DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND CRIMINALIZATION

WHITES: THE CRIMES THEY DON'T COMMIT
BY STUDENT

As a Latino in the United States I can attest to the dichotomies that presently exist in law enforcement and the policies that define crime. Put simply the halves are those who are White and those who are not. These racialized policies tend to follow the contours of geographical borders like communities, cities, or even whole states. The ideologies at the base of these policies are simplistic and stereotypical in nature.

The racialization of crimes are influenced by many things and a key one is the “Broken Window Policy,” which gave law enforcement the freedom to assume and stereotype something based on physical appearance.  Todays “Stop and Frisk” is a descendant of that policy. Stop and Frisk allows officers to frisk individuals who show signs of suspicion. Sadly, the statistics show that most of the individuals frisked have been Black and Latino men. According to the New York Civil Liberties Union, “[Between] 2002 and 2012, black and Latino residents made up close to 90 percent of people stopped, and about 88 percent of stops – more than 3.8 million – were innocent New Yorkers.” This is evidence that race, besides those that are considered white, are criminalized.  

These beliefs arise after the end of slavery and into the realm of policy making (such as Jim Crow) and it argues for the Nature side of the “Nurture versus Nature” debate. The nature side of the debate argues that blacks are inherently inferior to Whites because they don’t have the mental capacity to excel beyond their present conditions.  The nurture side argues that the historical and present oppressive conditions have held blacks and Latinos from developing. This kind of thinking is so integrated into U.S culture and policy that we can see even President Thomas Jefferson say in his only book Notes on the State of Virginia, in reference to black people, that, “In general, their existence appears to participate more of sensation then reflection…”

To finally establish the purpose behind my title, whites have had the privilege of not being seen as criminal as a tribute to their historical dominance.  The white policy makers, ignorant of their privilege, make laws, like in New York’s “Stop and Frisk,” that further criminalizes Latinos and Blacks and perpetuates the belief that they are inherently criminal and subordinate. To further explain the injustice in our present and past legal system, whites don’t commit less crime as a result of their superiority but a result of luck; lucky to be born privileged.

DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND CRIMINALIZATION

BY STUDENT

Every year our prison system numbers increase drastically. The United States has the largest incarcerated population in the world. Have you ever wondered why most of those numbers are Latinos and African Americans? Honestly, I have wondered this my entire life. The United States is supposed to be a country that is full of opportunities and welcoming of everyone. However, if your skin complexion isn’t lighter than a brown piece of bag, you get denied your civil rights and liberties. Why must our skin complexion make us more prone to failure and incarceration?

Imagine a missile, and we the minorities, are the walking targets. The missile may miss, but eventually it catches up. What I mean by this is that us minorities are almost always at the center of some issue. We spend all this time trying to be better, so we can get away from the identity that society assigns us with but no matter how hard we try to escape it, it eventually comes back to bite us. For instance, Trayvon Martin was simply going to the store to get some skittles and Arizona bottle. But sadly, his life was taken away due to a mistake. He supposedly fit this description of young black men who were coming into gated communities stealing. Because of the way he looked, it caused him his life. Why is it that once one Hispanic or African American does something wrong, everyone else in that category is now seen the same way? A white person can commit as many crimes and still maintain their image while ours gets tarnished. Based on data collected by the US Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics, the sentencing projects points out that “Hispanics are the fastest growing group being imprisoned”. (Morin 2008) They also found that from 1985 to 1995 the number of Hispanics in prison rose by 219%, which averages to about 12.9% each year. I feel that in many of these cases the problem is that people have many misconceptions, misconceptions that are fueled by the constant negative stereotypes of minorities in the media.

There are false ideas made to classify and justify the separation between the human races in our society, such as stereotypes. Some of the stereotypes that harm Latinos/as are that we are lazy, not educated and are only here to do the jobs everyone else won’t do. When in reality there are many of us out here striving to be our best, by getting an education and trying to make something of ourselves, but even then its still difficult. For many the wish to see their family out of the struggle leads them to low paying jobs. Which will only pay the bills and take away the possibility of an education or simply land them in jail. Like this 40-year-old ex-gangster said, “You know, in my life I’ve rarely been amazed. But I’ll tell you what amazed me is the last times I was in prison. I thought, all these guys were in there for something, you know, that they had done SOMETHING. But then people started telling me what they were in for. More than half the guys, they were in for drugs, for possession. I mean, for NOTHING. That was truly amazing, you know, to me” (Gilmore 2007). People selling drugs just to be able to have enough money to feed their families or pay the bills. It’s not that they want to be in jail, it’s just the only way they see of having a better living. But sadly it’s a blueprint that has already been made, that sets up minorities to fail. We can always challenge the way life is set up for us, but it will never change. Our skin complexion will always determine our life span and destiny.

Work Cited

·      Morin, Jose Luis. Latina/os and US prisons: Trends and Challenges. John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York, NY, 2008

·      Gilmore, Ruth. Golden Gulag: prisons, surplus, crisis, and opposition in globalizing California. University of California press, 2007.

DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND CRIMINALIZATION

BY R.P.

It’s really a shame that in the year 2015 there is still substantial evidence for systematic racism in the police force. Police officers, amongst many others, view African American’s, and Latino’s as a threat no matter what the circumstance. More Latinos are incarcerated than Whites, and more African Americans are incarcerated than Whites and Latinos. A lot of these issues come from the fact that many of the low income areas of New York City are now, or were once areas of Latino or African American dominance. Since these areas were underprivileged and typically poor, there were high rates of crime and violence. The issue now is that police still view specific races as violent, while that’s not the truth. What are the effects of Latinos being viewed as criminals on the Latino population as a whole, and what happens to these Latinos who are seen as criminals? In this blog post I argue that there is an issue in law enforcement causing a widespread stereotyping of people of color which leads to more and more Latinos in prisons.

Since 1848 (when the Mexican American war ended), Mexicans and other groups of Latino descent seem to be discriminated against in the US Criminal Justice System, which is “infused” with racist ideas of the Latino as dangerous “aliens” (Morin, 2008). The stereotype of Latinos to be criminals has persisted through the years because of the U.S. Law, media, and society from around 1848 to now. For example, Latin American immigrants are usually recognized as “underserving” by law enforcement, and are more likely to have negative incidences with the criminal justice system (Morin, 2008). From the years 1971 to 2001, Latinos experiences a major increase of the rate of being in prison (ten times increase) (Morin, 2008). Another substantial increase for Latinos was from 1985 to 1995. In 1985 10.9% of all inmates (federal and state prisons) were Latino, and in 1995 the percentage rose to 15.5% (Morin, 2008). Another scary statistic is that as of 2003, 4% of ALL Latino males in their 20s were incarcerated, while the number was only 1.5% for White males in the same age group (the number for African Americans is 12% for those who are interested)(Rios, 2006). Finally, in a lifetime Latino males have a 17.9% chance of going to prison, while a White male has a 5.9% chance, Latino males have nearly a three times greater chance of going to prison than a White male (Morin, 2008). These examples and percentages aren’t just coincidental. Since around the 1960s, politics has shifted from being about the war on poverty, to the war on drugs or the war on crime. This shift has linked poverty with crime, “especially poverty in ‘minority communities’”, such as Latino oriented neighborhoods in NYC (Morin, 2008). It’s not right that people of color have such a higher chance of going to prison than whites. It’s all because of the stereotypes, there is a higher potential for racial violence as a consequence of bad data, and bad policing (Muhammad, 2010)

This systematic racism affects children of Latino descent in more ways than one. First off, the young adult “deviants” are built up to be criminals based on the media, and they face criminalization starting as early as 8 years old (Rios, 2006). These kids are built up, realizing that adults of the same race as them are feared by the police, and that they are viewed as criminals. They shouldn’t be brought up in a world where they learn that everyone will look down on them their entire lives. That is going to cause an array of issues in itself! I mean, 95% of all “juveniles” sent to court are youth of color (Rios, 2006), which does include African Americans, Latino, and many other races but that is a significant difference compared to white children. In New York City in the 1920s, it was found that black youths were twice as likely to be arraigned in Children’s court as white youths (Muhammad, 2010). Again, this isn’t a coincidence it’s a systematic problem of racism in the police force and any law areas associated. We need a complete reform, the year is 2015, “racial stereotypes” shouldn’t be so prominent in law enforcement anymore and it’s so unfortunate and unfair that it is. 

Works Cited

Morin, José Luis. “Latinas/os and US Prisons: Trends and Challenges.” Latino Studies 2008: Web. 22 Sept. 2015.

Muhammad, Khalil Gibran. 2010. “The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America.” Web. 22 Sept. 2015

Rios, Victor M. “The Hyper-Criminalization of Black and Latino Male Youth in the Era of Mass Incarceration.” Web. 22 Sept. 2015

Soto, Daniel Vidal. “Gentrifying New York City’s underground.” Latino Rebels 2014: Web. 22 Sept. 2015.

DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND CRIMINALIZATION

BY STUDENT

We are the fastest growing minority group in the prison system. One in four prisoners is Latino. Latino children are more than 3 times as likely to have a parent in jail, compared to a white person (Morin). This leads me to think that Latinos like myself are more inclined to violence and to incarceration but this isn’t necessarily true as most Latinos incarcerated are in jail due to non-violent offences. Like my other classmates have posted, sometimes the media’s portrayal of a Latino and harsh drug and immigration laws can sometimes influence the incarcerations taking place but either way we make up a lot of the majority in prison and this is something we should be working against, or trying to fix. So why are Latinos being incarcerated at such a frequent rate?

One reason is the war on drugs. This war on drugs has to do with our incarcerations because the majority of locations affected by drugs are usually low income neighborhoods stricken by poverty, where Latinos and Blacks often reside. Another big reason is that someone in prison isn’t allowed to
vote, but yet they are still accounted for on the census and therefore the government/state still receives taxes for that person. That seems like a pretty big reason to want Latino’s in prison, they aren't allowed to vote and so they’re voice isn’t heard and does not count. Some other reasons include racial profiling, the inability to communicate and speak english and often times running around without papers or identification due to an undocumented status. Also the Rockefeller Drug Laws of 1973 made it even more difficult for Latinos to stay out of prison as you could receive up to 15 years in prison for a couple of grams of narcotics, whether selling or just in possession. Personally I feel as if Latinos are either sort of targetted for jail or set up in a way that goes back to the origins of our countries. Some examples of this could be the Cuban crime wave, barrios and slums and other unnecessary obstacles put in the way of a minority.

Now, not only do we have to deal with many unnecessary obstacles and harsh living conditions but the state also chooses to fund private prisons and federal prisons much more than higher educational facilities. This may be because of crime, but I feel like if they were to focus more on resources
and keeping people out of jail then all of this funding wouldn’t be needed for prisons in the first place. Basically I read a document that discussed NYC in the 90s and how prisons received more funding than SUNY’s (Gangi). This isn’t really shocking to me as I have known about the privatization of jails for a while but it should be shocking to anyone reading this just because it’s amazing how money goes to things like wars, the army and prison funding but it never goes towards artistic programs, after school programs, or even something as simple as a neighborhood park to keep kids away from the streets.

The main takeaway I want people to have from this blog is some of the reasons why we are going to jail at such a frequent rate, also I really want people to read about our government funding and where it is going. Lastly, I feel like all of these incarcerations could have been avoided but harsh drug laws and the inability to speak english by some Latinos may have led to many of these incarcerations and changed lives, lives that could have been changed for the better had it not been for the incarceration of a father, brother or son.

References

Gangi, Robert. N​ew York State of Mind?​(n.d.): n. pag. N​ew York State of Mind?: Higher Education vs. Prison Funding in the Empire State.​Web. 29 Sept. 2015.

Morin, Jose L. "Young Latino Males: An American Delima." Young Latino Males. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2015.

DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND CRIMINALIZATION

CRIMINALIZATION OF LATINOS

BY STUDENT

The rate of incarceration in the United States has been increasing steadily on an annual basis for many years. In today’s world there is no equal distribution of different races within prisons, but a majority of Latinos/Latinas, African Americans and Native Americans. In recent years, Latinas/os have been identified as the fastest rate of imprisonment of all groups in the country. (Morín 11) This might seem “surprising” to some people because television and social media always portray African Americans more than any other race as those being criminalized and imprisoned the most. Just to clarify a bit more how bad the number of Latinas/os incarcerated is, from 1985-1995, the number of Hispanics rose 219%. While Latinas/os represented 10.9% of all state and federal inmates in 1985, by 1995, the percentage had grown to 15.5%. (Morín 13) Although people of color specifically are being incarcerated all over the country (and very quickly) it is more of a problem in California than it is anywhere else. With the increasing number of Latinas/os being imprisoned it raised a few basic questions for me. Why were Latinas/os being targeted so much and put in jail? Also, with the number of prisoners increasing so much, where were they all being put? Was there enough room in prisons prior to the surge of minority races bring imprisoned?

In Latina/os And U.S. Prisons: Trends and Challenges the author gives a few factors contributing to the rise of Latina/o population in prisons, “The racialization of crime; the manner in which criminal justice policy is formulated and justified around the fear of crime; how the courts and the criminal justice system operate; and the role of the media in promoting negative images of Latinas/os are among the areas explored in discerning contributing factors.” (Morín 11) These are all issues that could be easily resolved if the world didn’t automatically judge people based on their race or ethnicity. Another reason Latinas/os are exposed to high rates of incarceration is because of SOME of them being “immigrants” and the media seeing them as harmful people in our country. As I said earlier this is something that should be easy to put a stop to, but because the world is blind to reason and just believes what they are told by the media and other forms of news it can continue being an issue for a long time (when there is no reason for it to be.)

The other issue I wanted to bring up was IF this problem continues to occur, is there enough room in California jails to fit the large amount of “prisoners.” During the early 1980’s in California there were a lot of plans to build new prisons. In 1982 the legislature approved the siting of new facilities in Los Angeles and San Diego. That same year the legislature successfully petitioned voters to approve $495,000,000 in general obligation bonds to build new prisons—based on the argument that more prison cells would enhance public safety and punish wrongdoers. (Gilmore 93) The expansion of prisons throughout California would not have to be an issue if it wasn’t for the increase of Latinas/os and African Americans being incarcerated. In Los Angeles, Latina/o youth are incarcerated at rates much higher than White youth – 7.3 times as often from 1996 to 1998 – and Latina/o youth are prosecuted as adults more often than White youth – 2.4 times as often from 1996 to 1998. (Morín 26) If that issue (7 times as many Latinas/os being incarcerated) were not an issue, which it shouldn’t be, then there would be no need for more prisons.

References:

Morin, Jose Luis. Latina/os and US prisons: Trends and Challenges. John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York, NY, 2008.

Gilmore, Ruth. Golden Gulag: prisons, surplus, crisis, and opposition in globalizing California. University of California press, 2007.

DEINDUSTRIALIZATION AND CRIMINALIZATION

BY STUDENT

The United States has a notorious history of treating minorities as less than equal. The sad truth is that after all these years, some people still see only two divisions: white or people of color. If you fit into the latter category, you are suddenly not an individual, but merely part of a stereotype of “your people.” This kind of segregation enveloped African-Americans in the United States for generations. But it doesn’t stop there. It stretches to Latinos, Asians, Indians, etc. Why is it that the color of your skin makes you more susceptible to being seen as a criminal? Why is it that when a white person massacres a crowd, it’s not seen as nefarious as when a black person does anything at all? Why is it that a white man can plead “mental illness” but a black man is a “thug,” a “gangster,” even if he is innocent? In this blog post I argue that blacks and Latinos share the common experiences of criminalization, and this can be seen in areas of Los Angeles, California.

Police brutality, especially towards African-Americans, is one of the most prevalent topics as of recent times in the U.S., with cases such as those of Trayvon Martin, Mike Brown, and Eric Garner. These men have died due to severe police brutality. “Many law enforcement officials flouted the constitutional rights of black criminal suspects, posing a constant threat to innocent bystanders while simultaneously encouraging disrespect for law and order among everyone” (Muhammad 2010). Some officers abuse their power, instead of protecting and serving as they should. Racial profiling is also a very real thing— the use of race or ethnicity as grounds for suspecting someone of having committed an offense. African-Americans and Latinos get racially profiled often.

As of 2015, Latinos outnumber whites in California. California and Los Angeles have the largest Latino populations of any state or county in the nation (Panzar 2015). In 1995, thirty-six percent of those arrested in California were Latino. Many people mistake gang culture for the larger Latino culture due to the way the news and entertainment media portray them— as troubled youths or ones who need to be steered in the right direction. Californians feared that streets would be overrun by menacing gangbangers with shaved heads, tattoos and baggy pants. These are ridiculous stereotypes, ones that also follow African-Americans. “Past and current incidents of police brutality reinforce these misconceptions by buttressing the idea that Latinos are either wildly overrepresented in the ranks of criminals or disproportionately jailed by overzealous and racist cops, judges and juries” (Hayes-Bautista et al. 1996). This should not cloud over the fact that there are multitudes of blacks and Latinos in college, well-educated and flourishing. In 1996, there were nine times more Latinos in California’s colleges than in its prisons and jails. If you treat people like criminals and nothing else, eventually it gets harder to break out of that stereotype to the point that there is not even a slight attempt to. There is good and bad in every race, and viewing people from a myopic perspective will only do harm.


Works Cited:

Muhammad, Khalil Gibran. The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2010.

Hayes-Bautista, David, and Gregory Rodriguez. "The Criminalization of the Latino Identity Makes Fighting Gangs That Much Harder." Los Angeles Times. Last modified September 15, 1996. http://articles.latimes.com/1996-09-15/opinion/op-44051_1_latino-identity.

Panzar, Javier. "It's Official: Latinos Now Outnumber Whites in California." Los Angeles Times. Last modified June 8, 2015. http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-census-latinos-20150708-story.html.

STRUGGLING FOR SPACE, CREATING LATINA/O URBAN CULTURES

INEQUALITY AND OPPRESSION OF PUERTO RICANS IN NEW YORK CITY DURING THE LATE 20TH CENTURY

BY STUDENT

Why keep the Puerto Ricans oppressed? Throughout history minorities were oppressed through many forms such as enslavement, lower quality of food and degrading ones culture. The young lords were inspired by the black panthers party with a purpose was to gain social justice for New York’s working-class Latino population. The young lords originally started as a gang in Chicago, fighting against the evictions of minorities to increase property revenues in the Latino dense areas of Chicago. The young lords eventually transformed from a gang to an organized civil and movement rights movement (NY times, 2015). 

The government oppressed Puerto Ricans in many ways. One of the first ways in which Puerto Ricans felt they needed to take action was during the month of July in 1969 the sanitation department was not picking up the garbage that was pilling up on the streets of east Harlem. This movement was called “the garbage offensive”. The Latinos threw all the trash that was stockpiled on the sidewalks, onto the cities streets to create a barricade, which created traffic to get the attention of the sanitation to be forced to pick up the garbage. (NY times 2015) In December of the same year 13 young lords are arrested for requesting to use the Methodist church in east Harlem for a simple community free breakfast program for the poor Latinos (palante) 3 weeks later the young lords went to their last resort and bared arms to take the church hostage and renamed it “the peoples church” (1969 manifesto) They occupied it for almost 2 weeks and gave free breakfast, community day care center, and a place for poetry slams. 

I feel as if Puerto Ricans were oppressed to prevent them from interrupting the common economic flow of the upper class. Around the time of the young lords was when the country was trying to still over come racial bias and white supremacy. It was a generation that was used to the common act of inequality of minorities. With the city taking away basic human functions such as communal breakfasts and garbage removal in east Harlem makes Latinos spend time and energy trying to substitute for the lack of those basic functions. Which in turn would make it harder for them to move upward in class and wealth. 

References

·      “Young Lords Party: 13- Point Program and Platform”

·      Cotter, Holland. "When the Young Lords Were Outlaws in New York." The New York Times. The New York Times, 23 July 2015

·      "AboutYoungLords." AboutYoungLords. N.p., n.d. Web.  <http://palante.org/AboutYoungLords.htm>

STRUGGLING FOR SPACE, CREATING LATINA/O URBAN CULTURES

THE PUERTO RICAN STRUGGLE IN U.S. CITIES
BY STUDENT

Being a LACS major, I’ve had the opportunity to learn and still be learning about Puerto Ricans in the United States.  As a Latina I’ve been surrounded by Puerto Ricans culturally, family and friend wise but I had no knowledge about the struggle Puerto Ricans have faced. It was not until I had declared LACS my major where I really began to learn about their struggle through the classes I was taking. After what I had heard and learned in the past semesters I have to question why Puerto Ricans had to be the Latino group to obtain citizenship but yet struggle more than other Latinos groups. Especially when they were forced to be part of this country that refuses to see them as equal U.S. citizens. That is when I came to realize that the Puerto Rican struggle began as early as the U.S intervened and took over the island. Even though this was occurring late 19^th century, Puerto Ricans have since been trying to survive in this country that they have to call themselves citizens of. Even decades later Puerto Ricans have continued to struggle and it was not until late 1960s where life became unbearable; conditions for Puerto Ricans in the U.S reached the boiling point. Puerto Ricans in the United States faced racial discrimination, deficient community services, and poor education and job opportunities this time. People were living in poor conditions like fitting eighteen people in a three-room unit or thirty people sharing a broken toilet with no seat, and twenty-five residents sharing a cellar that was then created into sleeping quarters.  Puerto Ricans had a limited opportunity of advancement that kept them part of an underprivileged working class. Puerto Rican communities began to address these injustices by using direct action and creating social organizations. One of these organizations was the Young Lords Party; I had no idea about them till a year ago and in my opinion is one of the social organizations we should all be taught about.

The Young Lords were very respected by the Puerto Rican community. Their mission was to speak for the people. In 1967, this powerful organization believed in social justice movements to help improve the living conditions and social situations of Puerto Ricans in U.S cities. The Young Lords implemented their own health, educational, and public assistance programs and fought against social injustice. Their 13-point manifesto consisted of all the needs they were asking for all Puerto Ricans, both in the United States and in their homeland. Most important of all they wanted self-determination because they had enough with the U.S taking over their voice (Young Lords Party- manifesto, 1979). NYPD the ones who are supposed to protect the people opposed the Young Lords and tried to stop them from achieving their goals by murdering Young Lords members such as beating them up to death and destroying the evidence like they did to Jose Lind. Or hanging another member, Julio Roldan, in a jail cell but not taking responsibility of his death and claiming it was a “suicide” as seen and stated by the Young Lords in their film El Pueblo Se Levanta. The Young Lords had to take arms in self-defense after seeing the injustices that were being done to their people. Immediate action was taken and they were able to better the living standards for Puerto Ricans but that did not stop the future issues Puerto Ricans had to face like gentrification.  

Many Puerto Ricans grew up in barrios feeling a connection to their homeland in Puerto Rico since the people surrounding them were fellow Puerto Ricans. Anglo society has tried to separate Puerto Ricans, move them out of areas and away from one another so it could be more difficult to keep them as a powerful community. Although social movements were happening in New York City, many barrios created by Puerto Ricans began disappearing. Over the past few years, the Lower East Side has been in the process of gentrification, something to which the Puerto Rican community has tried to voice opposition.  Gentrification has been a major factor in the Puerto Rican struggle in New York City. Because of their high poverty rate and unemployment, it gave Puerto Ricans no alternative but to reside in low-income areas or in public housing. After time, higher-class people and other ethnicities have taken over the areas Puerto Ricans reside in and pushed them out of their community. Puerto Ricans were trapped in higher priced housing when they only earned a substandard wage and had no other option but to move to cheaper areas such as South Bronx, Spanish Harlem, and Manhattan's Lower East Side. Gentrification has pushed out thousands of Puerto Ricans in the years especially since New York City moved away from being an industrial city. Gentrification has caused an increase in housing prices, forcing thousands of Puerto Ricans to leave their homes in search of more affordable options. This was a way for Anglo Society to displace minorities from areas they had created strong ties with the community and the people. They felt it was not beneficial at all to keep minorities close to one another, reason why Gentrification is still happening and is not only targeting Puerto Ricans but all Latinos. In this blog post I argue that the Puerto Rican struggle began with the colonization of the island and because they became the only minority group to have citizenship, the Anglo society has targeted this specific group so they won’t ever feel equal to them.

“Young Lords Party: 13-Point Program and Platform.” 1969.

El Pueblo Se Levanta, 1971, Third World Newsreel.