Born Free: Muslim Led Slave Revolts in the Americas and The Prison Industrial Complex with Margarita Rosa

Summary: In the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries Senegambian Muslims were led by their sheikhs to revolt across the Western Hemisphere against Spanish slavery. In their efforts rests the earliest liberation theology put to work: An approach that refused to accept bondage as anything but antithetical to faith; and saw faith synonymous with freedom. What followed was a legal logic that justified mass-murdering those Muslim slaves, banning them from those lands, sending many back to Africa and mass incarceration. As those policies morphed, and the world changed, we are facing a different type of slavery under a system that has graduated from mass incarceration to what Vincent Lloyd called ”hyper-incarceration” and still focuses on black people. As Muslims, we have a religious duty to stand against this modern-day slavery as our ancestors did three hundred years ago, working for justice and a fair system. In this episode, I sit down with Margarita Rosa to discuss those revolts and how faithful people must push for prison abolition and justice people of colour here and abroad. Did you know that even though they we in bondage, those brothers and sisters paid zakat to free other slaves? In this episode, I sit down with Margarita Rosa to discuss those revolts and how faithful people must push for prison abolition and justice for all people.