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> racism in the United States got fixed Did I miss a memo? There are more black men under state custody or supervision in the United States today for acts tha

by jMyles 10y ago

> racism in the United States got fixed Did I miss a memo? There are more black men under state custody or supervision in the United States today for acts that no sensible person regards as criminal (drugs) than were enslaved in 1850.

nickff 10y ago
Many otherwise sensible people support 'drug crimes', and most of those who want to 'decriminalize' recreational drugs still support widespread criminally and civilly enforced restrictions. I support no special drug regulations or crimes at all (i.e. nothing outside fraud liability), but I am in the tiny minority. edit: to be clear, I would prefer to eliminate the whole prescription system and FDA regulatory apparatus. I am not just talking about marijuana.
- 464192002d7fe1c 10y ago
  Keep in mind also, even those people who support legalization (myself) do not necessarily believe that that means that existing laws should be ignored and unenforced. This creates a situation where police and politicians can choose, based on whatever subjective factors they want, who to prosecute. This leads to anarchy.
464192002d7fe1c 10y ago
"no sensible person regards as criminal" If no sensible person regards them as criminal, they would not be crimes. Your assertion is that the sentencing/laws are racist. I would assert that crime, itself, is racist. For whatever reason some minorities commit more crimes. Keep in mind, I'm not saying that they do it BECAUSE they are a minority. I am not saying black people are inherently more criminal because they are black, merely that based on demographics a black person is more likely to be a criminal. I do not know why that is (nor do you) and do not make any attempt at explaining it.
- itsjohncena 10y ago
  People do know. You just aren't looking to answer the question, for reasons only you know. http://newjimcrow.com/ http://newjimcrow.com/
jrs95 10y ago
Although to be fair it's probably a much lower proportion of black men now than it was in 1850. There are certainly still problems, but they aren't nearly as bad as they were just a few decades ago.
- itsjohncena 10y ago
  I don't know how you're reaching this conclusion from reading that we imprison more black men than ever and that the numbers are even higher than slavery numbers. More reading on the astonishing and completely demoralising statistics on "missing" black men in society: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/04/20/upshot/missing-black-men.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/04/20/upshot/missin... 13th on Netflix also lays out a persuasive point about free labour in prisons benefiting from racism in arrests means we literally still have slavery.
  - jrs95 10y ago
    There are about 10x as many African Americans now as there were then, and the vast majority at the time were slaves.
    - itsjohncena 10y ago
      I feel you, but ultimately I think you're trying to make our still dystopian present easier to swallow, which is understandable. I really like how 13th on Netflix repeated a simple but devastating stat: the US has 5% of the world's population, but it imprisons 25% of the world's prisoners, with 40% of them being black men. With most of those black prisoners doing free labour while having their wealth, power, and freedom stripped due to their imprisonment, it really doesn't feel any different than it's ever been. It's just hidden from the public now.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  > Although to be fair it's probably a much lower proportion of black men now than it was in 1850. Probably not; slaves weren't legally treated as persons and weren't generally incarcerated for crimes as such, and while there was certainly racism against non-slave blacks, I've seen no account of massive disproportionate imprisonment. Now, slavery itself was a bigger problem than the current disproportionate imprisonment, but also different in kind, not merely degree.
nym 10y ago
While that was an overstatement, laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States have been fixed (Jim Crow).
- itsjohncena 10y ago
  Really though, enforcing racial segregation by policy or law never ended. Redlining is just one example of MANY. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining What's unfortunate now is how many people believe our incredibly segregated neighbourhood and work environments are the way they are either by choice or circumstance rather than by deliberate planning and design to oppress and mitigate political and economic power.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
rdtsc 10y ago
The modern prison-industrial complex is reshaping of slavery basically. It needs as input people it can control, force them to work for meager pay, extract maximum profits even from families trying to call them. Lobby for War on Drugs to stay in effect to keep the input to the funnel full. Btw as surprising as it may be to people here, Hillary Clinton was a choice candidate for PIC. They gave her at least $250k in lobbying just last year. Lately she claimed she will refund it, but it was a token gesture so far and she donate about $10k to a women's prison charity. She was also a big proponent of the infamous "three strikes law" is which filled the prisons with various repeat offenders no matter how minor their crimes.
- TheCoelacanth 10y ago
  And yet private prison stocks shot up dramatically when she lost the election. Obviously investors didn't agree that she would be great for them.
  - rdtsc 10y ago
    Didn't most stocks shoot up? Dow had hit a historic highest point lately also apparently. So one hand we have proven active lobbying, proven "tough on crime" stance and strong support for "three strikes" law, on the other hand, stocks generally shoot up after election. But even looking at stocks, GEO is up a bit higher than what it was last year. CXW is just back to where it was last year this time. Did you see other stocks there? Those are the two I know about. US Steel for example went from 7-9 range to 30. Now that's a solid difference. Google was 650 now in 800s. Is Google also supporting Trump... who knows, fire up the presses (really doubt it).
    - azemetre 10y ago
      The poster is referring to the direct comments Hillary Clinton made against private prisons during her Presidential election, IIRC it was in August. When she made these comments, prison stocks fell nearly 40%.
  - jMyles 10y ago
flukus 10y ago
> There are more black men under state custody or supervision in the United States today for acts that no sensible person regards as criminal (drugs) than were enslaved in 1850. How does it look when you adjust for other factors, namely poverty?

by jMyles 10y ago

nickff 10y ago

Many otherwise sensible people support 'drug crimes', and most of those who want to 'decriminalize' recreational drugs still support widespread criminally and civilly enforced restrictions. I support no special drug regulations or crimes at all (i.e. nothing outside fraud liability), but I am in the tiny minority. edit: to be clear, I would prefer to eliminate the whole prescription system and FDA regulatory apparatus. I am not just talking about marijuana.

464192002d7fe1c 10y ago
Keep in mind also, even those people who support legalization (myself) do not necessarily believe that that means that existing laws should be ignored and unenforced. This creates a situation where police and politicians can choose, based on whatever subjective factors they want, who to prosecute. This leads to anarchy.

464192002d7fe1c 10y ago

"no sensible person regards as criminal" If no sensible person regards them as criminal, they would not be crimes. Your assertion is that the sentencing/laws are racist. I would assert that crime, itself, is racist. For whatever reason some minorities commit more crimes. Keep in mind, I'm not saying that they do it BECAUSE they are a minority. I am not saying black people are inherently more criminal because they are black, merely that based on demographics a black person is more likely to be a criminal. I do not know why that is (nor do you) and do not make any attempt at explaining it.

itsjohncena 10y ago
People do know. You just aren't looking to answer the question, for reasons only you know. http://newjimcrow.com/ http://newjimcrow.com/

jrs95 10y ago

Although to be fair it's probably a much lower proportion of black men now than it was in 1850. There are certainly still problems, but they aren't nearly as bad as they were just a few decades ago.

itsjohncena 10y ago
I don't know how you're reaching this conclusion from reading that we imprison more black men than ever and that the numbers are even higher than slavery numbers. More reading on the astonishing and completely demoralising statistics on "missing" black men in society: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/04/20/upshot/missing-black-men.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/04/20/upshot/missin... 13th on Netflix also lays out a persuasive point about free labour in prisons benefiting from racism in arrests means we literally still have slavery.
- jrs95 10y ago
  There are about 10x as many African Americans now as there were then, and the vast majority at the time were slaves.
  - itsjohncena 10y ago
    I feel you, but ultimately I think you're trying to make our still dystopian present easier to swallow, which is understandable. I really like how 13th on Netflix repeated a simple but devastating stat: the US has 5% of the world's population, but it imprisons 25% of the world's prisoners, with 40% of them being black men. With most of those black prisoners doing free labour while having their wealth, power, and freedom stripped due to their imprisonment, it really doesn't feel any different than it's ever been. It's just hidden from the public now.
dragonwriter 10y ago
> Although to be fair it's probably a much lower proportion of black men now than it was in 1850. Probably not; slaves weren't legally treated as persons and weren't generally incarcerated for crimes as such, and while there was certainly racism against non-slave blacks, I've seen no account of massive disproportionate imprisonment. Now, slavery itself was a bigger problem than the current disproportionate imprisonment, but also different in kind, not merely degree.

nym 10y ago

While that was an overstatement, laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States have been fixed (Jim Crow).

itsjohncena 10y ago
Really though, enforcing racial segregation by policy or law never ended. Redlining is just one example of MANY. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining What's unfortunate now is how many people believe our incredibly segregated neighbourhood and work environments are the way they are either by choice or circumstance rather than by deliberate planning and design to oppress and mitigate political and economic power.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

rdtsc 10y ago

The modern prison-industrial complex is reshaping of slavery basically. It needs as input people it can control, force them to work for meager pay, extract maximum profits even from families trying to call them. Lobby for War on Drugs to stay in effect to keep the input to the funnel full. Btw as surprising as it may be to people here, Hillary Clinton was a choice candidate for PIC. They gave her at least $250k in lobbying just last year. Lately she claimed she will refund it, but it was a token gesture so far and she donate about $10k to a women's prison charity. She was also a big proponent of the infamous "three strikes law" is which filled the prisons with various repeat offenders no matter how minor their crimes.

TheCoelacanth 10y ago
And yet private prison stocks shot up dramatically when she lost the election. Obviously investors didn't agree that she would be great for them.
- rdtsc 10y ago
  Didn't most stocks shoot up? Dow had hit a historic highest point lately also apparently. So one hand we have proven active lobbying, proven "tough on crime" stance and strong support for "three strikes" law, on the other hand, stocks generally shoot up after election. But even looking at stocks, GEO is up a bit higher than what it was last year. CXW is just back to where it was last year this time. Did you see other stocks there? Those are the two I know about. US Steel for example went from 7-9 range to 30. Now that's a solid difference. Google was 650 now in 800s. Is Google also supporting Trump... who knows, fire up the presses (really doubt it).
  - azemetre 10y ago
    The poster is referring to the direct comments Hillary Clinton made against private prisons during her Presidential election, IIRC it was in August. When she made these comments, prison stocks fell nearly 40%.
- jMyles 10y ago

flukus 10y ago

> There are more black men under state custody or supervision in the United States today for acts that no sensible person regards as criminal (drugs) than were enslaved in 1850. How does it look when you adjust for other factors, namely poverty?