Colin Kaepernick is calling for abolishing the police and prison institutions as part of a new series of essays.
The series titled “Abolition for the People: The Movement for a Future Without Policing & Prisons” is a partnership between Kaepernick Publishing and the Medium publication Level that builds on a rich tradition of Black organizing and freedom-fighting, according to the website.
“Over the next four weeks, we will publish 30 essays from political prisoners, grassroots organizers, movement leaders, scholars, and family members of those affected by anti-Black state violence and terrorism,” Kaepernick wrote in the debut essay titled “The Demand for Abolition” that was published on Tuesday.
The essays will focus on several themes, including police and policing, prisons and carcerality, and abolition of police instead of reform. The former NFL quarterback explained what each of the categories means and what it will encompass in the series.
“Reform, at its core, preserves, enhances, and further entrenches policing and prisons into the United States’ social order,” Kaepernick wrote. “Abolition is the only way to secure a future beyond anti-Black institutions of social control, violenza, and premature death.”
Kaepernick explained that he wants to replace institutions like police and prisons with “transformative and restorative processes that are not rooted in punitive practices.
“By abolishing policing and prisons, not only can we eliminate white supremacist establishments, but we can create space for budgets to be reinvested directly into communities to address mental health needs, homelessness and houselessness, access to education, and job creation as well as community-based methods of accountability,” scrisse.
Over the next month, Kaepernick wrote that he hopes that readers will confront the “white supremacist underpinnings of policing and prisons and the state-sanctioned oppression, distruzione, and execution of Black and Indigenous people and people of color.”
“Another world is possible, a world grounded in love, giustizia, and accountability, a world grounded in safety and good health, a world grounded in meeting the needs of the people,” ha concluso. “Abolition now. Abolition for the people.”
