4 ms·

Why is it intentionally racist to hold the perception that drug users and criminals are inherently violent?

avs733 6y ago
It isn't intentionally racist to hold the belief...but the belief is an intentional construction to justify racist policing. Off the cuff and reducing a complicated discussion to somethign simple you can start here: https://medium.com/equityorg/reefer-madness-the-racist-roots-of-marijuana-prohibition-37b9e7fb7d6c https://medium.com/equityorg/reefer-madness-the-racist-roots... The early representations used to vilify marijuana were part of jim crow efforts to ensure racial hierarchies. They included representations (later reused with crack cocaine) of Black and Hispanic people using drugs and then being sent into a violent frenzy where they murder and kill white people. The modern versions of this are more subtle, because they aren't being made explicitly but rather are part of a narrative societal norms is built on, which makes the entire discussion fuzzy and implicit. C.f. ... the magical negro, and white people's belief that Black people actually have magical powers and super human strength - https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1948550614553642 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/194855061455364... and as an extension... excited delirium, which is an invented thing used to justify violence by police and drug people and is often correlated with a presumption of drug use - https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2020/08/10/how-excited-delirium-is-misused-to-justify-police-brutality/ https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2020/08/10/how-ex... With excited delirium, 'symptoms' may include "attempts at violence, unexpected strength [see previous paper]...Complications may include rhabdomyolysis or high blood potassium". Those complications happen to also be side effects of narcotics people are injected with...the 'diagnosis' is much much more likely to be applied to Black people (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28990246/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28990246/) it is a disease, invented by police, that only seems to occur when police are involved and suspect drug use, that is disproportionately applied to people of color, to provide a post hoc rationalization for violence comited against them.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  A lot of this is narrative and you really have to be skeptical of any narrative that is too clean and simple and flat to describe a complex situation. Crime rates have gone down dramatically in the past couple decades, so we have the luxury to apply hindsight and see what we got wrong and what we got right. But you should generally assume positive intent. Crime was a very serious problem in the U.S. in the 70s, 80s, and early 90s. Take a look at NYC from 1965-2019: http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/nycrime.htm http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/nycrime.htm Murder rates were 5x higher in 1990 than today. It was a big, big problem. It was believed that drugs drove a lot of that and funded gang activity...some of which was absolutely true. Some of which was absolutely exaggerated. The victims of crimes are on the other side of this equation of justice. They also deserve justice and consideration. The ideal of our system is for the law to apply the minimum sentence to prevent the crime from re-occurring again. I think it unfortunately oscillates with the moods of the moment, but if murder rates were to suddenly return to NYC 1990 levels in your town, and someone you know or love was murdered, you might be singing a different tune.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  Dude, it's been a hundred years. Times change. Nobody cares about weed anymore for the most part. Crack is mostly a non issue as that epidemic has already ran its course. Perceptions of coke are relegated to jokes about white collar professionals and crazy parties. Heroin and meth are the two drugs people really look down on these days and they're stereotypical white people drugs. Attempts to cast everyone who wants some sort of stricter drug enforcement as closet racists is naive at best. And this is coming from someone who thinks meth should be available at Walmart just like caffeine pills.
  - butbutemails2 6y ago
    Reminds me of that Milton Friedman joke about the 1950s[1] 1. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt7bzxurJ1I https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt7bzxurJ1I

It isn't intentionally racist to hold the belief...but the belief is an intentional construction to justify racist policing. Off the cuff and reducing a complicated discussion to somethign simple you can start here: https://medium.com/equityorg/reefer-madness-the-racist-roots-of-marijuana-prohibition-37b9e7fb7d6c https://medium.com/equityorg/reefer-madness-the-racist-roots... The early representations used to vilify marijuana were part of jim crow efforts to ensure racial hierarchies. They included representations (later reused with crack cocaine) of Black and Hispanic people using drugs and then being sent into a violent frenzy where they murder and kill white people. The modern versions of this are more subtle, because they aren't being made explicitly but rather are part of a narrative societal norms is built on, which makes the entire discussion fuzzy and implicit. C.f. ... the magical negro, and white people's belief that Black people actually have magical powers and super human strength - https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1948550614553642 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/194855061455364... and as an extension... excited delirium, which is an invented thing used to justify violence by police and drug people and is often correlated with a presumption of drug use - https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2020/08/10/how-excited-delirium-is-misused-to-justify-police-brutality/ https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2020/08/10/how-ex... With excited delirium, 'symptoms' may include "attempts at violence, unexpected strength [see previous paper]...Complications may include rhabdomyolysis or high blood potassium". Those complications happen to also be side effects of narcotics people are injected with...the 'diagnosis' is much much more likely to be applied to Black people (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28990246/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28990246/) it is a disease, invented by police, that only seems to occur when police are involved and suspect drug use, that is disproportionately applied to people of color, to provide a post hoc rationalization for violence comited against them.

chrisco255 6y ago
A lot of this is narrative and you really have to be skeptical of any narrative that is too clean and simple and flat to describe a complex situation. Crime rates have gone down dramatically in the past couple decades, so we have the luxury to apply hindsight and see what we got wrong and what we got right. But you should generally assume positive intent. Crime was a very serious problem in the U.S. in the 70s, 80s, and early 90s. Take a look at NYC from 1965-2019: http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/nycrime.htm http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/nycrime.htm Murder rates were 5x higher in 1990 than today. It was a big, big problem. It was believed that drugs drove a lot of that and funded gang activity...some of which was absolutely true. Some of which was absolutely exaggerated. The victims of crimes are on the other side of this equation of justice. They also deserve justice and consideration. The ideal of our system is for the law to apply the minimum sentence to prevent the crime from re-occurring again. I think it unfortunately oscillates with the moods of the moment, but if murder rates were to suddenly return to NYC 1990 levels in your town, and someone you know or love was murdered, you might be singing a different tune.
throwaway0a5e 6y ago
Dude, it's been a hundred years. Times change. Nobody cares about weed anymore for the most part. Crack is mostly a non issue as that epidemic has already ran its course. Perceptions of coke are relegated to jokes about white collar professionals and crazy parties. Heroin and meth are the two drugs people really look down on these days and they're stereotypical white people drugs. Attempts to cast everyone who wants some sort of stricter drug enforcement as closet racists is naive at best. And this is coming from someone who thinks meth should be available at Walmart just like caffeine pills.
- butbutemails2 6y ago
  Reminds me of that Milton Friedman joke about the 1950s[1] 1. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt7bzxurJ1I https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt7bzxurJ1I