WEBVTT

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Three, seven, eight,

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two, four,

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zero, three, seven.

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Hodge.

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Three seven eight two four
zero three seven.

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I went to prison; that was my federal
inmate registration ID.

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The first thing that happens when you go
to prison is they take away your name,

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and from that moment forward,
you're that number.

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Hodge; three seven eight
two four zero three seven.

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It's the beginning of the dehumanizing
experience of mass incarceration.

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In 2001, I was a businesswoman.

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My organization and I became investigated.

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I went to trial believing
justice would prevail,

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and instead I was originally given
an 87 month federal prison sentence,

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as a first time, non-violent,
white collar offence.

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In addition to that,
I received three years probation.

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Now, like so many of you,

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I wasn't aware of mass incarceration
until it visited my doorstep.

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I had family members
who went to prison, distant relatives,

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and friends who had gone to prison.

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But prison was something
that happened to other people.

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While I was in prison, I wasn't Theresa.

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I wasn't Irma and Charlie's daughter,

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I wasn't Darcelle,

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Charlene, Tammy, or Latanya's sister.

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I wasn't even Lauren's mother.

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I was Hodge; three seven eight
two four zero three seven.

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In 2006, was when I was convicted,

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and I had six months to prepare
for going to prison.

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It's kind of funny
when I think about that,

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because how do you really
prepare to go to prison?

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I did it, and I still
don't know how I did it.

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My mother, my four sisters,
and my daughter and I,

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we got in two cars, we left Maryland,
and we headed to West Virginia.

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Alderson Federal Prison Camp;
the first federal prison for women.

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It was established in 1927.

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The reality is, everything about a prison
was designed for a man.

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While I was in the parking lot,
I had three big concerns.

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The first one, I was afraid I would never
see the women who took me to prison again.

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I was facing six years inside the prison,
and death was a possibility.

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So I was very fearful of that.

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The second thing was, I was concerned,
would I be relevant again?

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Would I find meaning in my life,
professionally or personally?

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The third fear was for my safety.


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I was afraid.

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Television had informed me
up to this point,

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and what I was afraid of

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was that I possibly would have to fight
my way through prison,

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or that I could be raped.

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Somewhere on television,
that stuck in my mind as a possibility.

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The reality is, "Orange
is the New Black" was not out yet,

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and I didn't have anything
else to inform me.

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When I arrived in prison,
what I discovered was something different.

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I found amazing women
who too were in prison.

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Prison is kind of a microcosm
of the rest of the United States.

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It's a combination of everybody,
with one exception:

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we have more black and brown men
who are incarcerated.

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There's 2.3 million people
in American prisons today.

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America has 5% of the world's population


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and 25% of the world's prisoners.

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The number of women imprisoned
from 1980 to 2011 has increased by 586%.

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Today, there are 200 000 women
who are in prison,

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and another one million who are under
some form of correctional supervision.

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There are three million children
who have a mother,

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or maybe a mother
and father, who's in prison.

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The reality is, we are incarcerating
too many people for too long.

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Two years into my prison sentence,
I received a sentence reduction,

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and my prison sentence 
as reduced to 70 months.

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That's five years and ten months.

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The good news for me at the time
was I had already served over two years,

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and whereas when I first walked in,
I wasn't sure if I could do the time,

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at this moment, I actually knew
I could go the distance.

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And so I was really excited,

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because I had about two and a half years
to go when this happened.

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When it was time to leave prison,
I was really excited.

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But, to be honest, I was afraid again.

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This time I wasn't afraid


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when it comes
to the women who I met.

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I was afraid when I was leaving
what would happen to many of them.

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A lot of them didn't have
the support system I had;

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I was concerned that they were going back
to under-resourced communities,

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not a support system like mine,

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and I was concerned

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that many wouldn't be able to reconnect
back to society in a meaningful way.

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I never met a woman who was lying
on her bunk saying,

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"I can't wait to go back to prison."

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It's absolutely no way of life.

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And yet, 70% of people who go to prison,
within three years return.

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That's not just an indictment
of our government,

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it's an indictment of all of us.

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Because at the end of the day,
we've made coming home entirely too hard.

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I'm going to tell you a story.

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It's actually one of the worst things
that happened to me since I came home,

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but it is the one thing
that motivates me the most.

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As I was preparing to start
this business with my daughter,

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I needed to get a job
to just pay a few of the bills.

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I had managed to keep
my overhead extremely low,

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because I was determined
I wouldn't allow prison to ruin my life.

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I was going to be an entrepreneur again.

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A girlfriend of mine
called me, and she said,

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"I think I've found a job that you can do
while trying to start this business."

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I said "Okay", and she sent me a link,

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I took a look at it, and I agreed;
it looked like a job I actually could do.

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I would be working from my home,
using my computer, and my internet,

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to do some back office work
for an organization.

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It paid probably slightly
above minimum wage.

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So I went online
and I applied for the job.

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I put in my name, my address,
my phone number,

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and very basic information.

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Then, the question appeared;

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the dreaded question that those of us
with an arrest or conviction fear.

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"Have you ever been convicted of a crime?"

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I took a deep breath,
and I checked "Yes", and I hit "enter".

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The screen went black.

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Then a message appeared.

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It said,

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"Something you answered
disqualified you for this job."

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Well, I knew it wasn't my name.


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(Laughter)

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I knew it wasn't my address,

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so it was pretty obvious.

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There's so much going on
in the news around "Ban the Box";

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that is a real life example
of ban the box.

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It's the reason why the box needs to go.

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It's not even the right conversation
we should be having.

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We shouldn't be allowing employers

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to discriminate
against millions of Americans,

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keeping them locked into sentences


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and mistakes they [made] five, ten,
fifteen, thirty years ago.

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We can't even have the right conversations
around the right to work

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until we ban the box.

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So as you hear all of this going on,
pay attention to it.

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Because we need people
who are coming home from prison

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to have their human capital restored,

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so that they can be good mothers
and fathers, good community members.

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and take care of their families.

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So what can we all do?

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We all have a role to play.

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Three things.

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First:

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language matters.

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Stop using the word "ex-offender",
"ex-felon", "convict".

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When you are referring to someone,

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if you're not sure what
to say, say their name.

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Second thing: on Wednesdays,
take five minutes,

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read an article, learn about this topic,
share it on social media,

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talk to someone about it.

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And the third thing:


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if you're an employer, employ someone;

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give them a second chance.

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If you're a legislator,
humanize this topic.

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Bring people in, talk to them,
get to know them.

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I can assure you
that if you get to know people,

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you won't feel like you need
to discriminate against them.

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Last: for me, I stand firmly in my shoes,

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I embrace the 14 years


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that I was in conflict
with the criminal justice system.

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I have incorporated
that experience into who I am,

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and today it's neatly tucked into me.

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It's a part of my past.

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I am not three, seven, eight,

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two, four, zero,

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three, seven.

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I am Theresa Hodge.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)