Today, a Midday Newsmaker interview with Georgetown University law professor and former federal prosecutor Paul Butler. He’s written a book that is a clarion call for a complete change in the way we think about the problems of racial inequality and injustice.
The book is Chokehold: Policing Black Men – A Renegade Prosecutor’s Radical Thoughts on How to Disrupt the System. In it, Butler quotes the famous Langston Hughes poem, Harlem, in which Hughes asks, “What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?...Or does it explode?”
Butler argues for explosion in this provocative book, which questions assumptions long held by those on both the left and the right. He also chronicles how the curse of White Supremacy has dictated in a fundamental way the political, judicial, and social norms in America; and he proposes some very controversial ideas, such as abolition of prisons. Throughout, Butler argues the case for radical reform persuasively, and with tremendous grace, erudition and scholarly authority.
Professor Butler joins Tom from NPR studios in Washington, D.C.
Paul Butler is the guest speaker for the Open Society Institute Baltimore's Talking About Race series on Tuesday, October 3, 2017. Click on the link below to register for this free event.
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/policing-black-men-a-conversation-with-paul-butler-tickets-37252642657
