As is the case today under neoliberal regimes, criminalization has historically focused on violently disappearing signs of social ill and unrest rather than addressing their root causes. Efforts to conceal the disabling human costs of the Civil War—and of racism and poverty—led to the enactment of “ugly” laws, which effectively criminalized the presence of disabled people in public spaces.32 Conversely, failure to provide universal, free, quality, and accessible health care—which leads to hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths annually—is not criminalized, in the interests of profit.
