Do crime statistics justify prejudice in policing? And what is the solution to the discrepancies?

[Atreus21]

This is absolutely not a well documented scientific fact as there is a wide range of opinions on when human personhood occurs. Regardless, we are discussing when they have legal personhood with all the rights and protections of human beings.

You keep changing the terminology. A biological human being is as scientifically verifiable as any other species of animal. At conception a new member of the species with distinct genetics is created. Debating legal personhood is putting the cart before the horse. The subject is an innocent human being, scientifically. On what basis do we deliberately deprive innocent human beings of their lives?

It demonstrates exactly that because it requires you to make a value judgment over whose life is more deserving of protection. Given that literally an unlimited number of embryos is not worth one child's life or as dank shows, even one child's significant injury, they are clearly not the same thing or even remotely approaching it.

It demonstrates that people are willing to sacrifice innocent party A for innocent party B depending on the circumstances. It demonstrates human decision-making under pressure. It says absolutely nothing about what is a human being and what isn't.

 

[Atreus21]

Let's pretend you are held at gunpoint and forced to choose:
Slap this baby
Dump gasoline into a dumpster filled with billions of embryos and light them on fire

If you refuse to choose, the you and the baby will be thrown into the dumpster and all of you will be burned.

Do you slap that baby?

Hell I bet you wouldn't harm a fucking kitten if you switched it out for the baby.

In that scenario I would happily slap the baby.

 

[HomerJS]

I guess those so called crime statistics cause the leader of the free world to decree black people guilty of crime even if DNA evidence exonerates them.

 

[UglyCasanova]

You’re obsessed. To the point it’s sad. Think about something other than Trump, it’s a big world out there.

 

[Pipeline 1010]

Some rando thoughts here:

Crime statistics and racial prejudice are locked in a vicious cycle. Police clearly enforce the law more in poor/minority neighborhoods, and therefore catch more crime there. The people they catch go to prison where they become worse, more violent, and likely more addicted to things than when they came in. Then they are released back into their neighborhoods, where they are now many more times likely to commit a violent crime than before they went to prison. Which leads to the need for more policing in that neighborhood. When you look at the statistics for drug use, whites use at a slightly higher rate than blacks, yet blacks whose only crime is drug related far outnumber whites in prison. Blacks are clearly policed more. And clearly punished and ruined in prison more.

I don't really know what the answer is. We can't just say "well it's our fault that we disproportionately turned them violent with our prison system so let's no longer send cops to their neighborhood."

Yet I do think we could start by ending the war on drugs, thereby eliminating the violent black market it sustains and ending this disproportionately enforced part of the law. It will take a decade or two, but I suspect drug crime would fall to almost none. And we would no longer be taking poor young black men who have the slightest change of succeeding in life and ripping that chance away from them because drugs.

 

[fskimospy]

You keep changing the terminology. A biological human being is as scientifically verifiable as any other species of animal. At conception a new member of the species with distinct genetics is created. Debating legal personhood is putting the cart before the horse. The subject is an innocent human being, scientifically. On what basis do we deliberately deprive innocent human beings of their lives?

My terminology is always entirely consistent, you are the one who continues to conflate a fertilized embryo with a human being despite the obvious fact that you do not consider them equal, as shown by my example. You don’t even consider them on the same planet as equal, you just can’t bring yourself to admit it.

I mean does it really require explanation as to why human society does not treat a bundle of a few cells the same as the child your wife just gave birth to?

It demonstrates that people are willing to sacrifice innocent party A for innocent party B depending on the circumstances.

No, it shows that your first paragraph is clearly nonsense because if the equality your first paragraph implies were true this would be the world’s easiest choice.

Obviously if the life of an embryo was equally worthy of protection as that of a baby if you could save just two embryos by sacrificing a baby that would be the right choice. The fact that no sane person would sacrifice a baby for a thousand, a million, or a billion embryos shows just how hollow your comparison is.

It demonstrates human decision-making under pressure. It says absolutely nothing about what is a human being and what isn't.

It has nothing to do with pressure, you’re free to take as much time as you want to consider your choice.

It says everything about what people really think, and how utterly dishonest calling a fertilized embryo a human with all the same rights and protections is because when the chips are down you’re willing to let an unlimited number burn to save another person you claim to be morally equal just because they are nine months ‘older’.

If you actually believe the two to be equal and choose to save the baby instead of the tray of embryos you are a moral monster. You aren’t of course, but that’s why you should stop making this nonsense argument.

 

[fskimospy]

You’re obsessed. To the point it’s sad. Think about something other than Trump, it’s a big world out there.

Are you trying to argue that in a discussion about racial bias in policing the demonstrated lifelong racism of the country’s chief law enforcement officer isn’t relevant?

 

[brycejones]

Are you trying to argue that in a discussion about racial bias in policing the demonstrated lifelong racism of the country’s chief law enforcement officer isn’t relevant?

Yes he is.

 

[brycejones]

You’re obsessed. To the point it’s sad. Think about something other than Trump, it’s a big world out there.

Do you have an aversion to reality? That case is a perfect example of the kind of profiling we are discussing in this thread. Plus the great orange one continues to argue they are guilty despite the evidence.

 

[pmv]

You’re obsessed. To the point it’s sad. Think about something other than Trump, it’s a big world out there.

I daresay the poster has views on other topics, and probably posts about those on other forums. This is a forum about (predominantly US) politics. Having an unusually politically extreme President is pretty important when it comes to US politics. Trump has a big effect on people's lives, and on some people's lives more than others.

Also - you are on thin ice to accuse people of monomania, given how many threads you start expressing outrage or disengenuous surprise at various forms of 'political correctness'. You seem a bit obsessed with 'social justice warriors' yourself.

 

[glenn1]

Some rando thoughts here:

Crime statistics and racial prejudice are locked in a vicious cycle. Police clearly enforce the law more in poor/minority neighborhoods, and therefore catch more crime there. The people they catch go to prison where they become worse, more violent, and likely more addicted to things than when they came in. Then they are released back into their neighborhoods, where they are now many more times likely to commit a violent crime than before they went to prison. Which leads to the need for more policing in that neighborhood. When you look at the statistics for drug use, whites use at a slightly higher rate than blacks, yet blacks whose only crime is drug related far outnumber whites in prison. Blacks are clearly policed more. And clearly punished and ruined in prison more.

I don't really know what the answer is. We can't just say "well it's our fault that we disproportionately turned them violent with our prison system so let's no longer send cops to their neighborhood."

Yet I do think we could start by ending the war on drugs, thereby eliminating the violent black market it sustains and ending this disproportionately enforced part of the law. It will take a decade or two, but I suspect drug crime would fall to almost none. And we would no longer be taking poor young black men who have the slightest change of succeeding in life and ripping that chance away from them because drugs.

We should end the so-called "war on drugs" because it's the correct and moral thing to do. That it would likely have an outsized benefit to certain demographics like blacks (at least reducing their incarceration rates for that subset of crimes) is a nice benefit as well but the entire effort is misguided to everyone of all races, creeds, and colors.

As far as the "poverty causes crime" argument that's obviously false as well. It's far more accurate to say that crime is one possible symptom that accompanies poverty (along with addiction to drugs, generally poorer health, lower lifespan, lower educational achievement, etc) instead of poverty being a causal factor for crime. We have plenty of real world examples; for example crime doesn't go up during bad economic times but rather goes down.

Second piece of evidence that poverty isn't a causal factor for crime is that relatively poor countries often have low crime rates. Since GDP and homicide rates are the easiest figures to both obtain and verify (unlike other violent crimes, dead bodies aren't really as ambiguous as something like assault) we can use those for simplicity. Moldova has a GDP per capita of $3,218 and it's murder rate is 101st worldwide (compared to Australia at 104), Macedonia has GDP per capita of $6,100 and is 152 worldwide (compared to New Zealand at 153), etc. If someone wants the links to those stats feel free:

https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Crime/Violent-crime/Murder-rate
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita


You could go on and on, but the point is made. First step in reducing the discrepancies is not excusing away the behavior that caused them. Saying "blacks don't commit more crime" in the U.S. is not only counterfactual but prevents the country from frankly acknowledging hard truths. It's not a "racist" statement to acknowledge the truth that white males commit far more mass shooting type events than other demographic groups. There's no more something in the DNA of white males that forces them to shoot up schools than there's something in the DNA of blacks that cause them to commit homicide (primarily against other blacks) at rates 6 times or so that of other demographics but it's factual. Likewise it's factual that other types of crime are committed by blacks at outsized rates in the U.S. and it's not just a function of "OMG the police are only arresting blacks for it when whites commit at the exact same rates." That's not only factually dishonest, it does a grave disservice to coming up with a solution for "prejudice in policing." If one side isn't even willing to admit reality as it actually is then there truly are no solutions to be had.

 

[HomerJS]

You’re obsessed. To the point it’s sad. Think about something other than Trump, it’s a big world out there.

Being black I guess I shouldn't have a vested interest in how we are treated by the CJS. After all you started a thread on this very topic. How uppity of me. So sorry

 

[Paratus]

You keep changing the terminology. A biological human being is as scientifically verifiable as any other species of animal. At conception a new member of the species with distinct genetics is created. Debating legal personhood is putting the cart before the horse. The subject is an innocent human being, scientifically. On what basis do we deliberately deprive innocent human beings of their lives?



It demonstrates that people are willing to sacrifice innocent party A for innocent party B depending on the circumstances. It demonstrates human decision-making under pressure. It says absolutely nothing about what is a human being and what isn't.

How many babies is this?

Spoiler

1

How many babies is this?

Spoiler

Between 0 and 5

But to you these are the same.
Apparently 1= 0,1,2,3,4, & 5

Deciding to take this while pregnant:

Has a 95% of ending a pregnancy

While older parents have 70% of ending a pregnancy every month they try.

A woman makes the former decision and she’s responsible for murder according to you.

An older couple makes the latter decision and your fine with it. I guess 25% makes all the difference?

Or maybe you’ll argue the couple didn’t want their “baby” to die. Which is fair. However when a parent does something reckless like driving drunk with a child in the car we slap them with a felony. They don’t necessarily want their child injured or killed either when they drink but they still get a felony DUI with Child.

The risk to the child in that case is only 0.001% per year or so (estimated 12 million drunk driving episodes per year vs roughly 120 kids killed in the same car as the drunk driver)

So a decision by a parent with a risk of 0.001% of death is a felony and a decision with a 95% risk of death is murder but a decision with a risk of 70% is just right.

This of course is you claiming to treat a fetus the same as a baby.

It’s why I have a problem taking your justifications seriously.


I do however enjoy how the epistemological implications of your position on fetal person hood shits all over the Christian belief in an an all knowing, all loving, all powerful God.

 

[Atreus21]

My terminology is always entirely consistent, you are the one who continues to conflate a fertilized embryo with a human being despite the obvious fact that you do not consider them equal, as shown by my example. You don’t even consider them on the same planet as equal, you just can’t bring yourself to admit it.

It's amusing to have someone tell you what you believe.

No, it shows that your first paragraph is clearly nonsense because if the equality your first paragraph implies were true this would be the world’s easiest choice.

In a competition there can be no equal parties. The whole nature of competition is to determine which party is valued highest, and your hypothetical by definition introduces competition to discover that.

Obviously if the life of an embryo was equally worthy of protection as that of a baby if you could save just two embryos by sacrificing a baby that would be the right choice. The fact that no sane person would sacrifice a baby for a thousand, a million, or a billion embryos shows just how hollow your comparison is.

- Choice between saving one baby and a billion embryos: I choose the baby.
- Choice between saving one baby and a billion embryos, several of which are my only possible offspring: ...I'd probably still save the baby, but I could understand if someone opted to preserve their offspring.
- Choice between a person dying of cancer and a billion embryos: I think I'd save the embryos.
- Choice between saving a teenager who raped and murdered my wife and a billion embros: I definitely save the embryos.

Is this becoming clear now? People will sacrifice innocents to save other innocents depending on the circumstances. Would you finally stop telling me what I believe?

It has nothing to do with pressure, you’re free to take as much time as you want to consider your choice.

As much time as I want? Then why can't I save both parties?

It says everything about what people really think, and how utterly dishonest calling a fertilized embryo a human with all the same rights and protections is because when the chips are down you’re willing to let an unlimited number burn to save another person you claim to be morally equal just because they are nine months ‘older’.

I think in the end this whole hypothetical boils down to a red herring, and also a straw man. Pro-lifers don't say the unborn have all the same rights and protections as others, but rather only the most fundamental right (to live). Moreover, abortion doesn't involve a competition. The value of the unborn's life can be considered in the abstract, because no one has to die.

If you actually believe the two to be equal and choose to save the baby instead of the tray of embryos you are a moral monster. You aren’t of course, but that’s why you should stop making this nonsense argument.

...and because of this we can also describe it as a loaded question. If the two parties in your hypothetical are my twin children, and I am bound by your conditions to only choose one of them, no matter which I choose I'm a moral monster according to you, even though I had no choice.

 

[glenn1]

...and because of this we can also describe it as a loaded question. If the two parties in your hypothetical are my twin children, and I am bound by your conditions to only choose one of them, no matter which I choose I'm a moral monster according to you, even though I had no choice.

The much fairer hypothetical would be "would you save a billion embryos if doing so meant a woman was inconvenienced or embarrassed by being pregnant" because that's what many abortions boil down to.

 

[Atreus21]

How many babies is this?

Spoiler

1

How many babies is this?

Spoiler

Between 0 and 5

But to you these are the same.
Apparently 1= 0,1,2,3,4, & 5

Deciding to take this while pregnant:

Has a 95% of ending a pregnancy

While older parents have 70% of ending a pregnancy every month they try.

A woman makes the former decision and she’s responsible for murder according to you.

An older couple makes the latter decision and your fine with it. I guess 25% makes all the difference?

What makes a difference is deliberately killing innocent human beings.

Or maybe you’ll argue the couple didn’t want their “baby” to die. Which is fair. However when a parent does something reckless like driving drunk with a child in the car we slap them with a felony. They don’t necessarily want their child injured or killed either when they drink but they still get a felony DUI with Child.

Rightly so. Killing someone because of your recklessness and carelessness makes you responsible for their death. It's not as bad as deliberately killing someone, but it's still rightly criminalized.

The risk to the child in that case is only 0.001% per year or so (estimated 12 million drunk driving episodes per year vs roughly 120 kids killed in the same car as the drunk driver)

So a decision by a parent with a risk of 0.001% of death is a felony (because it was reckless and careless) and a decision with a 95% risk of death is murder (because it was deliberate) but a decision with a risk of 70% is just right (because it was accidental).

Fixed that for you. Now does it make sense?

 

[Commodus]

The much fairer hypothetical would be "would you save a billion embryos if doing so meant a woman was inconvenienced or embarrassed by being pregnant" because that's what many abortions boil down to.

Please stop with the willful, malicious lie that abortion is often about just being "inconvenienced or embarrassed." Having to raise a child you didn't want and weren't prepared for is not the same as forgetting where you put your keys. It's a pretty damn serious consequence that can inflict suffering on both the parents and the child. And many of those women who have abortions still characterize it as a difficult, emotional decision. The difference is that people who actually support women believe they should still be allowed to make that decision.

 

[fskimospy]

It's amusing to have someone tell you what you believe.

You just proved that I was right about what you believe below, haha.

In a competition there can be no equal parties. The whole nature of competition is to determine which party is valued highest, and your hypothetical by definition introduces competition to discover that.

The purpose of that hypothetical is not to just show that the two are unequal, but that they are CATEGORICALLY unequal, in that an unlimited amount of embryos are not worth the life of one real baby. Because they are categorically unequal you can't say that the destruction of an embryo is the same as the death of a child as you already admitting they could never be the same.

- Choice between saving one baby and a billion embryos: I choose the baby.

Is this becoming clear now? People will sacrifice innocents to save other innocents depending on the circumstances. Would you finally stop telling me what I believe?

Great, now that you have admitted that even a billion of one thing is not worth one of the other I assume you will no longer keep pushing this point.

As much time as I want? Then why can't I save both parties?

Because it is a thought experiment. You claimed that it was about what choices people would make in the moment and it is not. It is a binary choice but it is one that I am comfortable giving you unlimited time to weigh.

I think in the end this whole hypothetical boils down to a red herring, and also a straw man. Pro-lifers don't say the unborn have all the same rights and protections as others, but rather only the most fundamental right (to live). Moreover, abortion doesn't involve a competition. The value of the unborn's life can be considered in the abstract, because no one has to die.

It is most certainly not a straw man, it is exposing your own irrational reasoning. Other rights and protections are irrelevant because the hypothetical is EXPLICITLY about the right to life. You are trying to say two different entities should be treated identically in terms of their right to life even though you admit one isn't even worth 1/1,000,000,000 of another.

...and because of this we can also describe it as a loaded question. If the two parties in your hypothetical are my twin children, and I am bound by your conditions to only choose one of them, no matter which I choose I'm a moral monster according to you, even though I had no choice.

This also makes no sense. You would not be a moral monster for choosing one child over another, because one had to die either way. You would be a moral monster for choosing one child over a billion children, which is what you claim those embryos are. This gets back to why no one actually believes a fertilized embryo is the same as a real baby and anyone who claims otherwise is lying or insane.

 

[fskimospy]

What makes a difference is deliberately killing innocent human beings.

Rightly so. Killing someone because of your recklessness and carelessness makes you responsible for their death. It's not as bad as deliberately killing someone, but it's still rightly criminalized.

Fixed that for you. Now does it make sense?

You don't think deliberately creating a situation where there's a 70% chance of your 'child' dying is reckless and careless?

 

[SMOGZINN]

We have factual problems and I'm not sure how to handle them. When more crimes are committed by blacks per capita something needs to be done at a deeper level than locking them up but on the other hand when someone commits a crime I will not support preferential treatment by race. That means the punishment needs to be handed out on an equal basis. Of course it's not but is a goal we need to meet. But everything else being the same more black people will be arrested as they commit more crimes on average. So now what? Pretend that isn't true and racist?

The answer here is that punishment is not really a good societal goal. Recompense for loss is a ideal we should look towards, but overall our goal should be rehabilitation. We need to look at the reasons for crime and address them on an individual basis. Most crime comes down to a feeling of hopelessness and lack of economic opportunity. We can correct this. When you arrest someone make sure that when they get out of prison their economic opportunities are better then when they went in. Having served their time seal their records so they are not permanently branded a pariah. Have actually useful job placement programs in place so that when you get out of jail you have a job waiting for you. Have housing placement programs in place so, if they need, they have a place to live. We half ass many of these things already, we just need to actually commit to them and not cut their budget every time some politician things 'being tough on crime' means we have to remove all hope from those that enter the prison system.

Is profiling prejudice? Or is it prediction based on statistical analysis?

Do you believe that they commit crimes because they are black?
If you think that then it would profiling would make sense. It would also be prejudice.
If you don't think that then it does not make any sense to do because it is targeting the wrong things.

Can credit reports be prejudice?

Do you think that credit reports should have a modifier based on race? Give brown people a lower starting score since they are more likely to default on their credit? That is the analogy here. You are saying that darker skinned people are more likely to not pay their bills, so based on that they should have a lower score than a lighter skinned person with the same history.

Profiling does not work because it targets the wrong things. Correlation does not equal causation.

 

[fskimospy]

Do you think that credit reports should have a modifier based on race? Give brown people a lower starting score since they are more likely to default on their credit? That is the analogy here. You are saying that darker skinned people are more likely to not pay their bills, so based on that they should have a lower score than a lighter skinned person with the same history.

Profiling does not work because it targets the wrong things. Correlation does not equal causation.

That’s a great point, I wish I had thought to put it that way.

 

[blankslate]

In response to the last dozen or so posts.

Within societies when one looks at relative income between the haves and the have-nots, it is the magnitude of the economic divide within a given country that affects the societal ills the country is dealing with than that countries relative wealth when compared to other countries

as highlighted in this fairly lengthy TED talk which explains how as economic inequality within a nation increases the societal ills (including crime) that the country has to deal with increases.

So going back to my earlier post a main goal of the U.S. gov't should be to decrease economic inequality. If that offends you... then we just disagree very much on how much economic inequality affects societies.


_________________
*edited for Grammar

 

[glenn1]

Do you think that credit reports should have a modifier based on race? Give brown people a lower starting score since they are more likely to default on their credit? That is the analogy here. You are saying that darker skinned people are more likely to not pay their bills, so based on that they should have a lower score than a lighter skinned person with the same history.

Profiling does not work because it targets the wrong things. Correlation does not equal causation.

Do you think if one racial group defaulted on their loans at higher rates than another, we should attempt to foreclose on houses at equal levels in both racial groups?

If you were a mortgage lender looking to write loans, would you go into an area where people had higher credit scores or lower credit scores?

If you were a District Attorney in 2009 trying to crack down on fraudulent home loans, would you pick any credit union at random and start looking for people committing loan fraud since to do otherwise would be "profiling" or would you start with the banks like Golden West where numerous employees had already been prosecuted for loan fraud in a company known for overlooking rules?

 

[SMOGZINN]

Do you think if one racial group defaulted on their loans at higher rates than another, we should attempt to foreclose on houses at equal levels in both racial groups?

That matters on just what your goal is. If you are attempting to stop people from defaulting in general you should be looking at why they default and not stopping at the color of their skin, unless of course you think it is the color of their skin that causes the default. Then you need to consider why that is. By making it about the color of their skin you are being prejudice.

If the color of their skin really does not matter in the paying of a mortgage then it should be about equal to representation, shouldn't it? If it is not then there is something happening to make it not equal. Address that instead of punishing them for it.

 

[glenn1]

That matters on just what your goal is. If you are attempting to stop people from defaulting in general you should be looking at why they default and not stopping at the color of their skin, unless of course you think it is the color of their skin that causes the default. Then you need to consider why that is. By making it about the color of their skin you are being prejudice.

If the color of their skin really does not matter in the paying of a mortgage then it should be about equal to representation, shouldn't it? If it is not then there is something happening to make it not equal. Address that instead of punishing them for it.

Is it the job of police to "look at the reason" people commit crimes? Your point, while made with good intentions, leads directly and inexorably to the effective outcome that we don't arrest or prosecute some crimes because the folks committing them "have reasons" and to do so despite those reasons means we end up with "too many" of one type of person in jail for it.