“Innocence, however, is just a code for nonthreatening to white civil society. [“Innocent” Black men are] differentiated from other Black men—the ‘bad’ ones—and the legal system is diagnosed as being ‘infected’ with racism, making the fact that the legal system is the constituent mechanism through which racial violence is carried out (wishful last minute appeals to the right to a ‘fair’ trial reveal this—as if trials were ever intended to be fair!). The State is imagined to be deviating from its intended role as protector of the people, rather than being the primary perpetrator.”
- Jackie Wang, Against Innocence: Race, Gender, and the Politics of Safety (via andreaisace)
- Jackie Wang, Against Innocence: Race, Gender, and the Politics of Safety (via andreaisace)