Pour Vous, Sanjay & Captain

May 23, 2006

Last week, the Captain posted what can at best be described as an overtly derogatory assessment of the minortiy prison population. And by minority, I mean “black.”

Sanjay, you and I both called him on egregious assumptions, and irresponsible rhetoric. I came across some data this morning that substantiates our claims, and rather invalidates his assertion that “blacks commit more crimes than whites.” This comes to you via Radley Balko, a policy analyst for the Cato Institute, and writer for Fox News. I particularly enjoy the work he does regarding the war on drugs - he has a lot more time to sift through the data than I do.

-Total U.S. inmates numbered 488,000 in 1985, 1.3 million in 2001, and number 2.2 million today.

-According to survey data by human rights groups, one in five U.S. prison inmates has been sexually assaulted.

-According to federal sentencing guidelines, a man would need to possess 50 times more powder cocaine (prefered by white users) than crack cocaine (prefered by black users) to earn the same prison sentence.

-Blacks represent about 12 percent of the U.S. population, but 48 percent of the prison population. They represent just 13 percent of drug users, but 38 percent of those arrested for drug crimes, and 59 percent of those convicted.

-When convicted of the same drug felony, blacks are about 50 percent more likely to be sentenced to prison than whites.

So there it is, for whatever it’s worth. I’m not going to dispute the fact: Blacks are “convicted” of disproportionally more crimes than whites (and probably other minorities.) Making the leap, however, between “commit” and “are convicted of” is is, among others things, a compositional fallacy.


Posted in: Potpourri

Comments

2 Comments so far

  1. Sanjay May 23, 2006 1:19 pm

    Agreed, but I think it’s besides the point. The post itself was nakedly racist: nobody — NOBODY — denies that blacks commit crimes disproporionately. Aaron was speaking in a code most people know quite well, and, as is appropriate to that code, gets huffy when called a racist.

    Which, after weeks of tirades on Mexican immigrants working at Chipotle, his constant sneering comments at me as an Indian American, posts on how Latino men treat women like crap and Muslims have no historical concept of chivalry, titling posts about a 12 year old America getting pregnant “This is not Africa” and the like, ought not to’ve surprised anyone. Aaron is what he is.

    He then had his charming vote, and didn’t turn on comment filtering for 24 hours — over which time he got no postings in his defense, surprisingly. So he turned on filtering and claimed his result. Cherming human being, Aaron Clarey.

  2. Sanjay May 25, 2006 10:08 pm

    Funny funny thing! I am informed Aaron has quietly and quickly removed the post under discussion as well as some older charming ones about the habits of Latino men. Amazing! I would say our Mr. Clarey has had, shall we say, an economics lesson.

    Wonderfully, the caching properties of Google preserve the original posts, and I have kept my own copies as has a friend, because hard experience has taught me that folks like Aaron tend to get into situations where someone would find those items useful, and I would prefer to help than not (in fact, said economics lesson may well involve someone wanting such documentation right now). But it’s good that he’s acquired the shame (or fear) to take those down.

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