The Business of Life with Dr King
Dr Ariel Rosita King brings on a variety of International guests from various countries, cultures, organisations, and businesses to talk about turning
problem into possibilities! Let's turn our challenges in opportunities together!
The Business of Life with Dr King
From College Campus to Human Rights Activism: One Student's Fight with Tristan Matthew Chen
Most Americans don't realize that slavery remains legal in the United States, hidden in plain sight within the 13th Amendment's exception clause: "neither slavery nor involuntary servitude except as punishment for crime." This constitutional loophole enables the modern prison industrial complex to exploit incarcerated individuals for what amounts to free labor.
In this eye-opening conversation, human rights activist Tristan Matthew Chen reveals how his journey began at Gettysburg College, where the historical significance of the Civil War battlefield sparked his interest in understanding America's unfinished business with slavery. What started as a student club evolved into TalkListenChange.net, a platform dedicated to ending modern slavery through education and advocacy. Chen explains how mandatory minimum sentencing and three-strikes laws have created a system where people serve life sentences for minor drug offenses—particularly affecting communities of color and those without financial resources for adequate legal representation.
The economic motivations behind mass incarceration become clear as Chen connects the dots between private prisons, corporate exploitation of prison labor, and financial institutions that profit from this system. With Americans spending hundreds of billions on incarceration annually, he argues that treating drug issues as public health concerns rather than criminal matters would be both more humane and economically sensible. The conversation highlights how young activists between 16-30 have historically driven meaningful social change, positioning Chen's generation uniquely to challenge these entrenched systems.
Ready to help end the last legally sanctioned form of slavery in America? Visit TalkListenChange.net to sign the petition advocating for constitutional change, learn more about these critical issues, and share this information with others. As Chen emphasizes, if not now, when? If not us, who?
Music, lyrics, guitar and singing by Dr Ariel Rosita King
Teach me to live one day at a time
with courage love and a sense of pride.
Giving me the ability to love and accept myself
so I can go and give it to someone else.
Teach me to live one day at a time.....
The Business of Life
Dr Ariella (Ariel) Rosita King
Original Song, "Teach Me to Live one Day At A Time"
written, guitar and vocals by Dr. Ariel Rosita King
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Hello and welcome to the Business of Life. Today we have a special guest, Mr Tristan Matthew Chen. Welcome.
Tristan Matthew Chen :Hi, hi, dr King, thank you for having me Happy to be here.
Dr Ariel King:Thank you so much. Please tell us, what are we talking about today?
Tristan Matthew Chen :So today I want to talk a little bit about human rights activism in America in 2025, little bit about human rights activism in America in 2025. And then also talk a little bit about a history project TalkListenChangenet.
Dr Ariel King:Absolutely wonderful. Okay, let's get started. Tell us a little bit more about either of the projects that you're currently working on.
Tristan Matthew Chen :For sure. Well, I guess we'll talk about you know how I started to get involved with human rights activism and where that sort of initiative spark started. I started while I was a freshman at Gettysburg College. In 1863 was really the turning point of the American Civil War, which was fought over slavery. So I was in school, at college, you know, on a battlefield literally for the first time, learning about, you know, american history and the brutality of slavery. And it wasn't until I took a criminal justice reform trip on my spring break where I immersed myself with education, speaking to judges and lawyers, where I really learned about how truly laws and things are messed up. So this project that we're going to talk about Talk, listen, change is something that's pretty much evolved since 2018. At first it started out as a student club, like a social political club, to just talk about important issues, and it gradually evolved into long form journalism, which is what it currently is when people go to read it.
Dr Ariel King:Thank you, I really. I mean, I find that so interesting. So please tell me right now I guess it's now six years old your project and what are the major issues that you're working on now and what do you see some of the major issues that are important to work on in the future to?
Tristan Matthew Chen :work on in the future. Yeah, so the project is definitely centered around ending modern slavery in America. It's an anti-slavery petition and most people don't know that slavery is still legal in America. The 13th Amendment says neither slavery nor involuntary servitude except as a punishment for crime. So in 1865, you have legislators write that law. Literally it's ingrained in the Constitution right now Slavery except. So slavery is still legal today, in 2025 if you are convicted of a crime. 25 if you are convicted of a crime.
Tristan Matthew Chen :And so the project really focuses on what I think are the most grotesque, inhumane, current human rights violations in America, and what you find is that there are too many people who are being sentenced in prison very trivial, nonviolent things like a gram of marijuana for life in prison. It's quite absurd that that can continue to happen today, but that's just the reality that there are thousands and thousands of pretty much innocent people serving cruel and inhumane, unjust punishments. And so this project was just an attempt. You know, six or seven years ago, just a student, what can I do to impact, affect some sort of change? Very much, with your foundation, you know how can we promote youth leadership and have an impact, or at least try to have an impact and so the project it's really sort of helping advocate. You know current nonprofits and initiatives that already exist. You know through the work of Worth Rises and End Exception. You know promoting journalism. You know promoting the truth, I think has never been more important than today.
Tristan Matthew Chen :And it's really. I mean, most people don't know too much about modern slavery in America. They don't know about the impact that mandatory minimums and three strikes are having on humans.
Dr Ariel King:Right the idea that if you're I mean, this is so interesting and we have an international audience, so would you explain some of the things that you're talking about? For example, if you're convicted of a crime, then it is possible for slavery, these minimums you're talking about these three strikes, because many people who don't live in America I know some of it even though I don't live in America don't have any idea what this is, and I think what you're saying is really important and really good education for us.
Tristan Matthew Chen :Yeah. So during my Gettysburg College trip on the spring break, it was like a seven day trip to Washington DC where I stayed there, talked to judges, lawyers, and one of the organizations we visited was called FAM F-A-M-M Families Against Mandatory Minimums and I met this young lady who had served like a 24 year sentence in prison for, you know, being like the middle person and accidentally possessing, you know, a couple pills. Clearly, I mean all lawyers, or most lawyers in America, agree that mandatory minimums inflict cruel, unjust, inhumane punishments. You know, violating the Eighth Amendment, but mandatory. Basically, the idea is, if you're arrested for a crime, you know, multiple times, if the charge is as small as possessing a single gram of marijuana, that third charge will cause, you know, a life sentence or trigger some sort of crazy punishment, which is true. You know there are people, there are countless people in this country, most throughout the South. You know Mississippi, texas, alabama, georgia, where this is happening. It's happened, it's continuing to happen. You know you have the war on drugs, the idea where cannabis is made illegal purely to put people of color and black people in prison. I mean, it's nothing you know unheard of or new. The evidence is so strikingly clear. How can marijuana be legal in Washington DC, our nation's capital, yet people throughout the South and all parts of this country are continuing to receive literally life in prison for for small possession amounts, and it's because of mandatory minimums, because of the war on drugs and it really goes back to, you know, slavery and the fact that it's legal in this country and how this country was made.
Tristan Matthew Chen :I think, prison slavery. You know all consumers, you know even in our phones. You know we're sort of tied to slavery, whether it's where we get metals, that power, electronics from Africa, whether it's the food that goes on our tables in America. You know slavery is intertwined. And so I think it's important for people to ask themselves how they can contribute to the movement to end modern slavery. And for Americans, I think it's important to talk about the need to end the slavery exception. I think it's important to advocate and really to shed light on impact, the negative impact that the war on drugs and mandatory minimums have had and continue to have, that the war on drugs and mandatory minimums have had and continue to have, because I don't think it's fair that someone should spend their life in prison over a joint. I mean, I've smoked marijuana before and just the amount of money you know, hundreds of billions of dollars of people making money off this. Why should anyone else go to prison for it?
Dr Ariel King:That's a good point. By the way, you said people making money. So I understand that prisons now are not necessarily run by the state anymore, but they're actually run by for-profit organizations. Do you think that maybe some of what we're seeing is for-profit organizations getting money to house people, people actually doing regular jobs like anyone else, but actually getting paid pennies on the dollar or pennies on the $10? And basically what you have is truly a workforce? Perhaps?
Tristan Matthew Chen :Yeah, I mean. So there are the federal prisons and then there's the private prisons. You know there's not just one criminal justice system in America. There are thousands of local, state and federal. But predominantly where these inhumane human rights violations are taking place are at the state level, in state prisons, in private prisons. You have private prisons, influencing judges and people are working for whether it's pennies, three pennies, five pennies or a dollar. I mean there are some states where people are just making nothing.
Dr Ariel King:I think working is pardon me, isn't working mandatory in many of these prisons? Like it's not a choice, it's a right vacation to actually work.
Tristan Matthew Chen :It's different in in every place. I don't know the specifics, but I know if people do refuse in many prisons. If they do refuse to work has turned into a prison and we know where prisoners, you know, pick cotton and are forced to do labor. Um, it really is just a messed up system that needs to be addressed that needs to be addressed.
Dr Ariel King:Can I ask, is this system, do you think that the system is equally doled out to people, so if you have two or three people and they're of different economic or different socioeconomic or especially educational, that there are different punishments for different people? Or do you think that a middle class educated person can also wind up in prison for life or something really small? Or is it also a matter of being the possibility of a lawyer to help you to navigate the system?
Tristan Matthew Chen :Yeah, I think socioeconomic, economic status for sure plays a role. I mean, if you have money, you're not going to go to prison for life for that. If you have money, you're not going to grow up in, you know, an impoverished neighborhood that's plagued by violence and drugs I think America needs to address, you know, living in poverty. You know it shouldn't have to mean that you have to grow up in a neighborhood where gun violence is prevalent. It shouldn't have to mean that police will unnecessarily you know raid and patrol looking to arrest, for you know minor things. But the reality is, you know lockup quotas are a thing. You know some police presence in places. They have quotas and they'll just try and arrest people.
Dr Ariel King:Um, that's a very good point. I think someone told me that there's even something called the grade to prison tunnel, that especially for boys, especially for um, boys of african, caribbean descent I don't know about others um that by the second or third grade that they can look at the reading level of a third grader and if they've participated or not and whether or not they've already checked out, they don't feel like they're part of their group somehow and they literally start to look at how many beds from third grade, which is eight years old. So they look at eight year olds to see who will wind up in prison, which I thought years old. So they look at eight-year-olds to see who will wind up in prison, which I thought was really unusual. Do you know anything about that or how that works?
Tristan Matthew Chen :I don't know exactly. I mean I know. I mean, when you're talking about children in prison, you know, I know that there have been cases. I mean there's this one case where a judge was sentenced to prison. I think President Biden might have parted him, but basically a judge was being influenced by a private prison group to send it's called Kids for Cash, who's getting money to send children as young as eight, nine years old to prison.
Tristan Matthew Chen :Very minor things, things, and it's just, I mean, if that is happening behind the scenes, if things happen that we don't know about, and if things are happening that we do know about and we can see how bad they are. You know how bad are things really. It's a lot, I mean it's a lot. I mean it is a lot to address and to unpack. But the idea with the petition the anti-slavery petition was just to give americans and people you know a place to start, a place to talk about things, to really put the constitution you know, to analyze what's going on, how we can fix it, um, and hopefully it'll be a starting point for you know some real justice and freedom, because ideally that's the goal I love that so you're talking about.
Dr Ariel King:I mean, part of what your group did, I guess, is educate and talk about it together so you'd have an understanding of it and then decide well, wait a minute, let's see how we can inform other people and get them involved that's fabulous um, how many people do you have on the petition today, and do you have to be in america or an american citizen to sign, or can anybody all over the world sign this petition to?
Tristan Matthew Chen :anyone can sign it. Really, the more people that sign it the better. I honestly haven't even looked at it since I published it. I think the last time I saw it it had like 25 signatures. I just put it out online. But, yeah, anyone should sign it, people should sign it, people should talk about it. And yeah, that's the goal to talk about things, to get people to listen and ultimately, to convince legislators to change and to act, and I don't see why it should be impossible.
Dr Ariel King:I love that. I mean, if it can be done, a young person like yourself can do it, that's for sure. And what I really love is that a young person like yourself even said sure. And what I really love is that a young person like yourself even said well, wait a minute, why is this like this? And most of the time within history, it's a young person like yourself that literally changes the trajectory of a history in a country. So thank you for that. I really appreciate you doing that. It's a very difficult problem. May I ask are you looking at changing the constitution itself, or do you understand, or what can be done legally to actually change the exception clause? Slavery is not acceptable, except the exception clause.
Tristan Matthew Chen :I think there is already an amendment proposal by some politicians to amend the constitution to just entirely abolish that phrase. You know, remove the exception, so it exists. You know, there are politicians in US Congress who have realized the issue. It really is just a matter of people coming together to say, hey, this is a problem, I agree this should be changed, um, but simply, you know, changing that phrase, that is one thing we need to do. But really, the number of people who have been affected by mandatory minimums and who are stuck in prison forever until they die, you know that is really a big issue that needs to be addressed, because there are too many people in American prisons, you know, serving life sentences for minor drug crimes, and it's just.
Dr Ariel King:So it might be economic. I mean, that's so interesting. Oh for sure it took a young person like you to figure out that it's economic. I never even thought about that.
Tristan Matthew Chen :I mean America spends, you know, hundreds of billions of dollars on mass incarceration every year. You know there's no need to lock someone up forever for doing a gram of coke or a gram of whatever you know. Drug problems are a public health issue and should be treated as such, and it's time that people say that Treat it, just like other medical issues, like alcoholism, for example.
Dr Ariel King:We don't lock up people who have alcoholism. I mean, that's a very, very good point. So perhaps what we're seeing I'm not sure is economically influenced. If you have somebody in prison for life and it's not necessarily what they did, because there are people in prison that have there are people that are out of prison that have done a lot more and there are people that are in prison who have done a lot less but perhaps it's also truly an economic pipeline. You have more people in prison for more time that have to work for free.
Tristan Matthew Chen :Oh, absolutely, it is totally about money and Wall Street is guilty. Wall Street is guilty. I mean all these corporations that are, you know, abusing this slavery exploitation, who are consciously, you know, choosing to exploit labor from prisoners who are stuck there for you, for justice and freedom. And you know banks. You know you really look at the legacy of financial banks in this country and around the world. You know Bank of America. You know Wells Fargo, barclays. You know banks that date back to slavery. You know chattel slavery, when you got people being sold. You know how much money these banks make and you know you see over time how guilt, how guilt, is being played out in different forms. You know how you're guilty back then, guilty today. You know you have banks investing in private prisons. You have banks with corporate clients who abuse the slavery loophole.
Tristan Matthew Chen :I think banks and Wall Street have a definitely a critical role. You know chief executives, in speaking out, have a critical role, the same role as every normal human consumer. You know you have a voice. What are you going to do with it? I think that's important and so yeah.
Dr Ariel King:I love that, but I think, as a young person, I think you're in this very, very special time in your life, and when I work with young people through the foundation, I don't usually talk about that. What's really interesting is we have very intelligent, passionate young people who have a clear understanding of the issues that are going on within society a particular society like a particular country or various societies and there's a time when you are educated and you don't necessarily have a family, a mortgage, a car payment and an employer to think about that you can lose your life. I'm talking about that. So there's a golden triangle.
Dr Ariel King:I think not for all people, but for some young people between 16 and usually 28 and 30, that these issues can be taken up and that they can be pushed. And if you look at all of throughout history, of what is pushed and what's changed by young people, very few are over 30. Very few. Most are between that 16 and that 30. Some of it is the energy, the passion galvanizing other people that you all know, expressing that and leading all of us, including older people like myself, towards a more just and better society. So I'm really happy that you're doing this and I do hope that you continue to look at this issue and to help educate about it and also to speak up and say you know there are ways to make money. This is not one of them.
Tristan Matthew Chen :Yeah.
Dr Ariel King:Bravo, yeah, definitely.
Tristan Matthew Chen :I mean well said.
Dr Ariel King:For our audience. Would you like to tell them more about the project and how they can get involved in what you're doing?
Tristan Matthew Chen :Yeah. So if you just go to wwwtalklistenchangenet, just go to that website, read it. There's a big button that says sign here. Just sign your name, get your friends and family, share the video, share the podcast. The more people that can read about these issues and sign their name down to take note, the better. And sign their name down to take note, the better. I think. Petitions throughout history, throughout American history, specifically anti-slavery petitions. You got Benjamin Franklin 1790, you know saying, hey, slavery is bad, let's finally change this. You know anti-slavery petitions are nothing new. I think it's just about time. I mean so, yes, that's how people can help. Just go to the website talklistenchangenet.
Dr Ariel King:Thank you. I love that. I love that, tristan Chen. I love how you say it's about time and you're right and I love the fact that you have taken this on even to speak about it and to bring it into the awareness of most people all around the world. I think is extremely important. So I want to thank you for that, and you would be surprised if there are other countries that are doing the same in one way or another. That law has become a way to collect money and to gain influence, including economic influence. I want to thank you for being here today. Thank you so much. Thank you to our audience, and remember if I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, then when? That was by Hillel and I say if not me, then who? Thank you for being with us.