The New Jim Crow: America's drug laws and African Americans

[Count of Montesano]

The thread in the Political Mudpit about racist and violent White extremists prompted me to post this article by columnist Leonard Pitts Jr. It's a review of a book by ACLU lawyer Michelle Alexander called "The New Jim Crow." Alexander conducted research showing that poor African Americans are far more likely to go to jail over drug offenses compared to middle class Whites. America's criminal justice system essentially creates a new racial caste because even one drug conviction basically destroys a person's chance of finding decent employment or even decent housing.

Here's an excerpt from Pitts review of the book:

The result is a compelling new book. Others have written of the racial bias of the criminal injustice system. In “The New Jim Crow,” Alexander goes a provocative step further. She contends that the mass incarceration of black men for nonviolent drug offenses, combined with sentencing disparities and laws making it legal to discriminate against felons in housing, employment, education and voting, constitute nothing less than a new racial caste system. A new segregation.

She has a point. Yes, the War on Drugs is officially race-neutral. So were the grandfather clause and other Jim Crow laws whose intention and effect was nevertheless to restrict black freedom.

The War on Drugs is a war on African-American people and we countenance it because we implicitly accept certain assumptions sold to us by news and entertainment media, chief among them that drug use is rampant in the black community. But. The. Assumption. Is. WRONG.

According to federal figures, blacks and whites use drugs at a roughly equal rate in percentage terms. In terms of raw numbers, WHITES are far and away the biggest users — and dealers — of illegal drugs.

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/opinion...-crow.html.csp

[Captain Jin]

To be honest I think it's more around socio-economic backgrounds than it is about race, it just so happens there is a disproportionate amount of blacks in a poor economic background. Because for instance you take a rich black kid in an upscale neighborhood or community and he gets busted with weed or whatever he will likely be punished the same as a white kid in that instance. Statistics don't always show all the facts or the situation. If police are routinely picking up gang members sometimes they pin them with minor drug charges just to get them off the streets for a short period of time. Now if they bust some suburban kid they are less likely to press charges because obviously who is the more dangerous offender?

[Emperador Carlos]

Maybe that's because they're far more likely to do drugs...


I'm just saying that's what the trend shows...

[Viking Prince]

Maybe that's because they're far more likely to do drugs...


I'm just saying that's what the trend shows...

Are you saying that being black means you are more likely to do drugs? I sincerely hope that you meant that of those that do drugs, the statistics show ...

There is a difference. From what I have read, there is no credible regression study that shows race to be statistically significant.

[Maturin y Domanova]

Maybe that's because they're far more likely to do drugs...


I'm just saying that's what the trend shows...

That's not what the numbers show at all. With pot, for instance, blacks are arrested and convicted in numbers exceeding by far their proportion of higher usage rates. And they are convicted much more often than white people when they are arrested. And mos pot users are still white.

So while we are drawing stupid conclusions from statistics, I suppose black people are just bad at doing drugs and getting away with it?

Nuts.

We just need to stop facilitating the welfare mentality.

Don't be dense. It's common sense, nevermind the entire field of sociology. Your 'standard of living, your background and your environment' are all critical factors in cultural attitudes and attributes that directly and indirectly influence behavior. And it's not an excuse for anything.

Of course, none of it has to mean anything at all on an individual level. It can be utterly irrelevant. But amongst a population of millions, the most minor factors can move numbers. And we are talking about correlation and numbers, not the psychology of individuals. Otherwise it gets too complicated.

Or were you just suggesting African Americans are biologically pre-disposed to drug use?

[Phier]

Don't be a dunce. It's common sense, nevermind the entire field of sociology. Your 'standard of living, your background and your environment' are all critical factors in cultural attitudes and attributes. And it's not an excuse.

Of course, none of it has to mean anything at all on an individual level. It can be utterly irrelevant. But amongst a population of millions, the most minor factors can move numbers. And we are talking about correlation and numbers, not the psychology of individuals. Otherwise it gets too complicated.

Or were you just suggesting African Americans are biologically pre-disposed to drug use?

I'm saying the state makes a really poor father.

Where you got "African Americans are biologically pre-disposed to drug use" out of my statement is beyond me, perhaps because I'm such a dunce eh?

[Maturin y Domanova]

I'm saying the state makes a really poor father.

Oh. That's not what he was saying, I don't think.

Where you got "African Americans are biologically pre-disposed to drug use" out of my statement is beyond me, perhaps because I'm such a dunce eh?

Sorry, I've just been in the mudpit and am convinced that there are little TW-playing Klansmen running around all over the place.

[removeduser_4536284751384]

why would skin colour affect the tendency to do drugs?

I mean, eye colour doesn't. Head size doesn't.

[Gelgoog]

it has nothing to do with race, and everything to do with socio-economic situation. Studies have been done to show that anytime you put any race or ethnic group into a certain socio-economic bracket and their tendency to commit crime skyrockets.

With white flight in the 60s, you have a ton of inner city blacks who can't find jobs because gangs have run out all the businesses. So the only way to make money is by selling drugs. This causes the problem that even when given the opportunity to get an education and a decent job alot of blacks will keep selling drugs because they can make thousands of dollars a week working only a few hours selling drugs....why should they bust their ass getting an education and working hard to barely scrap by. Its a vicious circle.

So no, its not the "MAN" keeping blacks down.

[Rolling Thunder]

You know, there have been two people here who said "It's not neccesarily race, more likely socio-economic status", so, I'll just say I pretty much agree with their conclusion and then Rep the two gentlemen in question.

[Phier]

The same applies for all violent crime and other not directly related to drugs, crimes. Now how much of the black over representation of crime would go down if the drugs were completely filtered out I don't know, but despite being 12% of the population, they represent a majority of the arrests for murder outright, and are strongly over represented in other violent crimes, rapes, and non violent crimes, including white collar crime.

So basically the law, period, is the New Jim Crow.

[Thorn777]

I love how often the word "socio-economic" is used by rightwing posters in this thread. I almost thought it could be scrapped from the dictionary seeing how more and more people are tired of the same old reality just being the same old reality and look for logical fallacies like "evil Islam, not western" etc to explain their world.

Thank you.+rep

[Achilla]

The standard of living, your background and your environment take their toll and what you are, and what can become in the future. The 'black' case in the US is simply beyond hopeless.

[Phier]

The standard of living, your background and your environment take their toll and what you are, and what can become in the future. The 'black' case in the US is simply beyond hopeless.

Nuts.

We just need to stop facilitating the welfare mentality.

[Gelgoog]

I love how often the word "socio-economic" is used by rightwing posters in this thread. I almost thought it could be scrapped from the dictionary seeing how more and more people are tired of the same old reality just being the same old reality and look for logical fallacies like "evil Islam, not western" etc to explain their world.

Thank you.+rep

I use the word socio-economic because I got my degree in criminal justice. Socio-economic is used by all of acedemia. When area often studied is minorities and their over-representation in the justice system. It has nothing to do with right or left wing. You are actually making a logical fallacy when you right off decades of sociological research as a "logical fallacy".

[Captain Jin]

I love how often the word "socio-economic" is used by rightwing posters in this thread. I almost thought it could be scrapped from the dictionary seeing how more and more people are tired of the same old reality just being the same old reality and look for logical fallacies like "evil Islam, not western" etc to explain their world.

Thank you.+rep

I'm not a right-wing poster, slick.

[Sphere]

One of the great failures in terms of improving the lives of black people was the assumption that once all the proper civil rights laws were put in place (criminalizing employer discrimination, integrating schools etc) that the woes of the black population would be over. The truth is you still had a pitifully large percent of the black population growing up in essentially inner city slums, out of which few were able to escape. Most that did got the hell out and never looked back, and instead melded into the white middle-class.

If you ever get the chance, watch the HBO series "The Wire" which is the best fictional take on the subject.

[TheTrainee]

^^^ oh damn you, stealing my The Wire comment ^^^

[Captain Jin]

The Wire is an excellent look at inner-city life, crime, education, policing, and the media.

[justicar5]

The Wire is an excellent look at inner-city life, crime, education, policing, and the media.

The Wire is just plain excellent. Oh and I do not believe that the #war on drugs' is racist, just that the law is unevenly applied, who are you more likely to sentence harshly, the graduate or the high-school dropout?