1.) Throughout the text, Michelle Alexander continuously seemed to talk about an issue that plagued The United States quite harshly at a certain point, this was the battle with crack cocaine or illegal drugs on the whole. Considering her viewpoint on the matter, she claimed that this issue with crack cocaine was primarily affecting populations with people of color. Although the “War on Drugs” was created in an effort to combat the growing use of the drug, it was also an attempt to lessen the amount of people being incarcerated because of drug-related charges. Thus, mass incarceration became an issue as well within the country. Michelle Alexander claims that the main reason for many people going to jail in the U.S. is deeply wrong, she says this because the vast majority of people who are incarcerated are of color. For example, according to the passage it states “The racial dimension of mass incarceration is its most striking feature. No other country in the world imprisons so many of its racial or ethnic minorities. The United States imprisons a larger percentage of its black population than South Africa did at the height of apartheid.” This quote from the text is not only a prime example as to why The United States has a mass incarceration issue but considering that it is the only country that has the most imprisonments for people of racial or ethnic minorities compared to whites. Not to mention, the issue revolving drugs is what aids in the problem of certain people of different backgrounds to be highlighted more than others. Someone would be more likely to think of a Black individual distributing drugs than a White one.

2.) Considering racial disparities in the rates of incarceration, it “cannot be explained by rates of drug crimes” because despite the fact that mass incarceration in the United States is primarily composed of people of racial or ethnic backgrounds, it is simply not true. For example, according to the text it states, “These stark racial disparities cannot be explained by rates of drug crime. Studies show that people of all colors use and sell illegal drugs at remarkably similar rates.” This quote from the text not only shares that it is not only one type of people that use and sell illegal drugs but all compare to be similar statistically speaking. So, even though one set of people go to jail more than others and it would seem like they commit more drug crimes; it does not depict the full picture.

3.) When you think of the phrase “the American penal system has emerged as a system of social control unparalleled in world history,” I believe that it is trying to talk about the country’s legal system. The United State’s legal system is used to enforce the law and ensure that it’s citizen’s understand “right” from “wrong,” while ensuring their safety. Citizens make up a society and the law is considered to be a system, so it is there to ensure law and order amongst them. Being that it is “unparalleled in world history,” I would just say that this means it is quite advanced and heavily placed in this country compared to others.