An Eternal Crime

In the movie “Life” Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence struggled with the fact of being condemned for life. They grew old, and they died. To most Americans who have committed certain mistakes and got caught and thrown behind bars, it is a similar experience. Whether they are in for life, or are out after satisfying their debts to society, convicts have often found themselves suffering the eternal nightmare of not being able to get employment and live a normal existence.

For those that are confined into prison for life, like Ray and Claude the characters in the film; whatever the cause, the severity, or even the baselessness of their cases; they must often resign to the fact that they are there for good, and they must settle with it. However, most offenders are usually liberated at a certain point. That’s where the eternal crime particularly takes hold. Once you were arrested, and you went to jail, it is like - life is over for you. You can’t vote; you can’t get a job; you cannot obtain financial aids for an education, and the list goes on. However, the worst part about it, the eternal crime against the offenders, is that they are not able to secure employment.

Recently, there has been a buzz about this issue. President Obama appears to have had it in the back of his mind to do something before the end of his term. He is talking about reform. He has commuted the sentences of a few nonviolent drug offenders that had been unfairly incarcerated for too long. And, he has even visited a federal prison setting as the only sitting president of the country to have done so. I praise the president. Further, Bill Clinton has confessed that his policies during his administration was wrong against criminal offenders. And, many Republicans are supporting Obama’s position, calling for reform in the justice system. Obama has defended his call for reform bluntly. He has declared, “Any system that allows us to turn a blind eye to hopelessness and despair – that’s not a justice system. It’s an injustice system.”

These two words - hopelessness and despair - bring me back to the film ‘Life’ again, where Ray and Claude are desperate for a way out to freedom that would never come. They are condemned for life. And, so are millions of our brothers and sisters out there who had served time behind bars for whatever reason, big or small. Whether it is a petty crime as shoplifting, or a serious act of murder, once somebody had been behind those bars, getting a serious or even a trashy job in these United States of America is next to impossible. Employers would not hire someone with a criminal past, whatever it had been. Whether a person has voluntarily admitted to his criminal past or not, it does not make a difference. He simply would not be hired once this background check had been conducted. Especially with the advent of the computer, the Internet, the social media and all, the bad history of a person is just a click away; plus, taking into consideration other discrimination factors.

One may judge, “well, the employers are right; the persons should not have committed any offense anyway.” But, remember! Jesus said that the person who had not sin should cast the first stone. And, nobody was worthy of doing so. We all should be able to discover some dirt in our closet past, as we may infer from President Obama., that the commuted prisoners had only succumbed to mistakes similar to his or ours. Then, why would we condemn the others for life? Why would we not allow them to live on?

When you take the mean of labor from a person, you just plainly take his life. That’s what we do when we don’t allow people who have been in jail to get a job. We literally murder them; and, with them all those depending on them, children, wives, husbands, and any others. And, with that, we are forcing them to live a permanent criminal life. If I may put it this way, the USA has ended up as a crime producer society in this circumstance. Those people who are not allowed to work, they must certainly have resorted to more crime. A man has to eat!

If Obama or anybody else wants to do some real justice, some real reform that would benefit these true helpless and desperate victims, and the American society at large, they must advocate laws that do not crucify the offenders after they have served their dues. They should not force the offenders to commit more crimes by being unable to secure normal and legal employments. As Obama mentioned, there should be measures in place to accommodate the individuals released from incarceration to reintegrate them in society. However, the Number One issue I advise the government to consider is to give those people back their lives by allowing them to be able to work to sustain themselves and their families, and not resort to criminal activities. We actually need legislation that bars employers from discriminating against people who had been in jail, at least for not-so-serious offences. 

By E.C. GRANMOUN
E.C. Granmoun is the Author of: "The Social Worker"  ebook, amazon.com

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