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wes moore is an amazing human honestly. we read his book in my 8th grade class called "the other Wes Moore" and it was really good but also realistic and sad at certain parts. it's about his life growing up in Baltimore during the crack epidemic and basically the idea behind it is that when he was studying abroad in Africa, his mother called him and told him about how a boy in Baltimore with the exact same name as him and been arrested and sentenced to life in prison. and he was curious about "the other Wes" so he wrote him a letter and they started exchanging letters back and forth. and the book switches perspectives between the two Wes's and shows that their lives were actually quite similar and if Wes had made some choices differently he may have end up in a similar position to the other wes. really good book and I highly recommend it.

Article | Paywall Free

"Maryland Gov. Wes Moore issued a mass pardon of more than 175,000 marijuana convictions Monday morning [June 17, 2024], one of the nation’s most sweeping acts of clemency involving a drug now in widespread recreational use.

The pardons forgive low-level marijuana possession charges for an estimated 100,000 people in what the Democratic governor said is a step to heal decades of social and economic injustice that disproportionately harms Black and Brown people. Moore noted criminal records have been used to deny housing, employment and education, holding people and their families back long after their sentences have been served.

[Note: If you're wondering how 175,000 convictions were pardoned but only 100,000 people are benefiting, it's because there are often multiple convictions per person.]

A Sweeping Act

“We aren’t nibbling around the edges. We are taking actions that are intentional, that are sweeping and unapologetic,” Moore said at an Annapolis event interrupted three times by standing ovations. “Policymaking is powerful. And if you look at the past, you see how policies have been intentionally deployed to hold back entire communities.”

Moore called the scope of his pardons “the most far-reaching and aggressive” executive action among officials nationwide who have sought to unwind criminal justice inequities with the growing legalization of marijuana. Nine other states and multiple cities have pardoned hundreds of thousands of old marijuana convictions in recent years, according to the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. Legalized marijuana markets reap billions in revenue for state governments each year, and polls show public sentiment on the drug has also turned — with more people both embracing cannabis use and repudiating racial disparities exacerbated by the War on Drugs.

The pardons, timed to coincide with Wednesday’s Juneteenth holiday, a day that has come to symbolize the end of slavery in the United States, come from a rising star in the Democratic Party and the lone Black governor of a U.S. state whose ascent is built on the promise to “leave no one behind.”

The Pardons and Demographics

Derek Liggins, 57, will be among those pardoned Monday, more than 16 years after his last day in prison for possessing and dealing marijuana in the late 1990s. Despite working hard to build a new life after serving time, Liggins said he still loses out on job opportunities and potential income.

“You can’t hold people accountable for possession of marijuana when you’ve got a dispensary on almost every corner,” he said.

Nationwide, according to the ACLU, Black people were more than three times more likely than White people to be arrested for marijuana possession. President Biden in 2022 issued a mass pardon of federal marijuana convictions — a reprieve for roughly 6,500 people — and urged governors to follow suit in states, where the vast majority of marijuana prosecutions take place.

Maryland’s pardon action rivals only Massachusetts, where the governor and an executive council together issued a blanket pardon in March expected to affect hundreds of thousands of people.

But Moore’s pardons appear to stand alone in the impact to communities of color in a state known for having one of the nation’s worst records for disproportionately incarcerating Black people for any crimes. More than 70 percent of the state’s male incarcerated population is Black, according to state data, more than double their proportion in society.

In announcing the pardons, he directly addressed how policies in Maryland and nationwide have systematically held back people of color — through incarceration and restricted access to jobs and housing...

Maryland, the most diverse state on the East Coast, has a dramatically higher concentration of Black people compared with other states that have issued broad pardons for marijuana: 33 percent of Maryland’s population is Black, while the next highest is Illinois, with 15 percent...

Reducing the state’s mass incarceration disparity has been a chief goal of Moore, Brown and Maryland Public Defender Natasha Dartigue, who are all the first Black people to hold their offices in the state. Brown and Dartigue have launched a prosecutor-defender partnership to study the “the entire continuum of the criminal system,” from stops with law enforcement to reentry, trying to detect all junctures where discretion or bias could influence how justice is applied, and ultimately reform it.

How It Will Work

Maryland officials said the pardons, which would also apply to people who are dead, will not result in releasing anyone from incarceration because none are imprisoned. Misdemeanor cannabis charges yield short sentences and prosecutions for misdemeanor criminal possession have stopped, as possessing small amounts of the drug is legal statewide.

Moore’s pardon action will automatically forgive every misdemeanor marijuana possession charge the Maryland judiciary could locate in the state’s electronic court records system, along with every misdemeanor paraphernalia charge tied to use or possession of marijuana. Maryland is the only state to pardon such paraphernalia charges, state officials said...

People who benefit from the mass pardon will see the charges marked in state court records within two weeks, and they will be eliminated from criminal background check databases within 10 months."

-via The Washington Post, June 17, 2024. Headings added by me.

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“mAkEuP sHoUlD bE iLlEgAl!! iT mAkEs wOmEn lOoK lIkE dIfFeReNt pEoPlE!!”

that’s the point. why do you think people love makeup so much? in a society where our natural faces and bodies are shamed and we are taught since birth to hate ourselves it’s not surprising that we want to cover up our insecurities. that’s exactly how the makeup industry operates. if everyone really liked their faces the way they were and didn’t want to change them, industries like makeup, skincare, and cosmetic surgery wouldn’t exist. the intention is to create a problem that does not exist and force us to rely on makeup companies to solve it. it’s all to turn a profit.

i personally don’t give a shit if someone wants to wear makeup as an art form or because they genuinely like it, but it’s also important to recognize that these companies are run by awful CEOs who want to make us feel like shit when we dare to leave the house without a full face of makeup on so they can make more money.

and in recent years, companies have tried to turn this narrative around and claim that makeup is “empowering women”, which is also bullshit. if makeup was really about “empowering women” then why is the makeup industry dominated by men. a study from the mbs group actually found that almost two-thirds of makeup company executives are men. this isn’t about empowering women, this is pseudo-liberalism as an attempt to cover up misogyny within the makeup industry.

again, i’m not hating on people who choose to wear makeup, more so on the companies that promote self-hatred to turn a profit.

also if anyone comments or rbs this with some shit along the lines of “stfu, you’re just upset that you’re bad at makeup/ugly” you are exactly the kind of person this post is about.

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I'd very much like to punch a feminist.

I’d never, ever hurt a lady but I’d be happy to punch a feminist. It’d bring me great joy.

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reblog to claim your goth sex hormones

Everyone has goth sex hormones it came free with your fucking existence.

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Can you please reblog if your blog is a safe place for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, asexual, aromantic, pansexual, non binary, demisexual or any other kind of queer or questioning people? Because mine is.

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I aspire to be like this woman

It’s so hard seeing other people live your dreams

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i hate america

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tw vent

how to not be insecure and hate urself and compare urself to others constantly and feel ugly and stupid no glue no borax

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my hair is VERY soft and could EASILY be played with and you know how many people are playing with my hair??? zero

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listening to my punk playlist while doing my ap world history homework fills me with a certain anti capitalist rage

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whisper is mine but background picture isn’t!! don’t repost!!

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if I saw these guys at my school I would fucking run

who THE FUCK are they.

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They De-Tumblrized Ms. Frizzle

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yall I won shopping, I went to the store on Christmas Eve with my mom because we were bored and I found a real juicy couture purse. original price was 90 dollars USD (which is already cheap for juicy) but it was marked down to 40

I love her she's my babygirl

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kinda off topic but set it off made a revamped version of wolf in sheep's clothing and it's not too different from the original

that song was honestly a big part of my childhood and also lowkey goes hard so enjoy

“Wolf in sheep’s clothing” ma’am thats Remus Lupin

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<3

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I would actually crash tf out

a fluffy modern au domestic jegulus raising harry fic that's all sweet and nice but the last chapter ends with "but the lamp starts looking weird" and it ends with flashes of canon as regulus sinks further down into the murky water of the cave