Official Participant in the Youth Media Blog-a-Thon

From: FOBBDeep

While most people are caught up in the election hype surrounding the race to the Presidency, it’s important to remember that there’s a hell of a lot of other things on the ballot to research. There are the congressional elections that are taking place for each person’s respective district, 12 state propositions, and whatever other propositions and local offices exist in one’s district.

To reitirate, there are 12 propositions on the California state ballot. For the Presidential undecided voters, who confuse me more than Republicans, this means you need to figure out that part of the ballot yesterday and start researching the other important things that in many aspects affect you even more.

Ideally, I would l would like to drop some knowledge on each of these propositions, but I’m busy as hell with classes and have to select the ones that I feel an urgency to speak. In this case, it’s regarding Proposition 6 aka the Runner’s Initiative: Police and Law Enforcement Funding. Criminal Penalties and Laws. Initiative Statute.

In a state where the institution criminalizes the youth and tracks them to become products of the prison industrial complex, such an initiative further perpetuates the cycle of injustice. Prop 6 essentially mandates nearly $1 billion each year towards a failing criminal justice system. This would in turn cut funds in education, healthcare, and other vital social programs that work at the roots. Instead of pumping more money to place even more folks behind prisons, what is needed is community-based solutions to curb the crime and violence.

What is ironic about the initiative is that the biggest contributor towards Prop 6’s passage, Henry T. Nicholas, has his own justice problem as he has been accused of securites fraud and multiple drug crimes.

Don’t let the name “Safe Neighborhood’s Act” fool ya’. It’s just going to make the problems that exist even worse. The anti-gang talk just further promotes the war on the youth, allowing more 14 year old to be tried as adults.