BY STUDENT
The United States is notorious for its overt and covert
racism against African Americans and Hispanics, who basically built this nation.
Ever since the slave trade, racial minorities have been exploited, marginalized
and labeled as “criminals.” Especially, in densely populated areas of the
country, such as the Bronx, Brooklyn and San Diego, were we focus most of our
class discussions. These densely populated areas are usually hyper policed,
which was evident in a video we watched by the Sugar Hill Gang, “Rapper’s
Delight.” The rappers were arrested for simply ‘walking while black’. This type
of hyper policing in urban areas, led to the racial disparity in incarceration,
that is still evident today. As of 2008, blacks and Hispanics accounted for 58%
of people incarcerated in the U.S. and percentage is steadily increasing (“Criminal
Justice Fact Sheet”). To put this into perspective, the combined percentage of
blacks and Hispanics in the U.S. is around 25% so, of that 25%, over half are
incarcerated (Carroll, 2001). You might now be asking yourself, what factors contributed
to the mass incarceration of African Americans and Hispanics?
The mass incarceration of blacks and Hispanics is primarily due
to politician’s “Get Tough on Crime,” and the “War on Drugs” initiatives (“Criminal
Justice Fact Sheet”). The Get Tough on Crime initiative began with the Clinton
administration, it featured harsher sentencing, the three-strike rule and mandatory
minimum sentencing. Most states in the U.S. adopted these policies, because
they were incentivized with federal funding (Yearwood). The ‘War on Drugs’ was
coined by Nixon, in efforts to decrease drugs usage in America, this featured
harsher drug sentencing which mainly affected people in the low ranks of the
socioeconomic hierarchy (racial minorities). It also led to the creation of the
100:1 crack to powder sentencing, which gave longer sentencing for crack rock
possession over cocaine. Which is ridiculous because they are the same drug,
the only difference is cocaine was the drug of choice for middle class whites
(Yearwood). Most of these policies have gone obsolete due to changing times,
but I wouldn’t be surprised if they are readopted under a different name. Today,
we have policies like stop and frisk in New York, that blatantly violates the
fourth amendment (“Stop and Frisk Practices,” 2017). Targets for these random
searches are usually young blacks and Latinos deemed ‘suspicious,’ mostly by white
cops that don’t understand the community they are patrolling.
This blog barely scratches the surface of the
criminalization of blacks and Hispanics in the United States. The origin goes
back to the Progressive Era, were corrupt government leaders would relocate
white red-light districts to black and Hispanic communities, to conceal their wrong-doings
‘under the cover of blackness’ (Muhammad, 2011). According to statistics, racial
minorities are no more prone to violence than their white counterparts, who
have significantly lower incarceration rates. In fact, if blacks and Hispanics
were incarcerated at the same rate as whites, their incarceration rate would
decrease by 50% (“Criminal Justice Fact Sheet”). Interesting don’t you think?
Works
Cited
Carroll, Joseph. "Public Overestimates U.S. Black
and Hispanic Populations." Gallup.com. June 04, 2001. Accessed March 01,
2017. http://www.gallup.com/poll/4435/public-overestimates-us-black-hispanic-populations.aspx.
Contributor,
Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr. "The Tough on Crime Era Needs to End."
TheHill. September 26, 2016. Accessed March 01, 2017. http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/crime/297446-the-tough-on-crime-era-needs-to-end.
"Criminal
Justice Fact Sheet." NAACP. Accessed March 01, 2017. http://www.naacp.org/criminal-justice-fact-sheet/.
Muhammad,
Khalil Gibran. The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of
Modern Urban America. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011.
"Stop
and Frisk Practices." New York Civil Liberties Union. February 21, 2017.
Accessed March 01, 2017.
https://www.nyclu.org/en/issues/racial-justice/stop-and-frisk-practices.
This blog post was put really well together and your flow made it easy to keep reading. However, reading the statistics and the topic itself is quite disturbing. There is so much information and data as proof behind the idea of racism and oppression against Blacks and Latinos. I believe the mass incarceration of these minorities is more than just violating their human rights, but also a vile way of taking advantage of people unjustly for their own profit. The problem with these cases are there are no personal vendettas against specific blacks and latinos. The hoops that minorities have to jump through are instilled in the frameworks of many establishments, private prisons are not the first.
ReplyDeleteOur professor recommended a documentary for us to watch called, "Thirteen." It speaks of the thirteenth amendment and how once slavery was abolished, only those who are incarcerated could be forced to work for free. This film, and also our discussions in class opened my eyes to see that it is no coincidence that the largest groups in prison are blacks and Latinos. Political figures have tried to keep the African American and Latino population in control by throwing them into prisons for crimes that hare associated with fear such as theft, drugs, and gang violence. The unfortunate part of it all is that most of this is false accusations and police officers using reasonable suspicion to persecute minority groups until they find reason to put them behind bars. Many blacks and Latinos have struggled to support themselves since the day their families immigrated here. Which makes them a perfect target by police officers and other law enforcement to attack and give a bad reputation. I hope this made sense, but I very much enjoyed your article and I am very passionate about this particular topic.
ReplyDeleteThis new stream of criminalization is something that affects most students in our class, as we have now grown a sharp look out to make sure we are not discriminated against and harassed by police authorities. The increase that we have seen in those incarcerated can be seen in New York itself, at Ryker's Island. The story of Kalief Brown, whom was falsely accused and tried at just 16 years old and killed himself as just 22 years old. This affect all our communities.
ReplyDeleteSome people may even consider this as the new Jim Crow Era, where those affected mainly are Blacks and Latinos, finding themselves in jail and considered criminals. This mentality might prevent them from ever leaving this environment and for others look for ways out. This is seen in many impoverished areas of New York and other urban cities in the United States. It is even more disturbing, considering White males commit drug crimes and petty crimes that often are not reported.
I've learned about this in another class as well and I learned that the US holds 1/4 of all the prisoners in the world with the majority being men of color. The documentary "The Thirteenth" looks at mass incarceration as a new wave of slavery that is always evolving.
ReplyDeleteIn current news, Trump is working to increase the number of privatized prisons, which will of course increase the number of people in those prisons and increase the likelihood of their human rights being violated. The Thirteenth pointed out that one day, the prison industrial complex will fold but will reinvent itself in another way. The documentary showed technology being developed that would make prisoners confined to their own homes and communities because it would be less expensive than keeping them in prison, which I think is pretty concerning.
I like how this issue was put to our attention because it is an ongoing issue that does not seem to present anything but more problems especially for the Black and Latinx community. I also like how some statistics were added on in order to show facts and really put things into perspective that most people do not know about or do not think about in comparison to other populations. The judgement before reasoning is unfair.
ReplyDeleteI think this post did a very good job of scratching the surface of how the system ,from the government down, has been set up to affect minority communities the most. The War on Drugs seemed more as if it was a war on people because it never really stopped the drug use and the trafficking of it. Instead what it did was destroy many families and communities.
ReplyDeleteThe criminlization of minorities is a very heated topic due to how prevalent it is in current events. Seeing the documentary, "thirteenth", it highly revolved around the overlook of the thirteenth amendement, and what's more disgusting about this is that it still happens today. From Trump's support to private prisons, to Nixon's War on Drugs, to even just the beginning of this country racism exists in the sense of imprisonment. It is from this where we should ask why America is the land of much opportunity and at the same time, hate?
ReplyDelete