Question

1. Based on movie 13th, answer for the following questions:

a) Why is the film called 13th? What connection is the filmmaker finding between incarceration and the constitution?

b) Slavery was an economic system. When slaves became free, what happened? Why did they enter incarceration?

c) How did this create a mythology of black criminality?

d) What was the impact of the early “Birth of a Nation” film? (include at least three major points)

e) Why are the phrases “a war on crime” and later “a war on drugs” considered dog whistle politics?

f) What is the Southern Strategy laid out by Nixon and Lee Atwater? How does this sound similar to the aftermath of this election?

g) What effect did the mandatory sentencing on crack have on communities of color?

h) How did the three-strikes law in CA come into being? And what impact did that have on incarceration?

i) “Over 90 percent of criminal prosecutors are white.” Why is this important when it comes to the three-strikes law and truth of sentencing?

j) What happened to many of the black leaders of the 1960s? Since there weren’t many prominent black leaders in the late 1970s and early 1980s, how did that impact mass incarceration laws?

k) Explain ALEC and its impact on incarceration.

l) What is the conflict with CCA in lowering crime?

m) Why do the poor, accused population often not go to trial?

n) How does the movie prove that wealth not guilt shapes outcomes in the criminal justice system?

Answer 1

• a)The film explores the "intersection of race, justice, and mass incarceration in the United States;" it is titled after the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which freed the slaves and prohibited slavery, with the exception of slavery as punishment for a crime.
  
• It has been 150 years since slavery was officially abolished in the United States, but documentary “13th” argues that it is still alive in the form of mass incarceration that disproportionately affects black people.
• The documentary owes its title to the 13th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which ended slavery in 1865.
• The film deconstructs the 13th amendment, breaks down all of the repercussions, the echoes of that amendment throughout history to the present day.
• The filmmaker makes it clear that the U.S. prison system is the nation’s greatest shame since slavery.
• More than that, she posits that it is actually a continuation of slavery. The systemic denial of freedom to African Americans is tied up in both institutions, and DuVernay new work makes those connections undeniable. In fact, her film argues convincingly that the country’s current incarceration state might be worse than slavery.
• Slavery would have been abolished in 1865 by the 13th Amendment (hence the film’s title), but for one small clause that all but grandfathered slavery back in for the sake of crime and punishment.
• That clause reads that slavery shall no longer exist in the U.S. “except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.“ America has been unshy about exploiting that clause to great profit ever since, and 13th duly chides the nation for it.
• Due to time limit,remaining can be asked as another question,they will be answered,thankyou for your cooperation