Frank,
My interpretation of the article is entirely different. It is an indictment
of how poor people, and particularly prisoners, are treated in our society.
But then, I read a lot of articles from this website and I listen to their
podcast. The website is run by young, progressive, independent journalists.
They're not the kind of people who would stoke fear over a communicable
disease. But they are the kind of people who would criticize government for
not protecting people and for using prisoners as slave labor.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Frank Ventura
Sent: Tuesday, March 3, 2020 2:58 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: In Case of Deadly Coronavirus Outbreak, New
York Plans To Use Prison Labor to Dig Mass Graves
Hi Miriam, I am surprised you didn't see through why we should be shocked at
this article? The reason is that it is clearly meant to stoke the flames of
fear about the Corona virus. OMG, we are all going to get Corona and they
are going to dump our bodies on a shitty little island off of the South
Bornx! Fear mongers like this are trying to create a nation of such fear
that people start locking themselves in their homes and avoid places where
they will come into contact with groups of people! Hmm... maybe that should
come to a head right around the beginning of November? Now wouldn't that be
convenient! Now you see why this fear mongering over Corona is so dangerous?
Frank
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of
miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Monday, March 2, 2020 5:44 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: In Case of Deadly Coronavirus Outbreak, New
York Plans To Use Prison Labor to Dig Mass Graves
Frank,
The article says precisely that, that all of the poor who die of disease are
buried there and it emphasizes that prisoners do the burying, which you
verify, and it points out the prisoners do a whole lot of other unpaid labor
in this country which has been written about in a lot of articles and
documented on Democracy Now. And I also grew up in New York City and as far
as I know, we always called that water which separates Queens from
Manhattan, the East River. We used the 59th Street Bridge to cross over the
East River from the east side of Manhattan into Queens where I lived from
the age of three years. So why are you sounding so enraged?
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Frank Ventura
Sent: Monday, March 2, 2020 5:07 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: In Case of Deadly Coronavirus Outbreak, New
York Plans To Use Prison Labor to Dig Mass Graves
What a crock of shit from another career bullshit artist. First of all Hart
Island is not in Long Island sound, it actually is in the East River, which
in reality is not a river but instead a estuary between Long Island sound
and the Atlantic ocean. Where this wacko piece of sensationalist crap comes
from and what the author is not telling you is Hart island (and the adjacent
small islands) are part of the systems of "Potter's fields". That is where
the poor and diseased of NY City are buried. If you die poor in NY City or
die from a contagious disease you are buried there. My paternal grandfather
was buried there because he died broke. All of the labor is performed by
inmates from Rikers island. Every day the ferry from Rikers comes and brings
inmate labor to burry the dead and maintain the grounds. As a kid we used to
row over there from City Island and sneak ashore. This article tries, in
vain, to imply that there will be something unusual done if Corona victims
die in NY City, that is just plain yellow journalism. For instance in the
80's AIDS patients were buried there, including the first baby to die of
AIDS in NY City. Those islands of the coast of the South Bronx have a dark
and murky past, for instance google the wreck of the passenger ship "General
Slocum" and you'll see what happens to a mass tragedy of poor people,
instead of the glitzy tragedy of the Titanic. Yes, Hart, North Brother,
South Brother, Rat, and a few other islands are generally unknown to the
public unless you are a resident of the poor South Bronx. I am old enough to
remember when there was still juvenile unit at Rikers and I can give you
some more tales of those islands.
Frank
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of
miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Monday, March 2, 2020 3:51 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] In Case of Deadly Coronavirus Outbreak, New York
Plans To Use Prison Labor to Dig Mass Graves
Coronavirus Dead
LATE STAGE CAPITALISM
In Case of Deadly Coronavirus Outbreak, New York Plans To Use Prison Labor
to Dig Mass Graves "The city has plans to send corpses to Hart Island in the
Long Island Sound where, in the late 19th century, yellow-fever patients
were quarantined.
Prisoners from Rikers Island would be ferried over to do the digging."
by Alan Macleod
March 02nd, 2020
By Alan Macleod
Two dozen new cases of Covid-19, a deadly strain of novel coronavirus, were
detected in the United States over the weekend, bringing the total to 42,
with 47 more U.S. nationals infected either in China or aboard the Diamond
Princess cruise ship. Included in the 42 is New York City's first case; the
patient in question is currently confined to her Manhattan home.
"There is no cause for surprise - this was expected. As I said from the
beginning, it was a matter of when, not if there would be a positive case of
novel coronavirus in New York," said Governor Andrew Cuomo, who last week
called for the state legislature to pass $40 million in emergency management
funds to confront the outbreak. Yet even with the extra money, it seems
clear that the city would be almost completely unprepared to handle a crisis
on the scale that much of the media is hyping it up to be.
A new report by New York Magazine, based upon information from the Center
for Disease Control (CDC) and a 2008 New York City pandemic response plan,
shows the Big Apple would be overwhelmed in the case of a Spanish Flu-like
epidemic. Last week Mayor de Blasio announced he had set aside an extra
1,200 hospital beds in case of need. But a truly serious outbreak could see
as many as 26,300 new patients per day arriving at hospitals. Furthermore,
the city has barely one sixth of the ventilators it would need in that
situation, with medical masks also in perilously short supply.
Perhaps the most notable information from the report is that if the city's
crematoria are overrun, New York intends to use prison slave labor to dig
mass graves:
The city has plans to send corpses to Hart Island in the Long Island Sound
where, in the late 19th century, yellow-fever patients were quarantined.
Prisoners from Rikers Island would be ferried over to do the digging."
This policy is based on a document authored during Michael Bloomberg's
tenure as mayor, one that saw a more authoritarian approach taken to crime
and policing. Bloomberg is currently running for the Democratic presidential
nomination.
The Media's Deafening Silence on Mike Bloomberg's Ties to Epstein and Other
Criminals Billionaire "Democratic" candidate Mike Bloomberg has ties to
Harvey Weinstein, Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffery Epstein among other
notables.
MintPress News | Whitney Webb | Feb 28
Yet while the prospect of Harvey Weinstein and other inmates of the infamous
prison being forced to come into contact with contaminated corpses might
raise some eyebrows, New York prisoners already bury thousands of poor,
homeless or unidentified people in deep, mass graves containing up to 1,000
bodies on Hart Island, being paid $0.50 per hour for their labor. More than
one million people have been interred on the desolated island off limits to
the public. In the past, it has also been used as a quarantine station and a
prison.
While the Chinese government has drawn praise for mobilizing its
considerable resources, building multiple hospitals in a matter of days to
house the infected, and effectively quarantining entire municipalities, the
American response has been less impressive. President Trump, who attempted
to cut the CDC's budget in February, proposed a tax cut in response to the
virus. The majority of American cases are located in the Pacific Northwest,
with Washington state governor Jay Inslee, himself a former Democratic
presidential candidate, declaring a state of emergency on Saturday.
In the United States, prisoners are leased out across the country to large
corporations, who use their artificially cheap labor to reap huge profits.
Everything from McDonald's uniforms to expensive lingerie to car parts to
Starbucks cups are manufactured by prisoners, who have little option but to
give their labor for as little as $0.12 per hour. Meanwhile, many
firefighters who tackled the California wildfires were actually incarcerated
inmates making $1 per hour risking their lives. And while governor of
Arkansas, Bill Clinton used prison slave labor in and around his mansion to
"keep costs down."
As Coronavirus Spreads So Does Anti-Chinese Racism Similar to how Ebola was
racialized as a distinctly African illness, news of the coronavirus has led
to an outbreak of anti-Chinese racism.
