
        2 years ago

        Companies like Bob Barker (not the tv one) and Sysco are quietly making mountains of cash to supply all those “leasable” inmates with the lowest possible quality food and toiletries. I would love to see a political candidate campaign on repealing the 13th amendment, I doubt it’ll happen any time soon but one can hope.

      • beliquititious@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        0·
        2 years ago

        Literally in some cases recently freed slaves were arrested for being black and leased back to the same locations where they were enslaved to the same people.

        • FordBeeblebrox@lemmy.world
          0·
          2 years ago

          That’s where our tireless and dedicated police force got started, the racism hasn’t gone anywhere they just have better toys now

          • corsicanguppy@lemmy.caEnglish
            0·
            2 years ago

            I bet there were cops before that.

            I’m thinking that there were cops quite a while before America was a thing.

            But thanks for the surprising lack of history.

            • FordBeeblebrox@lemmy.world
              0·
              2 years ago

              Perhaps I should have specified I am an American talking about American police in America, to make it easier for you to follow along but thank you for the surprising and completely unnecessary rudeness on behalf of the pigs though, happy holidays and fuck off to lick laces 🙂

  • ManOMorphos@lemmy.world
    0·
    2 years ago

    And you know that small businesses and independent establishments aren’t seeing one minute of that free prison labor under their roof. It’s all going to large companies with connections to government.

    I’m not arguing that either should benefit from effective slave labor, but the fact that the biggest players get this insane advantage just rubs extra salt in the wound.

  • Zement@feddit.nl
    0·
    2 years ago

    Oh this is delicious. Keep in mind they hate abortion and hate sexual education. It’s not a conspiracy any more. They want the poor to be uneducated and reproductive to have a jailed bottom slave minority.

    • rottingleaf@lemmy.worldBanned
      0·
      2 years ago

      I guess it became more egalitarian and less racist though? One can say they failed to end slavery, but they managed to end exclusively black slavery.

      So it turns out that USA is actually not land of the free, but land of the equal. Seems what they like to accuse USSR of. Those damned commies.

    • WhatAmLemmy@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      2 years ago

      So slavey never ended! Cool cool. Totally not a corporate dictatorship masquerading as a democracy…

      • Ignotum@lemmy.world
        0·
        2 years ago

        Yup, it never ended, it just rebranded
        I believe it’s called neoslavery, I think the last privately (legally) owned slave was released in 1946 if i recall correctly, now the only legal slavery is prisons

      • pyre@lemmy.world
        0·
        2 years ago

        the laws never pretended it ended. the thirteenth ammendment very plainly allows it:

        Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

        emphasis mine. it never said you can’t have slavery any more, it just said if you’re gonna do slavery you have to convict someone first.

        • Crikeste@lemm.ee
          0·
          2 years ago

          That’s how propagandized Americans are. lmfao They act as if this is some shadowy hidden part of our culture

          • Klear@lemmy.worldEnglish
            0·
            2 years ago

            It’s not like you’d expect people to be closely acquainted with an obscure legal document like the constitution.

            Oh, wait…

        • rottingleaf@lemmy.worldBanned
          0·
          2 years ago

          Not saying it’s not true, but it was pretty much in the spirit of English legal tradition. This probably even wasn’t a huge point of contention when written.

          If that part is changed, no kind of convict labor (or “public work” or whatever it’s called in Europe and elsewhere) will be legal. All the convicts will do is rot in the same building for many months and years.

          Without some deep prison reform you’ll have an increase in suicides and mental health cases. I’ve spent only 10 days in a mental hospital (from medical commission for conscript service, I live in Russia), and every opportunity to go do something unusual was happiness there. Even to help nurses with carrying somewhere some vaguely piss-smelling bed sheets in bags. It was nothing like prison. It was nothing like a usual mental hospital even. Still boredom gets you.

          Like I said, without a deep reform. With said deep reform - convict labor being allowed only with competitive wages somehow limited in use (say, only available upon release?), so that these wouldn’t go to overpriced prison goods or something like that to indirectly reproduce slave labor, - then yes.

          Actually, about prison goods - I think prisons can afford to provide inmates with a free delivery service, while what they buy they pay for themselves. Prisons in general shouldn’t sell anything to inmates or buy anything from them, the power imbalance is unacceptable. Or maybe it won’t be a free delivery service, just prison authorities will be obligated to accept those deliveries.