4
8 CRIMINAL INJUSTICE
The more
I
thought about that, the more profound it became.The power to define is
an
awesome power. It is the ability to manipu-late our ideas-to limit our agenda, to mold how we see, and to shapewhat we look at. It is the power to interpret the picture we see whenwe look at the world. It is the power to place a frame around thatpicture; to define where it begins and ends-which is the power tocreate our collective consciousness.And that is, after all, what pictures, what paintings do-theydefine what we see. They give us the painter's interpretation of reality.They give us illusion. The difference is that when we look at a paintingof an ocean, we know that we arelooking at a painting-and we knowthat there must have been a painter. We don't think we are looking atthe ocean itself.But when we are not looking at a painting, when we are lookingat society, we've been convinced that the interpretations of society thatwe've been taught are not interpretations-we think they are the realdeal; that is, the truth.That kind of social propaganda is not only tremendously pow-erful, it is also mostlyinvisible-and we can't fight what we don't see.Most of us accept the images and the definitions that we have beentaught as true, neutral, self-evident, and eternal; so the power to paintthe picture-to define what is right and wrong, what is lawful andwhat is criminal-is really the power to win the battle for our minds.And to win it without ever having to fight it.In the 1830s, the state of England defined poverty as a criminalstate. And England created special prisons for these special crimi-nals, and called them debtor prisons. So in England, in the 1800s,being poor-that is, not having enough money to pay to live-wasa jailable offense.But when we look at England during the Industrial Revolution,we see that it was not just Tom and Dick and Jane and some of theirclose friends who were poor.
An
entire class of human beings that wascreated by the Industrial Revolution was both exploited and definedas criminal by the owners of the technology, who had the power toboth define crime, and create poverty. If the women, men, and childrenwho were working
16
hours a day were the ones who had the powerto write the laws, or to create the conditions of their lives, they wouldnot have defined themselves as the criminals. And they wouldn't haveput themselves in prison.But they didn't write the laws, or build the prisons, or create thesocial vision of the times. And so people went to jail, not for exploiting,
THE CRIMINALIZATION
OF
POVERTY
49
but for being exploited. Then, as now, definitions of legal and illegalare made by those in power-by those who control the economy andthe institutions of the country. This truth is reflected in an adaptationof the Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rules." And whogoes to prison and who doesn't, who is poor and who is not, is basedon our accepting those rules.Though some of us may question the system's fairness in apply-ing its rules, most of us don't question the basis of the system itself.That is, we don't question the relationship between those who ownand those who don't. And though most of us vote every four years on
who goverrzs,
we never vote on, and rarely question
the system thatgoverns.
And because we don't ask that question, we don't challengethe legitimacy of that system. We accept it. We don't step outside ofthe frame around the picture. We don't disconnect the dots.As long as we accept certain ideas, like, "you can't changehumannature," or "the poor will always be with us" (an idea probablynot authored by poor people), as long as those ideas are the "givens"of our everyday lives, then society doesn't need to struggle with us todefend what we already accept.Aristotle said, "Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime."But when the paintings are all painted by the same school of painters,and when the social system is not even in the picture, then revolutionis not a solution, because society is not responsible for poverty. Sopoverty and crime are made the responsibility of poor people, andcriminals are jailed and separated by cages and by definition from therest of society.If we question any of this-if we say that prison destroyspeople, that prisons are overflowing and crime still increases, thatthe cost of imprisonment is more than the cost of education-if wesay that poor people and people of color are over-represented inprison.
..
If we say all that-and if we say that we think somethingis terribly wrong-we are told, again and again, that our system isinherently just and that it affords each and every one of us prettyclose to an equal chance to succeed.And if we continue to question, well, then they are willing toadjust some parts of the picture, to make sure that we believe that theinjustices of society are not part and parcel of the social structure.Because as long as we believe that, they can continue to manipulateus, and tell us that both the system and the injustice just sort ofexist-unrelated, side by side-like a force of nature. And if we accept
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