About 15 San Jose State students and community members gathered for an interactive discussion regarding mass incarceration and the American prison industrial complex.
The discussion was co-hosted by two SJSU student groups: Bridge, a non-profit political organization and Students Against Mass Incarceration.
Sabrina Nabizada, political science sophomore and current president of the SJSU Bridge chapter, explained the ultimate goal of the national organization.
“We are one of the many chapters of a national organization called Bridge USA, where we focus on detoxifying political discourse on college campuses,” Nabizada said.
MacKenzie Owens, global studies senior and Students Against Mass Incarceration treasurer, said the group is dedicated to advocating for local prison reform and stopping a new jail from being built in Santa Clara County.
Nabizada explained that the event was an active discussion based on a “Jubilee” style of communication between the presenters and audience with the purpose of finding a consensus amongst the different perspectives in the room.
“Basically, we say a statement and you go to either side of the room, the left side to agree or the right side to disagree,” Nabizada said. “Hopefully we can see some common ground between the different perspectives in the room.”
Student advocates said the interactive discussion stressed the importance of student expression through voicing their personal stances on the movement and gave a physical representation to the discussion about mass incarceration and the industrial prison complex.
Nabizada led the discussion to the topic of abolishing the police and whether society could benefit from having no policing system.
Sara Wille, global studies senior, said she believes abolishing the police system would create a backflow of crime.
“Every time you abolish a form of law you have a huge backflow,” Wille said. “I do agree with abolishing it for other programs to take its place.”
Aaron Horwitz, behavioral science junior said he believes there’s been an increase of crime in the Bay Area, specifically in San Francisco.
“San Francisco decriminalized petty theft, places were getting burglarized and police could do nothing about it,” Horwitz said.
In San Francisco decriminalizing petty theft was a potential step toward preventing mass incarceration, according to a July 14, 2021 article from NBC News.
The conversation shifted, asking participants if they believe incarcerated individuals should get livable wages for jobs they do in prison.
Jalen Terry, sociology junior explained his solution to the problem and proposed a system he believes would be effective.
“If these people can put their money in an account to have it stashed away so that when they get out they can be on their feet, I think they should definitely have the right to do so,” he said.
Pre-law freshman Magnus Herrlin argued that some criminals should not be allowed to make money for themselves if they’ve committed a heinous crime.
“I'm not talking about people who made low level drug offenses here … I’m talking about murderers, rapists, arsonists . . . if they need to do labor, which is allowed in the Constitution, I don't really have a problem with that,” Herrlin said.
Sociology junior Anthony Majano, believes there is an assumption that prisoners are “automatically violent” and don’t deserve to be a part of society.
“I believe the amount of people who are in jail for actual violent crimes is super marginal,” Majano said. “There's a lot of people in jail over issues that are no longer issues like possession of marijuana, also mental health reasons that can be addressed in a completely different manner.”
