3 ms·

I'm very unimpressed with the US justice system and agree with a lot of what you say. But does this really explain a massively disproportionate homicide rate a

I'm very unimpressed with the US justice system and agree with a lot of what you say. But does this really explain a massively disproportionate homicide rate among certain groups in the US? Sure for lesser or non-crimes like drugs there can be massively unfair, racist enforcement and penalties. For rape, sure, certain groups will get away with it. But for homicide? Are murders being selectively investigated? As far as Norway and "blah blah homogenous society" do they not also show a heavy bias in crimes committed by the "non homogenous" population there?

Someone 9y ago
"But for homicide? Are murders being selectively investigated?" There's a scale from accident, via involuntary manslaugher to murder. There may well be bias in judging what to prosecute. Also, laws such "three strikes you are out" may lead to more murders. If, say, you're a burglar with two strikes, and a house owner wakes up and recognizes you, hitting him hard out of fear for that third strike becomes more likely. Similarly, racial bias by the police may make people so wary of "he said, she said" situations that they will 'snap' and kill someone instead (IMO, many people convicted for murder aren't cold-blooded killers, but mentally not the most stable persons who have been dealt a socially unfavorable card in life)
- MichaelGG 9y ago
  Very good points, thank you. I wonder if there studies that show what kind of impact this has, overall? Probably hard to measure without finding an area that had a rapid racial change in government. I guess I was just objecting to the idea that "racism" is the cause for these statistical imbalances, especially since you see the same kind of thing happening in Europe which would seem, at least on the surface, to have less racism issues, no? But perhaps I'm wrong since a lot of good people think the opposite, but it's hard to tell since it's so politicized and sensitive, just like anything about race.
  - tptacek 9y ago
    It is absolutely not the case that Europe has less problems with racism than the United States. Racism is a very real problem throughout pretty much all of Europe.
    - MichaelGG 9y ago
      Interesting. So e.g. Norway has a similar level of racism towards blacks as the US does? Why?
      - tptacek 9y ago
        Non sequitur. Your analyses across this thread are all very weak, based on weirdly fallacious premises; here, that "racism" means "racism against black people". A reasonable reader might suspect that you reached, for whatever reason, the conclusion that capital punishment couldn't be racist (perhaps because, as you've stated in other comments on HN, you feel the term "racism" is used too often), and are now intent on working your way backwards from that conclusion. I think you should take a beat and reconsider how you're approaching the topic. It's an odd experience discussing this with you and watching you do little dances after each response to reorient yourself towards your preferred conclusion. Edited extensively from the one-liner I originally wrote, sorry.
        MichaelGG 9y ago
        Fair enough, though I'm not talking about capital punishment or lack of racism in the US justice system. It's terribly unfair, especially to blacks in the US - zero argument there. Do you have any suggestions on straight, fact-based reading on the subject, sources that aren't trying to appear sensitive? It's hard - even admitting races and may have differences upsets people. On Norway, I'm just saying they don't have the same levels of racism baggage as the US regarding "Africans" (quotes cause it seems weird that many of them have families in the US longer than mine, but I would get no qualifiers as an American) yet still Norway sees overrepresentation.
tptacek 9y ago
Yes, murders are selectively investigated. The clearance rate for urban core murders is surprisingly low. In some major cities it's as low as 30%. The national average is 65%.
- MichaelGG 9y ago
  Wouldn't that make the stats even more racially biased if they were investigated, given the demographics of urban areas?
  - tptacek 9y ago
    No, it means that when black and latino people are the victims of crime, the perpetrators are less likely to be convicted than when white people are. More importantly, it rebuts your argument that the severity of the crimes we're talking about is so grave that it's unlikely there's any bias in their enforcement. Not only is there bias, but smoking gun evidence of that bias (whether it's intentional or systemic) is a simple Google search away. You wrote: For rape, sure, certain groups will get away with it. But for homicide? Are murders being selectively investigated? The answer is, "yes, of course." Slightly edited.
    - MichaelGG 9y ago
      Thank you for the explanation - I didn't know the solve rate was so low at all. Is it thought that of these unsolved black/latino murders, the race of the perpetrator is disproportionately white? Edit: So I searched a bit, and, in NYC, it's said this is due to reduced budgets for homicide in certain areas that are predominately minority. For this to impact the stats (the raw numbers being that blacks, as a group in the US, commit 4-5x homicide by population, and similarly bad numbers looking at interracial crime) it'd have to be a massively disproportionate amount of non-blacks going into these neighbourhoods and killing them. From the "flavour" text in the articles I read, the victims families are lamenting that cops don't care because "it's just blacks men killing other black men". But wow am I astounded how low the solved rate is, that's crazy. Though I would suspect most homicides are at least reported, whereas many lesser crimes (like drug possession) might not be. It's totally plausible that the real drug possession rate among whites is actually orders of magnitude higher than reported, less so for homicide. Thanks again for taking the time to respond and correct me.

Someone 9y ago

"But for homicide? Are murders being selectively investigated?" There's a scale from accident, via involuntary manslaugher to murder. There may well be bias in judging what to prosecute. Also, laws such "three strikes you are out" may lead to more murders. If, say, you're a burglar with two strikes, and a house owner wakes up and recognizes you, hitting him hard out of fear for that third strike becomes more likely. Similarly, racial bias by the police may make people so wary of "he said, she said" situations that they will 'snap' and kill someone instead (IMO, many people convicted for murder aren't cold-blooded killers, but mentally not the most stable persons who have been dealt a socially unfavorable card in life)

MichaelGG 9y ago
Very good points, thank you. I wonder if there studies that show what kind of impact this has, overall? Probably hard to measure without finding an area that had a rapid racial change in government. I guess I was just objecting to the idea that "racism" is the cause for these statistical imbalances, especially since you see the same kind of thing happening in Europe which would seem, at least on the surface, to have less racism issues, no? But perhaps I'm wrong since a lot of good people think the opposite, but it's hard to tell since it's so politicized and sensitive, just like anything about race.
- tptacek 9y ago
  It is absolutely not the case that Europe has less problems with racism than the United States. Racism is a very real problem throughout pretty much all of Europe.
  - MichaelGG 9y ago
    Interesting. So e.g. Norway has a similar level of racism towards blacks as the US does? Why?
    - tptacek 9y ago
      Non sequitur. Your analyses across this thread are all very weak, based on weirdly fallacious premises; here, that "racism" means "racism against black people". A reasonable reader might suspect that you reached, for whatever reason, the conclusion that capital punishment couldn't be racist (perhaps because, as you've stated in other comments on HN, you feel the term "racism" is used too often), and are now intent on working your way backwards from that conclusion. I think you should take a beat and reconsider how you're approaching the topic. It's an odd experience discussing this with you and watching you do little dances after each response to reorient yourself towards your preferred conclusion. Edited extensively from the one-liner I originally wrote, sorry.
      - MichaelGG 9y ago
        Fair enough, though I'm not talking about capital punishment or lack of racism in the US justice system. It's terribly unfair, especially to blacks in the US - zero argument there. Do you have any suggestions on straight, fact-based reading on the subject, sources that aren't trying to appear sensitive? It's hard - even admitting races and may have differences upsets people. On Norway, I'm just saying they don't have the same levels of racism baggage as the US regarding "Africans" (quotes cause it seems weird that many of them have families in the US longer than mine, but I would get no qualifiers as an American) yet still Norway sees overrepresentation.

tptacek 9y ago

Yes, murders are selectively investigated. The clearance rate for urban core murders is surprisingly low. In some major cities it's as low as 30%. The national average is 65%.

MichaelGG 9y ago
Wouldn't that make the stats even more racially biased if they were investigated, given the demographics of urban areas?
- tptacek 9y ago
  No, it means that when black and latino people are the victims of crime, the perpetrators are less likely to be convicted than when white people are. More importantly, it rebuts your argument that the severity of the crimes we're talking about is so grave that it's unlikely there's any bias in their enforcement. Not only is there bias, but smoking gun evidence of that bias (whether it's intentional or systemic) is a simple Google search away. You wrote: For rape, sure, certain groups will get away with it. But for homicide? Are murders being selectively investigated? The answer is, "yes, of course." Slightly edited.
  - MichaelGG 9y ago
    Thank you for the explanation - I didn't know the solve rate was so low at all. Is it thought that of these unsolved black/latino murders, the race of the perpetrator is disproportionately white? Edit: So I searched a bit, and, in NYC, it's said this is due to reduced budgets for homicide in certain areas that are predominately minority. For this to impact the stats (the raw numbers being that blacks, as a group in the US, commit 4-5x homicide by population, and similarly bad numbers looking at interracial crime) it'd have to be a massively disproportionate amount of non-blacks going into these neighbourhoods and killing them. From the "flavour" text in the articles I read, the victims families are lamenting that cops don't care because "it's just blacks men killing other black men". But wow am I astounded how low the solved rate is, that's crazy. Though I would suspect most homicides are at least reported, whereas many lesser crimes (like drug possession) might not be. It's totally plausible that the real drug possession rate among whites is actually orders of magnitude higher than reported, less so for homicide. Thanks again for taking the time to respond and correct me.