#519: Hope And Despair In These Times
Voting rights, prison reform, Mexican repatriation, and learning how to hunt
Things have been heavy at school. One of our students has been in crisis. Over the past month, alongside my amazing colleagues, I’ve been trying my best to support her and her mom. Things were dark at first. And despite all our efforts, I can’t say that everything is all better now. But I am beginning to see some light.
I share this because lately, everywhere I look, and everything I read, there are opportunities for hope and despair. This week’s issue includes perspectives on societal collapse, forced repatriation, and the restriction of civil rights. But at the same time, there are accounts of resistance and resilience. There are stories of people doing something amid the scary times we’re in.
If you have time to read just one article, it has to be “An Optimistic Quest In Apocalyptic Times,” by Nylah Iqbal Muhammad. When I first read it, the piece was foreign and familiar at the same time. It expanded my worldview. Most of all, it taught me that if I want change, I have to act.
If Ms. Muhammad’s article is too much for you, I encourage you to take on:
I hope at least one of the conversations or articles resonates with you. Leave a comment if you want to share your thoughts. As always, thank you for your readership and your support of Article Club. If you appreciate the newsletter, I’d be honored if you shared it with a friend or colleague. Have a great weekend ahead!
1️⃣ An Optimistic Quest In Apocalyptic Times
Nylah Iqbal Muhammad begins this beautiful article with a provocation: “I was born in a country called The United States. This country no longer exists. Not for me, anyway. Not for many people. And, soon, maybe not for anyone.”
In this apocalyptic time, Ms. Muhammad, who is Black and Muslim, reflects on how she wants to respond, live, and thrive. Her approach is to reclaim the land that her family has lost, whether from theft or migration. She writes:
When one is landless, one loses the ability to feed and defend one’s self. One loses, in essence, their sovereignty. American capitalism coerced a people — for whom freedom was always the only goal — to believe that wealth lay in urban and suburban houses and not in land, that we should plant our future in concrete and not in rich soil.
Not only does Ms. Muhammad aim to return to the land, she also focuses on the importance of hunting. She acknowledges that “hunting has symbolized white patriarchal racial dominance and national mythmaking.” But learning to hunt, and killing and processing animals, leads Ms. Muhammad to a greater appreciation of nature and a reconnection to her ancestors.
By Nylah Iqbal Muhammad • The Bitter Southerner • 25 min • Gift Link
2️⃣ Mexican Repatriation In The 1930s
Last week’s issue focused on the attack on public education. One piece illuminated how Oklahoma, Texas, and other states have modified their social studies standards and banned teachers from creating curriculum that might interrogate a whitewashed version of our country’s past.
One reason I read is to learn. It’s to fill the gaps in my knowledge. Even though I majored in history, and even though I passed the AP U.S. History exam in high school, before this year, never once had I learned about Mexican repatriation during the Great Depression, in which 300,000 to 2 million people of Mexican descent were repatriated or deported. A large percentage were children. A large percentage were American citizens.
I’d love to know: Were you taught this in school?
3️⃣ When America Emptied Its Youth Prisons
In the 1990s and early 2000s, we believed in the danger of superpredators. We believed in taking care of broken windows, or else more serious crime would follow. Most of all, we believed that there were good kids and bad kids, and bad kids should remain behind bars, so that they would learn from their evil deeds.
And then, beginning around 2000, something changed. Over the last 20-plus years, the number of young people incarcerated in our country rapidly declined, by an astonishing 77 percent.
This article explains how that trend happened. It goes on to demonstrate that crime has not risen as a result. Finally, the piece asks whether our culture is shifting, at least in how we think about our children. Is prison no longer “rooted in the American consciousness,” as Angela Y. Davis suggests, “as an inevitable fact of life, like birth and death?”
By James Forman Jr. • The New York Times Magazine • 23 min • Gift Link
➕ Here is the article read by the author.
4️⃣ If The Voting Rights Act Falls
For most of American history, the right to vote has been restricted. The 15th and 19th amendments extended the franchise. But the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was the first piece of legislation that truly made a lasting difference. For half a century, there was wide agreement among liberal and conservative lawmakers not to trample on this fundamental right. But then came Shelby County v. Holder in 2013, and ever since, Southern states have redrawn electoral maps to decrease the voting power of Black Americans. This year, the Supreme Court will likely gut the VRA, calling its provisions no longer necessary to counteract racism in our country’s past.
This podcast does a great job explaining the impact of what’s about to happen.
By Hanna Rosin • Radio Atlantic • 33 min • Apple Podcasts
Thank you for reading and listening this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀
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