The dominant belief in our society is that prisons are a necessary tool to fight crime. Prisons are often thought to counter crime in at least three ways: 1. Deterrence: The expectation of a prison sentence increases the perceived cost of committing a crime, thus creating incentives not to commit crimes. 2. Incapacitation: By coercively…

C4SS Feed 44 presents Kelly Vee‘s “Will the Real Feminists Please Stand Up” read by Katrina Haffner and edited by Nick Ford. Amnesty International understands what Lena Dunham apparently doesn’t: women own their own bodies. Outlawing sex work is just another way in which the State exerts its control over women’s bodies (as most sex…

C4SS Feed 44 presents Kelly Vee‘s “Bill Cosby, Rape Culture and Individual Responsibility” read by Tony Dreher and edited by Nick Ford. We don’t have to choose between combatting rape culture and holding individual rapists accountable. Under rape culture, individual rapists are not held accountable for their actions. Our society treats rapists as innocent boys…

On July 26th, 35 of Bill Cosby’s rape victims came forward to discuss their rapes and the culture that ignored their cries for help. A serial rapist going uncharged for years due to celebrity is indicative of a deeper cultural problem — one that treats rape as an innocent mistake rather than a violent crime….

Amnesty International has drafted a proposal calling for sex work to be legalized worldwide. The proposal “reflects a growing body of research from UN agencies, human rights organisations, and social science which indicates that criminalisation, in its varying forms, exposes sex workers to increased risk of human rights abuses.” According to Amnesty, the policy is…

This week marks the 2014 National Week of Action Against Incarcerating Youth. Across the country, actions will be held to protest everything from the criminalization of queer and disabled youth to the isolation of youth in solitary confinement. Ultimately, what activists are protesting is systematic child abuse by the state. Kids are being locked in…

Steven Reisner discusses a letter to Obama about ending torture once and for all. Ralph Nader discusses a potential left-right alliance. Vincent Navarro discusses the Mondragon worker cooperatives in Spain. James Peron discusses how people who hate gays also hate capitalists in the context of the businesses refusing to discriminate against them. Qatryk interviews Roderick…

There’s a lot of news and information related to prisons, policing, borders, and other facets of the prison state. In previous editions of the Weekly Abolitionist, I have tried to fit multiple stories into one theme or analytic frame. This week, however, I’ve encountered a diverse enough range of articles relating to these issues that…

Last Friday, Rodrigo Constantino, in his blog on Brazilian magazine Veja’s website, made a strange comment: “I have no doubt that ‘good girls’ are under less risk of sexual assault.” The statement was widely discussed and displeased many in social media, especially for following IPEA‘s research in Brazil, in which 58.5% of interviewees agreed with…

C4SS Senior Fellow and Lysander Spooner Research Scholar, Nathan Goodman, gives a fantastic presentation on rape culture, transphobia and strategies for resistance for the Genderevolution Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Goodman: Future Steubenvilles can be prevented by creating a culture where people stand up for each other’s basic rights and take issues of consent seriously.

Raising the issue of rape culture on libertarian radio shows.

Goodman: Because libertarians care deeply about aggression, we should seek a world where aggressors are held accountable and the victims of aggression are not shamed and degraded. Slut shaming stands directly in the way of such a world.

Goodman: “Serve and protect?” Not so much.

Darian Worden examines an outrage.