"That word `legitimate' is very sneaky. I'd say it's close to racist to assert that black on white crime is a "legitimate problem" rather than just a "social problem" or a plain old "problem"."
I have no idea what you are talking about. By legitimate, I simply mean "real" or "not imagined". I mean that the problem actually exists in reality, as a opposed to a problem that exists only in the heads of the stormfronters.
"...because only wilful ignorance could be blind to the socio-economic conditions that give rise to this crime."
I used to believe as you believe. I've read all the books - William Julius Wilson, The New Jim Crow, Tally's Corner, etc. etc. I used to be willfully ignorant of the more "race realist" positions, because, well, I thought they were racist. But then a friend I respected convinced me to study further. I did and the facts and evidence was compelling. It would be better for me personally if I actually took your advice and re-adopted my original views on the issue, which were more like yours. But the evidence has convinced me that socio-economic conditions are not at the root of the urban crime problem, and so I now believe otherwise.
In the 1890's Philadelphia was a far poorer (in terms of any measure of median income), and far more unequal city than it is today. It was the gilded age and extremely wealthy people lived right in the city, rather than the distant suburbs. The city teemed with immigrants of all sorts. Yet the murder rate was 1/10th of what it is today. Why?
Or look at London, England in the 1910's. Massive inequality, massive problems of poverty. Yet the homicide rate was a tiny fraction of what it is in modern Philadelphia.
You can do the exercise at home. Find the homicide rates for a couple dozen U.S. cities, from both present day and from the early 1900's. Correlate the crime rate with income, then try correlating with race.
Look at South Korea in the 1950's. Take the problems that John Kozol writes about in Savage Inequalities, compare to the South Korean schools of that period, and you'll see the South Koreans had it much worse. Yet the crime rate was low, and the dire school situation did not prevent their economic growth.
Or look at 1850's Japan or Germany in 1700's where it was the upper class committing a lot of the crime. Why? Because they could get away with it. If you were a young punk from a Samurai family you could terrorize and steal from a merchant and suffer no punishment. Now in Japan, the murder rate is ridiculously low and you can leave a purse on a public bench and not have it taken. Why? Read up on Japan policing tactics. And murder clearance and conviction rate is over 90%. People do not get away with murder. Compare to Baltimore where the solving rate is closer to 30%.
Socio-economics has little to do with crime rates. Crime is committed by people who do not fear its consequences, for one reason or another.
I went to college in a city with a large underclass black population. Multiple friends were mugged or assaulted. Then I visited China, a country that went through hell and back in the last sixty years, and is still way poorer than my college town. And yet I was safer anywhere I walked, than I was a few blocks away from my own dorm.
Also, this not just a matter of correlations. Read the links. In many of the attacks, the attackers are not out for money, and they are saying stuff like, "get whitey." These are racially motivated, black-on-white crimes.
For the record, I do not think that black people are incapable of low crime rates. Rather, they live in communities where a) the police only show up to bust some heads now and then, but do not provide an ongoing presence to deter crime b) there are no fathers to instill discipline c) teachers don't sufficiently discipline students for fear of being called racist d) there is an entire culture of victimhood and "blame whitey" Schools teach more about slavery and how whitey oppressed them, rather than teaching about science or engineering. Thus teenage thugs looking for some fun feel it morally acceptable to enact violence against whites.
What is the solution? Restore the same policing practices that made 1900's London, 1890's Philadelphia, or modern Japan safe. Stop teaching racial grievance in the schools. Allow white people to sue the schools for teach racial grievances, or for getting bullied for racial reasons, just as black people can sue schools when they get the same from white people. Make sure teenagers from broken homes are under the supervision of male authority figures one way or another, many via after-school activities, longer school days, or by having convent style living arrangements. You would also need to figure out a way to create a constructive black leadership. A leadership that would focus on opening black-owned businesses and then getting black people to spend money at those businesses rather than on products made by giant outside corporations. In other words, the leadership needs to drop the grievance/hand-out culture and replace it with the same type of culture used by every other ethnic group, ever, to get ahead.
Yes you're right. It's black people that are the problem.
Not centuries of subjugation and mistreatment.
Not racism.
By your own admission you've come to adopt a viewpoint you once regarded as racist.
What's more likely, (a) that you don't view the (still racist) position as racist now that you hold it _or_ (b) the position has somehow become un-racist. I'm going with a.
(c) it depends how you define racist. If you define racism as exhibiting personal animosity or prejudice to people one knows of another race, due to the color of their skin, then I am not a racist. If you define racism as identifying and pattern matching general problems that break down along ethnic and racial lines, then I am a racist. You can choose your own definition, I'll choose mine. How we define the word is not interesting to me. The real question is, are my views morally repugnant? I do not think so. If you think they are, then say exactly why.
Also, I sure as heck do not believe that white people are blameless in this whole crime and urban decay situation. There is a lot of blame to go around. I really do not care about blame or about who is at fault, just in identifying cause and effect and solving the problem. Denying the problem as legitimate, or attributing false reasons to the crime problem is neither useful nor constructive. (Subjugation and mistreatment of blacks by whites is and was a huge problem, but it is not causing the crime problem, and it is not helping anyone to pretend that it is).
Henry. Thanks for taking the time to debate me on this. I appreciate your civility.
> (Subjugation and mistreatment of blacks by whites is and was a huge problem, but it is not causing the crime problem, and it is not helping anyone to pretend that it is).
Centuries of subjugation and mistreatment has led to a socio-economic underclass. This is _fact_. There is plenty of documentation. Even though things are getting better the fact remains that this is the cause of the crime problem.
Rather than attribute the obvious source to the problem you have said:
1) That black on white crime is racially motivated, "get whitey". You can't just say that, you can't just trot out unsubstantiated claims. I just don't believe that's true.
2) That if only blacks got their act together in the way other races have that they'd improve their lot.
3) That there are poor people or underclasses in other societies and they don't carry on the way blacks in the US do.
Or words to that effect.
For me that is not pattern matching, that _is_ prejudicial thinking. And you accuse blacks of racism! You state implicitly and explicitly that it is because of their race that the crime rates are higher and that the urban decay is worse than other places at other times. That is prejudicial thinking and we can leave morality out of it. My concern in analysing the language and the logic that you use is if you are using the same standards for every group of people. I clearly see that you are not. That means you are exhibiting bias, that your thinking is prejudicial. You've learnt this, you need to unlearn it. I know it's not easy to confront that which is within us that is biased and prejudicial but there you go.
Tell you what. You point me towards the stats and the literature (not the anecdotes!) that have led you to these conclusions and we'll explore this topic together.
Tell you what. You point me towards the stats and the literature (not the anecdotes!) that have led you to these conclusions and we'll explore this topic together.
Send me an email at henry.k.mercer at google's email service. I'll reply back this weekend with a reading list.
I have no idea what you are talking about. By legitimate, I simply mean "real" or "not imagined". I mean that the problem actually exists in reality, as a opposed to a problem that exists only in the heads of the stormfronters.
"...because only wilful ignorance could be blind to the socio-economic conditions that give rise to this crime."
I used to believe as you believe. I've read all the books - William Julius Wilson, The New Jim Crow, Tally's Corner, etc. etc. I used to be willfully ignorant of the more "race realist" positions, because, well, I thought they were racist. But then a friend I respected convinced me to study further. I did and the facts and evidence was compelling. It would be better for me personally if I actually took your advice and re-adopted my original views on the issue, which were more like yours. But the evidence has convinced me that socio-economic conditions are not at the root of the urban crime problem, and so I now believe otherwise.
In the 1890's Philadelphia was a far poorer (in terms of any measure of median income), and far more unequal city than it is today. It was the gilded age and extremely wealthy people lived right in the city, rather than the distant suburbs. The city teemed with immigrants of all sorts. Yet the murder rate was 1/10th of what it is today. Why?
Or look at London, England in the 1910's. Massive inequality, massive problems of poverty. Yet the homicide rate was a tiny fraction of what it is in modern Philadelphia.
You can do the exercise at home. Find the homicide rates for a couple dozen U.S. cities, from both present day and from the early 1900's. Correlate the crime rate with income, then try correlating with race.
Look at South Korea in the 1950's. Take the problems that John Kozol writes about in Savage Inequalities, compare to the South Korean schools of that period, and you'll see the South Koreans had it much worse. Yet the crime rate was low, and the dire school situation did not prevent their economic growth.
Or look at 1850's Japan or Germany in 1700's where it was the upper class committing a lot of the crime. Why? Because they could get away with it. If you were a young punk from a Samurai family you could terrorize and steal from a merchant and suffer no punishment. Now in Japan, the murder rate is ridiculously low and you can leave a purse on a public bench and not have it taken. Why? Read up on Japan policing tactics. And murder clearance and conviction rate is over 90%. People do not get away with murder. Compare to Baltimore where the solving rate is closer to 30%.
Socio-economics has little to do with crime rates. Crime is committed by people who do not fear its consequences, for one reason or another.
I went to college in a city with a large underclass black population. Multiple friends were mugged or assaulted. Then I visited China, a country that went through hell and back in the last sixty years, and is still way poorer than my college town. And yet I was safer anywhere I walked, than I was a few blocks away from my own dorm.
Also, this not just a matter of correlations. Read the links. In many of the attacks, the attackers are not out for money, and they are saying stuff like, "get whitey." These are racially motivated, black-on-white crimes.
For the record, I do not think that black people are incapable of low crime rates. Rather, they live in communities where a) the police only show up to bust some heads now and then, but do not provide an ongoing presence to deter crime b) there are no fathers to instill discipline c) teachers don't sufficiently discipline students for fear of being called racist d) there is an entire culture of victimhood and "blame whitey" Schools teach more about slavery and how whitey oppressed them, rather than teaching about science or engineering. Thus teenage thugs looking for some fun feel it morally acceptable to enact violence against whites.
What is the solution? Restore the same policing practices that made 1900's London, 1890's Philadelphia, or modern Japan safe. Stop teaching racial grievance in the schools. Allow white people to sue the schools for teach racial grievances, or for getting bullied for racial reasons, just as black people can sue schools when they get the same from white people. Make sure teenagers from broken homes are under the supervision of male authority figures one way or another, many via after-school activities, longer school days, or by having convent style living arrangements. You would also need to figure out a way to create a constructive black leadership. A leadership that would focus on opening black-owned businesses and then getting black people to spend money at those businesses rather than on products made by giant outside corporations. In other words, the leadership needs to drop the grievance/hand-out culture and replace it with the same type of culture used by every other ethnic group, ever, to get ahead.