CRIMINALIZATION AND DIRTYING THE NAME OF LATINOS
In recent years, Latinos have been said to be the
group with the fastest rate of imprisonment in America and suggesting that they
have the largest amount of people in prison or jail. This has created the
perception that this group of either new or older immigrants and natives are
toxic to our country. If you dig deeper, you may find that Latinos are being imprisoned
for the littlest situations. The media has played a role in “dirtying” the name
of Latinos. Are authority figures and non-Latino individuals extending the
truth and portraying Latinos in a certain way in order to make them worse off
in today’s society and also trying to bring awareness to a “Puerto Rican problem”
or a “Latino problem” again? In this blog post I will discuss the Latino crime
rate in America and how it compares to the Latino crime rate specifically in
Miami, Florida. Also, I will argue that the truth about the Latino crime rates are
being altered in order to portray a negative view on these people.
According to NYCriminal Defense, 8,079,819
Latinos total have been incarcerated in the United States. It isn’t specified
exactly why they have been imprisoned so it doesn’t necessarily mean that serious
rule-breaking crimes were committed. Since there are many hate crimes thrown on
Latinos, similarly to blacks, it is a good possibility that some of the individuals
who made up the large number above, had been incarcerated for tomfoolery
reasons. In addition, when looking at violence records, Latinos/Hispanics had
the least total violence at 14.8% and whites had the top total violence of
42.9% in the U.S. Specifically in Miami-Dade County, there are 1,443
Hispanic/Latino inmates as compared to an almost 2,000 others who are
non-Hispanic/Latino. To clarify, the ratio is 33.6% Hispanic/Latino versus
66.4% other groups which include whites and African Americans. These statistics
show that Latino/Hispanic percentages are significantly lower than other groups
and that also, their violence records are actually estimated as the lowest.
Within the last decade, false information about
immigrants had been released by CNN’s Lou Dobbs who claimed that one third of
inmates serving time in federal prisons came from another country. He
emphasized the “one-third” part. Butcher and Piehl pointed out that actually,
immigrants to the U.S have lower incarceration rates than any other group. Because
less education opportunities and lower wages is corresponded with criminal
conduct, it is assumed that most immigrants would partake in this behavior.
However, on a Latino study regarding the population of Mexican immigrants, it
revealed that immigration and assumed criminal behaviors have been distorted by
public perceptions. In fact, it was found by Hagan and Palloni that noncitizen
Latin American immigrants come to the U.S. with such strong cultural and family
traditions that they have no desire to be compatible with criminal behaviors. These
studies show that some people of non-Latino and authority figure identities deem
Latino immigrants in an altered perspective when in fact, most of the Latino
immigrants have been raised otherwise. They are trying to say that a person’s
upbringing is linked to criminal behavior. In Lou Dobbs’ comment he was trying
to build the impression that in America we still have some sort of a Puerto
Rican problem or at least a Latino problem going on. In other words, he was
trying to portray that Latinos are dangerous and that this is a problem. Mr.
Dobbs is an example of “dirtying” the name and existence of Latinos. Unfortunately,
the downplaying of Latinos and their positive aspects is a problem in America
that might never disappear.
Citations
Junior, Daniel. "Miami-Dade County
Corrections and Rehabilitation Department Daily Jail Population
Statistics." Miami-Dade County. N.p., 24 Sept. 2016. Web. 25 Sept. 2016.
"Latino Crime Evolvement in U.S." NY
Criminal Defense. Bukh Law Firm, 2015. Web. 25 Sept. 2016.
Morin, Jose Luis. "Latinas/os and US
Prisons: Trends and Challenges." Latino Studies 6 (2008): 11-34. Web. 25
Sept. 2016.
I completely agree with your post, but I do think that the media and US officials are not the only ones degrading the Latino image. I myself would say that my country is dangerous and full of criminals, I would never leave my house or my car open like I do here in the US because people would steal from me. So, how do we expect the US to say that we are not criminals when our own countries are worst than the US in terms of overall criminality? If we come from a dangerous country, at least some of us would also be dangerous and criminals, wouldn't it be fair for the US to assume this? I believe that If we wish to stop our bad reputation, we should also work to improve our countries and not assume that we have nothing to do for those who stayed home.
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ReplyDeleteIt is true that the media tends to portray a very skewed perception of Latinos. Your post reminded me of the concept of writing crime into race that we discussed in class. It's almost as if people believe that being Latino/a goes hand in hand with being a criminal. The real "Latino problem" is the unfair treatment Latinos receive from policy makers, the media, and prejudiced people. Your post does a good job pointing out that many Latinos do not want to be linked to criminal behavior.
This was by far my favorite blog post. While people talk about incarceration and how it is unfair you explained how Latinos are poorly represented in the media and in society and proved how Latinos are not their stereotype. It was hard to read that CNN had someone on air making false statements. Many people watch CNN and listen to what is being stated and to them that is the most accurate new source. Media plays a big problem in racial issues and this further proves that.
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