13th: Exploring the Evolution of Slavery

911 Words2 Pages

The documentary 13th discusses two fundamental issues going on in our country. The power of money in profitable incarceration and the everlasting of slavery. In 1865, when the 13th amendment was ratified, but little did the drafters know of the loophole they had left in the definition of one of the clauses. The clause that converts slavery from a legal business model to an equally legal method of punishment for criminals. This documentary did a very good job on not being biased and focusing on the facts. Based on that, you should go into the documentary open minded and unbiased. I would give this documentary a “thumbs up” because of the light that it has shined on some very important, but awful information about the 13th amendment. As we all learned in school, the 13th amendment abolished slavery in the United States. Although somewhere in Lynchings being acts of terrorism. African-Americans who fled North were refugees. A system that puts black men in chains and asks them to work for free so big corporations can make a profit from mass incarceration (Blades). It’s slavery just covered up with a different name. A quote at the end of the film that really caught my eyes was said by activist Bryan Stevenson, “People say all the time, ‘well, I don’t understand how people could have tolerated slavery?’ ‘How could they have made peace with that?’ ‘How could people have gone to a lynching and participated in that?’ ‘That’s so crazy, if I was living at that time I would never have tolerated anything like that.’ And the truth is we are living in this time, and we are tolerating it” (Felsenthal). This really is true because every now and then this will come up and someone will say “I can’t believe this happened” when it still does happen and you can try and do something. 13th was a great documentary and I think everyone should see it to open their eyes up to the perspective of black history and

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