Abolition For The People Quotes

“most are unaware that disabled people (and those labeled disabled) have always been primary among the carceral machine’s intended targets. In fact, there is evidence that disabled people have the most frequent and catastrophic encounters1 with carceral systems, and that ableism2 has long been central to the nation’s economic, political, legal, and social anatomy. Indeed, no social justice issue, including abolition,3 can be properly addressed without intentionally centering disability and ableism,4 and no social justice movement can be successful without disability justice at its heart.”
― Colin Kaepernick, Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future without Policing & Prisons

“Importantly, people who experience deprivation, violence, oppression, and/ or precarity also experience disability at disproportionately higher rates.”
― Colin Kaepernick, Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future without Policing & Prisons

“The language of abolition evokes historical continuity. While most anti-slavery abolitionists simply wanted to get rid of slavery, there were those who did recognize early on that slavery could not be comprehensively eradicated simply by disestablishing the institution itself, leaving intact the economic, political, and cultural conditions within which slavery flourished.”
― Colin Kaepernick, Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future without Policing & Prisons

“Abolitionist approaches ask us to enlarge our field of vision so that rather than focusing myopically on the problematic institution and asking what needs to be changed about that institution, we raise radical questions about the organization of the larger society.”
― Colin Kaepernick, Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future without Policing & Prisons

“Armed human beings, officially trained in efficient methods of administering death and violence, should not be dispatched in response to a Black woman experiencing an episode related to a psychiatric disability. She may not only not receive help, but her behavior may well be used as a pretext to kill her. Safety and security require education, housing, jobs, art, music, and recreation.”
― Colin Kaepernick, Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future without Policing & Prisons

“Attempting to undo the harm of policing and prisons without attending to these immense embodiments of systemic racism is doomed to failure.”
― Colin Kaepernick, Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future without Policing & Prisons

“Abolitionists] posit that if we build society anew to meet the human needs of education, health care, housing, meaningful and well-remunerated employment, and community togetherness and cohesion, many of the challenges historically oppressed and exploited communities face today will dissipate.”
― Colin Kaepernick, Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future without Policing & Prisons