If you were actually capable of thinking about that topic you'd realize that there's nothing contradictory about that. People are free until they commit crime, and the US is in a unique circumstance in that it has high criminality due to demographical and immigration issues, while also having the means to arrest, try, convict, and imprison people. There are countries that have more crime but less prisoners, because they lack the resources to enforce the law, and there are other countries that have the resources to enforce the law but don't have anywhere near the rate of minorities and immigrants from the third world that the US has.

The reason the US has a high rate of incarceration is due to circumstance, not because the US isn't free. If nothing about our system changed but our demographics were similar to any other western nation, we would not have a high rate of incarceration. Minorities commit disproportionate amounts of crime in other western countries just like they do in the US, the US just has way more of them, because of history, geography, and due to the fact that the US has historically attracted widespread immigration more than any other western country, because the US is a more desirable place to live for ambitious people whether they become scientists or they become criminals.

Quick, call me a racist. That will make the facts go away.