Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

The “Great Contradiction” of US Incarceration
Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
10 Sep 2019
🖨️ Print Article

Donte Mitchell, a longtime prisoner of the State of New York, finds essential truths in the poem, “The Great Contradiction,” as it applies to the two million prisoners in US. “We want them to be a part of our community, so we isolate them from our community; we want them to have self-worth, so we destroy their self-worth….”

Mass Black Incarceration

Related Podcasts

Involuntary Servitude in the Prison System
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Involuntary Servitude in the Prison System
24 June 2022
Savannah Eldrige is the founder of Coaliton to Abolish Slave
White Capitalist Law vs “Uncontrollable Blackness”
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
White Capitalist Law vs “Uncontrollable Blackness”
01 September 2020
The United States “criminalizes Black Americans,” but Black men “are not looking to be controlled” by this racist system, said Douglas
 Getting Out the Word: #PrisonsKill
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
Getting Out the Word: #PrisonsKill
25 August 2020
The Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee, IWOC, “is committed to the militant organizing of prisoners that takes its leadership and focus from

More Stories


  • Wolfgang Bronner
    North Nashville's Reckoning: The Fight for Sovereignty in the Shadow of a Data Center
    19 Aug 2026
    Fisk University, an HBCU, is presenting a $400 million A.I. data center as progress for the North Nashville community. In truth, it means more pollution, more surveillance, and another chapter in a…
  • Ryan Kost
    A Judge Said Queens Prosecutors Hid Evidence. A Secret Committee Cleared Them Anyway.
    19 Aug 2026
    The mass incarceration system demands thousands of Black bodies behind bars. That system is maintained by prosecutorial misconduct which goes unpunished. That impunity is integral to keeping the…
  • Paul Tiyambe Zeleza
    Who Killed Jason Arday?
    19 Aug 2026
    Arday was killed by the contradiction at the heart of white elite institutions: they want the appearance of racial progress without structural change, and they readily discard Black people, even…
  • Abayomi Azikiwe
    United States and Israeli Policy Further Divides Somalia
    19 Aug 2026
    White House to cut back on United Nations assistance while there is continued military and diplomatic interference by Washington and Tel Aviv in support of Somaliland, which has not been recognized…
  • Kimberly D. Miller
    Beyond the "Delcyification" of Analysis
    19 Aug 2026
    Siege, survival, and the dialectics of Venezuelan sovereignty.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us