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The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness?
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12 reviews of this product found across Reddit:
Yes. A big change in my beliefs was when I read The New Jim Crow and realized that the playing field is actually not level at all.
And add to that life experiences where I saw POC and women get treated much worse in similar situations, I started to realize how much I was living life on easy. For example, I got pulled over for reckless driving (I was completely guilty: 60 in a 25) and the cop let me call a ride rather than booking me. I also had been drinking and although I wasn't over the legal limit, it still made it worse. I had to go to court but the police didn't even mention the drinking on the summons/citation and all I had was a fine. Compare that to some of my young male black coworkers who couldn't even walk home at night (same town, and even the same street) after work without getting stopped and harassed.
Even accounting for economic status, you have to wilfully ignore reality to not see how straight white men have an easier go of it.
Glad you asked, see if your local library has a copy of this book, it was required reading in my sociology classes and does a good job of explaining the phenomenon.
Except it DOES exist, in basically every part of our society. Just because you don't believe it doesn't mean the statistics and the facts of history aren't there. You should try reading a book for once. Here's a good one.
I understand you feel like systemic racism doesn't exist, but that's really poor evidence.
Do you at least agree that the system is racist? Because I would like to know that at least one cop actually understands that his job is to perpetuate racism.
ETA: and if you don't think it is. I strongly encourage you to at least read: "The New Jim Crow". Amazon link
You want math, history, and proof? Let's take systemic racism, with which you seem to take issue above.
Read The New Jim Crow and The Color of Law and stack those against your 3.4%. I'll read any reputable counter-sources you might have, even though there aren't any.
Your example of "sexism" against men as your mythical strawman solution to the gender wage gap shows exactly the depth of your consideration here. Accusations of "reverse sexism" have been a cornerstone of the misogyny-apologist crowd for decades.
What ad hominem? Are you talking about where I pointed out that you’re a moron? That’s just the truth.
Bail reform means that people can’t just buy there way out of jail. If someone is a threat and shouldn’t be released from jail, then why should they be able to buy their way out? Explain that one to me. Or just admit this is one of those things you are opposed to because liberals support it.
Ballot harvesting? How is that low information? Are you one of those idiots who claim that mail in voting isn’t safe and secure despite having no evidence to support it?
I support raising the minimum wage and taxing the rich more. That would help with wage stagnation.
How do I love corporate power? I’m all for stronger unions and regulations.
I don’t want NATO to enter war with Russia. I want dictators who destabilize the region like Putin to be disposed. If Russia grinding itself against Ukraine does that, then great. I don’t think nations should just roll over and let bad state actors just roll over their neighbors.
Fetterman is objectively a better choice then Oz. I’m not sure what’s so controversial about that to you? Like do you think a snake oil salesman would do better for the people of the state? I’m not a Pelosi fan, I think she’s old guard and needs to make way for the next generation. That being said, no one would call her stupid.
Why wouldn’t people celebrate a democratic shift?
Solar is one of the cheapest energy sources right along with wind and it’s only getting better. I support nuclear power as well but it’s not exactly getting cheaper.
Electric cars are great and make the US less reliant on Middle East and Russian dictators. Not sure why you would be opposed to that.
World governments meeting and talking things out is good. Otherwise you get wars.
What pedos do I supposedly support? It’s not like I support Trump and Gaetz.
What’s wrong with assisted suicide?
There you go with the racist victim blaming again. You should check out The New Jim Crow.
You authoritarian simps are gross.
Phil Vischer addresses this in a series of excellent videos.
Holy Post: Race in America, part 1
Holy Post: Race in America, part 2
Connected to this, but indirectly are these videos:
Holy Post: Why do white Christians vote Republican and black Christians vote Democrat? (Note: obviously this is a generalization; he is speaking of major trends)
>As a Christian, I struggle with a proper response because I feel most of the new “revolutions” of our time are manufactured, especially considering that most are lawless and anti Christian. Am I showing a lack of wisdom or judgment?
The Christian community in the US has been lamentably part of the problem. Here's some background on this that most people are not aware of. This video of Phil's covers some of the history of how the term "Evangelical" got heavily loaded with political implications in the US, and a history of racism, sadly, has something to do with it:
Holy Post: What is an "Evangelical"?
>I don’t see racism existing like it used to, especially not how the media is constantly portraying it. I know racism still exists so I’m not denying it. But, from my perspective where I live, it’s really not a systemic problem.
It is a systemic problem. What makes it systemic is when laws are made that have racist motivations (none of it is explicit anymore; it's always plausibly deniable), or when the culture of institutions internalize racism. Then, even when individuals working within the institution are not themselves racist, or are even minorities themselves, they end up carrying out the system which is stacked against minorities.
One example of this is the relationship between a city's black population and how much it depends on fines and citations and traffic tickets for revenue:
Cities with more black residents rely more on traffic tickets and fines for revenue
Please read this entire article. This is important.
Systemic racism isn't the Jim-Crow style explicit segregation anymore. A lot of it exists as things like this. When cities heavily depend on police to raise revenue by ticketing and fining people, even black cops end up being part of the problem, because
- There's no way to do this non-abusively if you need to achieve certain revenue goals. Under this arrangement, the Police become extortionists, and their activity becomes divorced from keeping the peace and establishing justice. This is a fundamental conflict of interest. The article explains the extent to which this has eroded trust in the police and sowed animosity between them and the communities from which they extract revenue with these fines and citations
- if cops are going to victimize someone in this way with unjust and/or questionable fines to raise revenue from them, naturally they will go after the people who can't afford to defend themselves—the poor, which, due to the history (described by Phil Vischer in the videos above) are disproportionately black and brown.
- When cops are made to raise revenue with abusive fines, the prevalent stereotypes become a shield for targeting black citizens. If you have to make up a cover story, the cover story of a criminally inclined or unruly black citizen who was breaking the law seems more plausible due to the prevalent stereotypes than the cover story of a white or Asian person doing the same. So the targeting of poor black citizens get reinforced because it is safer for a cop to levy an abusive fine on a poor black person whom people are less likely to believe when they object and claim that the cop was lying.
- With far more interactions with cops such as these, especially if the interactions are unjust and there is a lot of resentment, a lot more of these interactions are at risk of escalating to violence, and a lot more of these will end up sending the citizens who have these interactions to jail.
- Sending a person to jail, even for a month or two, can destroy their life. For the poor, having the breadwinner of a household in jail can result in not only loss of one's job, but eviction, homelessness, and emotional trauma to the children. Taking out one of the parents can adversely impact their children, making them vulnerable various social pathologies (gangs, delinquency, etc.), setting them up for perpetuating the cycle of poverty.
- The culture of policing in America suggests to cops that they will not be held to account when they commit wrongdoings. Police unions help elect prosecutors, and prosecutors generally return the favor when police are accused of crimes.
One poignant example of selective policing that really struck me was an account from a former police officer, who was told not to go looking for drugs in the white neighborhoods. It's not as if drugs weren't being used at white frat houses any less than among the poor black neighborhoods, but the police turn a blind eye to that, and have a culture of who it is and is not acceptable to police for certain crimes. There are occasional exceptions to this, but the institutional norm absolutely exhibits a racial bias, especially if revenue from confiscating goods and cash and the issuing of fines are involved.
A fantastic book that really lays bare how we still have systemic racism is The New Jim Crow (Mass incarceration in the age of colorblindness) . If you doubt that systemic racism exists, perhaps because it is not as overt as it used to be (unless you are subject to it), this book will lay it bare. As a Christian, I recommend other Christians who genuinely want to know the truth of the matter but have doubts about whether racism is systemic in the US today to read this book.
My church had a guest speaker, Mako Nagasawa, who explained some of the things from this book in a lecture back when our church tackled the topic of racism, racial tensions, and what the church's response should be in light of Christian morals and ethics back in May of 2016. Take a look. It was eye-opening to say the least. Here is the guest speaker's lecture. (There is a button you can click to view the video of the lecture.) I was of the opinion that racism exists but it wasn't widespread and wasn't systematic, and I had a lot of misconceptions dashed by what I have learned since then. We, the church, have a lot of repentance to do—collectively, as when Daniel repented of the sins of his people. We need to love our neighbors as ourselves, and acknowledge their grievances, and not make excuses to dismiss them.
Here is an informative read on the subject: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/1620971933/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_fabc_datZFbSNWZZPZ
First, I hate to agree with you, but you're right in that conservatives will wave this away. There is no 1:1 statistic you can show to illustrate the issue. That's why there is a whole discourse and why people have spent their careers studying this and why we have hundreds of books and thousands of articles on the topic. This is what makes it systemic, it's a whole system you have to grasp to understand the issue.
What I can try to do is provide a very brief and topical overview with some useful sources.
First, we have to understand that property values have been critical in defining a number of other aspects of our country. Not only are homes the major factor in most people's and family's wealth, but they also are key in determining credit worthiness, educational support, access to food and other basic resources, and levels/methods of policing.
Redlining created a vicious cycle in black communities. If you were black, you were limited in where you could live. Black communities were subsequently devalued because they were black. Up until recently, your zip code was one of the deciding factors on your credit worthiness, meaning that if you lived in a black neighborhood it was much harder to get loans for things like starting a business or going to college. Combine that with the fact that school funding is based on property tax (which is based on property values) so schools in black communities were underfunded compared to white communities. Those factors severely limit economic opportunity and mobility. Add in the fact that these areas are also less likely to have grocery stores, public services, and transportation infrastructure because of those same property values, it becomes relatively more expensive to live in these areas while simultaneously being harder to earn the same income as a white person. This doesn't even touch on implicit bias in healthcare which is its own beast in and of itself; nor the implicit bias in hiring that makes it fundamentally more difficult to get a job if you have a "black" name or went to a black school.
What happens when you have limited economic opportunity? Criminal activity, especially petty crime, becomes far more appealing, as the cost benefit equation begins to shift harder and harder towards the benefit side. The reaction then is broken-window policing, which doesn't actually do anything to disincentivize the criminal activity and instead causes more people from black communities to be arrested and charged for low-level crimes. Those people face higher sentences (statistically) than whites due to both implicit and explicit bias. As a result the crime rate actually goes up (thanks statistics) and property values are further depressed while a significant portion of the productive age population is removed and disqualified from the labor pool, further reducing overall income in these areas.
This is the system that has been established both intentionally and unintentionally that continues to disadvantage minorities, and especially black communities in the US.
Here's some good resources on the background of the topic, including data and analysis.
Quick overview from NPR: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5FBJyqfoLM
Four great Brookings articles on economic mobility in general and the divide in mobility between black and white Americans: https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2019/02/15/how-racial-and-regional-inequality-affect-economic-opportunity/
And: https://www.brookings.edu/research/devaluation-of-assets-in-black-neighborhoods/
With a video version summarizing some of these for the more visually inclined: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2XFh_tD2RA
The New Jim Crow is the seminal work on the incarceration of black people: https://www.amazon.com/New-Jim-Crow-Incarceration-Colorblindness/dp/1620971933/ref=sr_1_2?crid=2DCHHGB8IPZAH&dchild=1&keywords=the+new+jim+crow&qid=1601147333&sprefix=the+new+%2Caps%2C176&sr=8-2
This is unprecedented. Whether you like it or not, the boycotting of this game will cause a buzz and draw more attention to the issue. It’s already doing that, which means it’s serving a purpose.
Also, chill the fuck out because you can’t watch your precious game. Here are a few book recommendations to keep you occupied:
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness https://www.amazon.com/dp/1620971933/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_91SrFbWBNNE88
Makes Me Wanna Holler: A Young Black Man in America https://www.amazon.com/dp/0679740708/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_x2SrFbCGN54VQ
Make Change: How to Fight Injustice, Dismantle Systemic Oppression, and Own Our Future https://www.amazon.com/dp/0358048001/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_12SrFbDR6998G
I'd need to write you a whole book to explain the multiple misconceptions you made in those three short sentences.
Luckily, someone already did it.
Read the book. Educate yourself. Then we can talk all you want.
Until then, I'm not interested in having a conversation with someone who does not understand even the basic, fundamental underpinnings of racism in modern America, much less how it intersects with crime and policing.
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