# Episode 17: Now They Do What They Told Ya

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-persistence-7020722/episode-17-now-they-do-what-they-told-ya
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-persistence-7020722/episode-17-now-they-do-what-they-told-ya.md
Podcast: [The Persistence](https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-persistence-7020722)
Published: 2026-05-09T10:55:00+00:00
Episode link: https://obsessivelycurious.substack.com/p/episode-17-now-they-do-what-they
Audio file: https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/196871477/f4c8da915b81ec8b62a97a3de0c88cec.mp3
Processing state: processed
JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-persistence-7020722/episodes/episode-17-now-they-do-what-they-told-ya
Duration seconds: 3104

## Resource

What do you do when the system publicly breaks in front of everyone… and then just keeps going? In the early 1970s, America looked like it was restoring order. The protests of the 1960s had fractured public trust, televised violence had exposed deep cracks in American institutions, and “law and order” politics promised stability in return. But the conflict never disappeared. It just changed location. This episode of The Persistence traces the shift from public unrest to bureaucratic management, as social problems became increasingly reframed as crime, punishment, and individual failure. As the Controlled Substances Act expanded policing and incarceration, prisons became the place the state moved the people and pressures it no longer wanted to confront publicly. Inside those walls, incarcerated people organized against overcrowding, racialized labor exploitation, brutality, and systemic neglect. After the killing of George Jackson at San Quentin in 1971, unrest spread across the country and culminated at Attica, where prisoners negotiated publicly, issued demands, and forced the nation to look directly at what had been hidden behind prison walls. The state answered with overwhelming force. And afterward, almost immediately, the narrative started changing. This episode explores the history of Attica, George Jackson, prison organizing, law and order politics, mass incarceration, and the evolution of institutional power in post-1960s America. 🎧 Listen if you’re interested in:Attica uprising · George Jackson · Prison history · Law and order politics · Mass incarceration · 1970s America · Protest movements · Political history · State violence · Social movements This episode was written by and produced by Angélica Cordero, with a little help from ChatGPT. Our theme song is Do…

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## Transcript

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