All the statistics gleaned from incarceration surveys and law enforcement records cannot indubitably frame a police department for clear racism. and Conversel

All the statistics gleaned from incarceration surveys and law enforcement records cannot indubitably frame a police department for clear racism. and Conversely, all the statistics gleaned from incarceration surveys and law enforcement records cannot indubitably absolve a police department of clear racism. It's just the nature of the beast. Even if you were to be able to prove it, there will always be concern-trolls who argue,quite convincingly, that preventing police departments from aggressively enforcing the law (even with provisions such as Stop and Frisk in NYC) is in itself an injustice to the poor and vulnerable (many of whom might in fact be of the inflicted race, themselves). Eg: Barney Frank argues in favor of more policing of black neighborhoods as not doing so would be a disservice to the law abiding (black) residents who are also themselves victims of crime albeit from gang members who might be black,themselves. So STOP and FRISK is in essence justified, one could imply from Frank's rationale. This from an openly gay and progressive Democrat. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW3xFGeGIWk&t=2m12s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW3xFGeGIWk&t=2m12s General perception has always been the scale used to judge whether a party is at the receiving end of overt or covert racism. Statistics have always been a sideshow. A sweetener, if you will, to seal the argument but not the primary means of smelling that something's awry in the way people are treated. Whether it is community policing or non-discriminatory housing. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/12/business/economy/discrimination-in-housing-against-nonwhites-persists-quietly-us-study-finds.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/12/business/economy/discrimin... Justice Potter Stewart's thumb rule for ascertaining whether something fits the definition of hardcore pornography applies here: "I know it when I see it." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it Whether Atherton is the most fitting poster child for the kind of limousine liberalism that I described, is another matter altogether. I wouldn't be one bit surprised if this happened in any of the most educated and virulently liberal nooks of the country. The fact is it does exist and yes it is a thing. It has been called the "Oh, don't give me any of that racist crap! My Husband and I gave money to Colin Powell!" strain of racism. To remove the last remnants of niggling doubt from those who genuinely suspect that such a pattern of behavior actually exists among the most gifted, accomplished and refined, while wealthy, members of our society, I give you this memorable exchange from the movie Cruel Intentions: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb2XlqE9OUg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb2XlqE9OUg This has always been there and given the current mores of our society, is likely to persist unless we shed our partisan coats and overhaul our approaches to solving societal problems in a wholesale way.