Policing, Mass Imprisonment, and the Failure of American Lawyers

Re:Policing, Mass Imprisonment, and the Failure of American ... by millermp12 on Wednesday May 20, 2015 @10:38AM (#9576594)

The problem is, a substantial (and potentially growing) segment of the population doesn't agree with you.

If racism is _the_ problem, why does it produce perfectly antipodal outcomes for different "people of color"? i.e. Asians are economically ascendant (surpassing whites on most metric), while blacks, well... you get the idea.

Rubbing the amulet of "structural racism" so much has entirely debased the term.

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Re:Policing, Mass Imprisonment, and the Failure of American ... by rmxt on Wednesday May 20, 2015 @11:02AM (#9576775)

Are you really equating the plight and histories of Asian-Americans and African-Americans in America over the past 3 centuries? You can do that with a straight face?

Hint: one history includes codified discrimination until ~50 years ago and legal enslavement until ~150 years ago and the other one doesn't. Well, I'll give you that Asian Americans faced codified discrimination into the 20th century, but don't overlook the "antipodal" patterns of how each ethnic group came to be in America.

Hint 2: Asian Americans came over, at a minimum, in indentured servitude.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Asian_Americans

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_history

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Re:Policing, Mass Imprisonment, and the Failure of American ... by DanielBMarkham on Wednesday May 20, 2015 @11:50AM (#9577119)

I must point out that, by insisting on tying this to race, this discussion has quickly degenerated into "Who's been discriminated against the most?" which has exactly nothing to do with whether or not the criminal justice system in general is screwed up. Most all of us agree that something must be done. Do you want to gather together to fix it, or spend time in endless identity politics? I mean, even if you're "right", Who cares? Isn't the goal to make a change for the better?

Quod Erat Demondstrandum.

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Re:Policing, Mass Imprisonment, and the Failure of American ... by istjohn on Wednesday May 20, 2015 @01:35PM (#9577846)

Your suggestion that there is a tenuous connection between the problems with our criminal justice system and racism is laughable. The connection is self-evident and unavoidable.

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Re:Policing, Mass Imprisonment, and the Failure of American ... by richmarr on Wednesday May 20, 2015 @03:32PM (#9578653)

@rmxt may or may not be right, personally I think he is, but stating outright that segregation (within living memory) has "exactly nothing" to do with the current state of criminal justice is clearly a hasty statement... that given a moment to think about I'm sure you'd take back, right?

...and if he is right, then the reason why he's right will be useful for solving the problem. It's pretty tough to solve a problem when you don't understand what caused it.

By the way, dismiss identity politics at your risk. It might be uncomfortable to talk about, but it underpins a lot of current affairs: crime, Russia, Gamergate, ISIS.

Recommend reading this. It's long, but worth every painful line: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/good-men-project/why-its-so-ha...

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