13th

I've been putting off this film for so many years because I knew it would make me very very angry. It did. The United States possesses only 5% of the world's population, yet also possesses 25% of that same world's incarcerated people. TWENTY FIVE PERCENT. That means that one in four people in the world are imprisoned in the US. These are some of the shocking statistics that the film stated:

US Prison Population:

1970 - 357,292

1980 - 513,900

1985 - 759,100

1990 - 1,179,200

2000 - 2,015,300

2014 - 2,306,200

Black Prison Population in 2001: 878,400

Lifetime likelihood of imprisonment for Black men: 1 in 3

Black men make up 6.5% of the US population and 40.2% of its prison population.

To fully understand how the above is even possible, see the film 13th. It is upsetting and will make you unbelievably enraged but it is so important. Warning: they do show clips with audio of several executions of Black men by cops. Thankfully I was able to mute it in time and look away.

(photo kidnapped from ceu)