(see blog editors’ commentary at bottom of post)

Hey _____,

Good to hear from you! I’m good and my Christmas was just another day down. I don’t and haven’t celebrated Christmas for 12 years now so it didn’t bother me. But I will pass on the message and maybe others will write you about it.

I did see the protest on the news and it makes me sick to think how many people are buying into the bullshit sold through the news. I wish I had been at that protest because…well, it would have been interesting. 🙂

Now for the more important stuff. I did get the newsletter and did enjoy it, but I am bothered by some of what others say. Like one person says that the justice system does not work for the blacks and browns. Well, I’m white and am probably sitting in this jail with the highest bond and my charge is only attempted first degree murder. I have a — bond and know of people with capital murder charges with 1 or 2 million dollar bonds. Color has nothing to do with it. It only matters what side of the line you’re on. There’s plenty of Blacks that are lawyers, D.A.’s and judges so the whole color issue can be thrown out the door.

What needs to happen is gang bangers of all gangs need to smarten up, stop killing each other. We’re all on the same side of the law. What I say next is probably not the kind of stuff you can put in a newsletter but it needs to be said. Gang bangers kill each other for turf, colors, respect, disrespect, but at the end of the day there’s one gang that everyone bitches about but only a select few have the balls to do anything to: the cops. (They) are a part of the government and the government is the most corrupt and biggest gang out there. So like I said stop killing each other if you feel the need to kill you mise well make a difference. Just look what they did to little ‘Chuy’ Huerta. They killed him cold blooded are now getting away with it. Months ago they killed a mentally challenged kid by shooting him in the back, and around the same time gunned down a 64-year-old woman. In both cases they got away with it. And what’s even sicker is you got all these inmates doing the cops’ jobs. How you ask? Killing each other is one way and ratting on other inmates is another. The cops would be nothing without their rats. I can say this, I wouldn’t be here if people hadn’t ratted on me.

Just take the news almost every night the news say “police are looking for your help” anyone with info is asked to call “crimestoppers” and don’t you know you got some Joe Smo trying to be a hero but then month or so later Joe Smo gets in trouble by the same pigs he helped out. How ironic.

What people need to do is smarten the fuck up and realize cops are not your friends like schools trick you into believing. They’re liars, they only care about themselves, they’re crooked and they’re killers, and yet still hundreds of people help them do their jobs. And why do so many people do this for 10 seconds of fame on the news. For what, you’re forgotten as soon as they move to the next story. What people  need to do is stop fighting each other and come together. Rise up against the injustice, all colors, black, brown, white, red, blue, yellow all all the rest and take what we deserve, what’s ours

“FREEDOM”

Sorry, ____, I understand if you can’t share some of what I said but every bit of it is the truth. I also included my favorite poem…

It’s called Invictus, by William Ernest Henley.

Invictus means unconquerable in latin.

A fellow warrior

L. A.

Invictus

Out of the night that covers me

Black as the pit from pole to pole

I thank whatever Gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the horror of the shade

And yet the menace of the years

Finds, and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how straight the gate

How charged with punishments the scroll

I am the master of my fate

I am the captain of my soul.

–William Ernest Henley, 1875

Editors’ note: The writer makes a lot of interesting points and says so in a language we can get behind in a lot of ways. There is much good that can come from drawing lines and making people decide where they stand–on the role of jails and prisons or police in society, for example. His simple assertion that color has “nothing to do with it,” however, unravels when you consider that whiteness and white supremacy are not simply institutional values, but are constructions that are made and remade each day. That is, by people clinging to their whiteness and calling for more policing, bigger jails, and similar such things. For instance, to speak of the particular context the writer is writing about–the pretrial process and bond amounts–a recent study by the Justice Policy Institute shows that African Americans ages 18 through 29 receive significantly higher bail amounts than all other types of defendants, and the rate of Black/African American people being detained in jail is nearly five times higher than white people. Some black and brown faces in high places, or alternatively, a very high bond amount for a white person does not make for the end of race. Yes, people need to smarten up, or, in the old vernacular “unite and fight,” but it must be said that in this country the single biggest barrier to people uniting against their oppressors has been and remains race/white supremacy. That said, we believe that in action people can, will and do sometimes make the right choices and undermine the anti-human concept of race.It is such possibilities that we seek through our intervention in the injustice system.