Northeast Collaborative on Reentry from Prison

01/08/2024

Haters! You NO longer totally control the false, mythological nature of American history! The truth is out there!

Nikole Hannah-Jones posted a video of her "twirling on the haters" after the six-part Hulu docuseries "The 1619 Project" won an Emmy Award on Sunday.

07/11/2023

In 1866, as anti-Black police harassment raised tensions, an altercation between Black men and White police escalated into a shootout that led to a massacre.

06/23/2023

Oh, the White Man's Burden, lest we forget!

P.S. Black folk, we don't have to prove anything to white folk, least of all our humanity!

Learn more about our history of racial injustice.

06/10/2023

Lest we forget! Do much for being a nation of laws!

Learn more about our history of racial injustice.

10/11/2018

Good news from the far coast!

The court also converted all capital sentences to life imprisonment.

02/04/2018

"American enslavement of Africans shaped our country's sociopolitical institutions and formed the cornerstone of our industrial revolution. Today the persistent disparities African Americans face — and the backlash that seems to follow every African-American advancement — trace their roots to slavery and its aftermath." With links to SPL's survey of the situation and a self-test of knowledge.

Schools are not adequately teaching the history of American slavery. Educators are not sufficiently prepared to teach it. Textbooks do not have enough material about it.

11/14/2017

Assegnato il Premio Internazionale Gramsci per il Teatro in Carcere 2017 all'attivista Afroamericano Larry White  Conclusa ad Urbania la XVIII edizione del Conv...

10/21/2017

From TalkPoverty: "They’re not a panacea, but well-paid apprenticeships can help put returning citizens on the road toward a good job and a secure future."

While many prison inmates work, there are no laws preventing the prison system from exploiting them for free or cheap labor... Last week, a Louisiana sheriff gave a press conference railing against a new prisoner release program because it cost him free labor from “some good [inmates] that we use ev...

01/02/2017

We now have nine states involved, the New England States, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

08/12/2016

An open letter that's circulating among professional documentarians in support of the spontaneous video practice that has opened our eyes to the biased enforcement of our laws. He also reports shocking harassment of citizen journalists by embarrassed law enforcement.

"The images documented and distributed by these courageous citizen journalists have moved white Americans closer to conscience and consciousness. The visual evidence they’ve gathered has penetrated a border between the two Americas that decades of data has been incapable of crossing, and planted a growing awareness that white supremacy, not racism, is our country’s true disease. It is vital we protect this evidence and those who capture and disseminate it so that our democracy be strengthened by the conversation it has prompted, and the public continue to confront the bias embedded not just within police officers – white and black – but within us all."

Filmmaker David Felix Sutcliffe's open letter to the documentary community about courage, cameraphones and the .

07/29/2016

Though this reflection ends (read it through the link) with explicitly Christian language and imagery, I thought its concept of resilience would be useful in general prison and re-entry ministry:

Prison walls look like they're for keeping you
locked in, to keep you from getting out.

But they're also for keeping the light out,
to not let any joy leak in there.

We who build the walls are the ones imprisoned
by our illusions that we can lock out the light.

But it grows in you, this fierce acceptance,
and we can't stop it, can't touch it.
***

Grace and Peace to you. We believe in the God of grace. We follow the Teacher of Love. We live by the Spirit of mercy. We trust God’s healing of the world.

07/20/2016

One of the important subthreads to our issue, and for me the emphasis made by the reviewer on the function of words and other communication is vital.

Stephen Lurie reviews "Hell Is a Very Small Room".