4 ms·

Would you think it's a big deal if the cops pulled you over, and arrested you for grand theft, took you into booking, finger-printed you, took your picture, etc

Would you think it's a big deal if the cops pulled you over, and arrested you for grand theft, took you into booking, finger-printed you, took your picture, etc, then tossed you into a jail cell for a few days because it was a weekend and no judge was available, so you couldn't post bail? Even after you go through the rigamarole of proving your innocence, you still have to live with having been roughed up by the police, having your mug shoot plastered all over the internet, and having experienced county jail first hand. And that assumes that you're not charged with something else that happened during the course of the arrest. The problem is that these systems are deployed in communities such that they implicitly target black people, yet plenty of research shows that they aren't even remotely effective at identifying black people, at all. And the criminal justice system doesn't care.

qwepeyote 6y ago
The criminal justice system doesn’t care what race you are. It is an equal-opportunity devourer. And that is what makes it scariest of all.
- saltminer 6y ago
  The laws on our books might be race-blind, but the original intentions by lawmakers, enforcement by police and prosecutors, and behavior of juries are most definitely not.
  - qwepeyote 6y ago
    “Racism” is one of the most loaded concepts, but it’s a fact that even by this incredibly loaded definition the system is more racist than any other system in all of human history. But it isn’t racist in the way that you expect it to be. It isn’t racist at the level of the intersection of the system and the “street”. The problem that you think is the problem, isn’t. The real problem is much more insidious. And if you attempt to solve the problem that you think is the problem you will do nothing but worsen the problem, just as all previous interventions. It is what it is.
  - simplify 6y ago
    Sure, but it's still not the core issue. If racism were magically solved overnight, very little would change. You'd still have these corrupt systems exploiting the weak and poor.
    - qwepeyote 6y ago
      Just so.
- GaryNumanVevo 6y ago
  It most certainly does care, Black men get on average a 20% longer sentence for the same crime as white men. https://www.ussc.gov/research/research-reports/demographic-differences-sentencing https://www.ussc.gov/research/research-reports/demographic-d...
SkyBelow 6y ago
Given that the legal system targets based on gender more than race, why race is the go to inequality that is pointed out? There seems to be a social level acceptance that unequal targeting based on gender is somehow more acceptable (and by targeting I mean everything from the initial profiling and surveillance all the way to the chance of conviction and the sentence handed out, with each step granting compounding interest on inequality).

qwepeyote 6y ago

The criminal justice system doesn’t care what race you are. It is an equal-opportunity devourer. And that is what makes it scariest of all.

saltminer 6y ago
The laws on our books might be race-blind, but the original intentions by lawmakers, enforcement by police and prosecutors, and behavior of juries are most definitely not.
- qwepeyote 6y ago
  “Racism” is one of the most loaded concepts, but it’s a fact that even by this incredibly loaded definition the system is more racist than any other system in all of human history. But it isn’t racist in the way that you expect it to be. It isn’t racist at the level of the intersection of the system and the “street”. The problem that you think is the problem, isn’t. The real problem is much more insidious. And if you attempt to solve the problem that you think is the problem you will do nothing but worsen the problem, just as all previous interventions. It is what it is.
- simplify 6y ago
  Sure, but it's still not the core issue. If racism were magically solved overnight, very little would change. You'd still have these corrupt systems exploiting the weak and poor.
  - qwepeyote 6y ago
    Just so.
GaryNumanVevo 6y ago
It most certainly does care, Black men get on average a 20% longer sentence for the same crime as white men. https://www.ussc.gov/research/research-reports/demographic-differences-sentencing https://www.ussc.gov/research/research-reports/demographic-d...

SkyBelow 6y ago

Given that the legal system targets based on gender more than race, why race is the go to inequality that is pointed out? There seems to be a social level acceptance that unequal targeting based on gender is somehow more acceptable (and by targeting I mean everything from the initial profiling and surveillance all the way to the chance of conviction and the sentence handed out, with each step granting compounding interest on inequality).