How the War on Drugs explains the state
Channel: ItHadToBeSaid
Date: 2020-06-14

The War on Drugs is a pretty typical policy in all kinds of ways. In this video, I use the War on Drugs to explain how the state, capitalism and racism work, how they come together and destroy millions of lives. I look at the history of prohibition, the propaganda, the wars, the prisons, and why it’s mostly black and brown people who are targeted.

Links: 

A primer on the state: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXVC1ZMSNAM

Sponsors of the anti-drug organizations: https://blog.oup.com/2016/08/drug-free-america/

The War on Drugs by numbers: https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/criminal-justice/reports/2018/06/27/452819/ending-war-drugs-numbers/

Anti-drug propaganda: https://allthatsinteresting.com/20th-century-anti-marijuana-propaganda

CIA drug trafficking: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_CIA_drug_trafficking

Civil asset forfeiture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United_States

A history of the the War on Drugs: https://menso.wordpress.com/2010/09/13/an-assessment-of-us-drug-war-policy-no-victories-only-failure/

The revolving door of government and lobbyists: https://www.opensecrets.org/news/issues/marijuana/

Regulatory capture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture

The special interest groups keeping cannabis illegal: https://thefreshtoast.com/cannabis/meet-the-special-interests-keeping-cannabis-illegal/

Companies that use prison labor: https://www.ranker.com/list/companies-in-the-united-states-that-use-prison-labor/genevieve-carlton

Causes of death: https://www.drugwarfacts.org/chapter/causes_of_death

How the poor are criminalized: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/06/how-poverty-became-crime-america

Books: 

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander: https://newjimcrow.com/

Bad Neighbor Policy: Washington’s Futile War on Drugs in Latin America by Ted Galen Carpenter: https://www.cato.org/books/bad-neighbor-policy-washingtons-futile-war-drugs-latin-america

Drug Crazy: How We Got into This Mess and How We Can Get out by Mike Gray: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/378906.Drug_Crazy