Ask Me Help Desk - Drug war = The New Jim Crow

Drug war = The New Jim Crow

Hello:

Have I mentioned on these pages my belief that the drug war is racist to its core? I think I have.. Well, what I knew INSTINCTIVELY, somebody else knew ACADEMICALLY and she's written a book about it called, of all things, The New Jim Crow.

It marshals pages of statistics and legal citations to argue that the get-tough approach to crime that began in the Nixon administration and was intensified by Ronald Reagan, has devastated the black community. Professor Alexander writes, nearly one-third of black men are likely to spend time in prison at some point, only to find themselves falling into permanent second-class citizenship after they get out.

That is a familiar argument made by many critics of the criminal justice system, but Professor Alexander's book goes further, asserting that the crackdown was less a response to the actual explosion of violent crime than a deliberate effort to push back the gains of the civil rights movement.

Read this book and then write your congressman. This racist war MUST end.

excon

"Ten-plus printings later" you're just now finding it? Dude, I'm not impressed by using statistics to try and prove the drug war is "a deliberate effort to push back the gains of the civil rights movement." Statistics don't prove motivation.

Hello again, Steve:

I'm willing to accept that they didn't mean it, if they END it. If they don't, then it looks like they MEANT it.

excon

White America clearly forces Blacks to take and sell illegal drugs .

Here is the fact ,Right or wrong ,there are laws on the books about drugs . No body is forcing anyone else to break those laws .

It is this type of blame shifting in fact that helps people to not accept their own responsibilities for their actions. That liberals keep advancing such arguments make me suspicious of their motives . I think it's them that prefer the plantation mentality... the plantation of government dependency.

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Originally Posted by tomder55

White America clearly forces Blacks to take and sell illegal drugs .

Hello again, tom:

I wouldn't put it those words, but what you say is true. I'm also certain that you don't believe it.. That bothers me, NOT. Your side, historically, has been on the WRONG side of these social issues.

excon

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You also believed that separate but equal was actually equal...

Lol... I will not defend postions I have not taken.

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Originally Posted by tomder55

lol ...I will not defend postions I have not taken.

Hello again, tom:

Ok, I took it out. The rest of my statement is absolutely TRUE.

excon

Quote:

Originally Posted by excon

Hello again, tom:

The rest of my statement is absolutely TRUE.

excon

Now that would be a change, ex not doing a beatup

Hello again, tom:

I'd be willing to engage in SOME discussion of the social issues, that leads me to my conclusion...

We've got a disconnect... When I observe a city, and see a section of town with very poor people, and the bulk of them are NON-WHITE, I'd say that happens because of government POLICY. I suspect YOU'D say it's because they CHOOSE to live that way...

Certainly, if they CHOSE to live that way, then my argument goes into the crapper... Plus, IF the population of the ghetto ethnically represented the REST of society, then my argument goes into the crapper a second time...

But, that ISN'T the makeup of the ghetto.

Now, I START with the belief that people are the same no matter WHAT color their skin is. So, it's not plausible to me that an ethnic GROUP would CHOOSE those living conditions. To me, that's ample evidence, all by itself, to conclude that since it's NOT choice that has them live there, it MUST be policy.

Now, I don't know HOW you could explain that certain ethnic groups live in the ghetto by CHOICE, WITHOUT sounding racist, but I'm willing to let you try.

excon

Ghetto implies that they are forcibly living there. Ghetto is your word not mine . Why would they be different than any other race or ethnic group ? My ancestors came here and congregated in basically all Irish ,all Italian neighborhoods . NY city is still rich with ethnic pockets .

Now you might say that is a matter or poverty .But I don't see any evidence of that either . In the suburbs where there is choices about where you would live ,due to greater affluence ,there is often segregation by choice. So it would be incorrect to state that segregation is a government policy .It just isn't true
http://scholarship.law.georgetown.ed...s%20suburbs%22

What I really want to know is why you think there is any connection between where someone lives and being involved with illegal drug ?

Quote:

Originally Posted by tomder55

What I really want to know is why you think there is any connection between where someone lives and being involved with illegal drug ?

Hello again, tom:

If you live in an affluent neighborhood, you have a WIDE variety of choices.. If you live in the slums, you don't. I don't think you'd argue with that. Or, maybe you would.

excon

Again.. what is the connection between where you live and being in the illegal drug culture ?
Fact ;not everyone who is poor or a minority is involved . Fact ,there are affleunt whites who are in the illegal drug culture. So the premise that somehow the laws regarding illegal drugs are the equivalence of Jim Crow laws is a grotesque fallacy.

Hello again, tom:

I'm trying to lead you down this road one "ahh ha" moment at a time. It takes a little bit of dot connecting... You're not WILLING to do it, or you don't see ANY connection between the dots.. To ME, the connection is GLARING... To YOU, not so much...

Ok, let's take another tact. The black prison population FAR exceeds their proportionate representation in society. Why is that? There's an EASY right wing answer that doesn't involve much thought.. Is that the one you're going to latch onto??

Then there's the OBVIOUS answer, and it doesn't take any dots to get there.

excon

You are right... the dots don't connect . If poverty leads to crime, then crime rates would rise when poverty rates rise.The world's poorest nations would also have the highest crime rates.But you know that isn't so.

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Originally Posted by excon

Ok, let's take another tact. The black prison population FAR exceeds their proportionate representation in society. Why is that? There's an EASY right wing answer that doesn't involve much thought.. Is that the one you're gonna latch onto???

Then there's the OBVIOUS answer, and it doesn't take any dots to get there.

excon

Ex let me blow your argument out of the water, In other places where they don't have the war on drugs, the black population is over represented in prision populations. I believe that it is attitude to society, not laws that force this problem and it is the attitude of the people themselves. In our nation we have observed that the higher the percentage of black people in the population the higher their representation in prison. I think you might say black people are born with a chip on their shoulder and this gets them into trouble both in their own community and in the community at large. Why do they go to prison, it is usually for minor crimes, that is how it starts anyway, having done their apprenticeship they move on.

So crow it all you like, no one is targeting them. It is culture, it is attitude

Neither of you have read the book so I will forgive the ignorance. But you better check out why the prison system is a booming business, and check out the facts about how they recruit their candidates, and why. Ain't no future for a second class citizen in america.

Then maybe just maybe you can refrain from the prejudices and racism that keeps you from connecting the dots. Only a conservative could come up with the plantation blather or even its about someone's culture.

Its always about money, power and influence. 2 million votes, poor and minorities, locked up and trapped in the system that yields a legal under class that can never be served. Drug war my arse. Its pure class warfare and legal racism.

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Originally Posted by paraclete

I think you might say black people are born with a chip on their shoulder and this gets them into trouble both in their own community and in the community at large.

Hello clete:

Thank you for making my point.

excon

Tal I'll consider your facts when you come up with some . Your rants don't count .

I already have, just look up what I wrote and research it yourself. That was no rant, but a statement of facts. Okay I will help you out a bit! I know you still won't see it. From the book.

The New Jim Crow - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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According to Alexander, the majority of young black men in large American cities are "warehoused in prisons" (their labor no longer needed in the globalized economy) or, after having criminal records and labeled as "felons", permanently trapped in a second-class status. The communities of color are targeted and decimated by the U.S criminal justice system, with the "War on Drugs" being the primary tool chosen by the establishment intent on continuation of many of the traditional and new forms of discrimination, discrimination, which according to the conventional point of view, had mostly ended with the Civil rights movement reforms of the 1960s.[2]

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Politicians who opposed the civil rights acts, after their passage focused on "tough on crime" legislation, the calls for which became sanitized in terms of explicitly racial appeals. The law and order and tough on crime rhetoric proved appealing to working class whites, who were most directly affected by the government's desegregation measures and the resulting, often difficult, situation in urban centers and neighborhoods. The "anti-crime" campaign was to become the most successful and durable political tool and manipulation of the resurgent white right wing, and, together with the spontaneous white opposition to the social transformations that were taking place, led to a momentous and lasting to this day realignment of political forces in the United States.[28]

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This raises the issue of how exactly such disparity comes about in a society where old-fashioned racism is not normally practiced and racial discrimination is condemned by most, under a formally colorblind criminal justice system. The usual opinion is that the grossly disproportionate incarceration rates are the result of black men having much higher rates of violent crime; it is however drug convictions, not violent crime, that are primarily responsible for the prison boom. According to Alexander, "despite the colorblind rhetoric and fanfare of recent years, the design of the drug war effectively guarantees that those who are swept into the nation's new undercaste are largely black and brown".[47]

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The system operates in two major stages. The first is the granting law enforcement personnel extraordinary discretion as to whom to stop, investigate further, arrest and charge. This allows beliefs, stereotypes, policies and assumptions to unduly influence the decisions of officials. The second step is to disable the ability of court systems to consider claims of racial discrimination in the criminal justice system. It has been accomplished by requiring an unreasonably high standard of proof in discrimination cases: a (unobtainable in almost all cases) proof of some official's intentional racial discrimination (bigotry, racial hostility), rather than allowing a demonstration of the clearly discriminatory outcome of the legal process. This design turned out to be extraordinarily effective for the promoters of the system of racial control and extremely damaging for the segments of the population subjected to it.[48]

Racial profiling is a fact, but conservatives don't see that. I got more on redlining, and hiring practices, but its your turn to rant, or give some facts and not right wing opinions.

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Originally Posted by talaniman

I

Racial profiling is a fact, but conservatives don't see that. I got more on redlining, and hiring practices, but its your turn to rant, or give some facts and not right wing opinions.

So according to you blacks are profiled into prison having done nothing to deserve it, having broken no laws. Where do you get this garbage? People wind up in prison because they have done something wrong, not because they were born to it. Of course you may have a system where the county is just filling a quota for the road gang but you allow such a system to exist. Now we can debate all we like about whether drugs should be legal or not, and how not letting the lower castes just veg out is a bad idea, but you are actually giving in to the idea that there is an under class. What happened to all men are created equal, just nice words, I guess.

When it comes to employment, opportunity plays a big part in it and so does skill, so maybe blacks don't get many opportunities because of where they live and on account that they may need training, but there are ways out, like the military, but this doesn't give a license for lawlessness.

I'm sick of hearing from an underclass that they have no opportunity, no choice. Fact is they have a choice and they have taken it.