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I wrote about this in another thread, but I will cut and paste part of it here:
There seem to be recurrent threads that urge the thought that because black men are incarcerated at a higher percentage of population than white men, then black men must be more inclined towards criminal activity. Here are some of my thoughts.
We must recall that the decision on whether or not to indict a person, arrested for a crime, rests with the district attorney. Historically, and to this very day, most district attorneys are white males.
For example, say that the police for a particular jurisdiction arrest 100 black males and 100 white males during the same period of time.
In our example, the district attorney brings formal charges against 80 of the black males, but only against 60 of the white males, dismissing the rest.
Next, the district attorney may offer, as part of a plea bargain, probation (with no jail time) to 50 of the remaining white males (leaving 10 to face jail time), but to only 30 of the black males (leaving 50 to face jail time).
In this example, 10 of the 100 white males go to prison, and 50 of the black males go to prison.
While I am ‘making up numbers’ here, I am not making up what actually happens in real life situations. From my experience (for I practiced private law for several years back in the mid 1980s) the district attorneys were simply more tolerant of white criminals than black.
Once, in east Texas, I sat in a courtroom, waiting for my case to be called, and observed a judge struggle with a plea bargain submitted by the district attorney: the defendant, a white man in his 40s, had murdered a black man (age unknown). It was not an accidental murder, or committed in a rage of passion, etc. Rather, the white man killed the black man because of money due him. The DA had offered a plea deal of 10 years’ probation, with no jail time.
The judge (white male also) struggled for a few moments, saying “I don’t know. 10 years of probation for homicide?”
The DA explained that the white defendant had ‘never been in trouble before’ and that he came from a‘good family’. The judge finally accepted the deal.
I will note that, at least here in Texas, District Attorneys must be elected to office. That means they must raise campaign funds. Poor blacks are rather unlikely to contribute to such campaigns.
Recall that case about the 16year old white male here in Texas that was drunk-driving and killed some people, and people were outraged that he got off with only a probated sentenceof ten years? He pled guilty to four counts of manslaughter by intoxication and two counts of assault by intoxication causing bodily harm. He was facing 20 years in prison. It helped that he had wealthy parents.
We must also recall that some of the laws are skewed against the black population. An excellent example isthe Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986. It established mandatory sentence minimums for possession of cocaine.
However, Congress concluded that 5 grams of ‘crack’ cocaine would be treated the same as 500 grams of ‘powdered’cocaine. It is perhaps no coincidence that ‘crack’ cocaine (which was cheaper) was the drug of choice by black Americans, while ‘powdered’ cocaine was favored by white Americans.
Let us examine more closely what this 1986 Act involved:
It established two tiers of mandatory prison terms for first-time drug traffickers: a five-year and a ten-year minimum sentence. The sentence was triggered by the quantity and type of drug involved.
So, for the ten-year minimum sentence, a person must be found in possession of at least 50 grams of crack cocaine (or ‘base’ as it was called) or 5 kilograms of powdered cocaine. It was a 100-to-1 ratio. For the five-year minimum sentence, it was five grams of crack versus 500 grams of powder.
Congress had determined that‘crack’ cocaine was more ‘dangerous’ than powdered cocaine, and it also determined that crack cocaine was ‘more addictive’ than powdered cocaine. I doubt that either presumption is true.
The result: many more blackAmericans went to prison for possession of ‘cocaine’ than white Americans.
In 2010 Congress did pass the Fair Sentencing Act that addressed this ratio: from five grams of crack to 28 grams for the five-year minimum sentence, and from 50 grams of crack to 280 grams for the ten-year minimum sentence. The powdered remains the same, so there is still an adverse ratio, although not as much as before.
If you listen to the media and you are a black person, I think you probably have the idea that white ppl( all of them) are born rich with money and have no hardships at all and go through life with no problems and get whatever they want. I mean that would make me mad as hell too if I lived in a bad part of town and have everyone around me talking about the white man having it all.
This is just not true, all the white folks I grew up around in my poor neighborhood struggled week to week, we wore hand me downs and god forbid had to wear clothes (good ones I may add) from the goodwill. Thank god I left that life behind but it was not easy, the key it wanting it bad enough and not making excuses...you will not win all the time you will fail at a few things...that is life...you are not destined for failure unless you give up and decide you are going to fail.
What is with all these white apologist crap? Simple fact is the majority of white people don't go running around acting like hood rats.
Can't say the same about some other races.
No race's majority goes "around acting like hood rats".
You're telling me that out of 38 million people, over 19 million of them are "hood rats", even though 97+ percent of the AA population aren't in prison?
In all honesty we must remain truthful when it comes to privilege in our country. Let us not keep pretending that it does not exist, because it does not help race relations. Do you see any from the report that would not be true.
I have a solution! stop breaking the law and giving the police a reason to come after you!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Heaveno
In all honesty we must remain truthful when it comes to privilege in our country. Let us not keep pretending that it does not exist, because it does not help race relations. Do you see any from the report that would not be true.
In all honesty we must remain truthful when it comes to privilege in our country. Let us not keep pretending that it does not exist, because it does not help race relations. Do you see any from the report that would not be true.
I wrote about this in another thread, but I will cut and paste part of it here:
There seem to be recurrent threads that urge the thought that because black men are incarcerated at a higher percentage of population than white men, then black men must be more inclined towards criminal activity. Here are some of my thoughts.
We must recall that the decision on whether or not to indict a person, arrested for a crime, rests with the district attorney. Historically, and to this very day, most district attorneys are white males.
For example, say that the police for a particular jurisdiction arrest 100 black males and 100 white males during the same period of time.
etc. etc.
Which is why people tend to use murders as a stand-in for overall crime stats. There's usually no arguing that somebody is dead.
FBI crime stats for 2013. 5500 white victims, 6200 black victims. Unless there's some secret society I don't know about, I can make a guess who the offenders were without even looking up that table.
No race's majority goes "around acting like hood rats".
You're telling me that out of 38 million people, over 19 million of them are "hood rats", even though 97+ percent of the AA population aren't in prison?
But don't let those facts bother you.
What race routinely wrecks their neighborhoods?
But don't let that fact bother you.
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