Race and Crime

[Hektore]

Several times, I have had statistics about race and crime thrown around in front of me, usually showing that, blacks are far more likely than whites to end up in prison, be convicted of a violent crime, arrested, etc. In the several times that this has happened it has always been toward the aim of showing that racism in this country is not, or has not diminished and that it is very much alive and well. Now, I don't disagree that racism exists, but I was thinking about other variables that could heavily influence the trend. Things other than the canned racist 'it's just the way black people are' that I hear around home so often.

Well, I took an anthropology class, and in the class it was claimed that the best indicator for whether or not a person will end up in jail is not race, but socio-economic status. Specifically, household income of the house you grew up in and education completed were the top two. This started the gears turning in my head, and I immediately saw a connection. Slavery, forced a group of people into destitution. This treatment remained government sanctioned until very recently (much later than the end of slavery). The civil-rights movement, was a mere 30-60 years ago (depending on how you define the start/finish). That is only 2-3 generations, which is a very short period of time when you think about it. What our (American) history created was a class of citizens at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder that was easily identifiable by the color of their skin.

When examining the lowest class of people in this country (independently of race) I have had it shown to me that it is difficult to escape this class. Good schools, homes and communities are difficult to maintain without money. Money is exactly what poor, uneducated people don't have. It seems to me that if you were to take a large sample of lower class white people, and then look at their grandchildren, most of them will still be in the lower class. What our treatment of blacks has done is artificially placed an exceptionally high percentage of them in the lower class, and forcibly maintained them there until very recently. Also, consider that most blacks are still concentrated geographically in the mostly poor deep south, and the tendency for people to settle near where they grew up. These are confounding variables when you attempt to examine something like race and crime, and make me think that perhaps if you examined crime statistics for just the lower class, the lines between the races would disappear pr at least blur.

Now, I think about racism in general. Even if we somehow managed to become a society completely free of racial discrimination, wouldn't we still see the effects of practiced racism a mere 40 years later? Maybe it's unreasonable to expect total equality between races so soon? Maybe it's unreasonable to expect people brought up in a time when racism was proper to change their ways? Maybe we don't have a prayer for equality until all those alive then have passed? All questions I would like to have answers to, but simply don't.

So TFP, what say you?

[Ustwo]

If its societies fault alone, why are lower class whites lower class at all?

What makes them poor and uneducated as they were never slaves?

Why can some 'escape' while others never can?

Now this thread will go all political on you, but before that let me add this link...

I'm sure someone will point out this site is all uber conservative, nazi, or has mob ties, I haven't researched it, it was the first hit I could find on the subject.

Taking Other Factors into Account
The authors' regression analysis shows similar results. Black and white crime rates are affected differently by levels of economic well-being, education, and family stability.


White Crime
For whites, the robbery rate increases when:

* income falls
* inflation goes up
* there are more women working outside the home and more non-traditional households.

The burglary rate increases when:

* income falls
* education levels fall
* the percentage of female-headed households rises
* inflation goes up
* there are more women working outside the home and more non-traditional households.

The homicide rate increases when:

* education levels fall
* inflation goes up.

Black Crime
For blacks, the robbery rate increases when:

* income rises
* education levels rise
* the percentage of female-headed households falls
* the prison rate (percentage of the population in prison) goes up.

The burglary rate increases when:

* education rises
* the percentage of female-headed household falls
* inflation rises.

The homicide rate increases when:

* income rises.

The authors call for more research to analyze why increasing opportunity leads to more, not less, crime for African-Americans. They tentatively conclude that their results may support the findings of scholars like William Julius Wilson (1987, The Truly Disadvantaged). If the African-American community is becoming increasingly divided into a well-off middle-class and a poor urban underclass, rising overall rates of education and economic opportunity for blacks may have little impact on the poorest, crime-ridden urban neighborhoods.

http://www.children.smartlibrary.org...m?segment=1661

The concept of the above is that as blacks overall are doing better in society their crime rates and being victims of crime seems to be increasing, while the opposite happens for whites.

I think there is more going on here than basic poverty, being poor alone does not make you a criminal and not every problem in the black community is whitey's fault.

[Hektore]

Originally Posted by Ustwo

I think there is more going on here than basic poverty, being poor alone does not make you a criminal and not every problem in the black community is whitey's fault.

This is not even maybe where I meant to go with this. Mostly my goal was exploring other factors that influence why part of this country exists in the way it does. I don't believe racism is entirely to blame and I don't believe "it's all whitey's fault" either. I can see how this was not clear at all from the op, but it was my first attempt to get these thoughts something that resembles organized. You post goes to show there is more going on here than maybe anyone realizes.

[ratbastid]

Originally Posted by Ustwo

The concept of the above is that as blacks overall are doing better in society their crime rates and being victims of crime seems to be increasing, while the opposite happens for whites.

That's what their raw data claims to point to. That link doesn't suggest why that might be, though. Seems very counter-intuitive to me, but you evidently post it because it illustrates a point, but I don't really know what point that is. Care to elucidate?

Originally Posted by Ustwo

not every problem in the black community is whitey's fault.

PRETTY sure nobody said it was (on this thread, at least, and, at least, not yet)--though the fact that you'd go there preemptively is interesting. Was Obama talking about you when he talked about white people angry about being blamed for things they never did? He was sure talking about me! And it's a huge relief to be able to admit it.

I concur entirely with the OP that socioeconomic factors drive crime. The fact is that blacks are disproportionately on the short end of the socioeconomic stick (and anecdotal exceptions prove the rule). I was a little taken aback to see the OP imply that Civil Rights ended... as far as I'm concerned, the mission of civil rights is ongoingly unfulfilled, though we come ever closer and closer, and there are still people actively working for it.

If all people really had equal opportunity and had for 60 years, would we still see lingering racism? Probably. But that's not the case--there's still institutionalized racism built into how our laws are enforced and carried out. Not so much in the laws themselves, the way it used to be, but certainly in how the law hits the pavement.

The STAGGERING over-representation of blacks in prisons is clearly because of racism and socioeconomic bias built into the legal system. Just look at the quality of legal representation you get if you can pay for it yourself versus if you can't, as one example. So it's not just over-representation of blacks committing crimes; the conviction rate of black defendants is also disproportionate. As is the number of black people arrested. In this case I suspect BOTH socioeconomic and racial biases.

[Ustwo]

Originally Posted by Hektore

This is not even maybe where I meant to go with this. Mostly my goal was exploring other factors that influence why part of this country exists in the way it does. I don't believe racism is entirely to blame and I don't believe "it's all whitey's fault" either. I can see how this was not clear at all from the op, but it was my first attempt to get these thoughts something that resembles organized. You post goes to show there is more going on here than maybe anyone realizes.

Understood, I focused too much on the slavery aspect of it.

My personal opinion is that when normalized for every possible variable (something that would be impossible to do so this is just a guess) that blacks would still have a higher crime rate per capita than whites.

My feeling there is that its cultural, and that we have through our well meaning but fundamentally flawed social programs created a permanent underclass which can't be fixed unless we have the courage to end these programs.

What confuses and alarms me most about that study is something I would think would be just the opposite.

* the percentage of female-headed households falls

I'm not clear exactly what they mean by 'female-headed', but my first reading would be households where the father is not present, not that a female wears the pants in the family so to speak. I could be wrong, but if not the implication is that having a male influence is worse than it just being the mother. I really don't know how to read it, and I hope I'm reading it wrong.

Perhaps a easier question to work on would be the concept of poverty and 'lower class'.

Being an employer I have a number of employees which would be classified as lower class by those into making such lists. Its something I've never fully understood as to what factor creates this mindset, as it seems to be self imposed, and not even directly related to income. None seem to be inherently stupid, but all are poorly educated and fail to see a point in education. Its not so much that they don't see a value in it for others, but they don't see a value in it for themselves. What does seem to be a theme is just monumentally poor judgment in the character of people in their lives and major decisions. There seems to be little concept of delayed gratification, and as they tell me stories of their family as small talk it seems their relations are the same. Perhaps its just cultural, perhaps there is something fundamental in how they think genetically, but its confusing.

I'd add the ones working for me are NOT lazy nor are they criminals to my knowledge. Its like they can't see they can do more with their lives, or just don't care to.

To me it seems apparent there just many factors into what makes someone lower class, vrs what makes them criminally inclined, and its maybe possible that some people can't change their 'class' no matter how much you try to help them, its just how they see and enjoy the world.

[ratbastid]

Originally Posted by Ustwo

* the percentage of female-headed households falls

I'm not clear exactly what they mean by 'female-headed', but my first reading would be households where the father is not present, not that a female wears the pants in the family so to speak. I could be wrong, but if not the implication is that having a male influence is worse than it just being the mother. I really don't know how to read it, and I hope I'm reading it wrong.

That was the only piece of that thing that made any sense to me. You ever been around a black momma? They keep their kids in LINE.

[Ustwo]

Originally Posted by ratbastid

That was the only piece of that thing that made any sense to me. You ever been around a black momma? They keep their kids in LINE.

Oh I understand that, but I would think a black momma AND a black father would be better than just a black momma so to speak.

I know there have been initiatives in the black community in Chicago and I'll assume elsewhere to stress the importance of fathers staying with their children, but this would imply thats a BAD thing which is not what I would expect.

[Jinn]

f its societies fault alone, why are lower class whites lower class at all?

What makes them poor and uneducated as they were never slaves?

Why can some 'escape' while others never can?

Now this thread will go all political on you, but before that let me add this link...

I'm sure someone will point out this site is all uber conservative, nazi, or has mob ties, I haven't researched it, it was the first hit I could find on the subject.

http://www.children.smartlibrary.org...m?segment=1661

The concept of the above is that as blacks overall are doing better in society their crime rates and being victims of crime seems to be increasing, while the opposite happens for whites.

I think there is more going on here than basic poverty, being poor alone does not make you a criminal and not every problem in the black community is whitey's fault.

What you're demonstrated is the difference between correlation and causation. There is nothing to indicate from the actual report that these two things CAUSE one another, only that they seem to occur simultaneously. I'd be willing to bet that black crime rate also increases when the weather is warmer, but that doesn't mean warm weather causes black people to commit more crimes.

Everytime this issue comes up, the conservative viewpoint (typically older white males) seems to be "well, I came from a broken home and I made it, why can't they"? Or "my dad was an alcholic and a drug addict and I didn't become one, why are they.."

What it seems to ignore is the inherent privilege that you had which made it EASIER to overcome the difficulty of your youth. Conservatives hate to hear the word "privilege," because none of them think they actually HAVE any.