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Very excited to have a new paper!!
Because the U.S. Supreme Court has essentially gutted the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Const, it is perhaps time to turn to the establishment provisions of the state constitutions to ensure some degree of separation of church and state.
New Judicial Federalism and the Establishment Clause: Classroom Ten Commandments as a Case Study in State Constitutional Protection
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5134565#law #FediLaw #FediProf #Establishment #ChristianNationalism
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Very excited to have a new paper!!
Because the U.S. Supreme Court has essentially gutted the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Const, it is perhaps time to turn to the establishment provisions of the state constitutions to ensure some degree of separation of church and state.
New Judicial Federalism and the Establishment Clause: Classroom Ten Commandments as a Case Study in State Constitutional Protection
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5134565#law #FediLaw #FediProf #Establishment #ChristianNationalism
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Very excited to have a new paper!!
Because the U.S. Supreme Court has essentially gutted the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Const, it is perhaps time to turn to the establishment provisions of the state constitutions to ensure some degree of separation of church and state.
New Judicial Federalism and the Establishment Clause: Classroom Ten Commandments as a Case Study in State Constitutional Protection
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5134565#law #FediLaw #FediProf #Establishment #ChristianNationalism
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Very excited to have a new paper!!
Because the U.S. Supreme Court has essentially gutted the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Const, it is perhaps time to turn to the establishment provisions of the state constitutions to ensure some degree of separation of church and state.
New Judicial Federalism and the Establishment Clause: Classroom Ten Commandments as a Case Study in State Constitutional Protection
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5134565#law #FediLaw #FediProf #Establishment #ChristianNationalism
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🏆 Premios Nacionales Avelino Corma a Trabajos de Fin de Máster 2025. Enhorabuena a nuestro graduado en Ingeniería Química, Ramon Guimerà, premio TFM en la categoría de Catálisis, Petroleoquímica y Optimización de Procesos Industriales. Ramón ha realizado el Máster en Ingeniería Química en la UPV.
En la fotografía le acompaña Carolina Clausell Terol, vicedirectora de la ESTCE del Grado en Ingeniería Química UJI.
Más Información: https://premiosavelinocorma.com/
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🧘 ■ Reacciones a la trágica muerte de Tatiana Schlossberg, nieta de Kennedy: de la desgarradora despedida de su tía Maria Shriver a los ataques de Trump a los Kennedy en pleno duelo ■ La hija de Caroline Kennedy falleció a los 35 años a causa de una le[…]
https://www.huffingtonpost.es/life/reacciones-tragica-muerte-tatiana-schlossberg-nieta-kennedy-desgarradora-despedida-tia-maria-shriver-ataques-trump-kennedy-pleno-duelo-f202512.html?int=MASTODON_WORLD#life #donaldtrump #johnf.kennedy
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🧘 ■ Reacciones a la trágica muerte de Tatiana Schlossberg, nieta de Kennedy: de la desgarradora despedida de su tía Maria Shriver a los ataques de Trump a los Kennedy en pleno duelo ■ La hija de Caroline Kennedy falleció a los 35 años a causa de una le[…]
https://www.huffingtonpost.es/life/reacciones-tragica-muerte-tatiana-schlossberg-nieta-kennedy-desgarradora-despedida-tia-maria-shriver-ataques-trump-kennedy-pleno-duelo-f202512.html?int=MASTODON_WORLD#life #donaldtrump #johnf.kennedy
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Mission Health helps NICU babies celebrate first Christmas
ASHEVILLE, N.C. (FOX Carolina) – Mission Health is helping babies in its neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) celebrate…
#UnitedStates #US #USA #america #asheville #Christmas #Entertainment #health #missionhealth #mrs.claus #nc #neonatalintensivecareunit #nicu #northcarolina #preemiesofthecarolinas #Santa #sports #unitedstatesofamerica
https://www.europesays.com/2652773/ -
CW: Advent Beer Calendar 2024: Day 6
It’s #StNicholasDay today, following up on #Krampusnacht, in which children in European countries wake up to see if St. Nicholas left them a present under their pillows or in their shoes; the American Santa Claus is derived from St. Nick. To commemorate the holiday, today’s #AdventCalendar #beer is Saint Nicholas Winter Ale from #FourSaintsBrewing of North Carolina.
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The fault in our system: Why The George Stinney Jr. story is still important
Table of Contents
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
- The Systemic Failure of 1944
- The Architecture of a Loophole
- The 13th Amendment and the “Except” Clause
- 81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
- Isolation, Confession, and the Ten-Minute Verdict
- The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
- The Burke Family and the Protected Elite
- The Physical Impossibility
- Engineering and the Laws of Physics vs. State Narrative
- The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
- The Ghosts of Alexander McClay Williams, Joe Persons, and James Arcene
- The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
- Over-Policing, Differential Processing, and the “Crime Rate” Myth
- The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
- The Removal of the Breadwinner and Generational Economic Erasure
- The “Why” of the Present
- Modern Parallels and the Continuity of Disparity
- A Note on “The Green Mile”
- Magical Realism vs. Historical Reality
- Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
Introduction: The fault in the system
When I first told my wife and my son about the subject of my next article, they cringed. I don’t blame them. As an engineer who spends my days developing solutions that ensure the reliability and integrity of the systems my clients depend on, my life is dedicated to solutions that are sound. But the story of George Stinney Jr. is a systems failure so profound, so gut-wrenching, that the natural human instinct is to look away.
I struggled with the “why” myself. Why revisit a tragedy from 1944? Why drag a 14-year-old boy back into the light only to watch him sit on a Bible to fit into an electric chair? The answer lies in the foundation of our country. If we do not understand the “Stinney Era,” we cannot understand the modern carceral state. We are not just looking at a sad story; we are looking at the blueprint of mass incarceration—the “teeth” that gave the Jim Crow era its bite.
The Architecture of a Loophole
To understand why George Stinney was executed in 81 days, we have to go back further than 1944. We have to look at the 13th Amendment. While we celebrate it for “ending” slavery, it contained a structural flaw that was exploited by design:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States…”
That “except” clause is the most expensive word in American history. It created a legal bypass. If the state could label a Black person a “criminal,” it could legally return them to a state of servitude. Following the Civil War, Southern states engineered “Black Codes”—laws that criminalized everything from “vagrancy” to “loud talking.” This wasn’t about public safety; it was about labor and social control. The convict leasing system that followed was a direct evolution of the plantation, and by the mid-20th century, this system had evolved into the machinery of state-sanctioned terror that caught George Stinney in its gears.
81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
In March 1944, in the segregated mill town of Alcolu, South Carolina, two young white girls—Betty June Binnicker and Mary Emma Thames—were found dead in a ditch. The town wanted blood. George Stinney Jr., a 95-pound Black boy who had been seen near the girls earlier that day, was the easiest target.
The “system” functioned with terrifying efficiency:
- Isolation: George was interrogated alone. His parents were forced to flee town under threat of violence, leaving their child in the hands of a mob-controlled state.
- The “Confession”: The police claimed he confessed. No written record of this confession exists. There were no witnesses to the statement.
- The Trial: The trial lasted barely two hours. George’s court-appointed lawyer, a tax commissioner with no trial experience, called zero witnesses and performed no cross-examination.
- The Jury: An all-white jury took less than ten minutes to find him guilty. They did not recommend mercy.
On June 16, 1944, George Stinney Jr. became the youngest person executed in 20th-century America. He was so small that the adult-sized electrodes wouldn’t fit his head. They used a Bible—the very book used to swear in the “justice” that was killing him—as a booster seat. When the current hit, the oversized mask fell off, exposing his terrified, weeping face to the witnesses.
The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
If George Stinney Jr. did not kill those two girls, then who did? For seventy years, the state of South Carolina acted as if the question were settled. But in the decades following the execution, a much more sinister reality began to emerge from the shadows of Alcolu.
The leading theory, supported by local testimony and research presented during the 2014 exoneration hearing, points toward George Burke Jr. He was the son of a prominent white businessman who owned the lumber mill where George’s father worked. More chillingly, Burke’s father was the foreman of the jury that sent George Stinney to the electric chair.
The community had whispered for years about a deathbed confession from the Burke family, but in 1944, those whispers were a death sentence. In the social hierarchy of a segregated mill town, a member of the Burke family was untouchable. The “system” didn’t just need a culprit; it needed a diversion. By sacrificing a 14-year-old Black boy, the state provided the white community with “closure” while ensuring the powerful remained protected. This is the ultimate callousness: the law wasn’t used to find the truth; it was used as a shield for the privileged and a shroud for the innocent.
The Physical Impossibility
We must also look at the physics—the cold, hard data that the 1944 court ignored. The girls were killed with a fourteen-inch railroad spike, suffering massive skull fractures. Forensic experts in 2014 testified that it would have been physically impossible for a 95-pound child to wield such a weapon with the force required to kill two people while also managing to overpower them both.
George had an alibi—his sister, Amie, was with him grazing the family cow when the girls passed by—but in a system designed to exploit the “punishment clause” of the 13th Amendment, an alibi is just noise. The “duly convicted” label was the goal, and the state achieved it by ignoring the laws of physics and the screams of a child.
The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
George was a centerpiece, but he was not an anomaly. As I researched this, I found the ghosts of other children whose names have been scrubbed from the collective memory:
- Alexander McClay Williams (1931): At 16, he was the youngest person executed in Pennsylvania history. His “confession” was coerced, and the state suppressed evidence of a bloody handprint that didn’t match his. It took until 2022 for his conviction to be vacated.
- Joe Persons (1915): A boy in Georgia, estimated to be 12 or 13, who was so small that officials debated adding weights to his feet so the hanging would “work.”
- James Arcene (1885): A Cherokee youth executed for a crime committed when he was just 10 years old.
In each of these cases, the 13th Amendment’s “duly convicted” clause was the shield. By providing the thin veneer of a trial, the state could legally commit what was essentially a lynching.
The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
When we discuss mass incarceration, a common counter-argument often arises: “Don’t Black people simply commit more crime?” I know that if you calibrate a sensor to only look for anomalies in one specific area, your data will be skewed. To understand the disparity, we must look past the “output” and analyze the “filter” of the legal machine.
1. The Frequency of Interaction Fallacy
The argument that Black people “commit more crime” often confuses crime rates with arrest rates. A 2023 UCLA study using smartphone data from 10,000 officers across 23 cities found that police spend significantly more time in Black neighborhoods, even when those neighborhoods have the same crime rates and income levels as white neighborhoods.
The result is simple math: if you put 100 police officers in one neighborhood and two in another, you will “discover” more crime in the first one—even if the actual behavior is identical. This creates a “feedback loop” where higher arrest records are used to justify even more policing, artificially inflating the statistical profile of a community.
2. Drug Use vs. Drug Arrests
This is the “smoking gun” of systemic bias. For decades, federal surveys from the CDC and the NAACP have shown that Black and white Americans use and sell drugs at almost identical rates. However, despite similar usage, Black Americans are nearly 4 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession and 6 times more likely to be incarcerated for drug charges overall. It’s not about who is committing the crime; it’s about who the system is looking for.
3. The “Differential Processing” of Justice
Even when the crime and the criminal history are identical, the system treats the bodies differently:
- Bail: Black defendants are 21% more likely to be denied bail, which forces them to stay in jail while awaiting trial—leading to lost jobs, lost homes, and a higher likelihood of eventually taking a “guilty plea” just to go home.
- Plea Bargaining: Prosecutors are more likely to offer plea deals that include prison time to Black defendants, while white defendants are more likely to be offered “diversion programs” or probation.
- Sentencing Length: According to 2026 data reports, Black men receive sentences that are 19.1% longer than white men for the exact same crimes.
4. Wrongful Convictions: The Margin of Error
If the system were truly objective, the rate of “mistakes” would be equal. It isn’t. Black people make up 13% of the population but over 50% of the exonerated population. Innocent Black people are 7 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of murder and 12 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of drug crimes than white people.
George Stinney Jr. is the historical proof of this. The system didn’t care about the truth; it cared about “closure” that fit the racial hierarchy. When someone says, “they commit more crime,” they are looking at the output of a machine and assuming it is a neutral scale. But as an engineer, I see a filter. It filters out white crime through warnings and diversions, and it filters in Black crime through over-policing and structural bias.
The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
If you want to understand why a large percentage of the Black community remains trapped in poverty today, you need to look no further than the “teeth” of mass incarceration. It was never just about free labor for a season; it was about the permanent maintenance of a lower class.
When the state arrested George Stinney Jr., they didn’t just take a child; they destroyed a household. Within hours of his arrest, his father was fired from the local lumber mill. The family was given mere hours to vacate their company-owned housing and flee the town. They left behind their possessions, their community, and their stability.
Mass incarceration acts as a surgical strike against the Black family unit. By removing men—and in George’s case, the future men of the community—the system achieves several objectives:
- Destruction of the Household Anchor: Historically, when a man was incarcerated or executed, the family lost its primary earner. According to the American Journal of Sociology, paternal incarceration is one of the single greatest predictors of a family falling below the poverty line.
- The “Marriageable Men” Gap: By disproportionately removing Black men from the community, the state created a demographic vacuum. This forced single mothers into a cycle of “survival labor,” where the ability to save, invest, or purchase property became a mathematical impossibility.
- Educational Depletion: A 2014 study by the National Academy of Sciences found that the children of incarcerated parents are significantly less likely to graduate from college, creating a “secondary sentence” that spans generations.
The Numbers Behind the Theft
The statistics are staggering:
- The Wealth Gap: Today, the median white household holds roughly eight times the wealth of the median Black household. This is not a failure of work ethic; it is a result of a century of wealth-stripping policies.
- Lifetime Loss: The Brennan Center for Justice estimated that formerly incarcerated people lose an average of $500,000 in lifetime earnings. When you multiply that by the millions of Black men swept up in the “War on Drugs,” you are looking at trillions of dollars in wealth that never entered the Black community.
- Voter Disenfranchisement: In many states, a felony conviction (the “duly convicted” status of the 13th Amendment) leads to the loss of voting rights. This removes the community’s ability to vote for the very policies—school funding and housing—that build wealth.
Mass incarceration is not a “side effect” of poverty; it is the architect of it. It ensures that the Black community remains in a state of “perpetual catch-up.” Every time a generation begins to build equity, a new wave of “tough on crime” legislation resets the clock.
The “Why” of the Present
People ask me why this matters now. It matters because the “punishment clause” is still in the Constitution. The transition from the Jim Crow executions of the 40s to the mass incarceration boom of the 80s and 90s is a straight line.
I know that systems don’t fix themselves. When we look at the racial disparities in our modern prison system, we are seeing the same logic that executed George Stinney. We are seeing a system that prioritizes “closure” and “control” over “integrity.”
When the Stinney family was run out of town, they lost their property, their stability, and their history. This is how the wealth gap was engineered. Mass incarceration isn’t just about the person in the cell; it is about the “Generational Theft” of Black potential. We care about George Stinney because his execution was a warning shot: The law does not belong to you.
A Note on “The Green Mile”
By the way, as I dug into this, I noticed how many people believe that Stephen King’s The Green Mile is based on George Stinney. While King has never confirmed this, the parallels are undeniable: the two girls, the rural South, the wrongful execution.
But there is a dangerous difference. In the movie, John Coffey is a “Magical Negro”—a gentle giant with supernatural powers. In reality, George Stinney had no magic. He was just a scared 14-year-old child who wanted to go home. By turning these tragedies into “magical fables,” we risk softening the edges of the reality. We don’t need magic to explain George’s innocence; we just need to look at the physics of a 90-pound boy and the corruption of a system that didn’t care to measure the weight of the evidence.
Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
In 2014, seventy years after he was killed, Judge Carmen Mullen vacated George Stinney’s conviction. She cited “fundamental, constitutional violations of due process.” It was a victory, but a hollow one. You cannot return 70 years of life to a boy who was burned to death by his own government.
We revisit this story because the “crack” in the foundation is still there. As long as the 13th Amendment allows for slavery-by-another-name, and as long as our system views Black children as “superpredators” rather than children, George Stinney is not a ghost of the past. He is a mirror of the present.
If a system is designed to protect some by sacrificing others, it has no integrity. It is a bridge waiting to collapse. We owe it to George—and to the children whose names we don’t yet know—to stop patching the cracks and start questioning the blueprint. Until the “except as punishment” loophole is closed and the law is applied without the filter of power and race, we aren’t living in a state of justice. We are just living in a very long, very crowded Green Mile.
Glossary of Terms
- 13th Amendment (Punishment Clause): The section of the US Constitution that abolished slavery except as punishment for a crime, creating a legal loophole for involuntary servitude.
- Black Codes: Laws passed by Southern states after the Civil War to restrict the freedom of Black Americans and compel them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
- Convict Leasing: A system in which state penitentiaries leased incarcerated people to private companies (e.g., coal mines, railroads) for labor.
- Differential Processing: The phenomenon where individuals of different races are treated differently by the criminal justice system even when the alleged crimes are identical.
- Doli Incapax: A legal doctrine (often ignored in the Jim Crow era) suggesting that children below a certain age are incapable of forming the intent to commit a crime.
- Generational Wealth Theft: The systemic removal of assets, property, and earning potential from a specific community over time, preventing the accumulation of intergenerational wealth.
- Jim Crow Era: The period (late 19th century to mid-20th century) characterized by state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the United States.
- Vacated Conviction: A legal ruling that voids a previous conviction, treating it as if it never happened due to errors or violations of rights (as seen in Stinney’s 2014 case).
Bibliography & References
Legal & Historical Documents
- U.S. Const. amend. XIII. (1865). The 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
- State of South Carolina v. George Stinney, Jr. (1944). Trial Transcript and Court Records (Archived).
- Mullen, C. (2014). Order Vacating Judgment in the Case of State v. George Stinney, Jr. Circuit Court of South Carolina.
Academic Research & Books
- Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. The New Press.
- Blackmon, D. A. (2008). Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II. Doubleday.
- National Academy of Sciences. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. National Academies Press.
- The Sentencing Project. (2023). The Color of Justice: Racial and Ethnic Disparity in State Prisons. ### Articles & Data Reports
- Brennan Center for Justice. (2022). Conviction, Imprisonment, and Lost Earnings: How the Criminal Justice System Deepens Inequality.
- UCLA Department of Sociology. (2023). Police Activity Analysis: Surveillance and Deployment in Urban Environments.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission. (2024-2026). Report to the Congress: Federal Sentencing Statistics and Fentanyl Trafficking Trends.
- Urban Institute. (2026). Racial Disparities in Charging and Plea Bargaining: A Longitudinal Study.
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
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The fault in our system: Why The George Stinney Jr. story is still important
Table of Contents
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
- The Systemic Failure of 1944
- The Architecture of a Loophole
- The 13th Amendment and the “Except” Clause
- 81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
- Isolation, Confession, and the Ten-Minute Verdict
- The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
- The Burke Family and the Protected Elite
- The Physical Impossibility
- Engineering and the Laws of Physics vs. State Narrative
- The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
- The Ghosts of Alexander McClay Williams, Joe Persons, and James Arcene
- The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
- Over-Policing, Differential Processing, and the “Crime Rate” Myth
- The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
- The Removal of the Breadwinner and Generational Economic Erasure
- The “Why” of the Present
- Modern Parallels and the Continuity of Disparity
- A Note on “The Green Mile”
- Magical Realism vs. Historical Reality
- Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
Introduction: The fault in the system
When I first told my wife and my son about the subject of my next article, they cringed. I don’t blame them. As an engineer who spends my days developing solutions that ensure the reliability and integrity of the systems my clients depend on, my life is dedicated to solutions that are sound. But the story of George Stinney Jr. is a systems failure so profound, so gut-wrenching, that the natural human instinct is to look away.
I struggled with the “why” myself. Why revisit a tragedy from 1944? Why drag a 14-year-old boy back into the light only to watch him sit on a Bible to fit into an electric chair? The answer lies in the foundation of our country. If we do not understand the “Stinney Era,” we cannot understand the modern carceral state. We are not just looking at a sad story; we are looking at the blueprint of mass incarceration—the “teeth” that gave the Jim Crow era its bite.
The Architecture of a Loophole
To understand why George Stinney was executed in 81 days, we have to go back further than 1944. We have to look at the 13th Amendment. While we celebrate it for “ending” slavery, it contained a structural flaw that was exploited by design:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States…”
That “except” clause is the most expensive word in American history. It created a legal bypass. If the state could label a Black person a “criminal,” it could legally return them to a state of servitude. Following the Civil War, Southern states engineered “Black Codes”—laws that criminalized everything from “vagrancy” to “loud talking.” This wasn’t about public safety; it was about labor and social control. The convict leasing system that followed was a direct evolution of the plantation, and by the mid-20th century, this system had evolved into the machinery of state-sanctioned terror that caught George Stinney in its gears.
81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
In March 1944, in the segregated mill town of Alcolu, South Carolina, two young white girls—Betty June Binnicker and Mary Emma Thames—were found dead in a ditch. The town wanted blood. George Stinney Jr., a 95-pound Black boy who had been seen near the girls earlier that day, was the easiest target.
The “system” functioned with terrifying efficiency:
- Isolation: George was interrogated alone. His parents were forced to flee town under threat of violence, leaving their child in the hands of a mob-controlled state.
- The “Confession”: The police claimed he confessed. No written record of this confession exists. There were no witnesses to the statement.
- The Trial: The trial lasted barely two hours. George’s court-appointed lawyer, a tax commissioner with no trial experience, called zero witnesses and performed no cross-examination.
- The Jury: An all-white jury took less than ten minutes to find him guilty. They did not recommend mercy.
On June 16, 1944, George Stinney Jr. became the youngest person executed in 20th-century America. He was so small that the adult-sized electrodes wouldn’t fit his head. They used a Bible—the very book used to swear in the “justice” that was killing him—as a booster seat. When the current hit, the oversized mask fell off, exposing his terrified, weeping face to the witnesses.
The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
If George Stinney Jr. did not kill those two girls, then who did? For seventy years, the state of South Carolina acted as if the question were settled. But in the decades following the execution, a much more sinister reality began to emerge from the shadows of Alcolu.
The leading theory, supported by local testimony and research presented during the 2014 exoneration hearing, points toward George Burke Jr. He was the son of a prominent white businessman who owned the lumber mill where George’s father worked. More chillingly, Burke’s father was the foreman of the jury that sent George Stinney to the electric chair.
The community had whispered for years about a deathbed confession from the Burke family, but in 1944, those whispers were a death sentence. In the social hierarchy of a segregated mill town, a member of the Burke family was untouchable. The “system” didn’t just need a culprit; it needed a diversion. By sacrificing a 14-year-old Black boy, the state provided the white community with “closure” while ensuring the powerful remained protected. This is the ultimate callousness: the law wasn’t used to find the truth; it was used as a shield for the privileged and a shroud for the innocent.
The Physical Impossibility
We must also look at the physics—the cold, hard data that the 1944 court ignored. The girls were killed with a fourteen-inch railroad spike, suffering massive skull fractures. Forensic experts in 2014 testified that it would have been physically impossible for a 95-pound child to wield such a weapon with the force required to kill two people while also managing to overpower them both.
George had an alibi—his sister, Amie, was with him grazing the family cow when the girls passed by—but in a system designed to exploit the “punishment clause” of the 13th Amendment, an alibi is just noise. The “duly convicted” label was the goal, and the state achieved it by ignoring the laws of physics and the screams of a child.
The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
George was a centerpiece, but he was not an anomaly. As I researched this, I found the ghosts of other children whose names have been scrubbed from the collective memory:
- Alexander McClay Williams (1931): At 16, he was the youngest person executed in Pennsylvania history. His “confession” was coerced, and the state suppressed evidence of a bloody handprint that didn’t match his. It took until 2022 for his conviction to be vacated.
- Joe Persons (1915): A boy in Georgia, estimated to be 12 or 13, who was so small that officials debated adding weights to his feet so the hanging would “work.”
- James Arcene (1885): A Cherokee youth executed for a crime committed when he was just 10 years old.
In each of these cases, the 13th Amendment’s “duly convicted” clause was the shield. By providing the thin veneer of a trial, the state could legally commit what was essentially a lynching.
The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
When we discuss mass incarceration, a common counter-argument often arises: “Don’t Black people simply commit more crime?” I know that if you calibrate a sensor to only look for anomalies in one specific area, your data will be skewed. To understand the disparity, we must look past the “output” and analyze the “filter” of the legal machine.
1. The Frequency of Interaction Fallacy
The argument that Black people “commit more crime” often confuses crime rates with arrest rates. A 2023 UCLA study using smartphone data from 10,000 officers across 23 cities found that police spend significantly more time in Black neighborhoods, even when those neighborhoods have the same crime rates and income levels as white neighborhoods.
The result is simple math: if you put 100 police officers in one neighborhood and two in another, you will “discover” more crime in the first one—even if the actual behavior is identical. This creates a “feedback loop” where higher arrest records are used to justify even more policing, artificially inflating the statistical profile of a community.
2. Drug Use vs. Drug Arrests
This is the “smoking gun” of systemic bias. For decades, federal surveys from the CDC and the NAACP have shown that Black and white Americans use and sell drugs at almost identical rates. However, despite similar usage, Black Americans are nearly 4 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession and 6 times more likely to be incarcerated for drug charges overall. It’s not about who is committing the crime; it’s about who the system is looking for.
3. The “Differential Processing” of Justice
Even when the crime and the criminal history are identical, the system treats the bodies differently:
- Bail: Black defendants are 21% more likely to be denied bail, which forces them to stay in jail while awaiting trial—leading to lost jobs, lost homes, and a higher likelihood of eventually taking a “guilty plea” just to go home.
- Plea Bargaining: Prosecutors are more likely to offer plea deals that include prison time to Black defendants, while white defendants are more likely to be offered “diversion programs” or probation.
- Sentencing Length: According to 2026 data reports, Black men receive sentences that are 19.1% longer than white men for the exact same crimes.
4. Wrongful Convictions: The Margin of Error
If the system were truly objective, the rate of “mistakes” would be equal. It isn’t. Black people make up 13% of the population but over 50% of the exonerated population. Innocent Black people are 7 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of murder and 12 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of drug crimes than white people.
George Stinney Jr. is the historical proof of this. The system didn’t care about the truth; it cared about “closure” that fit the racial hierarchy. When someone says, “they commit more crime,” they are looking at the output of a machine and assuming it is a neutral scale. But as an engineer, I see a filter. It filters out white crime through warnings and diversions, and it filters in Black crime through over-policing and structural bias.
The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
If you want to understand why a large percentage of the Black community remains trapped in poverty today, you need to look no further than the “teeth” of mass incarceration. It was never just about free labor for a season; it was about the permanent maintenance of a lower class.
When the state arrested George Stinney Jr., they didn’t just take a child; they destroyed a household. Within hours of his arrest, his father was fired from the local lumber mill. The family was given mere hours to vacate their company-owned housing and flee the town. They left behind their possessions, their community, and their stability.
Mass incarceration acts as a surgical strike against the Black family unit. By removing men—and in George’s case, the future men of the community—the system achieves several objectives:
- Destruction of the Household Anchor: Historically, when a man was incarcerated or executed, the family lost its primary earner. According to the American Journal of Sociology, paternal incarceration is one of the single greatest predictors of a family falling below the poverty line.
- The “Marriageable Men” Gap: By disproportionately removing Black men from the community, the state created a demographic vacuum. This forced single mothers into a cycle of “survival labor,” where the ability to save, invest, or purchase property became a mathematical impossibility.
- Educational Depletion: A 2014 study by the National Academy of Sciences found that the children of incarcerated parents are significantly less likely to graduate from college, creating a “secondary sentence” that spans generations.
The Numbers Behind the Theft
The statistics are staggering:
- The Wealth Gap: Today, the median white household holds roughly eight times the wealth of the median Black household. This is not a failure of work ethic; it is a result of a century of wealth-stripping policies.
- Lifetime Loss: The Brennan Center for Justice estimated that formerly incarcerated people lose an average of $500,000 in lifetime earnings. When you multiply that by the millions of Black men swept up in the “War on Drugs,” you are looking at trillions of dollars in wealth that never entered the Black community.
- Voter Disenfranchisement: In many states, a felony conviction (the “duly convicted” status of the 13th Amendment) leads to the loss of voting rights. This removes the community’s ability to vote for the very policies—school funding and housing—that build wealth.
Mass incarceration is not a “side effect” of poverty; it is the architect of it. It ensures that the Black community remains in a state of “perpetual catch-up.” Every time a generation begins to build equity, a new wave of “tough on crime” legislation resets the clock.
The “Why” of the Present
People ask me why this matters now. It matters because the “punishment clause” is still in the Constitution. The transition from the Jim Crow executions of the 40s to the mass incarceration boom of the 80s and 90s is a straight line.
I know that systems don’t fix themselves. When we look at the racial disparities in our modern prison system, we are seeing the same logic that executed George Stinney. We are seeing a system that prioritizes “closure” and “control” over “integrity.”
When the Stinney family was run out of town, they lost their property, their stability, and their history. This is how the wealth gap was engineered. Mass incarceration isn’t just about the person in the cell; it is about the “Generational Theft” of Black potential. We care about George Stinney because his execution was a warning shot: The law does not belong to you.
A Note on “The Green Mile”
By the way, as I dug into this, I noticed how many people believe that Stephen King’s The Green Mile is based on George Stinney. While King has never confirmed this, the parallels are undeniable: the two girls, the rural South, the wrongful execution.
But there is a dangerous difference. In the movie, John Coffey is a “Magical Negro”—a gentle giant with supernatural powers. In reality, George Stinney had no magic. He was just a scared 14-year-old child who wanted to go home. By turning these tragedies into “magical fables,” we risk softening the edges of the reality. We don’t need magic to explain George’s innocence; we just need to look at the physics of a 90-pound boy and the corruption of a system that didn’t care to measure the weight of the evidence.
Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
In 2014, seventy years after he was killed, Judge Carmen Mullen vacated George Stinney’s conviction. She cited “fundamental, constitutional violations of due process.” It was a victory, but a hollow one. You cannot return 70 years of life to a boy who was burned to death by his own government.
We revisit this story because the “crack” in the foundation is still there. As long as the 13th Amendment allows for slavery-by-another-name, and as long as our system views Black children as “superpredators” rather than children, George Stinney is not a ghost of the past. He is a mirror of the present.
If a system is designed to protect some by sacrificing others, it has no integrity. It is a bridge waiting to collapse. We owe it to George—and to the children whose names we don’t yet know—to stop patching the cracks and start questioning the blueprint. Until the “except as punishment” loophole is closed and the law is applied without the filter of power and race, we aren’t living in a state of justice. We are just living in a very long, very crowded Green Mile.
Glossary of Terms
- 13th Amendment (Punishment Clause): The section of the US Constitution that abolished slavery except as punishment for a crime, creating a legal loophole for involuntary servitude.
- Black Codes: Laws passed by Southern states after the Civil War to restrict the freedom of Black Americans and compel them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
- Convict Leasing: A system in which state penitentiaries leased incarcerated people to private companies (e.g., coal mines, railroads) for labor.
- Differential Processing: The phenomenon where individuals of different races are treated differently by the criminal justice system even when the alleged crimes are identical.
- Doli Incapax: A legal doctrine (often ignored in the Jim Crow era) suggesting that children below a certain age are incapable of forming the intent to commit a crime.
- Generational Wealth Theft: The systemic removal of assets, property, and earning potential from a specific community over time, preventing the accumulation of intergenerational wealth.
- Jim Crow Era: The period (late 19th century to mid-20th century) characterized by state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the United States.
- Vacated Conviction: A legal ruling that voids a previous conviction, treating it as if it never happened due to errors or violations of rights (as seen in Stinney’s 2014 case).
Bibliography & References
Legal & Historical Documents
- U.S. Const. amend. XIII. (1865). The 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
- State of South Carolina v. George Stinney, Jr. (1944). Trial Transcript and Court Records (Archived).
- Mullen, C. (2014). Order Vacating Judgment in the Case of State v. George Stinney, Jr. Circuit Court of South Carolina.
Academic Research & Books
- Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. The New Press.
- Blackmon, D. A. (2008). Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II. Doubleday.
- National Academy of Sciences. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. National Academies Press.
- The Sentencing Project. (2023). The Color of Justice: Racial and Ethnic Disparity in State Prisons. ### Articles & Data Reports
- Brennan Center for Justice. (2022). Conviction, Imprisonment, and Lost Earnings: How the Criminal Justice System Deepens Inequality.
- UCLA Department of Sociology. (2023). Police Activity Analysis: Surveillance and Deployment in Urban Environments.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission. (2024-2026). Report to the Congress: Federal Sentencing Statistics and Fentanyl Trafficking Trends.
- Urban Institute. (2026). Racial Disparities in Charging and Plea Bargaining: A Longitudinal Study.
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
-
The fault in our system: Why The George Stinney Jr. story is still important
Table of Contents
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
- The Systemic Failure of 1944
- The Architecture of a Loophole
- The 13th Amendment and the “Except” Clause
- 81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
- Isolation, Confession, and the Ten-Minute Verdict
- The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
- The Burke Family and the Protected Elite
- The Physical Impossibility
- Engineering and the Laws of Physics vs. State Narrative
- The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
- The Ghosts of Alexander McClay Williams, Joe Persons, and James Arcene
- The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
- Over-Policing, Differential Processing, and the “Crime Rate” Myth
- The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
- The Removal of the Breadwinner and Generational Economic Erasure
- The “Why” of the Present
- Modern Parallels and the Continuity of Disparity
- A Note on “The Green Mile”
- Magical Realism vs. Historical Reality
- Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
Introduction: The fault in the system
When I first told my wife and my son about the subject of my next article, they cringed. I don’t blame them. As an engineer who spends my days developing solutions that ensure the reliability and integrity of the systems my clients depend on, my life is dedicated to solutions that are sound. But the story of George Stinney Jr. is a systems failure so profound, so gut-wrenching, that the natural human instinct is to look away.
I struggled with the “why” myself. Why revisit a tragedy from 1944? Why drag a 14-year-old boy back into the light only to watch him sit on a Bible to fit into an electric chair? The answer lies in the foundation of our country. If we do not understand the “Stinney Era,” we cannot understand the modern carceral state. We are not just looking at a sad story; we are looking at the blueprint of mass incarceration—the “teeth” that gave the Jim Crow era its bite.
The Architecture of a Loophole
To understand why George Stinney was executed in 81 days, we have to go back further than 1944. We have to look at the 13th Amendment. While we celebrate it for “ending” slavery, it contained a structural flaw that was exploited by design:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States…”
That “except” clause is the most expensive word in American history. It created a legal bypass. If the state could label a Black person a “criminal,” it could legally return them to a state of servitude. Following the Civil War, Southern states engineered “Black Codes”—laws that criminalized everything from “vagrancy” to “loud talking.” This wasn’t about public safety; it was about labor and social control. The convict leasing system that followed was a direct evolution of the plantation, and by the mid-20th century, this system had evolved into the machinery of state-sanctioned terror that caught George Stinney in its gears.
81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
In March 1944, in the segregated mill town of Alcolu, South Carolina, two young white girls—Betty June Binnicker and Mary Emma Thames—were found dead in a ditch. The town wanted blood. George Stinney Jr., a 95-pound Black boy who had been seen near the girls earlier that day, was the easiest target.
The “system” functioned with terrifying efficiency:
- Isolation: George was interrogated alone. His parents were forced to flee town under threat of violence, leaving their child in the hands of a mob-controlled state.
- The “Confession”: The police claimed he confessed. No written record of this confession exists. There were no witnesses to the statement.
- The Trial: The trial lasted barely two hours. George’s court-appointed lawyer, a tax commissioner with no trial experience, called zero witnesses and performed no cross-examination.
- The Jury: An all-white jury took less than ten minutes to find him guilty. They did not recommend mercy.
On June 16, 1944, George Stinney Jr. became the youngest person executed in 20th-century America. He was so small that the adult-sized electrodes wouldn’t fit his head. They used a Bible—the very book used to swear in the “justice” that was killing him—as a booster seat. When the current hit, the oversized mask fell off, exposing his terrified, weeping face to the witnesses.
The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
If George Stinney Jr. did not kill those two girls, then who did? For seventy years, the state of South Carolina acted as if the question were settled. But in the decades following the execution, a much more sinister reality began to emerge from the shadows of Alcolu.
The leading theory, supported by local testimony and research presented during the 2014 exoneration hearing, points toward George Burke Jr. He was the son of a prominent white businessman who owned the lumber mill where George’s father worked. More chillingly, Burke’s father was the foreman of the jury that sent George Stinney to the electric chair.
The community had whispered for years about a deathbed confession from the Burke family, but in 1944, those whispers were a death sentence. In the social hierarchy of a segregated mill town, a member of the Burke family was untouchable. The “system” didn’t just need a culprit; it needed a diversion. By sacrificing a 14-year-old Black boy, the state provided the white community with “closure” while ensuring the powerful remained protected. This is the ultimate callousness: the law wasn’t used to find the truth; it was used as a shield for the privileged and a shroud for the innocent.
The Physical Impossibility
We must also look at the physics—the cold, hard data that the 1944 court ignored. The girls were killed with a fourteen-inch railroad spike, suffering massive skull fractures. Forensic experts in 2014 testified that it would have been physically impossible for a 95-pound child to wield such a weapon with the force required to kill two people while also managing to overpower them both.
George had an alibi—his sister, Amie, was with him grazing the family cow when the girls passed by—but in a system designed to exploit the “punishment clause” of the 13th Amendment, an alibi is just noise. The “duly convicted” label was the goal, and the state achieved it by ignoring the laws of physics and the screams of a child.
The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
George was a centerpiece, but he was not an anomaly. As I researched this, I found the ghosts of other children whose names have been scrubbed from the collective memory:
- Alexander McClay Williams (1931): At 16, he was the youngest person executed in Pennsylvania history. His “confession” was coerced, and the state suppressed evidence of a bloody handprint that didn’t match his. It took until 2022 for his conviction to be vacated.
- Joe Persons (1915): A boy in Georgia, estimated to be 12 or 13, who was so small that officials debated adding weights to his feet so the hanging would “work.”
- James Arcene (1885): A Cherokee youth executed for a crime committed when he was just 10 years old.
In each of these cases, the 13th Amendment’s “duly convicted” clause was the shield. By providing the thin veneer of a trial, the state could legally commit what was essentially a lynching.
The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
When we discuss mass incarceration, a common counter-argument often arises: “Don’t Black people simply commit more crime?” I know that if you calibrate a sensor to only look for anomalies in one specific area, your data will be skewed. To understand the disparity, we must look past the “output” and analyze the “filter” of the legal machine.
1. The Frequency of Interaction Fallacy
The argument that Black people “commit more crime” often confuses crime rates with arrest rates. A 2023 UCLA study using smartphone data from 10,000 officers across 23 cities found that police spend significantly more time in Black neighborhoods, even when those neighborhoods have the same crime rates and income levels as white neighborhoods.
The result is simple math: if you put 100 police officers in one neighborhood and two in another, you will “discover” more crime in the first one—even if the actual behavior is identical. This creates a “feedback loop” where higher arrest records are used to justify even more policing, artificially inflating the statistical profile of a community.
2. Drug Use vs. Drug Arrests
This is the “smoking gun” of systemic bias. For decades, federal surveys from the CDC and the NAACP have shown that Black and white Americans use and sell drugs at almost identical rates. However, despite similar usage, Black Americans are nearly 4 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession and 6 times more likely to be incarcerated for drug charges overall. It’s not about who is committing the crime; it’s about who the system is looking for.
3. The “Differential Processing” of Justice
Even when the crime and the criminal history are identical, the system treats the bodies differently:
- Bail: Black defendants are 21% more likely to be denied bail, which forces them to stay in jail while awaiting trial—leading to lost jobs, lost homes, and a higher likelihood of eventually taking a “guilty plea” just to go home.
- Plea Bargaining: Prosecutors are more likely to offer plea deals that include prison time to Black defendants, while white defendants are more likely to be offered “diversion programs” or probation.
- Sentencing Length: According to 2026 data reports, Black men receive sentences that are 19.1% longer than white men for the exact same crimes.
4. Wrongful Convictions: The Margin of Error
If the system were truly objective, the rate of “mistakes” would be equal. It isn’t. Black people make up 13% of the population but over 50% of the exonerated population. Innocent Black people are 7 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of murder and 12 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of drug crimes than white people.
George Stinney Jr. is the historical proof of this. The system didn’t care about the truth; it cared about “closure” that fit the racial hierarchy. When someone says, “they commit more crime,” they are looking at the output of a machine and assuming it is a neutral scale. But as an engineer, I see a filter. It filters out white crime through warnings and diversions, and it filters in Black crime through over-policing and structural bias.
The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
If you want to understand why a large percentage of the Black community remains trapped in poverty today, you need to look no further than the “teeth” of mass incarceration. It was never just about free labor for a season; it was about the permanent maintenance of a lower class.
When the state arrested George Stinney Jr., they didn’t just take a child; they destroyed a household. Within hours of his arrest, his father was fired from the local lumber mill. The family was given mere hours to vacate their company-owned housing and flee the town. They left behind their possessions, their community, and their stability.
Mass incarceration acts as a surgical strike against the Black family unit. By removing men—and in George’s case, the future men of the community—the system achieves several objectives:
- Destruction of the Household Anchor: Historically, when a man was incarcerated or executed, the family lost its primary earner. According to the American Journal of Sociology, paternal incarceration is one of the single greatest predictors of a family falling below the poverty line.
- The “Marriageable Men” Gap: By disproportionately removing Black men from the community, the state created a demographic vacuum. This forced single mothers into a cycle of “survival labor,” where the ability to save, invest, or purchase property became a mathematical impossibility.
- Educational Depletion: A 2014 study by the National Academy of Sciences found that the children of incarcerated parents are significantly less likely to graduate from college, creating a “secondary sentence” that spans generations.
The Numbers Behind the Theft
The statistics are staggering:
- The Wealth Gap: Today, the median white household holds roughly eight times the wealth of the median Black household. This is not a failure of work ethic; it is a result of a century of wealth-stripping policies.
- Lifetime Loss: The Brennan Center for Justice estimated that formerly incarcerated people lose an average of $500,000 in lifetime earnings. When you multiply that by the millions of Black men swept up in the “War on Drugs,” you are looking at trillions of dollars in wealth that never entered the Black community.
- Voter Disenfranchisement: In many states, a felony conviction (the “duly convicted” status of the 13th Amendment) leads to the loss of voting rights. This removes the community’s ability to vote for the very policies—school funding and housing—that build wealth.
Mass incarceration is not a “side effect” of poverty; it is the architect of it. It ensures that the Black community remains in a state of “perpetual catch-up.” Every time a generation begins to build equity, a new wave of “tough on crime” legislation resets the clock.
The “Why” of the Present
People ask me why this matters now. It matters because the “punishment clause” is still in the Constitution. The transition from the Jim Crow executions of the 40s to the mass incarceration boom of the 80s and 90s is a straight line.
I know that systems don’t fix themselves. When we look at the racial disparities in our modern prison system, we are seeing the same logic that executed George Stinney. We are seeing a system that prioritizes “closure” and “control” over “integrity.”
When the Stinney family was run out of town, they lost their property, their stability, and their history. This is how the wealth gap was engineered. Mass incarceration isn’t just about the person in the cell; it is about the “Generational Theft” of Black potential. We care about George Stinney because his execution was a warning shot: The law does not belong to you.
A Note on “The Green Mile”
By the way, as I dug into this, I noticed how many people believe that Stephen King’s The Green Mile is based on George Stinney. While King has never confirmed this, the parallels are undeniable: the two girls, the rural South, the wrongful execution.
But there is a dangerous difference. In the movie, John Coffey is a “Magical Negro”—a gentle giant with supernatural powers. In reality, George Stinney had no magic. He was just a scared 14-year-old child who wanted to go home. By turning these tragedies into “magical fables,” we risk softening the edges of the reality. We don’t need magic to explain George’s innocence; we just need to look at the physics of a 90-pound boy and the corruption of a system that didn’t care to measure the weight of the evidence.
Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
In 2014, seventy years after he was killed, Judge Carmen Mullen vacated George Stinney’s conviction. She cited “fundamental, constitutional violations of due process.” It was a victory, but a hollow one. You cannot return 70 years of life to a boy who was burned to death by his own government.
We revisit this story because the “crack” in the foundation is still there. As long as the 13th Amendment allows for slavery-by-another-name, and as long as our system views Black children as “superpredators” rather than children, George Stinney is not a ghost of the past. He is a mirror of the present.
If a system is designed to protect some by sacrificing others, it has no integrity. It is a bridge waiting to collapse. We owe it to George—and to the children whose names we don’t yet know—to stop patching the cracks and start questioning the blueprint. Until the “except as punishment” loophole is closed and the law is applied without the filter of power and race, we aren’t living in a state of justice. We are just living in a very long, very crowded Green Mile.
Glossary of Terms
- 13th Amendment (Punishment Clause): The section of the US Constitution that abolished slavery except as punishment for a crime, creating a legal loophole for involuntary servitude.
- Black Codes: Laws passed by Southern states after the Civil War to restrict the freedom of Black Americans and compel them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
- Convict Leasing: A system in which state penitentiaries leased incarcerated people to private companies (e.g., coal mines, railroads) for labor.
- Differential Processing: The phenomenon where individuals of different races are treated differently by the criminal justice system even when the alleged crimes are identical.
- Doli Incapax: A legal doctrine (often ignored in the Jim Crow era) suggesting that children below a certain age are incapable of forming the intent to commit a crime.
- Generational Wealth Theft: The systemic removal of assets, property, and earning potential from a specific community over time, preventing the accumulation of intergenerational wealth.
- Jim Crow Era: The period (late 19th century to mid-20th century) characterized by state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the United States.
- Vacated Conviction: A legal ruling that voids a previous conviction, treating it as if it never happened due to errors or violations of rights (as seen in Stinney’s 2014 case).
Bibliography & References
Legal & Historical Documents
- U.S. Const. amend. XIII. (1865). The 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
- State of South Carolina v. George Stinney, Jr. (1944). Trial Transcript and Court Records (Archived).
- Mullen, C. (2014). Order Vacating Judgment in the Case of State v. George Stinney, Jr. Circuit Court of South Carolina.
Academic Research & Books
- Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. The New Press.
- Blackmon, D. A. (2008). Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II. Doubleday.
- National Academy of Sciences. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. National Academies Press.
- The Sentencing Project. (2023). The Color of Justice: Racial and Ethnic Disparity in State Prisons. ### Articles & Data Reports
- Brennan Center for Justice. (2022). Conviction, Imprisonment, and Lost Earnings: How the Criminal Justice System Deepens Inequality.
- UCLA Department of Sociology. (2023). Police Activity Analysis: Surveillance and Deployment in Urban Environments.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission. (2024-2026). Report to the Congress: Federal Sentencing Statistics and Fentanyl Trafficking Trends.
- Urban Institute. (2026). Racial Disparities in Charging and Plea Bargaining: A Longitudinal Study.
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
-
The fault in our system: Why The George Stinney Jr. story is still important
Table of Contents
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
- The Systemic Failure of 1944
- The Architecture of a Loophole
- The 13th Amendment and the “Except” Clause
- 81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
- Isolation, Confession, and the Ten-Minute Verdict
- The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
- The Burke Family and the Protected Elite
- The Physical Impossibility
- Engineering and the Laws of Physics vs. State Narrative
- The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
- The Ghosts of Alexander McClay Williams, Joe Persons, and James Arcene
- The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
- Over-Policing, Differential Processing, and the “Crime Rate” Myth
- The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
- The Removal of the Breadwinner and Generational Economic Erasure
- The “Why” of the Present
- Modern Parallels and the Continuity of Disparity
- A Note on “The Green Mile”
- Magical Realism vs. Historical Reality
- Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
Introduction: The fault in the system
When I first told my wife and my son about the subject of my next article, they cringed. I don’t blame them. As an engineer who spends my days developing solutions that ensure the reliability and integrity of the systems my clients depend on, my life is dedicated to solutions that are sound. But the story of George Stinney Jr. is a systems failure so profound, so gut-wrenching, that the natural human instinct is to look away.
I struggled with the “why” myself. Why revisit a tragedy from 1944? Why drag a 14-year-old boy back into the light only to watch him sit on a Bible to fit into an electric chair? The answer lies in the foundation of our country. If we do not understand the “Stinney Era,” we cannot understand the modern carceral state. We are not just looking at a sad story; we are looking at the blueprint of mass incarceration—the “teeth” that gave the Jim Crow era its bite.
The Architecture of a Loophole
To understand why George Stinney was executed in 81 days, we have to go back further than 1944. We have to look at the 13th Amendment. While we celebrate it for “ending” slavery, it contained a structural flaw that was exploited by design:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States…”
That “except” clause is the most expensive word in American history. It created a legal bypass. If the state could label a Black person a “criminal,” it could legally return them to a state of servitude. Following the Civil War, Southern states engineered “Black Codes”—laws that criminalized everything from “vagrancy” to “loud talking.” This wasn’t about public safety; it was about labor and social control. The convict leasing system that followed was a direct evolution of the plantation, and by the mid-20th century, this system had evolved into the machinery of state-sanctioned terror that caught George Stinney in its gears.
81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
In March 1944, in the segregated mill town of Alcolu, South Carolina, two young white girls—Betty June Binnicker and Mary Emma Thames—were found dead in a ditch. The town wanted blood. George Stinney Jr., a 95-pound Black boy who had been seen near the girls earlier that day, was the easiest target.
The “system” functioned with terrifying efficiency:
- Isolation: George was interrogated alone. His parents were forced to flee town under threat of violence, leaving their child in the hands of a mob-controlled state.
- The “Confession”: The police claimed he confessed. No written record of this confession exists. There were no witnesses to the statement.
- The Trial: The trial lasted barely two hours. George’s court-appointed lawyer, a tax commissioner with no trial experience, called zero witnesses and performed no cross-examination.
- The Jury: An all-white jury took less than ten minutes to find him guilty. They did not recommend mercy.
On June 16, 1944, George Stinney Jr. became the youngest person executed in 20th-century America. He was so small that the adult-sized electrodes wouldn’t fit his head. They used a Bible—the very book used to swear in the “justice” that was killing him—as a booster seat. When the current hit, the oversized mask fell off, exposing his terrified, weeping face to the witnesses.
The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
If George Stinney Jr. did not kill those two girls, then who did? For seventy years, the state of South Carolina acted as if the question were settled. But in the decades following the execution, a much more sinister reality began to emerge from the shadows of Alcolu.
The leading theory, supported by local testimony and research presented during the 2014 exoneration hearing, points toward George Burke Jr. He was the son of a prominent white businessman who owned the lumber mill where George’s father worked. More chillingly, Burke’s father was the foreman of the jury that sent George Stinney to the electric chair.
The community had whispered for years about a deathbed confession from the Burke family, but in 1944, those whispers were a death sentence. In the social hierarchy of a segregated mill town, a member of the Burke family was untouchable. The “system” didn’t just need a culprit; it needed a diversion. By sacrificing a 14-year-old Black boy, the state provided the white community with “closure” while ensuring the powerful remained protected. This is the ultimate callousness: the law wasn’t used to find the truth; it was used as a shield for the privileged and a shroud for the innocent.
The Physical Impossibility
We must also look at the physics—the cold, hard data that the 1944 court ignored. The girls were killed with a fourteen-inch railroad spike, suffering massive skull fractures. Forensic experts in 2014 testified that it would have been physically impossible for a 95-pound child to wield such a weapon with the force required to kill two people while also managing to overpower them both.
George had an alibi—his sister, Amie, was with him grazing the family cow when the girls passed by—but in a system designed to exploit the “punishment clause” of the 13th Amendment, an alibi is just noise. The “duly convicted” label was the goal, and the state achieved it by ignoring the laws of physics and the screams of a child.
The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
George was a centerpiece, but he was not an anomaly. As I researched this, I found the ghosts of other children whose names have been scrubbed from the collective memory:
- Alexander McClay Williams (1931): At 16, he was the youngest person executed in Pennsylvania history. His “confession” was coerced, and the state suppressed evidence of a bloody handprint that didn’t match his. It took until 2022 for his conviction to be vacated.
- Joe Persons (1915): A boy in Georgia, estimated to be 12 or 13, who was so small that officials debated adding weights to his feet so the hanging would “work.”
- James Arcene (1885): A Cherokee youth executed for a crime committed when he was just 10 years old.
In each of these cases, the 13th Amendment’s “duly convicted” clause was the shield. By providing the thin veneer of a trial, the state could legally commit what was essentially a lynching.
The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
When we discuss mass incarceration, a common counter-argument often arises: “Don’t Black people simply commit more crime?” I know that if you calibrate a sensor to only look for anomalies in one specific area, your data will be skewed. To understand the disparity, we must look past the “output” and analyze the “filter” of the legal machine.
1. The Frequency of Interaction Fallacy
The argument that Black people “commit more crime” often confuses crime rates with arrest rates. A 2023 UCLA study using smartphone data from 10,000 officers across 23 cities found that police spend significantly more time in Black neighborhoods, even when those neighborhoods have the same crime rates and income levels as white neighborhoods.
The result is simple math: if you put 100 police officers in one neighborhood and two in another, you will “discover” more crime in the first one—even if the actual behavior is identical. This creates a “feedback loop” where higher arrest records are used to justify even more policing, artificially inflating the statistical profile of a community.
2. Drug Use vs. Drug Arrests
This is the “smoking gun” of systemic bias. For decades, federal surveys from the CDC and the NAACP have shown that Black and white Americans use and sell drugs at almost identical rates. However, despite similar usage, Black Americans are nearly 4 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession and 6 times more likely to be incarcerated for drug charges overall. It’s not about who is committing the crime; it’s about who the system is looking for.
3. The “Differential Processing” of Justice
Even when the crime and the criminal history are identical, the system treats the bodies differently:
- Bail: Black defendants are 21% more likely to be denied bail, which forces them to stay in jail while awaiting trial—leading to lost jobs, lost homes, and a higher likelihood of eventually taking a “guilty plea” just to go home.
- Plea Bargaining: Prosecutors are more likely to offer plea deals that include prison time to Black defendants, while white defendants are more likely to be offered “diversion programs” or probation.
- Sentencing Length: According to 2026 data reports, Black men receive sentences that are 19.1% longer than white men for the exact same crimes.
4. Wrongful Convictions: The Margin of Error
If the system were truly objective, the rate of “mistakes” would be equal. It isn’t. Black people make up 13% of the population but over 50% of the exonerated population. Innocent Black people are 7 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of murder and 12 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of drug crimes than white people.
George Stinney Jr. is the historical proof of this. The system didn’t care about the truth; it cared about “closure” that fit the racial hierarchy. When someone says, “they commit more crime,” they are looking at the output of a machine and assuming it is a neutral scale. But as an engineer, I see a filter. It filters out white crime through warnings and diversions, and it filters in Black crime through over-policing and structural bias.
The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
If you want to understand why a large percentage of the Black community remains trapped in poverty today, you need to look no further than the “teeth” of mass incarceration. It was never just about free labor for a season; it was about the permanent maintenance of a lower class.
When the state arrested George Stinney Jr., they didn’t just take a child; they destroyed a household. Within hours of his arrest, his father was fired from the local lumber mill. The family was given mere hours to vacate their company-owned housing and flee the town. They left behind their possessions, their community, and their stability.
Mass incarceration acts as a surgical strike against the Black family unit. By removing men—and in George’s case, the future men of the community—the system achieves several objectives:
- Destruction of the Household Anchor: Historically, when a man was incarcerated or executed, the family lost its primary earner. According to the American Journal of Sociology, paternal incarceration is one of the single greatest predictors of a family falling below the poverty line.
- The “Marriageable Men” Gap: By disproportionately removing Black men from the community, the state created a demographic vacuum. This forced single mothers into a cycle of “survival labor,” where the ability to save, invest, or purchase property became a mathematical impossibility.
- Educational Depletion: A 2014 study by the National Academy of Sciences found that the children of incarcerated parents are significantly less likely to graduate from college, creating a “secondary sentence” that spans generations.
The Numbers Behind the Theft
The statistics are staggering:
- The Wealth Gap: Today, the median white household holds roughly eight times the wealth of the median Black household. This is not a failure of work ethic; it is a result of a century of wealth-stripping policies.
- Lifetime Loss: The Brennan Center for Justice estimated that formerly incarcerated people lose an average of $500,000 in lifetime earnings. When you multiply that by the millions of Black men swept up in the “War on Drugs,” you are looking at trillions of dollars in wealth that never entered the Black community.
- Voter Disenfranchisement: In many states, a felony conviction (the “duly convicted” status of the 13th Amendment) leads to the loss of voting rights. This removes the community’s ability to vote for the very policies—school funding and housing—that build wealth.
Mass incarceration is not a “side effect” of poverty; it is the architect of it. It ensures that the Black community remains in a state of “perpetual catch-up.” Every time a generation begins to build equity, a new wave of “tough on crime” legislation resets the clock.
The “Why” of the Present
People ask me why this matters now. It matters because the “punishment clause” is still in the Constitution. The transition from the Jim Crow executions of the 40s to the mass incarceration boom of the 80s and 90s is a straight line.
I know that systems don’t fix themselves. When we look at the racial disparities in our modern prison system, we are seeing the same logic that executed George Stinney. We are seeing a system that prioritizes “closure” and “control” over “integrity.”
When the Stinney family was run out of town, they lost their property, their stability, and their history. This is how the wealth gap was engineered. Mass incarceration isn’t just about the person in the cell; it is about the “Generational Theft” of Black potential. We care about George Stinney because his execution was a warning shot: The law does not belong to you.
A Note on “The Green Mile”
By the way, as I dug into this, I noticed how many people believe that Stephen King’s The Green Mile is based on George Stinney. While King has never confirmed this, the parallels are undeniable: the two girls, the rural South, the wrongful execution.
But there is a dangerous difference. In the movie, John Coffey is a “Magical Negro”—a gentle giant with supernatural powers. In reality, George Stinney had no magic. He was just a scared 14-year-old child who wanted to go home. By turning these tragedies into “magical fables,” we risk softening the edges of the reality. We don’t need magic to explain George’s innocence; we just need to look at the physics of a 90-pound boy and the corruption of a system that didn’t care to measure the weight of the evidence.
Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
In 2014, seventy years after he was killed, Judge Carmen Mullen vacated George Stinney’s conviction. She cited “fundamental, constitutional violations of due process.” It was a victory, but a hollow one. You cannot return 70 years of life to a boy who was burned to death by his own government.
We revisit this story because the “crack” in the foundation is still there. As long as the 13th Amendment allows for slavery-by-another-name, and as long as our system views Black children as “superpredators” rather than children, George Stinney is not a ghost of the past. He is a mirror of the present.
If a system is designed to protect some by sacrificing others, it has no integrity. It is a bridge waiting to collapse. We owe it to George—and to the children whose names we don’t yet know—to stop patching the cracks and start questioning the blueprint. Until the “except as punishment” loophole is closed and the law is applied without the filter of power and race, we aren’t living in a state of justice. We are just living in a very long, very crowded Green Mile.
Glossary of Terms
- 13th Amendment (Punishment Clause): The section of the US Constitution that abolished slavery except as punishment for a crime, creating a legal loophole for involuntary servitude.
- Black Codes: Laws passed by Southern states after the Civil War to restrict the freedom of Black Americans and compel them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
- Convict Leasing: A system in which state penitentiaries leased incarcerated people to private companies (e.g., coal mines, railroads) for labor.
- Differential Processing: The phenomenon where individuals of different races are treated differently by the criminal justice system even when the alleged crimes are identical.
- Doli Incapax: A legal doctrine (often ignored in the Jim Crow era) suggesting that children below a certain age are incapable of forming the intent to commit a crime.
- Generational Wealth Theft: The systemic removal of assets, property, and earning potential from a specific community over time, preventing the accumulation of intergenerational wealth.
- Jim Crow Era: The period (late 19th century to mid-20th century) characterized by state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the United States.
- Vacated Conviction: A legal ruling that voids a previous conviction, treating it as if it never happened due to errors or violations of rights (as seen in Stinney’s 2014 case).
Bibliography & References
Legal & Historical Documents
- U.S. Const. amend. XIII. (1865). The 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
- State of South Carolina v. George Stinney, Jr. (1944). Trial Transcript and Court Records (Archived).
- Mullen, C. (2014). Order Vacating Judgment in the Case of State v. George Stinney, Jr. Circuit Court of South Carolina.
Academic Research & Books
- Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. The New Press.
- Blackmon, D. A. (2008). Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II. Doubleday.
- National Academy of Sciences. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. National Academies Press.
- The Sentencing Project. (2023). The Color of Justice: Racial and Ethnic Disparity in State Prisons. ### Articles & Data Reports
- Brennan Center for Justice. (2022). Conviction, Imprisonment, and Lost Earnings: How the Criminal Justice System Deepens Inequality.
- UCLA Department of Sociology. (2023). Police Activity Analysis: Surveillance and Deployment in Urban Environments.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission. (2024-2026). Report to the Congress: Federal Sentencing Statistics and Fentanyl Trafficking Trends.
- Urban Institute. (2026). Racial Disparities in Charging and Plea Bargaining: A Longitudinal Study.
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
-
The fault in our system: Why The George Stinney Jr. story is still important
Table of Contents
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
- The Systemic Failure of 1944
- The Architecture of a Loophole
- The 13th Amendment and the “Except” Clause
- 81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
- Isolation, Confession, and the Ten-Minute Verdict
- The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
- The Burke Family and the Protected Elite
- The Physical Impossibility
- Engineering and the Laws of Physics vs. State Narrative
- The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
- The Ghosts of Alexander McClay Williams, Joe Persons, and James Arcene
- The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
- Over-Policing, Differential Processing, and the “Crime Rate” Myth
- The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
- The Removal of the Breadwinner and Generational Economic Erasure
- The “Why” of the Present
- Modern Parallels and the Continuity of Disparity
- A Note on “The Green Mile”
- Magical Realism vs. Historical Reality
- Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
Introduction: The fault in the system
When I first told my wife and my son about the subject of my next article, they cringed. I don’t blame them. As an engineer who spends my days developing solutions that ensure the reliability and integrity of the systems my clients depend on, my life is dedicated to solutions that are sound. But the story of George Stinney Jr. is a systems failure so profound, so gut-wrenching, that the natural human instinct is to look away.
I struggled with the “why” myself. Why revisit a tragedy from 1944? Why drag a 14-year-old boy back into the light only to watch him sit on a Bible to fit into an electric chair? The answer lies in the foundation of our country. If we do not understand the “Stinney Era,” we cannot understand the modern carceral state. We are not just looking at a sad story; we are looking at the blueprint of mass incarceration—the “teeth” that gave the Jim Crow era its bite.
The Architecture of a Loophole
To understand why George Stinney was executed in 81 days, we have to go back further than 1944. We have to look at the 13th Amendment. While we celebrate it for “ending” slavery, it contained a structural flaw that was exploited by design:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States…”
That “except” clause is the most expensive word in American history. It created a legal bypass. If the state could label a Black person a “criminal,” it could legally return them to a state of servitude. Following the Civil War, Southern states engineered “Black Codes”—laws that criminalized everything from “vagrancy” to “loud talking.” This wasn’t about public safety; it was about labor and social control. The convict leasing system that followed was a direct evolution of the plantation, and by the mid-20th century, this system had evolved into the machinery of state-sanctioned terror that caught George Stinney in its gears.
81 Days: The Velocity of Injustice
In March 1944, in the segregated mill town of Alcolu, South Carolina, two young white girls—Betty June Binnicker and Mary Emma Thames—were found dead in a ditch. The town wanted blood. George Stinney Jr., a 95-pound Black boy who had been seen near the girls earlier that day, was the easiest target.
The “system” functioned with terrifying efficiency:
- Isolation: George was interrogated alone. His parents were forced to flee town under threat of violence, leaving their child in the hands of a mob-controlled state.
- The “Confession”: The police claimed he confessed. No written record of this confession exists. There were no witnesses to the statement.
- The Trial: The trial lasted barely two hours. George’s court-appointed lawyer, a tax commissioner with no trial experience, called zero witnesses and performed no cross-examination.
- The Jury: An all-white jury took less than ten minutes to find him guilty. They did not recommend mercy.
On June 16, 1944, George Stinney Jr. became the youngest person executed in 20th-century America. He was so small that the adult-sized electrodes wouldn’t fit his head. They used a Bible—the very book used to swear in the “justice” that was killing him—as a booster seat. When the current hit, the oversized mask fell off, exposing his terrified, weeping face to the witnesses.
The Silent Suspect: When Justice is a Shield
If George Stinney Jr. did not kill those two girls, then who did? For seventy years, the state of South Carolina acted as if the question were settled. But in the decades following the execution, a much more sinister reality began to emerge from the shadows of Alcolu.
The leading theory, supported by local testimony and research presented during the 2014 exoneration hearing, points toward George Burke Jr. He was the son of a prominent white businessman who owned the lumber mill where George’s father worked. More chillingly, Burke’s father was the foreman of the jury that sent George Stinney to the electric chair.
The community had whispered for years about a deathbed confession from the Burke family, but in 1944, those whispers were a death sentence. In the social hierarchy of a segregated mill town, a member of the Burke family was untouchable. The “system” didn’t just need a culprit; it needed a diversion. By sacrificing a 14-year-old Black boy, the state provided the white community with “closure” while ensuring the powerful remained protected. This is the ultimate callousness: the law wasn’t used to find the truth; it was used as a shield for the privileged and a shroud for the innocent.
The Physical Impossibility
We must also look at the physics—the cold, hard data that the 1944 court ignored. The girls were killed with a fourteen-inch railroad spike, suffering massive skull fractures. Forensic experts in 2014 testified that it would have been physically impossible for a 95-pound child to wield such a weapon with the force required to kill two people while also managing to overpower them both.
George had an alibi—his sister, Amie, was with him grazing the family cow when the girls passed by—but in a system designed to exploit the “punishment clause” of the 13th Amendment, an alibi is just noise. The “duly convicted” label was the goal, and the state achieved it by ignoring the laws of physics and the screams of a child.
The Pattern: Beyond Alcolu
George was a centerpiece, but he was not an anomaly. As I researched this, I found the ghosts of other children whose names have been scrubbed from the collective memory:
- Alexander McClay Williams (1931): At 16, he was the youngest person executed in Pennsylvania history. His “confession” was coerced, and the state suppressed evidence of a bloody handprint that didn’t match his. It took until 2022 for his conviction to be vacated.
- Joe Persons (1915): A boy in Georgia, estimated to be 12 or 13, who was so small that officials debated adding weights to his feet so the hanging would “work.”
- James Arcene (1885): A Cherokee youth executed for a crime committed when he was just 10 years old.
In each of these cases, the 13th Amendment’s “duly convicted” clause was the shield. By providing the thin veneer of a trial, the state could legally commit what was essentially a lynching.
The Filter of Justice: Calibrating the Outcome
When we discuss mass incarceration, a common counter-argument often arises: “Don’t Black people simply commit more crime?” I know that if you calibrate a sensor to only look for anomalies in one specific area, your data will be skewed. To understand the disparity, we must look past the “output” and analyze the “filter” of the legal machine.
1. The Frequency of Interaction Fallacy
The argument that Black people “commit more crime” often confuses crime rates with arrest rates. A 2023 UCLA study using smartphone data from 10,000 officers across 23 cities found that police spend significantly more time in Black neighborhoods, even when those neighborhoods have the same crime rates and income levels as white neighborhoods.
The result is simple math: if you put 100 police officers in one neighborhood and two in another, you will “discover” more crime in the first one—even if the actual behavior is identical. This creates a “feedback loop” where higher arrest records are used to justify even more policing, artificially inflating the statistical profile of a community.
2. Drug Use vs. Drug Arrests
This is the “smoking gun” of systemic bias. For decades, federal surveys from the CDC and the NAACP have shown that Black and white Americans use and sell drugs at almost identical rates. However, despite similar usage, Black Americans are nearly 4 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession and 6 times more likely to be incarcerated for drug charges overall. It’s not about who is committing the crime; it’s about who the system is looking for.
3. The “Differential Processing” of Justice
Even when the crime and the criminal history are identical, the system treats the bodies differently:
- Bail: Black defendants are 21% more likely to be denied bail, which forces them to stay in jail while awaiting trial—leading to lost jobs, lost homes, and a higher likelihood of eventually taking a “guilty plea” just to go home.
- Plea Bargaining: Prosecutors are more likely to offer plea deals that include prison time to Black defendants, while white defendants are more likely to be offered “diversion programs” or probation.
- Sentencing Length: According to 2026 data reports, Black men receive sentences that are 19.1% longer than white men for the exact same crimes.
4. Wrongful Convictions: The Margin of Error
If the system were truly objective, the rate of “mistakes” would be equal. It isn’t. Black people make up 13% of the population but over 50% of the exonerated population. Innocent Black people are 7 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of murder and 12 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of drug crimes than white people.
George Stinney Jr. is the historical proof of this. The system didn’t care about the truth; it cared about “closure” that fit the racial hierarchy. When someone says, “they commit more crime,” they are looking at the output of a machine and assuming it is a neutral scale. But as an engineer, I see a filter. It filters out white crime through warnings and diversions, and it filters in Black crime through over-policing and structural bias.
The Economic Engineering of Poverty: Wealth Theft
If you want to understand why a large percentage of the Black community remains trapped in poverty today, you need to look no further than the “teeth” of mass incarceration. It was never just about free labor for a season; it was about the permanent maintenance of a lower class.
When the state arrested George Stinney Jr., they didn’t just take a child; they destroyed a household. Within hours of his arrest, his father was fired from the local lumber mill. The family was given mere hours to vacate their company-owned housing and flee the town. They left behind their possessions, their community, and their stability.
Mass incarceration acts as a surgical strike against the Black family unit. By removing men—and in George’s case, the future men of the community—the system achieves several objectives:
- Destruction of the Household Anchor: Historically, when a man was incarcerated or executed, the family lost its primary earner. According to the American Journal of Sociology, paternal incarceration is one of the single greatest predictors of a family falling below the poverty line.
- The “Marriageable Men” Gap: By disproportionately removing Black men from the community, the state created a demographic vacuum. This forced single mothers into a cycle of “survival labor,” where the ability to save, invest, or purchase property became a mathematical impossibility.
- Educational Depletion: A 2014 study by the National Academy of Sciences found that the children of incarcerated parents are significantly less likely to graduate from college, creating a “secondary sentence” that spans generations.
The Numbers Behind the Theft
The statistics are staggering:
- The Wealth Gap: Today, the median white household holds roughly eight times the wealth of the median Black household. This is not a failure of work ethic; it is a result of a century of wealth-stripping policies.
- Lifetime Loss: The Brennan Center for Justice estimated that formerly incarcerated people lose an average of $500,000 in lifetime earnings. When you multiply that by the millions of Black men swept up in the “War on Drugs,” you are looking at trillions of dollars in wealth that never entered the Black community.
- Voter Disenfranchisement: In many states, a felony conviction (the “duly convicted” status of the 13th Amendment) leads to the loss of voting rights. This removes the community’s ability to vote for the very policies—school funding and housing—that build wealth.
Mass incarceration is not a “side effect” of poverty; it is the architect of it. It ensures that the Black community remains in a state of “perpetual catch-up.” Every time a generation begins to build equity, a new wave of “tough on crime” legislation resets the clock.
The “Why” of the Present
People ask me why this matters now. It matters because the “punishment clause” is still in the Constitution. The transition from the Jim Crow executions of the 40s to the mass incarceration boom of the 80s and 90s is a straight line.
I know that systems don’t fix themselves. When we look at the racial disparities in our modern prison system, we are seeing the same logic that executed George Stinney. We are seeing a system that prioritizes “closure” and “control” over “integrity.”
When the Stinney family was run out of town, they lost their property, their stability, and their history. This is how the wealth gap was engineered. Mass incarceration isn’t just about the person in the cell; it is about the “Generational Theft” of Black potential. We care about George Stinney because his execution was a warning shot: The law does not belong to you.
A Note on “The Green Mile”
By the way, as I dug into this, I noticed how many people believe that Stephen King’s The Green Mile is based on George Stinney. While King has never confirmed this, the parallels are undeniable: the two girls, the rural South, the wrongful execution.
But there is a dangerous difference. In the movie, John Coffey is a “Magical Negro”—a gentle giant with supernatural powers. In reality, George Stinney had no magic. He was just a scared 14-year-old child who wanted to go home. By turning these tragedies into “magical fables,” we risk softening the edges of the reality. We don’t need magic to explain George’s innocence; we just need to look at the physics of a 90-pound boy and the corruption of a system that didn’t care to measure the weight of the evidence.
Conclusion: Closing the Loophole
In 2014, seventy years after he was killed, Judge Carmen Mullen vacated George Stinney’s conviction. She cited “fundamental, constitutional violations of due process.” It was a victory, but a hollow one. You cannot return 70 years of life to a boy who was burned to death by his own government.
We revisit this story because the “crack” in the foundation is still there. As long as the 13th Amendment allows for slavery-by-another-name, and as long as our system views Black children as “superpredators” rather than children, George Stinney is not a ghost of the past. He is a mirror of the present.
If a system is designed to protect some by sacrificing others, it has no integrity. It is a bridge waiting to collapse. We owe it to George—and to the children whose names we don’t yet know—to stop patching the cracks and start questioning the blueprint. Until the “except as punishment” loophole is closed and the law is applied without the filter of power and race, we aren’t living in a state of justice. We are just living in a very long, very crowded Green Mile.
Glossary of Terms
- 13th Amendment (Punishment Clause): The section of the US Constitution that abolished slavery except as punishment for a crime, creating a legal loophole for involuntary servitude.
- Black Codes: Laws passed by Southern states after the Civil War to restrict the freedom of Black Americans and compel them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
- Convict Leasing: A system in which state penitentiaries leased incarcerated people to private companies (e.g., coal mines, railroads) for labor.
- Differential Processing: The phenomenon where individuals of different races are treated differently by the criminal justice system even when the alleged crimes are identical.
- Doli Incapax: A legal doctrine (often ignored in the Jim Crow era) suggesting that children below a certain age are incapable of forming the intent to commit a crime.
- Generational Wealth Theft: The systemic removal of assets, property, and earning potential from a specific community over time, preventing the accumulation of intergenerational wealth.
- Jim Crow Era: The period (late 19th century to mid-20th century) characterized by state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the United States.
- Vacated Conviction: A legal ruling that voids a previous conviction, treating it as if it never happened due to errors or violations of rights (as seen in Stinney’s 2014 case).
Bibliography & References
Legal & Historical Documents
- U.S. Const. amend. XIII. (1865). The 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
- State of South Carolina v. George Stinney, Jr. (1944). Trial Transcript and Court Records (Archived).
- Mullen, C. (2014). Order Vacating Judgment in the Case of State v. George Stinney, Jr. Circuit Court of South Carolina.
Academic Research & Books
- Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. The New Press.
- Blackmon, D. A. (2008). Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II. Doubleday.
- National Academy of Sciences. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. National Academies Press.
- The Sentencing Project. (2023). The Color of Justice: Racial and Ethnic Disparity in State Prisons. ### Articles & Data Reports
- Brennan Center for Justice. (2022). Conviction, Imprisonment, and Lost Earnings: How the Criminal Justice System Deepens Inequality.
- UCLA Department of Sociology. (2023). Police Activity Analysis: Surveillance and Deployment in Urban Environments.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission. (2024-2026). Report to the Congress: Federal Sentencing Statistics and Fentanyl Trafficking Trends.
- Urban Institute. (2026). Racial Disparities in Charging and Plea Bargaining: A Longitudinal Study.
- Introduction: The Fault in the System
-
(2/3)
...👉I would encourage them [#RUSSIA] to do whatever the hell they want.👈 You got to pay. You got to pay your bills.”*
#LaurenceTribe: quotes Albert T. #Goins:
“Perhaps, Mr. #Trump forgot (if he ever knew) that 👉our internat obligations & treaties—such as those we undertook as members of #NATO—are themselves supreme law of the land as recog at Article VI of our Constit.👈 As so-called supremacy clause states in relevant part...
#Trump’s statements in S Carolina...
-
Frenk advierte urgencia de innovar educación en salud
Pasar de un sistema cerrado a arquitecturas abiertas; transitar de la experiencia estandarizada hacia respuestas a necesidades diversas; y modificar el periodo educativo fijo por una enseñanza de por vida
Por Martín García | Reportero
Los avances tecnológicos y en el aprendizaje, así como los cambios en el mercado laboral son determinantes del camino a futuro, razón por la cual es imperativo innovar en la educación de los profesionales de la salud, aseguró Julio Frenk Mora, doctor honoris causa por la UNAM.
Al dictar la conferencia magistral “Educación de los profesionales de la salud: el imperativo de la innovación” -en ocasión de su investidura, que le fue otorgada por esta casa de estudios en noviembre de 2025-, dijo:
La idea del modelo tradicional de las universidades es formar a gente joven y darle competencias necesarias para ingresar al mercado de trabajo. “Pero eso ya no existe, pues mientras el estudiantado está en el claustro universitario, se están creando nuevas ocupaciones y los empleos se están transformando por efecto de la tecnología”.
El también rector de la Universidad de California en Los Ángeles señaló en la Facultad de Medicina (FM) que lo más dramático es la inteligencia artificial, al igual que la automatización del mundo del trabajo médico, pues en el periodo limitado que una persona pasa en la universidad suceden numerosos avances y modificaciones.
Ante la directora de la FM, Ana Carolina Sepúlveda Vildósola, e integrantes de la comunidad, entre ellos estudiantes, docentes, exdirectores y exalumnos, sostuvo:
“Estos cambios venían generándose desde hace varias décadas, pero hace seis años los aceleró la pandemia de la COVID-19 y son la base del imperativo de la innovación”.
En el auditorio Dr. Alberto Guevara Rojas, el integrante de El Colegio Nacional y exsecretario de Salud consideró necesario responder a las preguntas clave de qué enseñar (currículum), cómo hacerlo (método pedagógico), cuándo (etapa del ciclo de vida) y a quién (acceso y diversidad).
Sugirió tres acciones estratégicas: en las universidades pasar de un sistema cerrado a arquitecturas abiertas; transitar de la experiencia estandarizada hacia respuestas a necesidades diversas; y modificar el periodo educativo fijo por una enseñanza de por vida.
“Tenemos que pensar ahora en las universidades como sistemas abiertos, donde la universidad se vuelve un prestador de servicios educativos dinámicos y cambiantes que acompañan a las personas a lo largo de todo su ciclo profesional, no solamente antes de ingresar al mercado laboral, sino cuando están en él”, acotó.
Agregó que debemos avanzar de una experiencia estandarizada – origen de la educación de masas creada en la Revolución Industrial y que se debe garantizar por su calidad-, a dar respuestas a una diversidad de necesidades formativas de los profesionales de la salud, lo que requiere un nivel de flexibilidad y de personalización que no ha sido el modelo que tenemos; ese es el cambio estratégico.
Hay que rebasar la idea de que la educación superior es algo que le pasa a la gente en un periodo fijo de su vida, reiteró.
Frenk Mora se pronunció por una enseñanza inherentemente interdisciplinaria, donde especialistas de medicina, enfermería odontología, psicología y carreras afines aprendan a laborar en equipo. –sn–
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Letters from an American – November 24, 2025 – Heather Cox Richardson
Letters from an American, November 24, 2025
By Heather Cox Richardson, Nov 24, 2025
U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie of South Carolina today dismissed the indictments of former Federal Bureau of Investigation director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, ruling that President Donald J. Trump’s appointment of Lindsey Halligan as interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia was invalid.
Trump had demanded the indictment of the two. When he was FBI director, Comey had refused to drop an investigation into Trump’s then–national security advisor Mike Flynn, who had lied to the FBI about his conversations with a Russian operative before Trump took office. James had successfully sued Trump, several of his children, and the Trump Organization for fraud, and when the interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, Erik Seibert, said there was not enough evidence to indict them, Trump forced him out of office and replaced him with Halligan, a former insurance lawyer and Trump aide.
Within days, Halligan obtained a grand jury indictment for Comey, charging him with lying to Congress, and another for James, charging her with alleged mortgage fraud. As David Kurtz points out in Talking Points Memo, the indictments were widely understood to be targeted prosecutions of those Trump considered enemies.
By law, after a Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney leaves the job, the attorney general can appoint an interim U.S. attorney for 120 days. If the position still has not been filled, the right to make another interim appointment goes to the district court, which has sole authority over the position until the Senate confirms a president’s nominee. This provision prevents a president from making an end run around the Senate’s duty to advise and consent by making consecutive 120-day appointments.
The Trump administration attempted to thwart this law. Trump appointed Seibert the interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia on January 21, and as the 120-day deadline approached, he nominated Seibert for the position. The district judges voted unanimously to keep Siebert on as the interim U.S. attorney as his nomination proceeded. But then Siebert declined to prosecute Comey and James, and Trump forced him out, pushing Attorney General Pam Bondi to put Halligan into his place as a new interim appointment.
Today, Currie found that Halligan’s appointment violated not only the law, but also the appointment clause of the U.S. Constitution, which requires the president to obtain the “advice and consent of the Senate” for such appointments. That unlawful appointment means that all of Halligan’s actions undertaken as a U.S. attorney are invalid. Because she was the only prosecutor to sign off on the Comey and James prosecutions, they, too, are invalid.
Currie wrote that if the indictments were to stand, “the Government could send any private citizen off the street—attorney or not—into the grand jury room to secure an indictment so long as the Attorney General gives her approval after the fact. That cannot be the law.”
After the judge’s decision, Comey posted a video saying that while the case mattered to him personally, “it matters most because a message has to be sent that the president of the United States cannot use the Department of Justice to target his political enemies. I don’t care what your politics are. You have to see that as fundamentally un-American and a threat to the rule of law that keeps all of us free.” He called for Americans to “stand up and show the fools who would frighten us, who would divide us, that we’re made of stronger stuff, that we believe in the rule of law, that we believe in the importance of doing things by the law.”
Attorney General Bondi said the government will “be taking all available legal action, including an immediate appeal.”
Shut down by the courts, Trump is turning to military justice to enforce his will.
Since six lawmakers released a video last week reminding servicemembers that they must refuse to carry out unlawful orders, Trump and his loyalists have continued to insist that such a reminder is “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR… punishable by DEATH!”
Their argument appears to be that by reiterating the law, the lawmakers implied that Trump has issued unlawful orders and therefore that they made troops question their orders and thus directly attacked the chain of command. It’s a convoluted argument, one that administration officials are using to claim that the lawmakers’ reminder that troops must not obey an unlawful order is actually encouragement not to obey lawful orders.
Administration officials insist that the lawmakers’ video is an attack on Trump because all of his orders have been lawful, although lawyers, lawmakers, and military personnel have expressed concerns about the legality of the administration’s deadly strikes on civilians in small boats near Venezuela.
This morning, the administration escalated its attacks on the lawmakers. The social media account of the “Department of War” posted that the department is investigating Captain Mark Kelly, a retired Navy officer who is now a Democratic senator from Arizona and who participated in the video, after “serious allegations of misconduct.” It suggested that Kelly, a retired Navy officer, could be recalled to active duty “for court-martial proceedings or administrative measures.”
Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.
Continue/Read Original Article Here: November 24, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson
#cameronMcgowan #easternDistrictOfVirginia #formerFbiDirector #heatherCoxRichardson #jamesComey #lawfulOrders #letitiaJames #lettersFromAnAmerican #markKelly #newYorkAttorneyGeneral #november242025 #pamBondi #southCarolina #substack #uSAttorney #uSDistrictCourt
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Letters from an American – November 24, 2025 – Heather Cox Richardson
Letters from an American, November 24, 2025
By Heather Cox Richardson, Nov 24, 2025
U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie of South Carolina today dismissed the indictments of former Federal Bureau of Investigation director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, ruling that President Donald J. Trump’s appointment of Lindsey Halligan as interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia was invalid.
Trump had demanded the indictment of the two. When he was FBI director, Comey had refused to drop an investigation into Trump’s then–national security advisor Mike Flynn, who had lied to the FBI about his conversations with a Russian operative before Trump took office. James had successfully sued Trump, several of his children, and the Trump Organization for fraud, and when the interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, Erik Seibert, said there was not enough evidence to indict them, Trump forced him out of office and replaced him with Halligan, a former insurance lawyer and Trump aide.
Within days, Halligan obtained a grand jury indictment for Comey, charging him with lying to Congress, and another for James, charging her with alleged mortgage fraud. As David Kurtz points out in Talking Points Memo, the indictments were widely understood to be targeted prosecutions of those Trump considered enemies.
By law, after a Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney leaves the job, the attorney general can appoint an interim U.S. attorney for 120 days. If the position still has not been filled, the right to make another interim appointment goes to the district court, which has sole authority over the position until the Senate confirms a president’s nominee. This provision prevents a president from making an end run around the Senate’s duty to advise and consent by making consecutive 120-day appointments.
The Trump administration attempted to thwart this law. Trump appointed Seibert the interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia on January 21, and as the 120-day deadline approached, he nominated Seibert for the position. The district judges voted unanimously to keep Siebert on as the interim U.S. attorney as his nomination proceeded. But then Siebert declined to prosecute Comey and James, and Trump forced him out, pushing Attorney General Pam Bondi to put Halligan into his place as a new interim appointment.
Today, Currie found that Halligan’s appointment violated not only the law, but also the appointment clause of the U.S. Constitution, which requires the president to obtain the “advice and consent of the Senate” for such appointments. That unlawful appointment means that all of Halligan’s actions undertaken as a U.S. attorney are invalid. Because she was the only prosecutor to sign off on the Comey and James prosecutions, they, too, are invalid.
Currie wrote that if the indictments were to stand, “the Government could send any private citizen off the street—attorney or not—into the grand jury room to secure an indictment so long as the Attorney General gives her approval after the fact. That cannot be the law.”
After the judge’s decision, Comey posted a video saying that while the case mattered to him personally, “it matters most because a message has to be sent that the president of the United States cannot use the Department of Justice to target his political enemies. I don’t care what your politics are. You have to see that as fundamentally un-American and a threat to the rule of law that keeps all of us free.” He called for Americans to “stand up and show the fools who would frighten us, who would divide us, that we’re made of stronger stuff, that we believe in the rule of law, that we believe in the importance of doing things by the law.”
Attorney General Bondi said the government will “be taking all available legal action, including an immediate appeal.”
Shut down by the courts, Trump is turning to military justice to enforce his will.
Since six lawmakers released a video last week reminding servicemembers that they must refuse to carry out unlawful orders, Trump and his loyalists have continued to insist that such a reminder is “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR… punishable by DEATH!”
Their argument appears to be that by reiterating the law, the lawmakers implied that Trump has issued unlawful orders and therefore that they made troops question their orders and thus directly attacked the chain of command. It’s a convoluted argument, one that administration officials are using to claim that the lawmakers’ reminder that troops must not obey an unlawful order is actually encouragement not to obey lawful orders.
Administration officials insist that the lawmakers’ video is an attack on Trump because all of his orders have been lawful, although lawyers, lawmakers, and military personnel have expressed concerns about the legality of the administration’s deadly strikes on civilians in small boats near Venezuela.
This morning, the administration escalated its attacks on the lawmakers. The social media account of the “Department of War” posted that the department is investigating Captain Mark Kelly, a retired Navy officer who is now a Democratic senator from Arizona and who participated in the video, after “serious allegations of misconduct.” It suggested that Kelly, a retired Navy officer, could be recalled to active duty “for court-martial proceedings or administrative measures.”
Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.
Continue/Read Original Article Here: November 24, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson
#cameronMcgowan #easternDistrictOfVirginia #formerFbiDirector #heatherCoxRichardson #jamesComey #lawfulOrders #letitiaJames #lettersFromAnAmerican #markKelly #newYorkAttorneyGeneral #november242025 #pamBondi #southCarolina #substack #uSAttorney #uSDistrictCourt
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Nuova destra, vecchio nazionalismo.
di M. Minetti
L’articolo è stato pubblicato su Transform Italia il giorno 1 ottobre 2025.
Le recenti manifestazioni anti-immmigrazione che si sono svolte nel Regno Unito evidenziano una crescente organizzazione delle forze di destra che si sono raccolte intorno alla Brexit prima, contro le restrizioni per arginare la pandemia di COVID19 e attualmente contro gli immigrati. Soprattutto a causa del suo passato imperiale, il Regno Unito è stato caratterizzato da almeno un secolo di immigrazione legale da parte dei cittadini delle ex-colonie, diffuse in tutti i continenti. Il colonialismo inglese, differentemente da quello spagnolo e portoghese, non ha perseguito convintamente il meticciato e l’assimilazione, mantenendo la separazione tra i cittadini britannici resisdenti nelle colonie e gli abitanti autoctoni. Questa segregazione e oppressione razziale, arrivata nel Nord America al genocidio dei nativi, è stata una conseguenza della cultura religiosa protestante, della applicazione delle leggi e dalle modalità del governo dell’Impero coloniale britannico ben documentate anche dalla Prof.ssa Caroline Elkins, premio Pulizer nel 2006. Anche oggi rimane traccia di quella separazione tra coloni e colonizzati nella forma multietnica della città di Londra che mantiene le diverse comunità di origine suddivise nei vari quartieri.
L’idea di una originaria omogeneità razziale è ormai decaduta dalla retorica anti-immigrati degli ultimi decenni, mentre emerge un suprematismo di tipo culturale e religioso, prevalentemente anti-islamico, nel momento in cui nei quartieri popolari gli abitanti di origine britannica sono immersi nel melting pot multietnico, senza alcun privilegio speciale. A quei cittadini, poco istruiti e riottosi, si rivolgono i politici della destra indicando negli immigrati recenti un pericolo per la sicurezza e la identità culturale britannica. Ecco formata l’alleanza tra i milionari della finanza e del commercio internazionale, che hanno supportato la Brexit per evadere dalle stringenti regole e dalla tassazione imposte dal mercato comune europeo, e il proletariato urbano nazionalista, il cui unico motivo di orgoglio è l’origine autoctona.
A fine luglio del 2024 erano scoppiati disordini in varie città del Regno Unito, fomentati dalla estrema destra, a seguito del triplice omicidio e ferimento di varie bambine, attuato da un ragazzo diciassettenne, cittadino inglese nero e radicalizzato islamico. Gli scontri nelle strade, con incendi e saccheggi di attività commerciali di immigrati, prevalentemente musulmani, mostrava una rabbia che covava da tempo e che probabilmente originava dalla stessa esclusione sociale di cui erano vittime gli immigrati da loro presi di mira. La classica guerra fra poveri fomentata negli Usa dai MAGA, in Italia dalla Lega, in Francia dal Rassemblement National e in germania da Alternative fur Deutchland.
La stessa dinamica di convogliamento della frustrazione popolare e dei sentimenti xenofobi, in una forma molto più accettabile socialmente e mirata alla integrazione istituzionale è emersa nella più imponente protesta organizzata in UK dalla estrema destra contro l’immigrazione e le politiche di accoglienza. Il 13 settembre si sono riunite nel centro di Londra più di centomila persone, gridando slogan nazionalisti e lanciando oggetti e lattine di birra verso la polizia. Oltre a mettere in difficoltà l’esecutivo laburista, queste manifestazioni forniscono l’area di espansione degli attivisti per il nuovo partito populista di destra di Niegel Farage, ReformUK. Questa nuova formazione, originata dal Partito per la Brexit e dall’UKIP, si pone alla destra dei Tories e intende usare l’arma del coinvolgimento popolare e della democrazia diretta mediata da piattaforma, che era stata finora una caratteristica dei partiti di sinistra. Solo, con una marcia in più: l’appoggio mediatico, tecnologico ed economico dei miliardari come Elon Musk, che ha arringato la folla dei partecipanti alla manifestazione di Londra, invitandoli alla rivolta citando nientemeno che l’anarchico George Orwell di 1984.
Come accade ormai in ogni paese democratico, l’informazione-spettacolo alla ricerca di voci “scomode”, lascia ampio spazio alla tribuna di Trump, Musk e Farage, che non esita ad appoggiare la guerra di Israele contro Gaza e l’Iran, attaccare il movimento LGTBQ+ e accusare gli stranieri di qualunque nefandezza. La macchina della propaganda di destra attua incessantemente le strategie trumpiane inaugurate da Steve Bannon, che hanno dimostrato di essere risibili ad un esame razionale, ma tremendamente efficaci nel meccanismo virale e truccato della visibilità sui social network.
La mobilitazione di piazza nel Regno Unito si sta dunque polarizzando fra la sinistra laburista o radicale, che porta in piazza i manifestanti a sostegno di Gaza e dei militanti di Palestine Action, subendo centinaia di arresti, e la destra nazionalista che cavalca l’odio per gli immigrati e per i cittadini musulmani, con un supporto discreto per il sionismo.
Negli ultimi due anni i conflitti sociali si sono acutizzati per l’attualità delle guerre in corso, per le ripercussioni negative sull’economia britannica dovute alla brexit e alla fuga di capitali russi o comunque stranieri, nonchè per i tagli lineari allo stato sociale operati dai governi conservatori ma aggravati recentemente dall’esecutivo laburista guidato da Starmer.
L’impressione è che questo clima di scontro polarizzato, focalizzato su temi bandiera, che poco hanno a che vedere con la vita quotidiana dei cittadini comuni ma risultano sovraesposti nei media e nella propaganda social, si stia estendendo in tutto l’occidente democratico. L’impotenza accumulata in questi anni di retrocessione della prartecipazione democratica e di crisi della rappresentanza vanno a ritrovare modalità di espressione della volontà popolare che cercano immediate identificazioni in schieramenti semplificati. E’ quello che sempre accade di fronte alle guerre, ci si allinea con uno o l’altro degli opponenti e qualsiasi incertezza viene bandita, inseguendo una risoluzione netta del conflitto.
E’ evidente che non possono che rimanere frustrate le pretese dei nazionalisti di tornare a comunità culturalmente omogenee, bloccando le migrazioni, espellendo gli stranieri e ostacolando religioni e usanze non autoctone, magari resuscitando la grandezza dell’Impero. La condivisione, la ragionevolezza o la raggiungibilità delle aspirazioni non è considerata necessaria. Quello che interessa alle forze politiche che organizzano le masse è molto spesso una identificazione viscerale, un riconoscimento identitario. Volendo azzardare una spiegazione psicosociale suppongo sia il tentativo, riuscito, di solleticare il narcisismo degli individui che hanno bisogno di rappresentarsi in uno spettacolo che li faccia sentire migliori, aderenti al proprio sè ideale, purtroppo piuttosto distante da quello impersonato durante la settimana lavorativa e nel tempo libero.
Da questo orizzonte pre-politico di mobilitazione popolare le destre non hanno nessuna intenzione di uscire, perchè gli interessi che vanno a rappresentare sono soltanto quelli delle élites, e Trump negli USA lo ha mostrato senza dubbio. Il rilancio del nazionalismo sciovinista serve solo a vincere le elezioni e indirizzare i disoccupati verso l’arruolamento militare. Per le forze socialiste, invece, la sfida è proprio quella di canalizzare l’indignazione in protesta, governandola, per arrivare a costruire forme di organizzazione trasformativa su obiettivi condivisi. La ricercatrice e influencer politica di area liberal Sarah Stein Lubrano, nel suo recente libro Don’t talk about politics, cita le ricerche sociali di Vincent Pons, secondo cui le manifestazioni non hanno quasi nessun effetto sull’orientamento dell’opinione pubblica (Lubrano 2025, p 128), per arrivare ad affermare che comunque “funzionano perché spesso rappresentano la droga di passaggio tra la partecipazione occasionale e l’attivismo duraturo”(p. 134). Sono quindi ottimi modi per reclutare nuovi militanti, e questo vale sia a sinistra che, purtroppo, a destra.
#destra #Farage #immigrazione #inghilterra #inglese #islam #Londra #manifestazione #Musk #nazionalismo #reformUK #regnoUnito #sionismo #tories #UK
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#BlackCode #13thAmendment #Slavery #SystemicOpression #SystemicRacism #SystemicViolenceIn 1866, one year after the 13 Amendment was ratified (the amendment that ended slavery), Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Tennessee, and South Carolina began to lease out convicts for labor (peonage). This made the business of arresting Blacks very lucrative, which is why hundreds of White men were hired by these states as police officers. Their primary responsibility was to search out and arrest Blacks who were in violation of Black Codes.
Once arrested, these men, women and children would be leased to plantations where they would harvest cotton, tobacco, sugar cane. Or they would be leased to work at coal mines, or railroad companies. The owners of these businesses would pay the state for every prisoner who worked for them; prison labor.
It is believed that after the passing of the 13th Amendment, more than 800,000 Blacks were part of the system of peonage, or re-enslavement through the prison system. Peonage didn’t end until after World War II began, around 1940.
This is how it happened.
The 13th Amendment declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." (Ratified in 1865)
Did you catch that? It says, “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude could occur except as a punishment for a crime". Lawmakers used this phrase to make petty offenses crimes. When Blacks were found guilty of committing these crimes, they were imprisoned and then leased out to the same businesses that lost slaves after the passing of the 13th Amendment. This system of convict labor is called peonage.
The majority of White Southern farmers and business owners hated the 13th Amendment because it took away slave labor. As a way to appease them, the federal government turned a blind eye when southern states used this clause in the 13th Amendment to establish laws called Black Codes. Here are some examples of Black Codes:
- In Louisiana, it was illegal for a Black man to preach to Black congregations without special permission in writing from the president of the police. If caught, he could be arrested and fined. If he could not pay the fines, which were unbelievably high, he would be forced to work for an individual, or go to jail or prison where he would work until his debt was paid off.
- If a Black person did not have a job, he or she could be arrested and imprisoned on the charge of vagrancy or loitering.
This next Black Code will make you cringe.
- In South Carolina, if the parent of a Black child was considered vagrant, the judicial system allowed the police and/or other government agencies to “apprentice” the child to an "employer". Males could be held until the age of 21, and females could be held until they were 18. Their owner had the legal right to inflict punishment on the child for disobedience, and to recapture them if they ran away.
This (peonage) is an example of systemic racism - Racism established and perpetuated by government systems. Slavery was made legal by the U.S. Government. Segregation, Black Codes, Jim Crow and peonage were all made legal by the government, and upheld by the judicial system. These acts of racism were built into the system, which is where the term “Systemic Racism” is derived.
This is the part of Black History that most of us were never told about.
(Chuck Allen via my FB friends) -
#BlackCode #13thAmendment #Slavery #SystemicOpression #SystemicRacism #SystemicViolenceIn 1866, one year after the 13 Amendment was ratified (the amendment that ended slavery), Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Tennessee, and South Carolina began to lease out convicts for labor (peonage). This made the business of arresting Blacks very lucrative, which is why hundreds of White men were hired by these states as police officers. Their primary responsibility was to search out and arrest Blacks who were in violation of Black Codes.
Once arrested, these men, women and children would be leased to plantations where they would harvest cotton, tobacco, sugar cane. Or they would be leased to work at coal mines, or railroad companies. The owners of these businesses would pay the state for every prisoner who worked for them; prison labor.
It is believed that after the passing of the 13th Amendment, more than 800,000 Blacks were part of the system of peonage, or re-enslavement through the prison system. Peonage didn’t end until after World War II began, around 1940.
This is how it happened.
The 13th Amendment declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." (Ratified in 1865)
Did you catch that? It says, “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude could occur except as a punishment for a crime". Lawmakers used this phrase to make petty offenses crimes. When Blacks were found guilty of committing these crimes, they were imprisoned and then leased out to the same businesses that lost slaves after the passing of the 13th Amendment. This system of convict labor is called peonage.
The majority of White Southern farmers and business owners hated the 13th Amendment because it took away slave labor. As a way to appease them, the federal government turned a blind eye when southern states used this clause in the 13th Amendment to establish laws called Black Codes. Here are some examples of Black Codes:
- In Louisiana, it was illegal for a Black man to preach to Black congregations without special permission in writing from the president of the police. If caught, he could be arrested and fined. If he could not pay the fines, which were unbelievably high, he would be forced to work for an individual, or go to jail or prison where he would work until his debt was paid off.
- If a Black person did not have a job, he or she could be arrested and imprisoned on the charge of vagrancy or loitering.
This next Black Code will make you cringe.
- In South Carolina, if the parent of a Black child was considered vagrant, the judicial system allowed the police and/or other government agencies to “apprentice” the child to an "employer". Males could be held until the age of 21, and females could be held until they were 18. Their owner had the legal right to inflict punishment on the child for disobedience, and to recapture them if they ran away.
This (peonage) is an example of systemic racism - Racism established and perpetuated by government systems. Slavery was made legal by the U.S. Government. Segregation, Black Codes, Jim Crow and peonage were all made legal by the government, and upheld by the judicial system. These acts of racism were built into the system, which is where the term “Systemic Racism” is derived.
This is the part of Black History that most of us were never told about.
(Chuck Allen via my FB friends) -
#BlackCode #13thAmendment #Slavery #SystemicOpression #SystemicRacism #SystemicViolenceIn 1866, one year after the 13 Amendment was ratified (the amendment that ended slavery), Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Tennessee, and South Carolina began to lease out convicts for labor (peonage). This made the business of arresting Blacks very lucrative, which is why hundreds of White men were hired by these states as police officers. Their primary responsibility was to search out and arrest Blacks who were in violation of Black Codes.
Once arrested, these men, women and children would be leased to plantations where they would harvest cotton, tobacco, sugar cane. Or they would be leased to work at coal mines, or railroad companies. The owners of these businesses would pay the state for every prisoner who worked for them; prison labor.
It is believed that after the passing of the 13th Amendment, more than 800,000 Blacks were part of the system of peonage, or re-enslavement through the prison system. Peonage didn’t end until after World War II began, around 1940.
This is how it happened.
The 13th Amendment declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." (Ratified in 1865)
Did you catch that? It says, “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude could occur except as a punishment for a crime". Lawmakers used this phrase to make petty offenses crimes. When Blacks were found guilty of committing these crimes, they were imprisoned and then leased out to the same businesses that lost slaves after the passing of the 13th Amendment. This system of convict labor is called peonage.
The majority of White Southern farmers and business owners hated the 13th Amendment because it took away slave labor. As a way to appease them, the federal government turned a blind eye when southern states used this clause in the 13th Amendment to establish laws called Black Codes. Here are some examples of Black Codes:
- In Louisiana, it was illegal for a Black man to preach to Black congregations without special permission in writing from the president of the police. If caught, he could be arrested and fined. If he could not pay the fines, which were unbelievably high, he would be forced to work for an individual, or go to jail or prison where he would work until his debt was paid off.
- If a Black person did not have a job, he or she could be arrested and imprisoned on the charge of vagrancy or loitering.
This next Black Code will make you cringe.
- In South Carolina, if the parent of a Black child was considered vagrant, the judicial system allowed the police and/or other government agencies to “apprentice” the child to an "employer". Males could be held until the age of 21, and females could be held until they were 18. Their owner had the legal right to inflict punishment on the child for disobedience, and to recapture them if they ran away.
This (peonage) is an example of systemic racism - Racism established and perpetuated by government systems. Slavery was made legal by the U.S. Government. Segregation, Black Codes, Jim Crow and peonage were all made legal by the government, and upheld by the judicial system. These acts of racism were built into the system, which is where the term “Systemic Racism” is derived.
This is the part of Black History that most of us were never told about.
(Chuck Allen via my FB friends) -
#BlackCode #13thAmendment #Slavery #SystemicOpression #SystemicRacism #SystemicViolenceIn 1866, one year after the 13 Amendment was ratified (the amendment that ended slavery), Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Tennessee, and South Carolina began to lease out convicts for labor (peonage). This made the business of arresting Blacks very lucrative, which is why hundreds of White men were hired by these states as police officers. Their primary responsibility was to search out and arrest Blacks who were in violation of Black Codes.
Once arrested, these men, women and children would be leased to plantations where they would harvest cotton, tobacco, sugar cane. Or they would be leased to work at coal mines, or railroad companies. The owners of these businesses would pay the state for every prisoner who worked for them; prison labor.
It is believed that after the passing of the 13th Amendment, more than 800,000 Blacks were part of the system of peonage, or re-enslavement through the prison system. Peonage didn’t end until after World War II began, around 1940.
This is how it happened.
The 13th Amendment declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." (Ratified in 1865)
Did you catch that? It says, “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude could occur except as a punishment for a crime". Lawmakers used this phrase to make petty offenses crimes. When Blacks were found guilty of committing these crimes, they were imprisoned and then leased out to the same businesses that lost slaves after the passing of the 13th Amendment. This system of convict labor is called peonage.
The majority of White Southern farmers and business owners hated the 13th Amendment because it took away slave labor. As a way to appease them, the federal government turned a blind eye when southern states used this clause in the 13th Amendment to establish laws called Black Codes. Here are some examples of Black Codes:
- In Louisiana, it was illegal for a Black man to preach to Black congregations without special permission in writing from the president of the police. If caught, he could be arrested and fined. If he could not pay the fines, which were unbelievably high, he would be forced to work for an individual, or go to jail or prison where he would work until his debt was paid off.
- If a Black person did not have a job, he or she could be arrested and imprisoned on the charge of vagrancy or loitering.
This next Black Code will make you cringe.
- In South Carolina, if the parent of a Black child was considered vagrant, the judicial system allowed the police and/or other government agencies to “apprentice” the child to an "employer". Males could be held until the age of 21, and females could be held until they were 18. Their owner had the legal right to inflict punishment on the child for disobedience, and to recapture them if they ran away.
This (peonage) is an example of systemic racism - Racism established and perpetuated by government systems. Slavery was made legal by the U.S. Government. Segregation, Black Codes, Jim Crow and peonage were all made legal by the government, and upheld by the judicial system. These acts of racism were built into the system, which is where the term “Systemic Racism” is derived.
This is the part of Black History that most of us were never told about.
(Chuck Allen via my FB friends) -
#BlackCode #13thAmendment #Slavery #SystemicOpression #SystemicRacism #SystemicViolenceIn 1866, one year after the 13 Amendment was ratified (the amendment that ended slavery), Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Tennessee, and South Carolina began to lease out convicts for labor (peonage). This made the business of arresting Blacks very lucrative, which is why hundreds of White men were hired by these states as police officers. Their primary responsibility was to search out and arrest Blacks who were in violation of Black Codes.
Once arrested, these men, women and children would be leased to plantations where they would harvest cotton, tobacco, sugar cane. Or they would be leased to work at coal mines, or railroad companies. The owners of these businesses would pay the state for every prisoner who worked for them; prison labor.
It is believed that after the passing of the 13th Amendment, more than 800,000 Blacks were part of the system of peonage, or re-enslavement through the prison system. Peonage didn’t end until after World War II began, around 1940.
This is how it happened.
The 13th Amendment declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." (Ratified in 1865)
Did you catch that? It says, “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude could occur except as a punishment for a crime". Lawmakers used this phrase to make petty offenses crimes. When Blacks were found guilty of committing these crimes, they were imprisoned and then leased out to the same businesses that lost slaves after the passing of the 13th Amendment. This system of convict labor is called peonage.
The majority of White Southern farmers and business owners hated the 13th Amendment because it took away slave labor. As a way to appease them, the federal government turned a blind eye when southern states used this clause in the 13th Amendment to establish laws called Black Codes. Here are some examples of Black Codes:
- In Louisiana, it was illegal for a Black man to preach to Black congregations without special permission in writing from the president of the police. If caught, he could be arrested and fined. If he could not pay the fines, which were unbelievably high, he would be forced to work for an individual, or go to jail or prison where he would work until his debt was paid off.
- If a Black person did not have a job, he or she could be arrested and imprisoned on the charge of vagrancy or loitering.
This next Black Code will make you cringe.
- In South Carolina, if the parent of a Black child was considered vagrant, the judicial system allowed the police and/or other government agencies to “apprentice” the child to an "employer". Males could be held until the age of 21, and females could be held until they were 18. Their owner had the legal right to inflict punishment on the child for disobedience, and to recapture them if they ran away.
This (peonage) is an example of systemic racism - Racism established and perpetuated by government systems. Slavery was made legal by the U.S. Government. Segregation, Black Codes, Jim Crow and peonage were all made legal by the government, and upheld by the judicial system. These acts of racism were built into the system, which is where the term “Systemic Racism” is derived.
This is the part of Black History that most of us were never told about.
(Chuck Allen via my FB friends) -
Todo lo que necesitas saber sobre WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Cada mayo en Cáceres tiene lugar un evento que rompe todos los límites.
Las plazas dejan de ser plazas.
Las murallas dejan de ser pasado.
Y, durante unos días, el mundo deja de ser algo lejano.Se vuelve cercano. Tangible. Sonoro.
Eso es WOMAD Cáceres.
En 2026 celebra su 33ª edición, del 7 al 10 de mayo, con una propuesta que vuelve a mezclar culturas, estilos y procedencias hasta convertir el casco histórico en un mapa vivo del planeta.
📍 Un casco histórico convertido en escenario
El festival se reparte en tres espacios principales:
- Plaza Mayor → grandes conciertos y programación central
- Plaza de San Jorge → electrónica, mestizaje y sesiones nocturnas
- Plaza de Santa María → formato íntimo, propuestas locales y acústicas
A esto se suman talleres, cine en la Filmoteca de Extremadura, mercado global y actividades familiares.
Todo, manteniendo una de sus señas de identidad:
entrada gratuita y acceso abierto.📅 Programación oficial WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Una edición con 21 artistas de 14 países, donde conviven afrobeat, electrónica global, folk, funk, flamenco o sonidos urbanos.
🟡 Jueves, 7 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Apertura institucional
- 21:00 — Balkan Paradise Orchestra
- 22:30 — Bareto
- 00:00 — 47Soul
Plaza de San Jorge
- 23:30 — Islandman
🟡 Viernes, 8 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Caamaño & Ameixeiras
- 22:00 — Steam Down
- 23:30 — Seun Kuti & Egypt 80
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — Raz & Afla
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Djarabi
- 19:30 — Canchalera
🟡 Sábado, 9 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Zé Ibarra
- 22:00 — Shanghai Restoration Project + Tebza Majaivane
- 23:30 — BIM
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — LK Funk
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Jorge Navarro
- 19:30 — Dominique Atsama
🟡 Domingo, 10 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 13:00 — A Garulla
- 14:30 — Carolina La Chispa
- 17:00 — Willy Wilazo
- 18:30 — Diego Andújar
- 20:00 — Clausura oficial
🎭 Mucho más que conciertos
WOMAD es mucho más que música, una experiencia completa:
- Talleres participativos (mañanas y tardes)
- Actividades infantiles
- Mercado global de gastronomía y artesanía
- Cine musical en la Filmoteca de Extremadura
- Pasacalles y animación urbana
Aquí no vienes solo a escuchar. Vienes a mezclarte.
🌍 De experimento a símbolo cultural
WOMAD nació en 1982 de la mano de Peter Gabriel con una idea casi utópica:
usar la música como lenguaje común.Llegó a Cáceres en 1992.
Y desde entonces ha hecho algo poco habitual:
convertir una ciudad pequeña en un punto de encuentro global.Más de 160.000 asistentes en ediciones recientes lo confirman.
Y su peso es tal que forma parte del relato cultural de la candidatura de la ciudad a Capital Europea de la Cultura 2031.🧭 Lo que realmente pasa en WOMAD
No es solo la programación.
Es ese concierto al que llegas sin expectativas.
Ese idioma que no entiendes pero sientes.
Esa sensación de estar en mitad del mundo sin haber salido de Extremadura.WOMAD no se consume.
Se vive.
📣 Ahora te toca a ti
Si nunca has venido, este puede ser el año.
Si ya has estado, sabes que siempre hay algo que te sorprende.👉 Cuéntame: qué artista tienes marcado o qué recuerdo te hizo volver.
🔎 Y un último detalle que casi nadie recuerda
Antes de convertirse en referencia mundial, WOMAD estuvo a punto de desaparecer tras su primera edición.
Fue una gira improvisada liderada por Peter Gabriel la que salvó el proyecto.
Décadas después, esa idea que casi no sobrevive…
sigue llenando de mundo una ciudad como Cáceres.¡¡Ahhhh!! Si te gusta el contenido de El Borrador, no olvides suscribirte 📩. Es fácil y GRATIS.
#arte #Cáceres #evento #extremadura #festival #Música #womad -
Todo lo que necesitas saber sobre WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Cada mayo en Cáceres tiene lugar un evento que rompe todos los límites.
Las plazas dejan de ser plazas.
Las murallas dejan de ser pasado.
Y, durante unos días, el mundo deja de ser algo lejano.Se vuelve cercano. Tangible. Sonoro.
Eso es WOMAD Cáceres.
En 2026 celebra su 33ª edición, del 7 al 10 de mayo, con una propuesta que vuelve a mezclar culturas, estilos y procedencias hasta convertir el casco histórico en un mapa vivo del planeta.
📍 Un casco histórico convertido en escenario
El festival se reparte en tres espacios principales:
- Plaza Mayor → grandes conciertos y programación central
- Plaza de San Jorge → electrónica, mestizaje y sesiones nocturnas
- Plaza de Santa María → formato íntimo, propuestas locales y acústicas
A esto se suman talleres, cine en la Filmoteca de Extremadura, mercado global y actividades familiares.
Todo, manteniendo una de sus señas de identidad:
entrada gratuita y acceso abierto.📅 Programación oficial WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Una edición con 21 artistas de 14 países, donde conviven afrobeat, electrónica global, folk, funk, flamenco o sonidos urbanos.
🟡 Jueves, 7 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Apertura institucional
- 21:00 — Balkan Paradise Orchestra
- 22:30 — Bareto
- 00:00 — 47Soul
Plaza de San Jorge
- 23:30 — Islandman
🟡 Viernes, 8 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Caamaño & Ameixeiras
- 22:00 — Steam Down
- 23:30 — Seun Kuti & Egypt 80
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — Raz & Afla
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Djarabi
- 19:30 — Canchalera
🟡 Sábado, 9 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Zé Ibarra
- 22:00 — Shanghai Restoration Project + Tebza Majaivane
- 23:30 — BIM
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — LK Funk
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Jorge Navarro
- 19:30 — Dominique Atsama
🟡 Domingo, 10 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 13:00 — A Garulla
- 14:30 — Carolina La Chispa
- 17:00 — Willy Wilazo
- 18:30 — Diego Andújar
- 20:00 — Clausura oficial
🎭 Mucho más que conciertos
WOMAD es mucho más que música, una experiencia completa:
- Talleres participativos (mañanas y tardes)
- Actividades infantiles
- Mercado global de gastronomía y artesanía
- Cine musical en la Filmoteca de Extremadura
- Pasacalles y animación urbana
Aquí no vienes solo a escuchar. Vienes a mezclarte.
🌍 De experimento a símbolo cultural
WOMAD nació en 1982 de la mano de Peter Gabriel con una idea casi utópica:
usar la música como lenguaje común.Llegó a Cáceres en 1992.
Y desde entonces ha hecho algo poco habitual:
convertir una ciudad pequeña en un punto de encuentro global.Más de 160.000 asistentes en ediciones recientes lo confirman.
Y su peso es tal que forma parte del relato cultural de la candidatura de la ciudad a Capital Europea de la Cultura 2031.🧭 Lo que realmente pasa en WOMAD
No es solo la programación.
Es ese concierto al que llegas sin expectativas.
Ese idioma que no entiendes pero sientes.
Esa sensación de estar en mitad del mundo sin haber salido de Extremadura.WOMAD no se consume.
Se vive.
📣 Ahora te toca a ti
Si nunca has venido, este puede ser el año.
Si ya has estado, sabes que siempre hay algo que te sorprende.👉 Cuéntame: qué artista tienes marcado o qué recuerdo te hizo volver.
🔎 Y un último detalle que casi nadie recuerda
Antes de convertirse en referencia mundial, WOMAD estuvo a punto de desaparecer tras su primera edición.
Fue una gira improvisada liderada por Peter Gabriel la que salvó el proyecto.
Décadas después, esa idea que casi no sobrevive…
sigue llenando de mundo una ciudad como Cáceres.¡¡Ahhhh!! Si te gusta el contenido de El Borrador, no olvides suscribirte 📩. Es fácil y GRATIS.
#arte #Cáceres #evento #extremadura #festival #Música #womad -
Todo lo que necesitas saber sobre WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Cada mayo en Cáceres tiene lugar un evento que rompe todos los límites.
Las plazas dejan de ser plazas.
Las murallas dejan de ser pasado.
Y, durante unos días, el mundo deja de ser algo lejano.Se vuelve cercano. Tangible. Sonoro.
Eso es WOMAD Cáceres.
En 2026 celebra su 33ª edición, del 7 al 10 de mayo, con una propuesta que vuelve a mezclar culturas, estilos y procedencias hasta convertir el casco histórico en un mapa vivo del planeta.
📍 Un casco histórico convertido en escenario
El festival se reparte en tres espacios principales:
- Plaza Mayor → grandes conciertos y programación central
- Plaza de San Jorge → electrónica, mestizaje y sesiones nocturnas
- Plaza de Santa María → formato íntimo, propuestas locales y acústicas
A esto se suman talleres, cine en la Filmoteca de Extremadura, mercado global y actividades familiares.
Todo, manteniendo una de sus señas de identidad:
entrada gratuita y acceso abierto.📅 Programación oficial WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Una edición con 21 artistas de 14 países, donde conviven afrobeat, electrónica global, folk, funk, flamenco o sonidos urbanos.
🟡 Jueves, 7 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Apertura institucional
- 21:00 — Balkan Paradise Orchestra
- 22:30 — Bareto
- 00:00 — 47Soul
Plaza de San Jorge
- 23:30 — Islandman
🟡 Viernes, 8 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Caamaño & Ameixeiras
- 22:00 — Steam Down
- 23:30 — Seun Kuti & Egypt 80
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — Raz & Afla
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Djarabi
- 19:30 — Canchalera
🟡 Sábado, 9 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Zé Ibarra
- 22:00 — Shanghai Restoration Project + Tebza Majaivane
- 23:30 — BIM
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — LK Funk
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Jorge Navarro
- 19:30 — Dominique Atsama
🟡 Domingo, 10 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 13:00 — A Garulla
- 14:30 — Carolina La Chispa
- 17:00 — Willy Wilazo
- 18:30 — Diego Andújar
- 20:00 — Clausura oficial
🎭 Mucho más que conciertos
WOMAD es mucho más que música, una experiencia completa:
- Talleres participativos (mañanas y tardes)
- Actividades infantiles
- Mercado global de gastronomía y artesanía
- Cine musical en la Filmoteca de Extremadura
- Pasacalles y animación urbana
Aquí no vienes solo a escuchar. Vienes a mezclarte.
🌍 De experimento a símbolo cultural
WOMAD nació en 1982 de la mano de Peter Gabriel con una idea casi utópica:
usar la música como lenguaje común.Llegó a Cáceres en 1992.
Y desde entonces ha hecho algo poco habitual:
convertir una ciudad pequeña en un punto de encuentro global.Más de 160.000 asistentes en ediciones recientes lo confirman.
Y su peso es tal que forma parte del relato cultural de la candidatura de la ciudad a Capital Europea de la Cultura 2031.🧭 Lo que realmente pasa en WOMAD
No es solo la programación.
Es ese concierto al que llegas sin expectativas.
Ese idioma que no entiendes pero sientes.
Esa sensación de estar en mitad del mundo sin haber salido de Extremadura.WOMAD no se consume.
Se vive.
📣 Ahora te toca a ti
Si nunca has venido, este puede ser el año.
Si ya has estado, sabes que siempre hay algo que te sorprende.👉 Cuéntame: qué artista tienes marcado o qué recuerdo te hizo volver.
🔎 Y un último detalle que casi nadie recuerda
Antes de convertirse en referencia mundial, WOMAD estuvo a punto de desaparecer tras su primera edición.
Fue una gira improvisada liderada por Peter Gabriel la que salvó el proyecto.
Décadas después, esa idea que casi no sobrevive…
sigue llenando de mundo una ciudad como Cáceres.¡¡Ahhhh!! Si te gusta el contenido de El Borrador, no olvides suscribirte 📩. Es fácil y GRATIS.
#arte #Cáceres #evento #extremadura #festival #Música #womad -
Todo lo que necesitas saber sobre WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Cada mayo en Cáceres tiene lugar un evento que rompe todos los límites.
Las plazas dejan de ser plazas.
Las murallas dejan de ser pasado.
Y, durante unos días, el mundo deja de ser algo lejano.Se vuelve cercano. Tangible. Sonoro.
Eso es WOMAD Cáceres.
En 2026 celebra su 33ª edición, del 7 al 10 de mayo, con una propuesta que vuelve a mezclar culturas, estilos y procedencias hasta convertir el casco histórico en un mapa vivo del planeta.
📍 Un casco histórico convertido en escenario
El festival se reparte en tres espacios principales:
- Plaza Mayor → grandes conciertos y programación central
- Plaza de San Jorge → electrónica, mestizaje y sesiones nocturnas
- Plaza de Santa María → formato íntimo, propuestas locales y acústicas
A esto se suman talleres, cine en la Filmoteca de Extremadura, mercado global y actividades familiares.
Todo, manteniendo una de sus señas de identidad:
entrada gratuita y acceso abierto.📅 Programación oficial WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Una edición con 21 artistas de 14 países, donde conviven afrobeat, electrónica global, folk, funk, flamenco o sonidos urbanos.
🟡 Jueves, 7 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Apertura institucional
- 21:00 — Balkan Paradise Orchestra
- 22:30 — Bareto
- 00:00 — 47Soul
Plaza de San Jorge
- 23:30 — Islandman
🟡 Viernes, 8 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Caamaño & Ameixeiras
- 22:00 — Steam Down
- 23:30 — Seun Kuti & Egypt 80
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — Raz & Afla
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Djarabi
- 19:30 — Canchalera
🟡 Sábado, 9 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Zé Ibarra
- 22:00 — Shanghai Restoration Project + Tebza Majaivane
- 23:30 — BIM
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — LK Funk
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Jorge Navarro
- 19:30 — Dominique Atsama
🟡 Domingo, 10 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 13:00 — A Garulla
- 14:30 — Carolina La Chispa
- 17:00 — Willy Wilazo
- 18:30 — Diego Andújar
- 20:00 — Clausura oficial
🎭 Mucho más que conciertos
WOMAD es mucho más que música, una experiencia completa:
- Talleres participativos (mañanas y tardes)
- Actividades infantiles
- Mercado global de gastronomía y artesanía
- Cine musical en la Filmoteca de Extremadura
- Pasacalles y animación urbana
Aquí no vienes solo a escuchar. Vienes a mezclarte.
🌍 De experimento a símbolo cultural
WOMAD nació en 1982 de la mano de Peter Gabriel con una idea casi utópica:
usar la música como lenguaje común.Llegó a Cáceres en 1992.
Y desde entonces ha hecho algo poco habitual:
convertir una ciudad pequeña en un punto de encuentro global.Más de 160.000 asistentes en ediciones recientes lo confirman.
Y su peso es tal que forma parte del relato cultural de la candidatura de la ciudad a Capital Europea de la Cultura 2031.🧭 Lo que realmente pasa en WOMAD
No es solo la programación.
Es ese concierto al que llegas sin expectativas.
Ese idioma que no entiendes pero sientes.
Esa sensación de estar en mitad del mundo sin haber salido de Extremadura.WOMAD no se consume.
Se vive.
📣 Ahora te toca a ti
Si nunca has venido, este puede ser el año.
Si ya has estado, sabes que siempre hay algo que te sorprende.👉 Cuéntame: qué artista tienes marcado o qué recuerdo te hizo volver.
🔎 Y un último detalle que casi nadie recuerda
Antes de convertirse en referencia mundial, WOMAD estuvo a punto de desaparecer tras su primera edición.
Fue una gira improvisada liderada por Peter Gabriel la que salvó el proyecto.
Décadas después, esa idea que casi no sobrevive…
sigue llenando de mundo una ciudad como Cáceres.¡¡Ahhhh!! Si te gusta el contenido de El Borrador, no olvides suscribirte 📩. Es fácil y GRATIS.
#arte #Cáceres #evento #extremadura #festival #Música #womad -
Todo lo que necesitas saber sobre WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Cada mayo en Cáceres tiene lugar un evento que rompe todos los límites.
Las plazas dejan de ser plazas.
Las murallas dejan de ser pasado.
Y, durante unos días, el mundo deja de ser algo lejano.Se vuelve cercano. Tangible. Sonoro.
Eso es WOMAD Cáceres.
En 2026 celebra su 33ª edición, del 7 al 10 de mayo, con una propuesta que vuelve a mezclar culturas, estilos y procedencias hasta convertir el casco histórico en un mapa vivo del planeta.
📍 Un casco histórico convertido en escenario
El festival se reparte en tres espacios principales:
- Plaza Mayor → grandes conciertos y programación central
- Plaza de San Jorge → electrónica, mestizaje y sesiones nocturnas
- Plaza de Santa María → formato íntimo, propuestas locales y acústicas
A esto se suman talleres, cine en la Filmoteca de Extremadura, mercado global y actividades familiares.
Todo, manteniendo una de sus señas de identidad:
entrada gratuita y acceso abierto.📅 Programación oficial WOMAD Cáceres 2026
Una edición con 21 artistas de 14 países, donde conviven afrobeat, electrónica global, folk, funk, flamenco o sonidos urbanos.
🟡 Jueves, 7 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Apertura institucional
- 21:00 — Balkan Paradise Orchestra
- 22:30 — Bareto
- 00:00 — 47Soul
Plaza de San Jorge
- 23:30 — Islandman
🟡 Viernes, 8 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Caamaño & Ameixeiras
- 22:00 — Steam Down
- 23:30 — Seun Kuti & Egypt 80
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — Raz & Afla
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Djarabi
- 19:30 — Canchalera
🟡 Sábado, 9 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 20:30 — Zé Ibarra
- 22:00 — Shanghai Restoration Project + Tebza Majaivane
- 23:30 — BIM
Plaza de San Jorge
- 01:00 — LK Funk
Plaza de Santa María
- 18:30 — Jorge Navarro
- 19:30 — Dominique Atsama
🟡 Domingo, 10 de mayo
Plaza Mayor
- 13:00 — A Garulla
- 14:30 — Carolina La Chispa
- 17:00 — Willy Wilazo
- 18:30 — Diego Andújar
- 20:00 — Clausura oficial
🎭 Mucho más que conciertos
WOMAD es mucho más que música, una experiencia completa:
- Talleres participativos (mañanas y tardes)
- Actividades infantiles
- Mercado global de gastronomía y artesanía
- Cine musical en la Filmoteca de Extremadura
- Pasacalles y animación urbana
Aquí no vienes solo a escuchar. Vienes a mezclarte.
🌍 De experimento a símbolo cultural
WOMAD nació en 1982 de la mano de Peter Gabriel con una idea casi utópica:
usar la música como lenguaje común.Llegó a Cáceres en 1992.
Y desde entonces ha hecho algo poco habitual:
convertir una ciudad pequeña en un punto de encuentro global.Más de 160.000 asistentes en ediciones recientes lo confirman.
Y su peso es tal que forma parte del relato cultural de la candidatura de la ciudad a Capital Europea de la Cultura 2031.🧭 Lo que realmente pasa en WOMAD
No es solo la programación.
Es ese concierto al que llegas sin expectativas.
Ese idioma que no entiendes pero sientes.
Esa sensación de estar en mitad del mundo sin haber salido de Extremadura.WOMAD no se consume.
Se vive.
📣 Ahora te toca a ti
Si nunca has venido, este puede ser el año.
Si ya has estado, sabes que siempre hay algo que te sorprende.👉 Cuéntame: qué artista tienes marcado o qué recuerdo te hizo volver.
🔎 Y un último detalle que casi nadie recuerda
Antes de convertirse en referencia mundial, WOMAD estuvo a punto de desaparecer tras su primera edición.
Fue una gira improvisada liderada por Peter Gabriel la que salvó el proyecto.
Décadas después, esa idea que casi no sobrevive…
sigue llenando de mundo una ciudad como Cáceres.¡¡Ahhhh!! Si te gusta el contenido de El Borrador, no olvides suscribirte 📩. Es fácil y GRATIS.
#arte #Cáceres #evento #extremadura #festival #Música #womad -
Ned Hamson's Second Line View of the News @nedhamsonsecondlineviewofthenews.com@nedhamsonsecondlineviewofthenews.com ·COLONIALISMO do século 21 – implementado por corporações e ONGs? Cuja sobrevivência está em jogo aqui, Survival? A sobrevivência das florestas tropicais e dos povos Indígenas ou da Cartier e outros na indústria de joias de ouro e diamantes? – Pensando em doar para uma ONG? Por favor, leia isso primeiro! – 2025! | Barbara Crane Navarro
“Ouro ou Natureza?” – © Fotolia / Wikimedia / Collage: Mirela Hadzic para o resgate da floresta tropical“A tolice do homem aumentou o valor do ouro e da prata por causa de sua escassez; enquanto a natureza, como um pai amoroso, nos deu gratuitamente as melhores coisas, como ar, terra e água, mas escondeu de nós as que são vãs e desnecessárias.” – Thomas More,” Utopia “, livro II – 1516
Foto: publicidade CartierA sistemática conquista e colonização européia das Américas começou em 1492 e ainda está em andamento. A motivação principal era, e continua a ser, a exploração. O aumento da riqueza na Europa dependeu do ouro, os diamantes e outras riquezas saqueadas às custas da degradação da natureza e da subjugação dos povos Indígenas …
Foto: mina de ouro: Emiliano Mancuso / National GeographicA ONG Survival proclama: “Estamos lutando pela sobrevivência dos povos indígenas. Evitamos que madeireiros, mineiros e empresas de petróleo destruam as terras, vidas e meios de subsistência de tribos em todo o mundo. Pressionamos os governos a reconhecer os direitos às terras indígenas. Documentamos e expomos as atrocidades cometidas contra os povos tribais e tomamos medidas diretas para detê-los. “
Fui voluntária para a Survival France nos anos 90 e início dos anos 2000, quando voltei para a França depois de viver com os Yanomami na Venezuela e no Brasil e inicialmente pensei que a Survival fez a coisa certa.
Passei muito tempo coletando assinaturas em petições da Survival defendendo os direitos dos povos Indígenas em diferentes partes do mundo (antes que as petições existissem na internet) incluindo impressões digitais como assinaturas Yanomami.
Yapacana tepui, Amazonas, Venezuela – foto: Barbara Crane Navarro
A comunidade Curripaco em Guachapana, ao longo do rio Orinoco, me pediu para criar uma petição para ajudá-los a se livrar dos garimpeiros da Colômbia que os aterrorizaram em seu caminho para locais ilegais de mineração de ouro no Yapacana tepui.
Agora, em 2024, a aldeia de Guachapana e as florestas circundantes foram efetivamente varridas do mapa; saqueada, escavada e contaminada com mercúrio pelos garimpeiros – a comunidade totalmente devastada.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/12/06/venezuela-yapacana-gold-mining/
A situação piorou e a mineração de ouro está destruindo o tepui Yapacana, um local sagrado, e contaminando com mercúrio as fontes de água, peixes, solo, animais selvagens e povos indígenas da região. Mas não só nesta região. A Venezuela está mais desmatada, envenenada e saqueada por minas de ouro do que o Brasil!
“Desmatamento na Venezuela aumenta com alvoroço dos garimpeiros na Amazônia
Estima-se que a perda de florestas virgens esteja aumentando em cerca de 170% ao ano na Venezuela – uma taxa ainda mais rápida do que no Brasil – devido a um boom de mineração de ouro sancionado pelo estado.”
Foto do homem Yanomami com arco e flecha, Amazonas, Venezuela e foto montagem – Barbara Crane Navarro / Resultado do xamã Yanomami convocando os espíritos Hekura para evitar que invasores destruam a floresta – Desenho no papel – Wacayowë YanomamiPassei um tempo com a Survival France perto da Embaixada do Brasil em Paris manifestando-se contra os governos dos presidentes do Brasil – começando com Fernando Collor de Mello.
Comecei a pensar que talvez educar os consumidores globais sobre a devastação da mineração de ouro, extração de madeira e desmatamento para soja e gado na floresta tropical e territórios Indígenas poderia ser uma abordagem mais eficaz do que tentar influenciar governos, muitas vezes influenciados por multinacionais, para mudar o ambiente políticas. Boicotar indústrias destrutivas parecia uma solução mais proativa.
Com as possibilidades oferecidas pela Internet, tenho me concentrado em trabalhar com a SOS Orinoco e outras associações venezuelanas que estão tentando impedir a devastação do projeto de mineração “Arco Minero del Orinoco” e Apib, Associação dos Povos Indígenas do Brasil.
Posteriormente, participei com a Survival France da manifestação contra o envolvimento da GDF Suez no projeto hidrelétrico de Belo Monte, acompanhada por várias pessoas que trabalharam na GDF Suez que também se opunham à inevitável destruição da floresta, dos rios e da vida dos povos Indígenas da região do Xingu que a barragem representaria.
Foto: Cacique Raoni Metuktire em Paris, segurando a petição internacional contra a barragem de Belo Monte, que lançou com outros chefes Kayapó.Os investidores privados envolvidos no projeto incluem as gigantes da mineração Alcoa e Vale (para abastecer novas minas próximas, como a proposta da mina de ouro de Belo Sun), conglomerados de construção Andrade Gutierrez, Votorantim, Grupo OAS, Queiroz Galvão, Odebrecht e Camargo Corrêa, e as empresas de energia GDF Suez (agora ENGIE) e Neoenergia. As primeiras turbinas estiveram em operação em maio de 2016 na barragem de Belo Monte. A barragem foi concluída com a instalação de sua 18ª turbina em novembro de 2019.
A mineradora canadense Belo Sun continua em busca de ouro em territórios indígenas no estado do Pará, apesar de ações judiciais movidas contra ela.
Seguem detalhes da ONG Mongabay: “Represado, agora minado: índios brasileiros lutam pelo futuro do Rio Xingu”:
Dados exclusivos mostram que a mineradora canadense possui 11 petições de pesquisa protocoladas na Agência Nacional de Mineração (NMA) que afetariam diretamente as Reservas Indígenas Arara da Volta Grande do Xingu e Trincheira Bacajá, no estado do Pará.
O projeto foi planejado para ser a maior mina de ouro a céu aberto da América Latina, com 74 toneladas de ouro a serem extraídas ao longo de 20 anos de operação.
Foto: Homem Xipaya na Cachoeira de Jericoá, Volta Grande do Xingu – Vidro VerenaEm 2018, fui contatado no Twitter por Stephen Corry, que é diretor da Survival International, com sede em Londres, desde 1984. Ele me pediu minha opinião sobre quem contatar na Venezuela quando os Yanomami no Alto Orinoco e no Parima região estava morrendo de malária transmitida por garimpeiros ilegais. Também conversamos no Twitter e por e-mail sobre outros assuntos que afetam os povos Indígenas. Corry sugeriu que eu contatasse Fiore Longo, a atual diretora da Survival France, e trocamos e-mails sobre como fazer planos para um encontro. Corry também pediu que eu compartilhasse vídeos da Survival sobre questões de floresta tropical no Twitter.
A Wikipedia afirma que “Stephen Corry trabalhou como membro da Survival International com a perspectiva de que os indígenas têm direitos morais e legais sobre suas terras. A proteção desse direito é considerada essencial para suas sobrevivência. Eles acreditam que os governos devem reconhecer isso e que isso só é possível se eles forem levados a isso pela força da opinião pública. A Survival International acredita que a cultura desse povo é de grande valor, e agora está em grande risco por uma violenta interferência em seus modo de vida.”
A Wikipedia adiciona, com um grande ponto de exclamação laranja: “Este artigo tem vários problemas. Ajude a melhorá-lo ou discuta esses problemas na página de discussão. Este artigo contém uma redação que promove o assunto de maneira subjetiva, sem transmitir informações reais. Esta biografia de uma pessoa viva precisa de citações adicionais para verificação.” (Março de 2019)
Sobre Davi Kopenawa, Wikipedia afirma: “Davi Kopenawa é um porta-voz dos índios Yanomami no Brasil. Ele se tornou conhecido por sua defesa em relação às questões tribais e à conservação da floresta amazônica quando … Survival International o convidou a aceitar o Right Livelihood Award em seu nome em 1989.… Davi Kopenawa conversou com os parlamentos britânico e sueco sobre o impacto catastrófico na saúde dos Yanomami. conseqüência da invasão ilegal de suas terras por 40 mil garimpeiros. O príncipe Charles chamou publicamente a situação de “genocídio”. Em sete anos, de 1987 a 1993, um quinto dos Yanomami morreu de malária e outras doenças transmitidas por garimpeiros. “
Foto: destruição da mineração de ouro em território Yanomami, Roraima, Brasil – Imagens GettyFiquei desconcertada depois de sugerir em janeiro de 2020 que Corry se juntasse a mim para “espalhar a mensagem abaixo porque acho que esse é um problema que precisa ser resolvido”. “Assim como as pessoas são encorajadas a mudar seus hábitos alimentares para proteger as florestas, os hábitos de consumo devem ser examinados, especialmente tão perto do Dia dos Namorados, quando gastos e consumo excessivos é galopante.
Não abordei outro aspecto questionável da estratégia de marketing da Cartier nesta mensagem a Davi Kopenawa; no site http://cartier.fr próximo a ‘Fondation Cartier‘ há ‘Cartier filantropia’: ‘Nossas operações’ com uma longa lista de países que inclui o Peru e a República Democrática do Congo.
Continuei com: Alguns desses países que a Cartier afirma ajudar são locais de mineração notórios (ouro, diamantes, etc., que também são usados na joalheria Cartier) que alimentaram guerras e conflitos por décadas.
Acrescentei que gostaria que Corry circulasse meu post ou escrevesse algo sobre ele (com ou sem mencionar as empresas pelo nome) antes do assalto do Dia dos Namorados e do ‘La Luta Yanomami’ da Fundação Cartier. » – (Em seguida, programado para 30 de janeiro até 13 de setembro de 2020 e interrompido temporariamente, de março a junho, pela pandemia de Covid-19)
« Aqui está minha mensagem para Davi Kopenawa: Quando o cacique Raoni Metuktire esteve em Paris, exigiu que os europeus parassem de comer carne para proteger os povos do Xingu da destruição de seu território pelo agro-negócio. Você, que representa os Yanomami, deve pedir ao povo europeu que pare de comprar, vender e se enfeitar com ouro para proteger o território Yanomami. Cartier, a empresa de relógios e joias de ouro de luxo que convida você a vir a Paris para falar, está ganhando dinheiro com a simpatia que os franceses têm pelos Yanomami e usando você e Claudia Andujar como brindes promocionais para ‘lavagem verde’ de seus envolvimento com o ouro indústria.
A mostra ‘A Luta Yanomami’ é trazida até vocês pela própria indústria que está destruindo suas vidas. A Cartier opera mais de 200 lojas em 125 países e foi classificada em 2018 pela Forbes como a 59ª marca mais rica e valiosa do mundo.
Não existe uma forma sustentável de minerar ouro. As florestas são destruídas para dar lugar à mineração e os rios são contaminados. O cianeto é usado na indústria de mineração de ouro legal em vez do mercúrio usado na mineração ilegal, mas os resultados tóxicos do uso de cianeto são os mesmos. A indústria do ouro legal é um labirinto de mineiros, banqueiros, traficantes e lojas de luxo. Mesmo na mineração de ouro industrial e em grande escala, existem regulamentações frouxas, grilagem de terras, expropriação sancionada pelo governo e lixo tóxico.
O crime organizado controla o mercado de distribuição ilegal de ouro e o ouro extraído ilegalmente ocupa uma parcela significativa do mercado global de ouro. Uma das razões pelas quais o ouro ilegal é tão valioso para grupos criminosos é que, ao contrário da cocaína, existe uma versão legal que se parece exatamente com ela. Traficantes de drogas contribuem para a violência na região amazônica. Suas operações eram baseadas no tráfico de drogas. Agora eles também dependem do tráfico ilegal de ouro. As redes criminosas estão empurrando ouro sujo para as empresas. Essa cadeia de suprimentos ilegal se estende por todo o mundo, da Samsung à Cartier. Cartier representa o fetichismo das joias de luxo – itens que são funcionalmente desnecessários para a sociedade humana. Você pode clicar neste link: http://cartier.com.br para ver quais itens de ouro de luxo eles estão vendendo no Brasil, então você pode clicar em ‘Fondation Cartier‘ no final da página para ver como eles estão vendendo você para dar a impressão de que se preocupam com a floresta e os povos Indígenas, pois continuam vendendo ouro para o mundo.
‘Você deve fazer todas as escolhas como se a vida de sua Mãe Terra dependesse disso, como se sua própria vida dependesse disso, como se a vida de seus filhos dependesse disso.’ – John Lundin Obrigada, Barbara”
A surpreendente resposta sem resposta de Corry foi: “Oi Bárbara! Eu espero que você esteja bem. Achei que você pudesse se interessar por um de nossos vídeos sobre a crise climática de uma perspectiva indígena sul-americana.”
Eu respondi: “Curioso silêncio de sua parte, Stephen, sobre minha pergunta acima a respeito da resposta de Davi. Curioso também que você e Fio estão condenando o WWF por suas práticas antiéticas, enquanto a Survival apóia e ajuda a Cartier e a indústria de luxo aparelhos desnecessários – você sabe, a própria indústria que destrói povos Indígenas em todo o mundo apoiados pela Survival por décadas. Survival deveria ter sido FORA da Cartier em janeiro para protestar com sinais como ‘Pare com a lavagem verde de ouro e diamantes de sangue!’ … A Fundação Cartier está apresentando a exposição ‘A Luta Yanomami’ enquanto os Yanomami agora lutam contra a indústria do ouro que está saqueando seu território! A última exibição deles foi ‘nós árvores’ e eu me pergunto a que árvores exatamente eles estavam se referindo quando é necessário arrancar árvores e envenenar rios e solo para extrair ouro para relógios e joias Cartier? Nenhuma de suas bugigangas de ouro de luxo está à venda na Fundação, mas Cartier, um comerciante de itens de ouro de luxo desde 1847, criou sua Fundação com fundos da venda de ouro.”
Stephen Corry respondeu: “Querida Barbara, Obrigado pelo seu e-mail. Claro, entendo o seu ponto de vista, mas lembre-se de que o diretor do Cartier Art Center é um amigo pessoal de Davi de longa data e já esteve com os Yanomami (mais de uma vez, eu acho). O centro vem promovendo os Yanomami de uma forma ou de outra há muitos anos. É claro que lutamos contra os garimpeiros do território Yanomami há décadas. Eu pessoalmente sei que a mineração de ouro em pequena escala, sem o uso de contaminantes, tem sido realizada por povos indígenas. Portanto, é errado dizer que todo ouro está poluindo em toda parte. Raoni pode simplesmente pedir às pessoas que não comam carne. No entanto, também existem milhões de indígenas que dependem dos animais do rebanho para seu sustento. A maioria vende também. Em minhas próprias andanças com Davi nos últimos 30 anos, ele sempre se opôs ao uso de pedras removidas da terra como material de construção nas cidades ocidentais. No entanto, isso fez nunca significou que ele se recusou a entrar em edifícios de pedra para promover a sobrevivência de seu povo. Davi escolheu usar suas conexões pessoais para promover sua luta. Longe de Survival tentando dissuadi-lo dessa escolha. Como disse, compreendo o seu ponto de vista, mas peço-lhe que aceite o nosso também! Pretendíamos, e ainda pretendemos, trazer seus pontos de vista para Davi, de qualquer maneira. Muitas felicidades. Sua, Stephen “
“Survival International 50 anos lutando pelas tribos, pela natureza, por toda a humanidade survivalinternational.org | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram Desde 1969 | Escritórios em Berlim, Londres, Madrid, Milão, Paris, São Francisco | Apoiadores em mais de 100 países”
Chocado, respondi: “Caro Stephen, Não é uma questão filosófica. O problema para Raoni é a devastação causada no Xingu pela agroindústria brasileira contra a qual ele denuncia incansavelmente. Raoni não apareceu em lugar nenhum a convite de um representante da JBS S.A. ou da Cargill, nunca. Viajei por vários anos no Mali, Costa do Marfim e Benin e conheci muitas pessoas que dependem de animais de rebanho para sua subsistência, um assunto totalmente diferente que o agroindústria global. Eu fui vegetariano durante a maior parte da minha vida, mas reconheço que mudar hábitos é complicado, pois todos os humanos precisam comer. Cartier, no entanto, construiu sua considerável fortuna vendendo itens que são inquestionavelmente inúteis para a humanidade. Suas bugigangas de “luxo” contêm ouro, bem como diamantes, esmeraldas, etc. nenhum deles é extraído por artesãos sem contaminantes. A Cartier opera mais de 200 lojas em 125 países e foi classificada em 2018 pela Forbes como a 59ª marca mais rica e valiosa do mundo. Você sabe melhor do que eu, Stephen, os danos causados pela mineração de diamantes em muitos países africanos. O governo de Trinidad e Tobago está muito preocupado com o cianeto e o mercúrio da mineração legal e ilegal ao longo do rio Orinoco, contaminando suas área de pesca a mais de 2.000 quilômetros de distância. Eles organizaram seminários para abordar este problema. Os Yanomami que conheço pessoalmente no Alto Orinoco, na Venezuela, sofrem de sarampo e outras doenças causadas pela invasão de garimpeiros na suas terras. Suas florestas estão destruídas e seus rios poluídos. Você e Davi podem ser amigos de quem quiser, mas aparecer na Cartier e permitir que, vamos ser honestos, esverdear seus imagem às custas dos Yanomami é ambíguo. Estou ansioso para ouvir a resposta de Davi aos pontos que levantei. Agradeço muito sua intervenção sobre essas questões em meu nome. Cumprimentos, Barbara”
Em seguida, adicionei Fiore Longo da Survival France ao intercâmbio:
“Olá Stephen e Fio, Fiquei me perguntando por que não houve resposta depois que enviei a cada um de vocês ‘minha mensagem para Davi Kopenawa’ por e-mail e no Twitter. Percebi agora que você está promovendo a exposição ‘A luta Yanomami’ da Cartier no Facebook. Você percebe que os Yanomami, a comunidade de Davi Kopenawa em particular, estão lutando contra 20.000 garimpeiros em seu território? Eu percebi nos últimos meses que você criticou o WWF por práticas antiéticas, enquanto agora está promovendo a indústria extrativista de joias de ouro e diamantes que está explorando muitos, senão a maioria dos povos indígenas que a Survival tem defendido ao longo de décadas. Esta parece ser uma contradição enorme e grotesca de seus princípios. Você certamente sabe que as fundações, em geral, são criadas na maioria das vezes para evitar o pagamento de sua parte nos impostos e / ou fazer uma lavagem verde de sua imagem.”
Em seguida, enviei isso para Longo:
“Caro Fio, Eu sei que você não sabia da última correspondência. Como esse problema se aplica a você também, estou incluindo e-mails recentes entre Stephen e eu. Meu fervor é alimentado por minha preocupação com meus amigos Yanomami que estão morrendo no Alto Orinoco devido à invasão de garimpeiros em seu território. Espero que possa haver uma maneira melhor para as pessoas se decorarem em nossa cultura do que o modelo de luxo atual, que exige a mineração de ouro e diamantes. Acho que essa questão poderia ser vista da mesma forma que estamos atualmente reexaminando os danos ao planeta causados por viagens aéreas. Davi, Stephen e você poderiam ajudar os Yanomami influenciando seu amigo, o diretor do Cartier Art Center, a transformar o envolvimento da Cartier na indústria de ouro e diamante de luxo em algo menos destrutivo e mais duradouro. Agradeço muito sua intervenção nessas questões com Davi e Cartier em meu nome e em nome dos Yanomami, que estão muito distantes da nossa civilização para falar por si mesmos. Cumprimentos, Barbara”
Mapas de minas de ouro em território Yanomami: Alto Orinoco – SOS Orinoco / Brasil – CCPYEnquanto isso, de acordo com a Forbes, a partir de 27 de julho de 2020, o valor da marca Cartier é de US $ 12,2 bilhões. “A Cartier vende joias para a realeza europeia há mais de um século. Existem cerca de 300 butiques Cartier em todo o mundo que exibem as joias e relógios de ponta da marca. A marca é extremamente lucrativa para a controladora Richemont … A Cartier reabriu sua loja principal em Nova York em 2017, após uma renovação de dois anos e meio. A mansão Cartier de quatro andares na Quinta Avenida é um museu e um varejista. A loja principal de Londres passou por uma reforma no ano passado e reabriu em dezembro. Um andar privado, La Résidence, é reservado aos melhores clientes da Cartier e inclui um bar, cozinha, sala de jantar e área de estar.”
Foto: anúncio da loja Cartier em Nova YorkEscrevi para Corry: “Parece-me que a Survival investiu mais mutuamente na Cartier do que você está fingindo. O fato de você não querer entrar em detalhes sobre este assunto não me surpreende. Representantes da Survival deram discursos na Cartier e continuam a anunciar (sob os auspícios da Survival) as exposições de arte abusivo de lavagem verde da Cartier. Por que você não está se posicionando contra isso? De que lado você está realmente?”
Locais de mineração de ouro: Garimpeiros em uma mina de ouro, Brasil – João Laet -The Guardian – 2020 (detalhe) / Crianças minerando ouro em águas carregadas de mercúrio, Venezuela – Edo – 2020O site da Survival afirma: “Ao contrário de muitas instituições de caridade, negamos financiamento do governo nacional e não aceitamos dinheiro de empresas que possam violar os direitos dos povos indígenas. … A Survival é política e financeiramente independente de qualquer envolvimento governamental, político, religioso ou corporativo. Porque contar com a sua generosidade nos dá total independência. Ele preserva nossa integridade, garantindo que nunca ajustemos nossa mensagem ou trabalho orientado para doadores. “Em “Serviços financeiros – De onde vem nosso dinheiro” está listado: A: Doações de apoiadores e fundações (67%) B: Arrecadação de fundos e vendas de nossa loja (11,8%) C: legado (18,2%) D: Investimentos (3%) “
Eu me pergunto quais “fundações” dão dinheiro para a Survival? Se as fundações doarem dinheiro para a Survival, como é possível ser independente do envolvimento corporativo?
Fiore Longo no Twitter disse: “Se há algo que aprendi ao passar anos e anos com #comunidades tribais indígenas em suas florestas, é isso que chamamos de natureza – o que nós ligar para a Terra – eles chamam de casa.”
“Fio, você já leu as respostas elusivas de Corry aos meus e-mails, mas não tinha mais nada a acrescentar ou alterar? Vocês dois falam tanto para denunciar outras ONGs, mas nada a acrescentar à ‘garimpagem de ouro em pequena escala, sem o uso de contaminantes’? Todos aqueles ‘anos e anos com comunidades indígenas tribais‘ e ‘andanças com Davi nos últimos 30 anos‘, mas vocês dois nunca perceberam os danos ambientais em uma mineração de ouro, diamantes, esmeraldas e safiras vendidas por Cartier e outros na indústria de luxo? Nenhum de vocês jamais conheceu crianças Indígenas com problemas neurológicos irreversíveis causados pela ingestão de peixes contaminados com mercúrio como as crianças Hoti do rio Ventuari na Venezuela ou as crianças Wayana de Haut-Maroni e Haut-Oyapock na Guiana Francesa? E o que dizer da África, onde o número de crianças trabalhando em minas de ouro na Tanzânia, Gana, República Democrática do Congo e outros países continua sendo uma grande preocupação? Crianças de 11 anos na República Centro-Africana trabalham ao lado de adultos no comércio de diamantes de sangue. Na Ásia, crianças de apenas cinco anos trabalham em minas e pedreiras. Envenenamento por mercúrio, doenças hepáticas e respiratórias são apenas alguns dos perigos que enfrentam …
De acordo com um estudo divulgado pela Info Amazonia, 838 toneladas de mercúrio foram emitidas da mineração artesanal e em pequena escala de ouro na região amazônica (2015 – dados mais recentes disponíveis do PNUMA).
http://mercury.infoamazonia.org https://pic.twitter.com/uF1hQx6upT
‘Mercúrio, o metal tóxico à sombra da indústria do ouro, é um negócio multimilionário. A produção de 1 tonelada de ouro, segundo registros oficiais, requer o uso de cerca de 6 toneladas de mercúrio.’ – Essas figuras representam um etnocídio e um ecocídio de proporções épicas …”
Mas, quem precisa da natureza em um reino em que Cartier está “reinventando a natureza, mais natural do que a própria natureza”? – desta publicidade fascinante da Cartier:
“Mais natural do que a própria natureza: a nova coleção de joias de luxo A natureza dá o tom para [Sur] naturel, a nova coleção da Cartier Haute Joaillerie. Ela abre caminho para uma beleza mais real do que a própria natureza, enraizada na realidade e transformada no reino do sobrenatural. Diamantes, esmeraldas e safiras se misturam com opala e kunzita, coral e água-marinha, berilo e quartzo. Água, flora e fauna dão vida a um universo ultraprecioso que existe na fronteira entre a fantasia e a realidade. Indo além da realidade, Cartier abre caminho para reinventar a natureza com a nova coleção Haute Joaillerie: [Sur] naturel. “
Foto publicitária: “Ultrapassando a realidade, a Cartier abre caminho para a natureza reinventada com a nova coleção de Alta Joalheria: [Sur] naturel.“Dário Kopenawa, filho de Davi, implora ao povo da Índia em um vídeo: “O ouro que veio do nosso território Yanomami é ouro de sangue, ouro às custas do sangue Indígena. Eu gostaria de enviar uma mensagem ao povo da Índia, ao governo indiano e às empresas que o importam: Você deve parar de comprar Ouro de Sangue. Comprar Blood Gold não é bom. É importante que o governo pense novamente, que o povo índio pense de novo e não compre Ouro de Sangue Yanomami.”
Talvez a Cartier gostaria de explicar a Davi e Dário Kopenawa por que eles têm lojas Cartier na Índia vendendo suas bugigangas de ouro e diamante de luxo?
Foto: uma loja Cartier na Índia: Boutique Cartier New Delhi – Nelson Mandela Rd, Vasant Kunj, New Delhi, ÍndiaA avaliação da Human Rights Watch sobre as práticas de negócios da Cartier está em um artigo de professionaljeweler.com:
“A Cartier é propriedade da Richemont, um grupo de produtos de luxo com sede na Suíça e representa cerca de 45 por cento da receita da Richemont. Cadeia de custódia: a Cartier tem cadeia de custódia para parte, mas não todo, de seu ouro. Não indica se tem cadeia de custódia para diamantes … A política de responsabilidade corporativa da Cartier não menciona a rastreabilidade … A controladora da Cartier, Richemont, diz que a rastreabilidade é uma meta de longo prazo e uma área para melhorias para todas as suas empresas nos próximos anos. De acordo com o Código de Conduta do Fornecedor da Richemont, os fornecedores são obrigados a demonstrar que estão realizando due diligence de direitos humanos, mas não está claro se a Cartier faz cumprir esta disposição. Cartier não respondeu ao pedido da Human Rights Watch de uma reunião.”
Corry postou no Twitter em 12 de agosto: “Quer salvar a Amazônia? ” Certifique-se de ficar o máximo possível com #TribalPeoples que criou o ecossistema em primeiro lugar. No entanto, as grandes ONGs conservacionistas chamam isso de ‘selva’ e lembre-se @WWF disse que # Povos indígenas irão reduzi-lo #FightEcofascism“
Claro, Stephen … Mas isso não é um ecossistema nem um região selvagem depois que os mineiros artesanais destruíram a floresta e venderam o ouro que desenterraram. Depois que o que Davi Kopenawa chama de “ouro canibal” foi transformado em mercadoria, tudo o que resta para os #povos tribais é a destruição e a morte do COVID-19 espalhado pelos garimpeiros.
E a @WWF não é a única ONG que Corry afirma ser antiética. Também tem este artigo da Corry no Twitter aqui: ” Ah sim, @nature_org (The Nature Conservancy) tem parceria com @Walmart É uma empresa altamente ética que não parece tratar as pessoas muito bem – para dizer o mínimo. Dê uma olhada e #FightEcofascism Grandes ONGs de “conservação” = escândalo. “
e novamente Corry:
“O FSC está ‘investigando’ seu próprio produtor ‘certificado’ de óleo de palma. Demorou 4 anos para * começar *.Posso terminar em 1 min:@FSC_IC dirá: “Não foi tão ruim quanto afirmado, não é nossa culpa de qualquer maneira, houve alguns erros, prometemos fazer melhor.”
O chefe do Centro de Arte Cartier, Diretor Geral da Fundação Cartier, Hervé Chandès, detalha em uma entrevista com Caroline Lebrun https://www.paris-art.com/herve-chandes-fondation-cartier/ quanto A fundação Cartier é supervisionada pela casa de relógios de ouro e joias de luxo Cartier. Chandès afirma que “A Fundação Cartier é privada, totalmente financiada pela Cartier para suas comunicações.”
Uma foto tirada por Chandès na comunidade de Davi Kopenawa aparece na página 27 do catálogo da Fundação Cartier de 2003 “Yanomami, o espírito da floresta”, a primeira exposição de arte em que Cartier usava os Yanomami – para esverdear seus imagem de ouro suja?
Foto: Fundação Cartier “Yanomami, o espírito da floresta” / Hervé ChandèsEu me perguntei na época se o mapa que os Yanomami estão segurando mostra a localização de centenas de lojas de relógios de ouro e joias de luxo Cartier ao redor do mundo …?
Antes mesmo do Covid-19, espalhado por garimpeiros, começar a dizimar as comunidades Yanomami, Davi Kopenawa convocou jornalistas do Guardian para informar-se sobre os danos causados pelas minas de ouro em território Yanomami no Brasil. “Era da Extinção – Como uma bomba explodindo: por que a maior reserva do Brasil está ameaçada de destruição” escrito por Dom Phillips.
Em 2018, o Miami Herald conduziu uma investigação aprofundada da indústria internacional de drogas ilegais, intitulada “Como os barões da droga ganham bilhões gastando ouro em Miami para suas joias e telefones.”
Foto: Ouro Sujo Dinheiro Limpo – Ilustração Miami Herald“Muito do ouro comercializado no mundo está manchado de sangue e violações dos direitos humanos”, disse Julián Bernardo González.
Uma grande diferença entre cocaína e ouro? A cocaína é obviamente ilegal. Com ouro, é difícil dizer. Os papéis podem ser falsificados. O metal pode ser derretido e fundido novamente até que sua origem seja impossível de localizar.
Veja como o ouro se encaixa: associados em cartéis de drogas disfarçados de traficantes de metais preciosos compram e exploram ouro na América Latina. Os lucros da cocaína são seu capital inicial. Eles vendem o metal por meio de empresas de fachada – escondendo sua marca criminosa – para refinarias nos Estados Unidos e em outros grandes países compradores de ouro, como a Suíça e os Emirados Árabes Unidos. Assim que o negócio foi fechado, os pilares da cocaína conseguiram transformar seu ouro sujo em prata limpa. Para o mundo exterior, eles não são mais traficantes de drogas; eles são comerciantes de ouro. É lavagem de dinheiro.“
“As regiões de mineração da floresta tropical tornaram-se epicentros do tráfico humano, doenças e destruição ambiental, de acordo com funcionários do governo e investigadores de direitos humanos. Os menores são forçados à escravidão. As prostitutas montam acampamentos perto de menores, aumentando a disseminação de infecções sexualmente transmissíveis. Um grupo de direitos humanos descobriu que 2.000 profissionais do sexo, 60% delas crianças, estavam empregadas em uma única área de mineração no Peru. Enquanto isso, a mineração de superfície e o uso indiscriminado de mercúrio para desenterrar ouro estão transformando grande parte dos ecossistemas mais biodiversos do mundo em uma paisagem lunar de pesadelo. Em 2016, o Peru declarou estado de emergência temporário após envenenamento generalizado por mercúrio em Madre de Dios, uma província na selva atormentada pela mineração ilegal. Quase quatro em cada cinco adultos na capital da região tiveram teste positivo para níveis perigosos de mercúrio.”
Foto: captura de tela – Garimpeiro usando seu corpo para misturar mercúrio com minério e água / “Ouro sujo” – Netflix (“Eu sei que o mercúrio pode matar você no longo prazo.”)Qualquer pessoa que esteja pensando em comprar ou usar ouro deve ver a série de antologia documental “Dirty Money” da Netflix, no episódio intitulado “Dirty Gold” (áudio disponível em português brasileiro). “… que vive com a ameaça diária de execução por parte do … Funcionário da refinaria – orgulho que a Cartier foi um cliente …”
Foto: captura de tela de Dirty Gold / NetflixAté 75% do ouro extraído a cada ano é usado em joias, relógios e outros símbolos de status vãos e fúteis vendidos pela Cartier e outras empresas da indústria de ouro de luxo e desconto em todo o mundo. Dezenas de milhares de árvores na floresta tropical devem ser arrancadas, centenas de toneladas de solo extraídas e misturadas com dezenas de toneladas de poluentes ambientais tóxicos que contaminam terras nativas para este anel dourado especial …
Fotos: capturas de tela do Dirty Gold / NetflixComo um orador na inauguração Cartier de “A Luta Yanomami” disse: “Este é o episódio definitivo da conquista das Américas. O acúmulo de ouro permitiu que a Europa se desenvolvesse. Nós devemos nos mobilizar para evitar o desaparecimento dos povos indígenas” . – e o desaparecimento de florestas essenciais à vida!
No Twitter, a Cartier continua “ajudando” os Yanomami: @Fond_Cartier A Fundação Cartier, pertencente à indústria de joias e relógios de ouro de luxo, anuncia: “Os Yanomami lançaram a campanha #ForaGarimpoForaCovid (#orpalers out – #Covid out) para exigir a remoção de 20.000 garimpeiros ilegais de suas terras. #MinersOutCovidOut ” – Comunicado de imprensa
Em agosto de 2020, Corry anunciou que deixaria o cargo de CEO da Survival International em 2021, o que aparentemente aconteceu, mas alguns dos outros representantes da Survival que estão com a organização há décadas ou menos também estiveram envolvidos com a Cartier.
Atualização: Agora, em 2023, Corry é presidente da Survival France…
Foto: Destruição da mineração de ouro na região de Madre de Dios, no Peru, vista do espaço – NASASegundo a ONG Mongabay, o Brasil exportou quase 20 toneladas de ouro ilegal para Canadá, Europa e Ásia em 2020.
Quase metade do ouro exportado pelo Brasil entre 2015 e 2020, ou 229 toneladas, veio do garimpo ilegal de ouro em terras indígenas na Amazônia.
Os garimpeiros ilegais foram motivados pelo aumento dos preços do ouro, pela retórica pró-mineração do governo Bolsonaro e agora recentemente eleitos políticos locais pró-mineração na região amazônica.
A maior quadrilha do Brasil, o Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), atua desde 2018 nas rotas do ouro e do narcotráfico pelo território Yanomami, em Roraima. Esses criminosos intimidam os Yanomami e incitam a violência contra as comunidades Yanomami com o uso de armas automáticas e bombas de gás lacrimogêneo! O PCC também é afiliado a gangues na Venezuela.
Os territórios Yanomami, no extremo norte do Brasil e também na fronteira com o extremo sul da Venezuela, estão em uma região estratégica para o tráfico internacional de drogas e ouro, bem como para o contrabando de armas. Essa fronteira com a Venezuela há muito é dominada pelo garimpo ilegal de ouro, e parte do ouro de sangue Yanomami acaba sendo vendido no país vizinho. Dário Kopenawa disse: “Os garimpeiros venezuelanos trabalham em nosso território
Yanomami, brasileiros também trabalham na Venezuela. Essa troca de garimpeiros artesanais existe, mas não há fiscalização por parte da legislação nacional, como o exército. Eles não vigiam, não fiscalizam aqui nem fiscalizam as fronteiras entre o Brasil e a Venezuela.
Em entrevista recente ao Estúdio i, o novo presidente do Ibama disse que parte dos garimpeiros expulsos da terra indígena Yanomami no Brasil agora viaja para a Venezuela para garimpar ouro.
Está claro há anos que o crime organizado, cartéis de drogas, refinarias e bancos são cúmplices. Lula se propõe a “consertar” a situação, mas mesmo que o Brasil pare o fluxo de ouro ilegal, os criminosos responsáveis pela verdadeira “cadeia de custódia” da indústria do ouro irão simplesmente vendê-lo através da Venezuela ou de qualquer outro lugar.
Trechos deste excelente artigo da Reuters:
«…mesmo o banco central não sabe se o ouro que compra é legal ou ilegal.
… instou o governo a tomar medidas para desmantelar um anel que lava ouro ilegal através do sistema financeiro para vendê-lo a compradores em países como a Suíça e a Grã-Bretanha.
Atualmente, o ouro é vendido com recibos de papel baseados na “boa fé” do vendedor, o que impossibilita a rastreabilidade de sua origem. »
“Conte o Ouro”
Enormes quantidades de ouro circulam pelo mundo a cada ano. Por trás desse apetite insaciável está uma verdade sombria sobre lavagem de dinheiro, mineração ilegal, danos ambientais e miséria humana.
Praticamente metade do ouro exportado pelo Brasil entre 2015 e 2020, 229 toneladas, veio de minas de ouro selvagens ilegais em terras Indígenas na Amazônia. Os detalhes são explicados neste relatório da ONG Instituto Escolhas: report from NGO Instituto Escolhas. (Excelentes gráficos com texto em inglês e português)
Imagem: Insight Crime
Em recente entrevista ao Valor, https://valor.globo.com/brasil/noticia/2023/02/10/reverter-crise-dos-yanomami-exige-tempo-e-muitas-acoes-diz-antropologo-frances.ghtml
Bruce Albert disse: “A situação é mais complexa hoje do que em 1990, é claro. Em 1990, assistimos ao início da mecanização e capitalização da mineração. Em 2022 estamos diante de verdadeiros garimpeiros ilegais…, altamente mecanizados e capitalizados, operando com escavadeiras de esteiras, abrindo caminhos privados na floresta, com uma frota de aviões e helicópteros. Eles são protegidos por milícias munidas de armamento pesado e provavelmente associadas ao crime organizado do sul do país, por lavagem de dinheiro.
Durante anos, esses garimpeiros submeteram mais da metade da população Yanomami a condições terríveis de saúde precária e desnutrição, violência, exploração sexual e degradação social.
A trágica situação em que os Yanomami no Brasil se encontram atualmente – que é de fato a pior em 50 anos – tem duas causas atribuíveis à má gestão assassina do ex-presidente Jair Bolsonaro entre 2019 e 2022. A primeira é a inauguração dos indígenas Yanomami Terre a verdadeiras empresas piratas que extraem ouro e cassiterita, em total desrespeito às leis brasileiras e à Constituição.
A terrível situação de saúde e desnutrição causada pela invasão do garimpo ilegal na Terra Indígena Yanomami e a destruição da base de subsistência indígena com rios poluídos, caça e roças devastadas estão longe de serem resolvidas.”
E: “O comércio de ouro deve ser minuciosamente revisto para que o controle da origem do metal produzido e destinado ao setor financeiro e joalheiro seja implementado de forma sistemática”.
O Valor disse na matéria: « Você disse em 2021 que tolerar a mineração em terras indígenas constituía crime de genocídio por omissão. »
Escrevi para Albert no Facebook para comentar sobre esta entrevista: « Esta é uma ótima visão geral, mas, assim como no plano de seis pontos da Survival International, ‘PARE DE COMPRAR OURO’ está faltando. »
Afirmação de Albert de que “O comércio de ouro deve ser minuciosamente revisado para que a fiscalização da origem do metal produzido e destinado ao setor financeiro e joalheiro possa ser implementada de forma sistemática.” não é uma solução viável para o atual modelo de negócios de garimpo focado no crime organizado e na lavagem de dinheiro do tráfico, tão bem detalhado no documentário « Dirty Gold ».
Em um Tweet em 24 de janeiro de 2023, a Survival International apresentou seu “Plano de Seis Pontos”
A crise de saúde Yanomami no #Brasil é “um genocídio que está em andamento há anos” –
@SarahDeeSvl
Trabalhamos com os #Yanomami há mais de 50 anos e não piorou muito desde então. Nossa declaração para acabar com esse genocídio de uma vez por todas: https://survivalinternational.org/news/13608
@BarbaraNavarro
para responder a
@Survival e @SarahDeeSvl
#5 é LOUCO! “Limpar as cadeias produtivas para garantir que quem compra o ouro brasileiro tenha certeza de que foi produzido legalmente”? Onde você estava? Os lucros das drogas do CRIME ORGANIZADO compram ouro sujo que é lavado em refinarias e vendido em todo o mundo! #5 deve ser #BoycottGOLD4YANOMAMI!
Em 1978, Bruce Albert e outro antropólogo, Patrick Menget, fundaram a filial da Survival International “Survival International France”.
Qual foi a influência do consultor da Fundação Cartier Bruce Albert, presidente da Survival France em 2003, durante a primeira exposição “Yanomami” da Cartier?
Em 25 de maio de 2022, a Survival International twittou:
“Bruce Albert também foi vice-presidente da Survival France.” Aparentemente, Albert e Menget alternaram as funções de presidente/vice-presidente? Quando me ofereci para a Survival France, interagi apenas com o diretor, outro antropólogo, Jean-Patrick Razon.
Eles incluíram uma foto intitulada: “Bruce Albert com amigos na comunidade Yanomami de Watoriki, dezembro de 2000. Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art, Paris ©Hervé Chandès”
(Sim, Chandès, o diretor da Fondation Cartier que, como ele diz, trabalha “de mãos dadas com a casa Cartier para sua comunicação”)
Foto: Bruce Albert com amigos da comunidade Yanomami de Watoriki, dezembro de 2000. Fundação Cartier de Arte Contemporânea, Paris ©Hervé Chandès
Que contraste devastador com a situação dos Yanomami em 2023, que vivem nas ruas de Boa Vista após receberem tratamento médico para problemas de saúde causados pela devastação do garimpo em seu território:
Yanomami da comunidade Ajarani vivendo nas ruas de Boa Vista – reduzidos a vítimas de “sacrifício humano” pela indústria do ouro? Fotos: Edmar Barros
Segundo relato de Fabiano Maisonnave, « 150 Yanomami conseguem voltar para suas aldeias, mas a espera por uma vaga no voo de volta pode ser muito longa – 10 anos em casos extremos. »
Bruce Albert escreve que Davi Kopenawa “só tem orgulho de desafiar a surdez arrogante dos brancos.” Albert explicou aos Yanomami os detalhes de seu envolvimento com o negócio Cartier?
Segundo reportagem da Globo, « Pequenos negócios receberam ouro ilegal e notas fiscais ilegais. Mais tarde, eles emitiram novas notas ilegais, dando ao ouro uma aparência de legalidade. Em seguida, o ouro foi repassado para empresas maiores no topo da cadeia de exportação. »
Pode-se dizer que a compra de joias, relógios e acessórios de ouro que contenham ouro extraído ilegalmente em terras indígenas configura crime de genocídio por omissão?
Abaixo, um curta-metragem sobre o assunto do Instituto Igarapé em inglês e português:
O Papa Francisco condenou os horrores da mineração de ouro durante uma visita à Amazônia. O boom do ouro na região, disse o papa, tornou-se um « deus falso exigindo sacrifício humano » – ecoando o « ouro canibal » de Davi Kopenawa.
Foto: Xamãs Yanomami lutam contra xawara – fumaça das epidemias
trazidas por garimpeiros – instalação-mídia mista – Barbara Crane NavarroA Cartier e outras empresas da indústria do ouro realmente sabem de onde vem o ouro que vendem como bijuterias? Os regulamentos frouxos e complicados da indústria do ouro podem ter garantido que eles nunca fossem realmente capazes de saber… Eles realmente se importam? E você ?
Foto: A vigília fúnebre dos Yanomami? – instalação (detalhe) Barbara Crane NavarroUma abjeta falta de rastreabilidade permite que toneladas de ouro garimpadas em terras Indígenas nos nove países da região amazônica entrem na cadeia de abastecimento global e acabem em uma joalheria perto de você!
Para mais informações sobre a Cartier e a indústria da arte, aqui –
Acho que a melhor forma de ajudar a preservar a floresta amazônica é ajudar diretamente os povos Indígenas que a protegem! Por favor, junte-se a mim para apoiar e doar para @ApibOficial – a Articulação dos Povos Indígenas do Brasil.
Eles fazem mais do que apenas petições aos governos que se beneficiam financeiramente da destruição em curso. A Apib está ajudando as comunidades Indígenas a resolver problemas de saúde em andamento e eles, juntamente com advogados Indígenas, levar os infratores à justiça!
Seguem informações adicionais sobre a APIB em português, inglês, e espanhol:
http://emergenciaindigena.apiboficial.org
E aqui:
https://apiboficial.org/sobre/?lang=en
Por favor, doe aqui:
https://apiboficial.org/apoie/?lang=en
#5 #BoycottGOLD4YANOMAMI #Brasil #comunidades #Covid #FightEcofascism #ForaGarimpoForaCovid #MinersOutCovidOut #povos #TribalPeoples #Yanomami