A Colony in a Nation

This felt like an extended text-version of a John Oliver segment (in a good way). A very quick read, but probably more informative if you haven't taken any (decent) courses on recent US history from the 1950s-1990s. Hayes makes interesting and valid connections between the nation-colony relationship of the Revolutionary era and the state of existing-while-black in today's America. He establishes this in the beginning and then sets out to explore the ways it plays out when policing and policy are grounded in white fear. I think this is a good starter book for diving into the ideas Hayes weaves together (redlining, broken windows policing, the War on Drugs, mass incarceration, gentrification, etc.) but if you just want a basic understanding of the stakes in the fight for black rights and the premise of the Black Lives Matter movement, I recommend this book.

This was a very interesting take on specifically how the criminal justice system works differently for the white majority and the Black people, and Chris manages to draw a line between policing in historical times (right from the days of slavery) to contemporaneous practices, and how this historical context plays into who gets branded a criminal and who gets multiple chances for redemption. The author also gives a critique of how much politicians use the rhetoric of law and order to drive up bigotry and divisions in society, just for the sake of electoral gains without any consideration for the actual impact on the health of the country.

The audiobook narration by Chris also enhances the listening experience, because he is clearly able to bring his frustrations and righteous indignation about the subject matter to life. I would definitely recommend the book as well the audio, if you wanna know more about this issue. It's a little old and short as well, but can definitely act as a beginner read.

3.5 rounded up

It was an easy read and I liked the concept Hayes brought forward I'm just not sure the book actually made the point it proposed to make so much as it rehashed known points with a dash of policing is hard and a splash of “not quite The New Jim Crow but almost”.