May 11, 2022 • 24 mins
After landing in prison as a teenager under the Three Strikes law, Jay Jordan knows the ins and outs of the carceral system from firsthand experience. This knowledge informs his advocacy and leadership as the CEO of the Alliance for Safety and Justice.
In the second part of our 2-part conversation, Jay addresses what we need to do to move from a system of punishment to a system of care, and helps us imagine what that system of care could look like. He tells the stories of violence interrupters who are out on the streets every day, saving lives. We also discuss the role of creativity in activism and how it manifests to bring us into a better world.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
- Hello and welcome to "A New Legacy,"
where we have conversationsabout new visions
for justice and healing inthis era of mass incarceration.
I'm Jess Nichol and I'mhere with my sister, Annie.
And today we are sharing the second half
of our conversation with Jay Jordan,
CEO of Alliance for Safety and Justice.
As we mentioned in part one,
(00:21):
this was such a rich andwide-ranging conversation
that we decided to dividethis into two episodes
to ensure that we are able to include
everything Jay had to say.
- Yeah, so part one of this conversation
which is already published on our website
includes his personal story
and the context for his political work.
And in this second episode,
(00:43):
we go into more detail aboutthe problematic approaches
of how our justice system addresses crime
and how we might more effectively
disrupt cycles of violence and harm.
- Right.
Jay talks about the reactivesystem that we have,
which is very differentfrom a preventative one.
Police respond to crime after it happens,
(01:06):
but there really isn't nearly enough focus
put on preventing that crime
from happening in the first place.
So this system we currently have is one
of retribution and punishment
rather than a system of care, as Jay says.
- Yeah and many people know that
our current criminal legalsystem is doing a lot of harm
to the most marginalizedpeople in our country.
(01:28):
But it's important thatwe learn from people
who have firsthand experienceswith what the problems are
or what other options have been created
or what to actually do about it right now.
And Jay talks about allof these challenges,
as well as things thatare actually working now
in service of public safety.
- I love what he shares in his episode
(01:49):
about violence interrupters
who go out and support peoplewho are in the streets,
mediating conflict,
and literally removingguns from people's hands.
- Yeah, and that willactually be a big theme
of some episodes that we have coming up.
So stay tuned for that.
- So I am gonna read aquick version of Jay's bio.
(02:12):
Jay Jordan has worked at theintersection of social justice
and politics throughout his career.
He serves as Alliance forSafety and Justice's CEO,
overseeing all of ASJ's state-based teams
and reform advocacy efforts,
as well as the #TimeDoneNational Director.
Jay co-founded theorganization's #TimeDone campaign
to organize people livingwith past conviction records
(02:33):
to eliminate the barriers to opportunity
that blocked them from success.
He previously served as Executive Director
of ASJ's flagship state-based program,
Californians for Safety and Justice.
If you'd like to learn more about Jay
and the incredible work he's done,
please visit our website at anewlegacy.com
to read his full bio and learn about
the various projects andcampaigns he's worked on.
(02:54):
And now, we will dive into part two
of our amazing conversationwith Jay Jordan.
(lively music)
- Right now across the country,
homicides are up, domestic violence is up.
But these things werealready beginning to boil,
because prior to COVID,
(03:15):
there was a mental health crisis,
there were the drugaddiction crises in America,
there were the homelessnesscrises in America.
When you have mental illness
and drug addiction in a household,
there's gonna be someviolence in that household.
When you have povertymixed with mental illness
and drug addiction on the streets,
you're going to get homicides.
When you look at thesystem's role in this,
they wait for homicides to happen.
(03:36):
And then they're like,"Oh, listen to police.
Listen to detectives."
Ambulances don't comeuntil something happened.
Why would a police show up at your house
if nothing happened?
Let's just put that on the shelf.
The system has nothing to do
with preventing homicides at all.
The system has nothing to do
with preventing DVs at all.
It only responds to it after it happens.
Now, how do you prevent it from happening?
(03:58):
This is what most peopleare trying to figure out
that are in the field.
It's not like we don'twanna abolish the system
or get rid of cops.
No, it's like,
how do we prevent thisstuff from happening?
There is a community-basedpublic safety infrastructure
that has existed in communities,
but it hasn't been funded in away that it should be funded.
When you look at frontline workers,
(04:19):
our frontline interventionists,
these are violence interrupters.
These are sometimes clergy,
these are coaches,
these are fathers.
Most of them are men,some of them are women.
These are uncles that are in the streets
from these communities,
they are literally takingguns out of young men's hands.
I was down in Albuquerque onmy way here, with Chief Albino,
and he runs a shop called La Plazita.
(04:42):
And he was telling meabout this young woman
who had a gun in her backpack
and he literally was like,
"Give me the gun now.
Put it on my desk now.
You do not need a gun.
You are here to do cultural organizing.
Give me the gun now."
And he got her to give him the gun.
Like, police don't do that.
Probation doesn't do that.
DAs don't do that.
Frontline gang interventionists,
(05:03):
assertive outreach workersthat are in the community
and saying, "Hey, what do you need?
Talk to me.
Let me tell you aboutthe way the world works."
These systems of care,
victims advocates,
not necessarily theones in the DA's office
but folks that do victims outreach,
and trauma recovery centers,
give them the tools and resources
they need to be successful in that system.
(05:23):
The criminal justice systemis not a system of care.
It's a system ofretribution and punishment.
And we need a complimentary system of care
that is in community
that is funded by public dollars
that prevents crime from happening.
If you look at what Aqeela Sherrill
had been able to do in Newark, right?
Gun violence reduced by 40%.
(05:44):
That is more than 100 peoplethat still have their life.
When you look at what'shappening in Los Angeles
and gun violence in Los Angeles, right?
Like, you have violenceinterventionists out there
putting their life on the line,
saying, "Don't shoot."
You know you have clergy inOakland doing night walks,
in Stockton doing night walks,
(06:05):
walking down these dangerousneighborhoods saying,
"Hey man, I wanna prayfor you, young brother.
You look like you're physicallygonna do some crazy stuff."
That is essentially what is needed.
Because the cops, they'renot there for that.
- This is the essential piece.
This piece, I feel so inspired.
It's like, these areheroes that are going out
at night on the streetsand talking to people
(06:28):
and taking their guns
and intervening in whatcould be deadly violence.
These are such heroes.
- Yeah they are, they are.
And there's dozens of them.
There's hundreds ofthem across the country.
Dozens of them in California.
I break it down into four buckets.
You have gang interventionists,
you have assertive outreach workers,
you have victims advocates,
(06:49):
and you have trauma recovery centers.
And then you have youth programs,
mentorship programs.
And the big one that noone really talks about
is youth sports.
There's a component of youth sports
that no one really talks about,
which is the mentorship.
A lot of kids of color,their lives are saved
because they go into youth sports.
And so this hugeapparatus of ensuring that
(07:10):
this subset of society,
from the ages of like 14 to 26,
that's the sweet spot right there.
That's the Goldilocks Song.
14 to 26 men of color andwhite men living in poverty,
have been through sometraumatic experience,
you know, single parent household,
grades are slipping.
We know who's susceptible tocommit violence and crime.
(07:32):
Like we know that, right?
And so why not invest money
into ensuring that they are okay?
There's an infrastructure that exists
in every single community like this
that is not funded with public dollars.
And that for me is whywe advocate at CSJ, ASJ,
to get people who shouldn'tbe in prison and jails
(07:52):
out of prisons and jails.
Like if you have a drug addiction problem,
why are you in jail?
If you have a mental illness problem,
why are you in jail?
If you stole a bike
because you didn't havemoney to buy a bike,
why, give this guy a job!
Don't put him in jail.
You spending $70,000,
just spend $50 for a bike.
You know what I mean?
Get those folks out.
Put them in a system of careto streamline them to success.
(08:14):
Take the money we save,which is gonna be billions,
and pump it into thecommunity-based public safety system
to prevent crime from happening,
lower the crime rate andlower the amount of money
we have to spend on punishing people.
It is a very simple concept.
The hard part about it is this.
It takes a paradigm shift.
Like, how do you tell an entire system
(08:36):
that have been doingsomething one way for so long,
and they're called heroesfor doing that one thing,
that some of the stuffthat they're doing is wrong
and maybe a little bit racist?
What y'all are doing is so important
because that story needs to be told.
We're not saying they're the enemy.
We're not saying the men andwomen who put on uniforms
and robes and go into these courthouses,
(08:58):
and these police cars, intothese jails and prisons,
are bad people.
No, they are in a systemof care for themselves,
not for the community.
They're in a system of punishment,
they're upholding thatsystem of punishment.
We need to ensure those menand women who wanna lace up
and go protect the community,
put them in a system ofcare in their community
that they live in
so they can prevent crime from happening
(09:19):
instead of putting themin a system of punishment
and upholding that system of punishment.
It's backwards.- Yeah. Yeah.
It feels like we're in thisincredibly crucial moment
where people who are lessimpacted by incarceration
are really beginning toquestion and reevaluate
a lot of the conventional thinking
around the criminal justice system.
One of the main things alot of people assume is that
(09:40):
harsh mandatory sentencinglaws are what victims want.
And obviously, that's not true for us
and for many crime survivors.
And you've spoken to this a bit already
but, you know, what do weneed to do as individuals
to challenge our thinkingaround criminal justice
and incarceration in this country?
- Well, folks just need totake a very logical view.
(10:01):
Logic and reasoning inthis is super important.
And parallels as well.
And everyone needs to do this.
Let's do parallels first.
Look at every other government system
and how that government system is set up
or how that system of care is set up.
A lot of people put thecriminal justice system
next to the public health system.
(10:22):
'Cause that's like, the closest you get
is where people havesomething done with them
and then the public steps in to help them.
Healthcare, whatever.
You put this system upto any other system,
if our healthcare systemfailed 60 to 70% of the time,
would we be talking aboutuniversal healthcare system?
No.
We'll be like, we don'twant the government system
in my household
(10:43):
because y'all are failing60 or 70% of the time.
I don't want that.
Like I said, what do people want?
If you had one thing that system did,
one thing the system did, right?
What would that one thing be?
And most people will sayto not have any crime.
You don't get to know crime bywaiting for crime to happen.
(11:05):
There's this parable that puts it best.
You're on a river and you seea baby floating in the river.
You take the baby out theriver, you take care of it.
And you see another babyfloating up the river
and you take the baby and take care of it.
At some point, you have to go upstream
and see who's puttingthese babies in the river.
And that's the justice system now.
And the people are like, hey, listen,
we're tired of just takingthese babies out the river.
We need to go upstream andfigure what's going on.
(11:26):
If we know that Jay Jordan who's 15,
his grades are slipping andhe's running away from home
two and three days at a time,
he's highly susceptible to be in trouble
with the justice system.
Just for the sheer fact thathe's out in the streets.
If we know that, what arethe system of care for that?
(11:46):
We need to, as individuals,
begin to look at this system
through very clear logicand reasoning and parallels,
and then challenge the status quo.
Instead of me picking up thephone and calling the police,
let me see if I can call mylocal pastor or some mentorship.
(12:08):
A lot of time, we thinkthat we have to build up
these huge campaigns.
And it's like, no, asindividuals, just have an analysis
and then interact with theworld through that analysis.
If a million people in America did that,
where it's like, hey,this system is not right.
We need a system where weprevent crime from happening.
Let's like stop for lockingpeople with mental illness up
and people in poverty up,
and interact with the world that way,
(12:29):
your conversation at your church,
with your family members,
is gonna be different.
And do it through alens of love and grace.
Horrible and evil thingshave happened to people,
good people, undeserving people.
And instead of singling out
and putting in things into context
and having an analysisof how that happened,
(12:50):
we put these blanket laws out there.
And these laws end upharming communities of color.
Because communities of color
are the ones where themost police are at, right?
And that is the problem withthe criminal justice system
and incarceration first laws,
is we don't put things into context
when something very, very bad happens.
We say, we just need to lock everybody up.
(13:10):
It's like, no, it's not the case, man.
People will need systems of care.
Give ourselves graceand do it through love.
But have an analysis.
Interact with the world through that lens
and put these things into context,
with parallels and logic and reasoning.
And I think if we all do that,
it makes people like me'sjob a whole lot easier
to go into a state house and say,
(13:32):
"Listen, when I say safety,
I'm saying the samething as Annie and Jess."
And they may say it through the lens of,
hey, we're spending too much money
on a system that doesn't keep us safe;
I may say safety because, hey man,
I can't get a job after I get out.
We all are saying the same thing.
And the system has to listen to us.
- Yeah.
This piece about, it'sa paradigm shift, right?
(13:54):
We could talk aboutredistributing dollars,
but what's gonna get us toredistribute those dollars?
It is an internal paradigm shift.
Something has to happen such that
people want to redistribute those dollars,
such that the programming
does get the support that it needs.
That's a pretty important step.
- A lot of it is culture too, right?
Our culture contributes to our politics.
(14:17):
And look at how manycrime shows are out there.
It used to be just "Law & Order."
♪ Dat-dat-da-dun ♪
Now it's like a "Law & Order (14:21):
SVU,"
"Law & Order (14:23):
Los Angeles,"
"NCIS" and "S.W.A.T." and "FBI."
And it's like, these badguys are out here trying to-
You know, and it's like, wait a minute.
How much of America is actually bad?
A lot of violent crime happens
when they're a relationship.
A lot of random crime happensbecause it's quality of life.
It's quality of life.
(14:43):
Everything that I've donewas because I didn't have.
I don't know any well-meaning person,
that's making over $100,000 a year,
that's out there stealingbikes, breaking into houses.
It just doesn't happen.
I know some rich people
that are doing crimes,you know what I mean?
But that's not the crimethat gets laws passed
and sweeps up into our communities.
If we want to address it,
(15:04):
let's address theunderlying causes of crime.
And if we were to change the culture,
we had TV shows and more documentaries
about the underlyingcauses of criminality.
And we treated crimelike it was a disease,
like it was a symptom and not the cause.
If we applied the same strategiesto preventative medicine
(15:24):
and to targeted treatment,
if we applied that to crime,
what's more deadly thanpoverty, unemployment,
lack of education, drugabuse, and mental illness?
That's the most deadliestthing you can have.
I wouldn't want to go into a society
where that was prevalent.
'Cause I know crime is gonna happen.
I'm not gonna catch a disease,I'm gonna catch a bullet!
(15:44):
We need to change culture.
We need to stop having a culture
of punishment and glorifying this whole,
people are bad narrative,people are just criminals.
Instead of saying, hey, thesefolks went through some stuff.
And get this.
100% of women who find themselvesin prison in California
were a victim ever beforethey were incarcerated.
(16:06):
That tells it all, right?
We are not addressingthe underlying causes.
Communities were saying,
we need an alternativeapproach to public safety.
That wasn't to say defund the police,
not to just defund themall and abolish them.
They were saying,
we need money to preventcrime from happening.
It is my sincerest desire
that we can have thispublic discussion again,
(16:28):
like we had last year.
Saying, what are the alternativestrategies to policing?
If we can have that samepublic dialogue and say,
this is the alternative strategy;
cops don't prevent crime;
these are the people who prevent crime.
These coaches, theseviolence interrupters.
Like that, I believe, when wehave these inflection points,
is when good people needto stand up and say,
wait a minute, thisdoesn't make any sense.
(16:48):
And I imagine that when this happens,
there's gonna be tremendous room
and space for folks like y'all to be like,
hey, actually, no, thatdoesn't make any sense.
We actually need to do something better.
I'm extremely hopeful.
I'll tell you why I'm extremely hopeful.
Because for the first time,
I actually felt that people are listening.
(17:10):
Everybody.
There was something that happened to us
as a country with George Floyd.
There was something that happened there
that we all were like, this is wrong.
I believe it's up to goodminded folks with an analysis,
stand in and say, hey,this is what we can build.
Shared safety strategiesthat actually make sense.
(17:31):
We have a president inthere that understands.
This my true deepest desire,
that we begin to look at thiscomplementary infrastructure
that's community-based, that exists,
and that has literally operatedwith little to no funding
in communities around this country.
And I feel like if we shipdollars to that infrastructure,
(17:55):
we are going to begin to seethe end of mass incarceration
as we know it because peopleare gonna say, hey, listen.
The stories that come from that,
calling people heroes.
When you begin to raise those folks up
and then law enforcement startto say, yeah, we need them,
get this,
gang interventionists don't operate
outside the purview of law enforcement.
They talk to law enforcement.
(18:17):
Let us do our job.
We're trying to prevent youfrom having to do your job.
And that's the beauty of it.
What's more American than that, right?
Like people who may be on twodifferent sides of the fence
coming together to say,we all want safety.
You do your job, and hopefully,
I ain't gotta come and arrest anybody.
And that for me is beautiful.
- I'm gonna wait for thatmoment 'cause we're ready.
(18:38):
When that conversationstarts coming up again,
we're ready to take part in that.
- It's gonna happensooner rather than later.
I'm an organizer, so we'regonna make it happen.
- Yeah it's so great,Jay, talking with you.
We have all of these questions
and I don't even knowif we asked most of them
because you just hit them.
It's awesome to get tohear your perspectives
and to get to learn from you.
(19:00):
I feel incredibly inspiredhere talking with you
and we have this final set of questions.
This will be kind of like an interesting
final question for you, Jay.
It's a little bit of a tangent
from what we've been discussing
but I'm personally really curious about
the connection betweenadvocacy and creativity.
I've noticed that so many activists
are incredibly creative people
(19:21):
and it makes sense thatyou would have to be
a really creative and innovative mind
to be a leader in this world
and be amending these rigid policies
that have been in place for decades.
And so I was just curious about you.
I was curious if you have othermeans of creative expression
and if so, what are they?
And do they feel like it'sfueled by the work that you do?
- I'm actually studying that.
Oh my God, I'm studying thebrain science of creativity
(19:42):
through the wounds of oppression.
So I stay up at night,
two, three in the morning sometimes
when the kiddos are asleepand the wife is laying down
and like that's my creative time.
Something about just the stillness.
And it reminds me of creativityas a means of escape,
is how we're able to remain hopeful.
(20:05):
The world is burning down around you.
Rome is burning.
And if you feed into the flames,
you would never be able tosee, okay, when this burns,
we're gonna be able to use the ashes
to build a mosaic of history.
Starting from prison,
used to write movie scripts.
I wrote plays.
And then I began to tryto reimagine systems.
(20:28):
Go back to what Maya Angelou said, right?
The question can't existunless the answer is out there
somewhere in the universe.
And that's, you know, themoral of why caged bird sings.
You have to be creativein times of despair.
Think about the motherwho comforts her child
when their stomachs are growling at night
and they don't have any money.
They get creative, well let's play a game.
(20:50):
And so like creativityas a means of escape
is why advocates are so creative.
I mean, look at hip hop, country music,
turning sorrow and pain into creativity.
I mean, look at rap.
Rap is all about theexperience of poverty.
I mean Tupac, his song "Changes":
I see no changes.
I wake up in the morning and I ask myself,
is life worth living?
Should I blast myself?
(21:10):
I'm tired of being broke,
even worse, I'm black.
Stomach hurts so, I'm lookingfor a purse to snatch, right?
It's being creative abouttelling the story of poverty.
And this is deep withparticularly black people.
We were thrown scraps.
We had to be creative.
We were in bondage.
When I think aboutliving through Jim Crow,
you know, my dad's storiesabout having to cross the street
(21:33):
because a white woman waswalking on the sidewalk.
His parents tellinghim, "Let's play a game.
Let's cross the street."
Creativity as a means ofescape your current conditions
because your conditions are so abhorrent
and so harmful and so painful
that you have to allow your brain
to do what it it needs to do.
And I believe that wasa gift from our creator,
to give us a brain that imagines
(21:55):
and can be creative to take us away.
Because some of this stuff is so painful,
deeply, deeply, deeply hurtful,
that all we can do isimagine a different place.
And that's what reimaginingjustice is about.
It's not about wantingto tear things down,
it's about knowing thatwe have been harmed
so much in this country.
All we can do is just imagine.
And when you imagine something,
(22:17):
like, you can turn those thingsinto concrete next steps.
Who would have thoughtthat Jay Jordan right here
would be in Oklahoma with my parents?
My dad owns 40 acres in the same city
where he went to segregated schools.
Now he owns land.
He has 40 acres and cows.
(22:37):
I'm talking to Annie and Jess Nichol
about transforming a system
that told me when I was in second grade
that I was a criminal.
- I feel so moved by that.
And it does feel like theanswer in so many ways.
Like we have to be brave enough
to imagine something different
than what we've alwaysassumed would be true
(22:58):
or taken for granted.
And I just feel so grateful to you, Jay,
for talking with us today.
This conversation has been a gift.
And I feel changed by it
and I feel really excitedto follow your lead.
- Yeah, and it seems likethe change is happening.
Here you are in Oklahoma, yourdad's farm, talking to us.
(23:19):
Yes, there's a lot to change still,
but it is happening.
You're hopeful, we're hopeful.
People have attention on this.
It's happening.
It's inevitable.
And I think that's oneof the biggest takeaways
or impressions that I'm leftwith in being with you, Jay.
And I feel so moved.
I mean, after talking with you,
I feel the goodness of the inevitability
(23:41):
of the change that's already happening.
- Thank you.
(lively music)
- Thank you for joining us and listening
to Jay Jordan speak tothese important issues.
We hope you were as moved
and inspired by his words as we were.
If you would like to learn more,
donate or support thework he's been a part of,
please go to our website, anewlegacy.com.
(24:03):
(lively music)
- Hello and welcome to "A New Legacy,"
where we have conversationsabout new visions
for justice and healing inthis era of mass incarceration.
I'm Jess Nichol and I'mhere with my sister, Annie.
And today we are sharing the second half
of our conversation with Jay Jordan,
CEO of Alliance for Safety and Justice.
As we mentioned in part one,
(00:21):
this was such a rich andwide-ranging conversation
that we decided to dividethis into two episodes
to ensure that we are able to include
everything Jay had to say.
- Yeah, so part one of this conversation
which is already published on our website
includes his personal story
and the context for his political work.
And in this second episode,
(00:43):
we go into more detail aboutthe problematic approaches
of how our justice system addresses crime
and how we might more effectively
disrupt cycles of violence and harm.
- Right.
Jay talks about the reactivesystem that we have,
which is very differentfrom a preventative one.
Police respond to crime after it happens,
(01:06):
but there really isn't nearly enough focus
put on preventing that crime
from happening in the first place.
So this system we currently have is one
of retribution and punishment
rather than a system of care, as Jay says.
- Yeah and many people know that
our current criminal legalsystem is doing a lot of harm
to the most marginalizedpeople in our country.
(01:28):
But it's important thatwe learn from people
who have firsthand experienceswith what the problems are
or what other options have been created
or what to actually do about it right now.
And Jay talks about allof these challenges,
as well as things thatare actually working now
in service of public safety.
- I love what he shares in his episode
(01:49):
about violence interrupters
who go out and support peoplewho are in the streets,
mediating conflict,
and literally removingguns from people's hands.
- Yeah, and that willactually be a big theme
of some episodes that we have coming up.
So stay tuned for that.
- So I am gonna read aquick version of Jay's bio.
(02:12):
Jay Jordan has worked at theintersection of social justice
and politics throughout his career.
He serves as Alliance forSafety and Justice's CEO,
overseeing all of ASJ's state-based teams
and reform advocacy efforts,
as well as the #TimeDoneNational Director.
Jay co-founded theorganization's #TimeDone campaign
to organize people livingwith past conviction records
(02:33):
to eliminate the barriers to opportunity
that blocked them from success.
He previously served as Executive Director
of ASJ's flagship state-based program,
Californians for Safety and Justice.
If you'd like to learn more about Jay
and the incredible work he's done,
please visit our website at anewlegacy.com
to read his full bio and learn about
the various projects andcampaigns he's worked on.
(02:54):
And now, we will dive into part two
of our amazing conversationwith Jay Jordan.
(lively music)
- Right now across the country,
homicides are up, domestic violence is up.
But these things werealready beginning to boil,
because prior to COVID,
(03:15):
there was a mental health crisis,
there were the drugaddiction crises in America,
there were the homelessnesscrises in America.
When you have mental illness
and drug addiction in a household,
there's gonna be someviolence in that household.
When you have povertymixed with mental illness
and drug addiction on the streets,
you're going to get homicides.
When you look at thesystem's role in this,
they wait for homicides to happen.
(03:36):
And then they're like,"Oh, listen to police.
Listen to detectives."
Ambulances don't comeuntil something happened.
Why would a police show up at your house
if nothing happened?
Let's just put that on the shelf.
The system has nothing to do
with preventing homicides at all.
The system has nothing to do
with preventing DVs at all.
It only responds to it after it happens.
Now, how do you prevent it from happening?
(03:58):
This is what most peopleare trying to figure out
that are in the field.
It's not like we don'twanna abolish the system
or get rid of cops.
No, it's like,
how do we prevent thisstuff from happening?
There is a community-basedpublic safety infrastructure
that has existed in communities,
but it hasn't been funded in away that it should be funded.
When you look at frontline workers,
(04:19):
our frontline interventionists,
these are violence interrupters.
These are sometimes clergy,
these are coaches,
these are fathers.
Most of them are men,some of them are women.
These are uncles that are in the streets
from these communities,
they are literally takingguns out of young men's hands.
I was down in Albuquerque onmy way here, with Chief Albino,
and he runs a shop called La Plazita.
(04:42):
And he was telling meabout this young woman
who had a gun in her backpack
and he literally was like,
"Give me the gun now.
Put it on my desk now.
You do not need a gun.
You are here to do cultural organizing.
Give me the gun now."
And he got her to give him the gun.
Like, police don't do that.
Probation doesn't do that.
DAs don't do that.
Frontline gang interventionists,
(05:03):
assertive outreach workersthat are in the community
and saying, "Hey, what do you need?
Talk to me.
Let me tell you aboutthe way the world works."
These systems of care,
victims advocates,
not necessarily theones in the DA's office
but folks that do victims outreach,
and trauma recovery centers,
give them the tools and resources
they need to be successful in that system.
(05:23):
The criminal justice systemis not a system of care.
It's a system ofretribution and punishment.
And we need a complimentary system of care
that is in community
that is funded by public dollars
that prevents crime from happening.
If you look at what Aqeela Sherrill
had been able to do in Newark, right?
Gun violence reduced by 40%.
(05:44):
That is more than 100 peoplethat still have their life.
When you look at what'shappening in Los Angeles
and gun violence in Los Angeles, right?
Like, you have violenceinterventionists out there
putting their life on the line,
saying, "Don't shoot."
You know you have clergy inOakland doing night walks,
in Stockton doing night walks,
(06:05):
walking down these dangerousneighborhoods saying,
"Hey man, I wanna prayfor you, young brother.
You look like you're physicallygonna do some crazy stuff."
That is essentially what is needed.
Because the cops, they'renot there for that.
- This is the essential piece.
This piece, I feel so inspired.
It's like, these areheroes that are going out
at night on the streetsand talking to people
(06:28):
and taking their guns
and intervening in whatcould be deadly violence.
These are such heroes.
- Yeah they are, they are.
And there's dozens of them.
There's hundreds ofthem across the country.
Dozens of them in California.
I break it down into four buckets.
You have gang interventionists,
you have assertive outreach workers,
you have victims advocates,
(06:49):
and you have trauma recovery centers.
And then you have youth programs,
mentorship programs.
And the big one that noone really talks about
is youth sports.
There's a component of youth sports
that no one really talks about,
which is the mentorship.
A lot of kids of color,their lives are saved
because they go into youth sports.
And so this hugeapparatus of ensuring that
(07:10):
this subset of society,
from the ages of like 14 to 26,
that's the sweet spot right there.
That's the Goldilocks Song.
14 to 26 men of color andwhite men living in poverty,
have been through sometraumatic experience,
you know, single parent household,
grades are slipping.
We know who's susceptible tocommit violence and crime.
(07:32):
Like we know that, right?
And so why not invest money
into ensuring that they are okay?
There's an infrastructure that exists
in every single community like this
that is not funded with public dollars.
And that for me is whywe advocate at CSJ, ASJ,
to get people who shouldn'tbe in prison and jails
(07:52):
out of prisons and jails.
Like if you have a drug addiction problem,
why are you in jail?
If you have a mental illness problem,
why are you in jail?
If you stole a bike
because you didn't havemoney to buy a bike,
why, give this guy a job!
Don't put him in jail.
You spending $70,000,
just spend $50 for a bike.
You know what I mean?
Get those folks out.
Put them in a system of careto streamline them to success.
(08:14):
Take the money we save,which is gonna be billions,
and pump it into thecommunity-based public safety system
to prevent crime from happening,
lower the crime rate andlower the amount of money
we have to spend on punishing people.
It is a very simple concept.
The hard part about it is this.
It takes a paradigm shift.
Like, how do you tell an entire system
(08:36):
that have been doingsomething one way for so long,
and they're called heroesfor doing that one thing,
that some of the stuffthat they're doing is wrong
and maybe a little bit racist?
What y'all are doing is so important
because that story needs to be told.
We're not saying they're the enemy.
We're not saying the men andwomen who put on uniforms
and robes and go into these courthouses,
(08:58):
and these police cars, intothese jails and prisons,
are bad people.
No, they are in a systemof care for themselves,
not for the community.
They're in a system of punishment,
they're upholding thatsystem of punishment.
We need to ensure those menand women who wanna lace up
and go protect the community,
put them in a system ofcare in their community
that they live in
so they can prevent crime from happening
(09:19):
instead of putting themin a system of punishment
and upholding that system of punishment.
It's backwards.- Yeah. Yeah.
It feels like we're in thisincredibly crucial moment
where people who are lessimpacted by incarceration
are really beginning toquestion and reevaluate
a lot of the conventional thinking
around the criminal justice system.
One of the main things alot of people assume is that
(09:40):
harsh mandatory sentencinglaws are what victims want.
And obviously, that's not true for us
and for many crime survivors.
And you've spoken to this a bit already
but, you know, what do weneed to do as individuals
to challenge our thinkingaround criminal justice
and incarceration in this country?
- Well, folks just need totake a very logical view.
(10:01):
Logic and reasoning inthis is super important.
And parallels as well.
And everyone needs to do this.
Let's do parallels first.
Look at every other government system
and how that government system is set up
or how that system of care is set up.
A lot of people put thecriminal justice system
next to the public health system.
(10:22):
'Cause that's like, the closest you get
is where people havesomething done with them
and then the public steps in to help them.
Healthcare, whatever.
You put this system upto any other system,
if our healthcare systemfailed 60 to 70% of the time,
would we be talking aboutuniversal healthcare system?
No.
We'll be like, we don'twant the government system
in my household
(10:43):
because y'all are failing60 or 70% of the time.
I don't want that.
Like I said, what do people want?
If you had one thing that system did,
one thing the system did, right?
What would that one thing be?
And most people will sayto not have any crime.
You don't get to know crime bywaiting for crime to happen.
(11:05):
There's this parable that puts it best.
You're on a river and you seea baby floating in the river.
You take the baby out theriver, you take care of it.
And you see another babyfloating up the river
and you take the baby and take care of it.
At some point, you have to go upstream
and see who's puttingthese babies in the river.
And that's the justice system now.
And the people are like, hey, listen,
we're tired of just takingthese babies out the river.
We need to go upstream andfigure what's going on.
(11:26):
If we know that Jay Jordan who's 15,
his grades are slipping andhe's running away from home
two and three days at a time,
he's highly susceptible to be in trouble
with the justice system.
Just for the sheer fact thathe's out in the streets.
If we know that, what arethe system of care for that?
(11:46):
We need to, as individuals,
begin to look at this system
through very clear logicand reasoning and parallels,
and then challenge the status quo.
Instead of me picking up thephone and calling the police,
let me see if I can call mylocal pastor or some mentorship.
(12:08):
A lot of time, we thinkthat we have to build up
these huge campaigns.
And it's like, no, asindividuals, just have an analysis
and then interact with theworld through that analysis.
If a million people in America did that,
where it's like, hey,this system is not right.
We need a system where weprevent crime from happening.
Let's like stop for lockingpeople with mental illness up
and people in poverty up,
and interact with the world that way,
(12:29):
your conversation at your church,
with your family members,
is gonna be different.
And do it through alens of love and grace.
Horrible and evil thingshave happened to people,
good people, undeserving people.
And instead of singling out
and putting in things into context
and having an analysisof how that happened,
(12:50):
we put these blanket laws out there.
And these laws end upharming communities of color.
Because communities of color
are the ones where themost police are at, right?
And that is the problem withthe criminal justice system
and incarceration first laws,
is we don't put things into context
when something very, very bad happens.
We say, we just need to lock everybody up.
(13:10):
It's like, no, it's not the case, man.
People will need systems of care.
Give ourselves graceand do it through love.
But have an analysis.
Interact with the world through that lens
and put these things into context,
with parallels and logic and reasoning.
And I think if we all do that,
it makes people like me'sjob a whole lot easier
to go into a state house and say,
(13:32):
"Listen, when I say safety,
I'm saying the samething as Annie and Jess."
And they may say it through the lens of,
hey, we're spending too much money
on a system that doesn't keep us safe;
I may say safety because, hey man,
I can't get a job after I get out.
We all are saying the same thing.
And the system has to listen to us.
- Yeah.
This piece about, it'sa paradigm shift, right?
(13:54):
We could talk aboutredistributing dollars,
but what's gonna get us toredistribute those dollars?
It is an internal paradigm shift.
Something has to happen such that
people want to redistribute those dollars,
such that the programming
does get the support that it needs.
That's a pretty important step.
- A lot of it is culture too, right?
Our culture contributes to our politics.
(14:17):
And look at how manycrime shows are out there.
It used to be just "Law & Order."
♪ Dat-dat-da-dun ♪
Now it's like a "Law & Order (14:21):
SVU,"
"Law & Order (14:23):
Los Angeles,"
"NCIS" and "S.W.A.T." and "FBI."
And it's like, these badguys are out here trying to-
You know, and it's like, wait a minute.
How much of America is actually bad?
A lot of violent crime happens
when they're a relationship.
A lot of random crime happensbecause it's quality of life.
It's quality of life.
(14:43):
Everything that I've donewas because I didn't have.
I don't know any well-meaning person,
that's making over $100,000 a year,
that's out there stealingbikes, breaking into houses.
It just doesn't happen.
I know some rich people
that are doing crimes,you know what I mean?
But that's not the crimethat gets laws passed
and sweeps up into our communities.
If we want to address it,
(15:04):
let's address theunderlying causes of crime.
And if we were to change the culture,
we had TV shows and more documentaries
about the underlyingcauses of criminality.
And we treated crimelike it was a disease,
like it was a symptom and not the cause.
If we applied the same strategiesto preventative medicine
(15:24):
and to targeted treatment,
if we applied that to crime,
what's more deadly thanpoverty, unemployment,
lack of education, drugabuse, and mental illness?
That's the most deadliestthing you can have.
I wouldn't want to go into a society
where that was prevalent.
'Cause I know crime is gonna happen.
I'm not gonna catch a disease,I'm gonna catch a bullet!
(15:44):
We need to change culture.
We need to stop having a culture
of punishment and glorifying this whole,
people are bad narrative,people are just criminals.
Instead of saying, hey, thesefolks went through some stuff.
And get this.
100% of women who find themselvesin prison in California
were a victim ever beforethey were incarcerated.
(16:06):
That tells it all, right?
We are not addressingthe underlying causes.
Communities were saying,
we need an alternativeapproach to public safety.
That wasn't to say defund the police,
not to just defund themall and abolish them.
They were saying,
we need money to preventcrime from happening.
It is my sincerest desire
that we can have thispublic discussion again,
(16:28):
like we had last year.
Saying, what are the alternativestrategies to policing?
If we can have that samepublic dialogue and say,
this is the alternative strategy;
cops don't prevent crime;
these are the people who prevent crime.
These coaches, theseviolence interrupters.
Like that, I believe, when wehave these inflection points,
is when good people needto stand up and say,
wait a minute, thisdoesn't make any sense.
(16:48):
And I imagine that when this happens,
there's gonna be tremendous room
and space for folks like y'all to be like,
hey, actually, no, thatdoesn't make any sense.
We actually need to do something better.
I'm extremely hopeful.
I'll tell you why I'm extremely hopeful.
Because for the first time,
I actually felt that people are listening.
(17:10):
Everybody.
There was something that happened to us
as a country with George Floyd.
There was something that happened there
that we all were like, this is wrong.
I believe it's up to goodminded folks with an analysis,
stand in and say, hey,this is what we can build.
Shared safety strategiesthat actually make sense.
(17:31):
We have a president inthere that understands.
This my true deepest desire,
that we begin to look at thiscomplementary infrastructure
that's community-based, that exists,
and that has literally operatedwith little to no funding
in communities around this country.
And I feel like if we shipdollars to that infrastructure,
(17:55):
we are going to begin to seethe end of mass incarceration
as we know it because peopleare gonna say, hey, listen.
The stories that come from that,
calling people heroes.
When you begin to raise those folks up
and then law enforcement startto say, yeah, we need them,
get this,
gang interventionists don't operate
outside the purview of law enforcement.
They talk to law enforcement.
(18:17):
Let us do our job.
We're trying to prevent youfrom having to do your job.
And that's the beauty of it.
What's more American than that, right?
Like people who may be on twodifferent sides of the fence
coming together to say,we all want safety.
You do your job, and hopefully,
I ain't gotta come and arrest anybody.
And that for me is beautiful.
- I'm gonna wait for thatmoment 'cause we're ready.
(18:38):
When that conversationstarts coming up again,
we're ready to take part in that.
- It's gonna happensooner rather than later.
I'm an organizer, so we'regonna make it happen.
- Yeah it's so great,Jay, talking with you.
We have all of these questions
and I don't even knowif we asked most of them
because you just hit them.
It's awesome to get tohear your perspectives
and to get to learn from you.
(19:00):
I feel incredibly inspiredhere talking with you
and we have this final set of questions.
This will be kind of like an interesting
final question for you, Jay.
It's a little bit of a tangent
from what we've been discussing
but I'm personally really curious about
the connection betweenadvocacy and creativity.
I've noticed that so many activists
are incredibly creative people
(19:21):
and it makes sense thatyou would have to be
a really creative and innovative mind
to be a leader in this world
and be amending these rigid policies
that have been in place for decades.
And so I was just curious about you.
I was curious if you have othermeans of creative expression
and if so, what are they?
And do they feel like it'sfueled by the work that you do?
- I'm actually studying that.
Oh my God, I'm studying thebrain science of creativity
(19:42):
through the wounds of oppression.
So I stay up at night,
two, three in the morning sometimes
when the kiddos are asleepand the wife is laying down
and like that's my creative time.
Something about just the stillness.
And it reminds me of creativityas a means of escape,
is how we're able to remain hopeful.
(20:05):
The world is burning down around you.
Rome is burning.
And if you feed into the flames,
you would never be able tosee, okay, when this burns,
we're gonna be able to use the ashes
to build a mosaic of history.
Starting from prison,
used to write movie scripts.
I wrote plays.
And then I began to tryto reimagine systems.
(20:28):
Go back to what Maya Angelou said, right?
The question can't existunless the answer is out there
somewhere in the universe.
And that's, you know, themoral of why caged bird sings.
You have to be creativein times of despair.
Think about the motherwho comforts her child
when their stomachs are growling at night
and they don't have any money.
They get creative, well let's play a game.
(20:50):
And so like creativityas a means of escape
is why advocates are so creative.
I mean, look at hip hop, country music,
turning sorrow and pain into creativity.
I mean, look at rap.
Rap is all about theexperience of poverty.
I mean Tupac, his song "Changes":
I see no changes.
I wake up in the morning and I ask myself,
is life worth living?
Should I blast myself?
(21:10):
I'm tired of being broke,
even worse, I'm black.
Stomach hurts so, I'm lookingfor a purse to snatch, right?
It's being creative abouttelling the story of poverty.
And this is deep withparticularly black people.
We were thrown scraps.
We had to be creative.
We were in bondage.
When I think aboutliving through Jim Crow,
you know, my dad's storiesabout having to cross the street
(21:33):
because a white woman waswalking on the sidewalk.
His parents tellinghim, "Let's play a game.
Let's cross the street."
Creativity as a means ofescape your current conditions
because your conditions are so abhorrent
and so harmful and so painful
that you have to allow your brain
to do what it it needs to do.
And I believe that wasa gift from our creator,
to give us a brain that imagines
(21:55):
and can be creative to take us away.
Because some of this stuff is so painful,
deeply, deeply, deeply hurtful,
that all we can do isimagine a different place.
And that's what reimaginingjustice is about.
It's not about wantingto tear things down,
it's about knowing thatwe have been harmed
so much in this country.
All we can do is just imagine.
And when you imagine something,
(22:17):
like, you can turn those thingsinto concrete next steps.
Who would have thoughtthat Jay Jordan right here
would be in Oklahoma with my parents?
My dad owns 40 acres in the same city
where he went to segregated schools.
Now he owns land.
He has 40 acres and cows.
(22:37):
I'm talking to Annie and Jess Nichol
about transforming a system
that told me when I was in second grade
that I was a criminal.
- I feel so moved by that.
And it does feel like theanswer in so many ways.
Like we have to be brave enough
to imagine something different
than what we've alwaysassumed would be true
(22:58):
or taken for granted.
And I just feel so grateful to you, Jay,
for talking with us today.
This conversation has been a gift.
And I feel changed by it
and I feel really excitedto follow your lead.
- Yeah, and it seems likethe change is happening.
Here you are in Oklahoma, yourdad's farm, talking to us.
(23:19):
Yes, there's a lot to change still,
but it is happening.
You're hopeful, we're hopeful.
People have attention on this.
It's happening.
It's inevitable.
And I think that's oneof the biggest takeaways
or impressions that I'm leftwith in being with you, Jay.
And I feel so moved.
I mean, after talking with you,
I feel the goodness of the inevitability
(23:41):
of the change that's already happening.
- Thank you.
(lively music)
- Thank you for joining us and listening
to Jay Jordan speak tothese important issues.
We hope you were as moved
and inspired by his words as we were.
If you would like to learn more,
donate or support thework he's been a part of,
please go to our website, anewlegacy.com.
(24:03):
(lively music)
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Amy Robach & T.J. Holmes present: Aubrey O’Day, Covering the Diddy Trial
Introducing… Aubrey O’Day Diddy’s former protege, television personality, platinum selling music artist, Danity Kane alum Aubrey O’Day joins veteran journalists Amy Robach and TJ Holmes to provide a unique perspective on the trial that has captivated the attention of the nation. Join them throughout the trial as they discuss, debate, and dissect every detail, every aspect of the proceedings. Aubrey will offer her opinions and expertise, as only she is qualified to do given her first-hand knowledge. From her days on Making the Band, as she emerged as the breakout star, the truth of the situation would be the opposite of the glitz and glamour. Listen throughout every minute of the trial, for this exclusive coverage. Amy Robach and TJ Holmes present Aubrey O’Day, Covering the Diddy Trial, an iHeartRadio podcast.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.