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lactoseintolerant's review against another edition
This book has a bizarrely pro-cop and pro-policing-in-general tone, while providing information on how racist the policing and court systems are. If you're looking for prison abolition viewpoints, you will not find them here (which is greatly misleading with the positioning of Angela Davis as a key author- whoops! wrong middle initial). If you're looking for a lot of facts about racism towards Black men within law enforcement, prosecution and prosecutors, and juries, without challenging the ideals of American justice, this is the book for you. The focus on prosecutors was greatly informative. Somehow circling back to bad apple theory after essays upon essays explaining how racism extends to every facet of the justice system was extremely frustrating.
nuhafariha's review
4.0
What I enjoyed most was the way the authors drew connections between past and present legal cases and delved into legal socialism, or the the way prejudices in the legal system infiltrate social circles and inspire certain behaviors and mindsets. In particular, I liked how the authors traced historical laws against nonblack POC such as Asian Americans as the foundation for present racial-based laws pointing to consistent inability of the US judicial system to correct its racial predilections. The stats in this collection of essays gets repetitive. And for good reason, they are horrifying and necessary to point out again and again, just like it's horrifying that a book like this has to be written over and over again.
caughtbetweenpages's review
emotional
informative
fast-paced
Not rating, in keeping with my general practice with non-fiction.
This collection of essays about the injustices Black men face in the American justice system gives an important overview of the history of racism in the US (particularly as it ties to the police and judicial bodies therein) and how it has perpetuated and reinforced systems leading to the over-incarceration and dehumanization of Black men. While I knew about the individual parts many of the essays were written about, presenting them as one collective body of work helped me tie the various pieces together and understand more completely the complexity and inherent racism within the system as a whole; I hadn't realized the degree to which prosecutors hold the lives of Black men in balance, and how easily they can tip those balances without recourse and reinforce the cycles that empower the system of oppression in the first place.
This collection of essays about the injustices Black men face in the American justice system gives an important overview of the history of racism in the US (particularly as it ties to the police and judicial bodies therein) and how it has perpetuated and reinforced systems leading to the over-incarceration and dehumanization of Black men. While I knew about the individual parts many of the essays were written about, presenting them as one collective body of work helped me tie the various pieces together and understand more completely the complexity and inherent racism within the system as a whole; I hadn't realized the degree to which prosecutors hold the lives of Black men in balance, and how easily they can tip those balances without recourse and reinforce the cycles that empower the system of oppression in the first place.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Police brutality, and Xenophobia
malikp's review
3.0
Policing the Black Man is a collection of essays covering the topics such as: policing, incarceration, the court system, implicit bias and more. These essays go through great lengths to explain concepts fundamental to understanding the role policing plays in the lives of Black men. Using lots of research and data, the various authors do a good job breaking down these concepts, but a lot of the essays are covering overlapping themes. The read gets really redundant towards the end.
siobhans_shelf's review against another edition
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
4.5