Michelle Alexander Quotes

When I was in prison, rap was all I had at that point because I was kicked out of school, all that education just gone and I couldn't come out of prison to play football - that was all over with.

I was in jail a couple of times, and I was probably heading back there for a long time. But martial arts saved my life and some of the choices I made with it.

I am a firm believer that upon release, ex-offenders should be afforded a second chance to become productive citizens by providing rehabilitation and education that will help them join the workforce.

When you're in prison, and we're left to our own devices, you're stripped of everything, and you really get to see who these people are, the good and the bad.

During my time in prison, I told myself that I wanted to be a part of the solution and not the problem.

I failed at the biggest things there are in life. I failed in my health, I failed in my marriage, I failed in everything, and I've picked myself up and gone on.

So I kind of lost track for a while, then I came back, I pulled myself together and I decided when I was 15 that I'm going to get sober and I'm going to become an actress.

I wish to preach not the doctrine of ignoble ease but the doctrine of the strenuous life.

America is the land of the second chance - and when the gates of the prison open, the path ahead should lead to a better life.

When a young person is sent 'up the river,' we need to remember that all rivers can change course.

My freshman and sophomore years in high school, I spent a lot of time trying to get back on the right track. I was arrested multiple times by the time I was 16, so I had a little harder time trying to adjust like a lot of us do in high school.

I went to prison; therefore, I've been rehabilitated, and now I want to get on with my life. I have paid for what I did, end of story.

Delegations from all over the world visit Homeboy Industries and scratch their heads as we tell them of our difficulty in placing our people in jobs after their time with us. Americans' seeming refusal to believe in a person's ability to redeem himself strikes these folks as foreign indeed.

I can confirm that I have been released from prison.

Boxing saved my life. There were a lot of gangs and I was hanging around with the wrong people.

I felt very accomplished staying busy in prison.

People coming out of jail need a path back into society: access to a job, a place to live, supportive services. We've seen what happens without it: they commit more crimes and return to jail, which is worse for everyone.

It took me three and a half years to go from being sentenced in federal court to going to the Oscars.

I knew hundreds and hundreds of women like me, who had traveled in and out of prison in a revolving door. They needed support and help just like I had received. And it could make a difference, just like it had made a difference in my life. I wanted to see them come back to the community and have a chance at a different life, too.

It took me a long time to get my life screwed up, and it's going to take a long time to get it back.

I made my third parole and I believe if I had made it the first time, I wouldn't be here today. I still would've been out there doing stupid stuff.

Restoring a person's ability to achieve success when they leave the prison walls promotes public safety, builds our economy and, most importantly, is the right thing to do.

I came here from Jamaica as a kid and didn't go to school, really, never had a great education. I was a little bit bad on the street, running around, doing this, doing that, and always getting into trouble. I was completely written off, so boxing has definitely saved my life.

I got caught back up in the underworld because the upperworld really doesn't have a place for people with criminal histories.

The attitude of Communists towards any person who has made mistakes in his work should be one of persuasion in order to help him change and start afresh and not one of exclusion, unless he is incorrigible.