Seeing, They Do Not See: Reexamining Our Responsibility to People Incarcerated as Youth

• In Event: Isis’ Justice: Re-membering Incarcerated Youth and the Urgency of Abolition

Abstract

Objective:

Within The Evidence of Things Not Seen, Baldwin (1995) shares the story of his research into the murder of Black children in Atlanta. He considers the White lie of the U.S. being a free and democratic society, and how that lie is often hypocritically shrouded in Christianity. Baldwin thinks about what might happen if White supremacists came to genuinely honor their self-proclaimed morality: seeing, they do not see.

Following Baldwin, and honoring Isis’ justice, I aim to re-examine our responsibility to people who were incarcerated as youth, presenting the evidence of things not seen. I specifically reflect upon a visit to a juvenile justice facility that was lauded as one of the best in the country. I interrogate this lauded project and the foundations of “justice” within the “juvenile justice system.” I assess how a teacher and principal within this facility were blinded by widely circulating narratives propagated by White supremacy, and the consequences it had on one particular young person who did all they could to move toward wholeness. I consider what would truly be needed to support this young person’s journey to wholeness.

Theoretical Framework:

When invoking justice, I do so within traditions of those who think about justice as theory and praxis that move to end systemic cruelty, domination, and exploitation (Kelley, 2022; Authors, 2022). Tuck and Yang (2018) have elucidated how the primary justice projects of the past ten years continue to be abolition and decolonization. Thus, justice is concerned with eradicating the systemic exploitation and domination of people for their labor (i.e., abolition), and the systemic elimination/removal of people in order to dominate and exploit the lands, waters, and living/nonliving beings they are in relation with (i.e., decolonization).

Data and Methodology:

Data for this paper primarily emerges from ethnographic research that took place at a series of juvenile incarceration facilities (e.g., field notes, interviews, participant observation), which were studied within the context of educational policy in its respective county. The young person primarily focused upon in this paper was a part of this data collection, as well as the adults who shaped this young person’s carceral experiences. This ethnographic data was contextualized with quantitative data gathered by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, which was re-interpreted and shared by The Sentencing Project.

Substantiated Conclusions:

The young person spotlighted in this paper was understood by a teacher and administrator through a deficit-based lens that only focused upon actions that led the student to the juvenile justice facility. These staff members overlooked what came before, as well as any futures for the young person that did not involve what they constructed as “success.” This carceral wholeness compromised the young person’s own quest toward a just wholeness.

Scholarly Significance:

As conversations around abolition and justice continue to reverberate across the 2020s, this paper aims to offer critical insight. I consider what it might mean to construct institutions that genuinely support youth to arrive at a just wholeness.

Author

• Casey Philip Wong, Georgia State University