So when is this "Honest" discussion regarding race relations goint to occur?

[Sean Renaud]

The problems outlined in the original post can only be solved by the communities with the violence problem. No government outreach or program sis going to help. Enforcement is about as aggressive as it can be, so that won't help, obviously and I will even grant you that it may be exacerbating the problem.

Easing off enforcement of violent felonies is no answer.

Leaving more people at home by abandoning prohibition is the only viable assistance I can think of from outside. That will have some unintended negative consequences, but the ones I can foresee seem small. I do not think that if drugs were legal a substantial number of people will do them. They get drugs inside of prison if they want them.

That's not true. We know that poverty leads to crime. We can alleviate poverty. We just don't want to.

Easing off enforcement is probably a descent start but we kinda have to define vilent very carefully here.

Abandoning prohibition would be HUGE but we won't do that. Not really.

 

[possum123]

Come on people. The govt. has been telling us for years that the colored race is not as intelligent as other races.
What does it take to make people see?
The govt. lets the black race have lower scores when applying for college. Why would that be?
The govt. gives the colored race extra points for govt. jobs because they are not as intelligent as other races. Why would they give them if they were equal to other races.
The govt. forces companies to hire colored people. Why would they have to force them unless the colored people are not as intelligent.

 

[Que]

That's not true. We know that poverty leads to crime. We can alleviate poverty. We just don't want to.

Easing off enforcement is probably a descent start but we kinda have to define vilent very carefully here.

Abandoning prohibition would be HUGE but we won't do that. Not really.

We do not know that. We know that in some populations there is correlation. we also know that in other populations there is not correlation.

Poverty as defined in third world terms does not exist in America. We have spent trillions and will spend trillions more. If we doubled the payouts on every government program tomorrow, there would be more big screens, more x-boxes, more cigarettes, scratchers tickets, more sports book, more drugs and alcohol and the exact same impoverished conditions that exist today.

I would define any crime where violence or the threat of violence is used as a violent crime. Brown commited a violent crime when he committed strong arm robbery. A teen shoplifting or doing a beer run is non-violent.


@The racist: The government does a lot of stupid things. Putting its imprimatur on what Bush called the soft bigotry of low expectations is among them. Not all of what you mentioned is directly gov't sanctioned but societies mal-adaption to wrong understanding of what legislation requires and in some case in direct contravention of what is legislated by doing exactly what it forbids.

 

[Sean Renaud]

I'd love to see this magical candy land where there is no causation between poverty and criminal activity.

I dont' mind their being more tvs and X-boxes. I know for some reason it really infuriates the right that our poor don't sit around reading by candle light but yeah. Besides we could spend it on jobs and education and probably get better returns.

If that is how we're defining violence then yeah, we can't go around nailing everybody for that shit. In the end the cost is simply too high.

And call it soft bigotry if you like, it's still one of the more effective tools for getting the job done.

 

[Ishmael]

Alright, you gave me a response without being snarky so I will respond in kind. What you say is true but you're missing my point. 13% of the population commits 50% of the violent crimes because, prisons are violent and everyone has to change their values to survive. Most of the people who go to prison come out worse and more violent. We as a society are making the violent crime worse than it has to be.

OK, look, is it the correctional system that's screwed or the justice system?

I totally agree that the penitentiary system is the 'finishing school' for criminals. I'd also agree that non-violent, low level, drug offenders shouldn't be sent there. But unfortunately the states can't afford a multitude of prison based on segregation of crimes committed. If there's a better way, an affordable way, I'd like to hear it. Unfortunately virtually all of the alternatives I've heard put forth are either impractical or prohibitively expensive.

As far as the justice system is concerned they go out of their way to keep people out of prison. Which is another problem, almost a paradox. Many of the criminals that do end up in prison seem to be shocked that they did. They were expecting another 2nd. ( or 10th as the case may be) chance. They lose respect for the system, and then become angered.

And then there's the mandatory sentencing. Law begins to prevail over justice. But there again there is that paradox. A great deal of that mandatory sentencing is precisely so that an individual that may be black does not spend more time in prison than a white man, or a Hispanic for that matter. Mandatory sentencing came about as a solution to a very real problem re. sentencing bias.

But when you get right down to it it is a moral decision whether to commit that very first crime or not. And it appears that far too many in the black community are lacking in that moral certitude. And the question is , "Why?" It's not as if there isn't a strong church presence. On the other hand we know that government policy since the 60's has virtually destroyed the black family. And we also know that a male child growing up in a single parent household has a much higher probability of ending up on the wrong side of the law (and that is as true for white kids as black). While the term "family values" is a platitude associated with the republicans, it just might be that they're on to something there, although some of the proposed initiatives are semi-fucked up.

Ishmael

 

[smoothg103rd]

The reason why us (hood) blacks do what we do is simple. We have to much value of quality things to be poor. We want to wear 250$ sneakers and 200$ pair of jeans. We are flashy, and you can't be flashy when you are broke. And the people in our neighborhood, who are flashy, is the drug dealers, murderers and gang bangers. And becoming a criminal is the easiest job in the world. They are no background checks, no drug testing, no prior experience, no interview and you will get the job automatically. It's the easy way out. I'm a victim of this saying and I know 100 others who say and feel the same way. " Why go to school for all them years just to START making money, when I could make it now." We know the risks but we fall in love with the rewards.

 

[Littlefinger]

Come on people. The govt. has been telling us for years that the colored race is not as intelligent as other races.
What does it take to make people see?
The govt. lets the black race have lower scores when applying for college. Why would that be?
The govt. gives the colored race extra points for govt. jobs because they are not as intelligent as other races. Why would they give them if they were equal to other races.
The govt. forces companies to hire colored people. Why would they have to force them unless the colored people are not as intelligent.

Wow, okay. This is the one. The one that puts you on ignore. Bye.

 

[RjThoughts]

Come on people. The govt. has been telling us for years that the colored race is not as intelligent as other races.
What does it take to make people see?
The govt. lets the black race have lower scores when applying for college. Why would that be?
The govt. gives the colored race extra points for govt. jobs because they are not as intelligent as other races. Why would they give them if they were equal to other races.
The govt. forces companies to hire colored people. Why would they have to force them unless the colored people are not as intelligent.

Citation is needed or this is pure bullshit pulled out of your ass.

 

[Kitty]

May and the Year of the Snake, actually. My Literthday is not LITerally my birthday.

Ohhh you're a Taurus.

 

[Busybody]

now THIS is a good read

The new threat: 'Racism without racists'


By John Blake, CNN

updated 9:32 AM EST, Thu November 27, 2014





Source: CNN









STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Whites and blacks don't speak the same language when they talk about racism
For many minorities, racism is less about overt hostility and more about bias
One sociologist calls it "racism without racists" and says "we are all in this game"
A new conversation on race can start with three phrases that often crop up




(CNN) -- In a classic study on race, psychologists staged an experiment with two photographs that produced a surprising result.

They showed people a photograph of two white men fighting, one unarmed and another holding a knife. Then they showed another photograph, this one of a white man with a knife fighting an unarmed African-American man.

When they asked people to identify the man who was armed in the first picture, most people picked the right one. Yet when they were asked the same question about the second photo, most people -- black and white -- incorrectly said the black man had the knife.

Even before the Ferguson grand jury's decision was announced, leaders were calling once again for a "national conversation on race." But here's why such conversations rarely go anywhere: Whites and racial minorities speak a different language when they talk about racism, scholars and psychologists say.







10 years of Pres. Obama discussing race
The knife fight experiment hints at the language gap. Some whites confine racism to intentional displays of racial hostility. It's the Ku Klux Klan, racial slurs in public, something "bad" that people do.




But for many racial minorities, that type of racism doesn't matter as much anymore, some scholars say. They talk more about the racism uncovered in the knife fight photos -- it doesn't wear a hood, but it causes unsuspecting people to see the world through a racially biased lens.

It's what one Duke University sociologist calls "racism without racists." Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, who's written a book by that title, says it's a new way of maintaining white domination in places like Ferguson.

"The main problem nowadays is not the folks with the hoods, but the folks dressed in suits," says Bonilla-Silva.

"The more we assume that the problem of racism is limited to the Klan, the birthers, the tea party or to the Republican Party, the less we understand that racial domination is a collective process and we are all in this game."

As people talk about what the grand jury's decision in Ferguson means, Bonilla-Silva and others say it's time for Americans to update their language on racism to reflect what it has become and not what it used to be.

The conversation can start, they say, by reflecting on three phrases that often crop up when whites and racial minorities talk about race.

'I don't see color'

It's a phrase some white people invoke when a conversation turns to race. Some apply it to Ferguson. They're not particularly troubled by the grand jury's decision to not issue an indictment. The racial identities of Darren Wilson, the white police officer, and Michael Brown, the black man he killed, shouldn't matter, they say. Let the legal system handle the decision without race-baiting. Justice should be colorblind.

Science has bad news, though, for anyone who claims to not see race: They're deluding themselves, say several bias experts. A body of scientific research over the past 50 years shows that people notice not only race but gender, wealth, even weight.

When babies are as young as 3 months old, research shows they start preferring to be around people of their own race, says Howard J. Ross, author of "Everyday Bias," which includes the story of the knife fight experiment.

Other studies confirm the power of racial bias, Ross says.

One study conducted by a Brigham Young University economics professor showed that white NBA referees call more fouls on black players, and black referees call more fouls on white players. Another study that was published in the American Journal of Sociology showed that newly released white felons experience better job hunting success than young black men with no criminal record, Ross says.

"Human beings are consistently, routinely and profoundly biased," Ross says.

The knife fight experiment reveals that even racial minorities are not immune to racial bias, Ross says.

"The overwhelming number of people will actually experience the black man as having the knife because we're more open to the notion of the black man having a knife than a white man, " Ross says. "This is one of the most insidious things about bias. People may absorb these things without knowing them."

Another famous experiment shows how racial bias can shape a person's economic prospects.




The first thing we must stop doing is making racism a personal thing.
-- Doreen E. Loury, director of Pan African Studies at Arcadia University

Professors at the University of Chicago and MIT sent 5,000 fictitious resumes in response to 1,300 help wanted ads. Each resume listed identical qualifications except for one variation -- some applicants had Anglo-sounding names such as "Brendan," while others had black-sounding names such as "Jamal." Applicants with Anglo-sounding names were 50% more likely to get calls for interviews than their black-sounding counterparts.

Most of the people who didn't call "Jamal" were probably unaware that their decision was motivated by racial bias, says Daniel L. Ames, a UCLA researcher who has studied and written about bias.

"If you ask someone on the hiring committee, none of them are going to say they're racially biased," Ames says. "They're not lying. They're just wrong."

Ames says such biases are dangerous because they're often unseen.

"Racial biases can in some ways be more destructive than overt racism because they're harder to spot, and therefore harder to combat," he says.

Still, some people are suspicious of focusing on the word bias. They prefer invoking the term racism because they say it leaves bruises. People claiming bias can admit they may have acted in racially insensitive ways but were unaware of their subconscious motivations.

"The idea of calling it racial bias lessens the blow," says Crystal Moten, a history professor at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

"Do you want to lessen the blow or do you want to eradicate racism? I want to eradicate racism," she says. "Yes I want opportunity for dialogue, but the impact of racism is killing people of color. We don't have time to tend to the emotional wounds of others, not when violence against people of color is the national status quo."

'But I have black friends'

In the movie "The Godfather," the character of Michael Corleone, played by Al Pacino, hatches an audacious plan to kill a mobster and a crooked cop who tried to kill his father. Michael's elders scoff at his plans because they believe his judgment is clouded by anger. But in a line that would define his ruthless approach to wielding power, Michael tells them:

"It's not personal. It's strictly business."



Ferguson has become a symbol of how some whites and racial minorities speak differently about racism, some say.

Ferguson has become a symbol of how some whites and racial minorities speak differently about racism, some say.

When some whites talk about racism, they think it's only personal -- what one person says or does to another. But many minorities and people who study race say racism can be impersonal, calculating, devoid of malice -- such as Michael Corleone's approach to power.

"The first thing we must stop doing is making racism a personal thing and understand that it is a system of advantage based on race," says Doreen E. Loury, director of the Pan African Studies program at Arcadia University, near Philadelphia.

Loury says racism "permeates every facet of our societal pores."

"It's about more than that cop who targets a teen while 'WWB' (walking while black) but the system that makes it OK to not only stop him but to put him in a system that will target and limit his life chances for life," she says.

Racial bias is so deeply engrained in people that it can manifest itself in surprising places, says Charles Gallagher, a sociologist at La Salle University in Philadelphia. He gave a hypothetical example:

"A white police officer in Ferguson may be married to a black woman and have black and Latino friends, but that doesn't mean the officer is above racial profiling," Gallagher says.

These old and new ways of talking about racism can be seen in how some whites and blacks perceive the events in Ferguson.

Many have already looked at them as something beyond a personal interaction between a white police officer and a young black man. They point out that two-thirds of Ferguson's population is black, yet the mayor, police chief and five of six city council members are white -- as are 50 of the 53 people in its Police Department.

Ferguson is like countless multiracial communities, they say: calm on the surface but seething with racial disparities beneath.

But those disparities are invisible to many whites, who often see themselves as victims of discrimination, writes Jamelle Bouie of Slate magazine in a recent essay, "The Gulf That Divides Us."

"Median income among black Americans is roughly half that of white Americans. But a narrow majority of whites believe blacks earn as much money as whites, and just 37% believe that there's a disparity between the two groups. Likewise, while 56% of blacks believe black Americans face significant discrimination, only 16% of whites agree," he writes.

"Many whites -- including many millennials -- believe discrimination against whites is more prevalent than discrimination against blacks."

But as Nicholas Kristof recently pointed out in The New York Times, the U.S. has a greater wealth gap between whites and blacks than South Africa had during apartheid.




The main problem nowadays is not the folks with the hoods, but the folks dressed in suits.
-- Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, author of "Racism without Racists"

Such racial inequities might seem invisible partly because segregated housing patterns mean that many middle- and upper-class whites live far from poor blacks.

It's also no longer culturally acceptable to be openly racist in the United States, says Bonilla-Silva, author of "Racism Without Racists."

Overt racism is so widely rejected in America that a white supremacist in Montana recently announced that he is creating a new inclusive Ku Klux Klan chapter that will not discriminate against people because of their color or sexual orientation. Instead, according to one report, the chapter's new mission will be to prevent a "new world order" where one government controls everything.

Another recent article revealed how white supremacists in America are facing such hostility at home that some have moved to Europe in an attempt to link up with far-right groups.

"The new racism, like God, works in mysterious ways and is quite effective in maintaining white privilege," Bonilla-Silva says. "For example, instead of saying as they used to say during the Jim Crow era that they do not want us as neighbors, they say things nowadays such as 'I am concerned about crime, property values and schools.' "

'Who you calling a racist?'

When protests erupted in Ferguson after the shooting this summer, various white and black residents tried to talk about race, but such discussions didn't bear fruit because of another reason:

People refuse to admit their biases, research has consistently shown.

Ross, author of "Everyday Bias," cited a Dartmouth College survey where misinformed voters were presented with factual information that contradicted their political biases.

There were voters, for example, who were disappointed with President Obama's economic record and believed he hadn't added any jobs during his presidency. They were shown a graph of nonfarm employment over the prior year that included a rising line indicating about a million jobs had been added.

"They were asked whether the number of people with jobs had gone up, down, or stayed about the same," Ross wrote. "Many, looking straight at the graph, said down."

Ross says it's even more difficult to get smart people to admit bias.

"The smarter we are, the more self-confident we are, and the more successful we are, the less likely we're going to question our own thinking," Ross says.

Some of the nation's smartest legal minds aren't big believers in racial bias either, and that could complicate efforts in Ferguson to reduce racial tensions.

Some say they could be eased by hiring more officers of color in Ferguson's police force.



A conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court could get rid of an important tool against racial bias, some say.

A conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court could get rid of an important tool against racial bias, some say.

But the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice John Roberts, has been suspicious of efforts to achieve diversity in workforces, believing that they amount to reverse racism or racial preferences, legal observers say.

Some fear the court is about to get rid of one of the most effective legal tools for addressing racial bias.

The court recently took up a fair housing case in Texas where the conservative majority could very well rule against the concept of "disparate impact," a legal approach that doesn't try to plumb the racist intentions of individuals or businesses but looks at the racial impact of their decisions.

Disparate impact is built on the belief that most people aren't stupid enough to openly announce they're racists but instead cloak their racism in seemingly race-neutral language. It also recognizes that some ostensibly race-neutral policies could reflect unintentional bias. A disparate impact lawsuit, for instance, wouldn't have to prove that a police department's white leaders are racist -- it would only have to show the impact of having all white officers in an almost all-black town.

Roberts distilled his approach to race in one of the court's most controversial cases in 2007. The court ruled 5-4 along ideological lines that a public school district in Seattle couldn't consider race when assigning students to schools, even for the purposes of integration.

"The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race," Roberts said in what is arguably his most famous quote.

Roberts has equated affirmative action programs with Jim Crow laws, says Erwin Chemerinsky, author of "The Case Against the Supreme Court."

"Chief Justice Roberts has expressly said that the Constitution and the government should be colorblind," Chemerinsky says. "He sees no difference between government action that discriminates against minorities and one that benefits minorities."

What that means for Ferguson is that any aggressive attempt to integrate the police force could be struck down in court, says Mark D. Naison, an African-American Studies professor at Fordham University in New York City.

Unless a lawyer can find smoking-gun evidence of some police department official saying he won't hire blacks, people won't have much legal leverage to make the police department diverse, he says.




Racial biases can in some ways be more destructive than overt racism.
-- Daniel L. Ames, UCLA researcher

"Once the doctrine of disparate impact is weakened, you have to prove discriminatory intent in order to declare a practice discriminatory," Naison says. "Huge racial disparities in law enforcement can be tolerated if they are the result of policies which are race-neutral in how they are written in the law even through the implementation is anything but."

The courts may ignore colorblind racism, but ordinary people ought to be aware of it when they talk about racism, others say. Ross, author of "Everyday Bias," says being biased doesn't make people bad, just human.

He says people are hardwired to be biased because it helped keep our ancestors alive. They survived, in part, by having to make quick assumptions about strangers who might prove threatening.

"We need to reduce the level of guilt but increase the level of responsibility we take for it," he says. "I didn't choose to internalize these messages, but it's inside of me and I have to be careful."

Part of being careful is expanding our definition of racism, says Bonilla-Silva, author of "Racism Without Racists."

Racism has evolved, but our language for describing it hasn't, he says.

"Colorblind racism is the new racial music most people dance to," he says. "The 'new racism' is subtle, institutionalized and seemingly nonracial."

How long before another Ferguson erupts is anyone's guess. But if and when it does, the knife fight experiment suggests that before people look at videotapes, read police reports and listen to radio talk shows to form their opinions, they should do something else first:

Look within themselves.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Sammy?


The CNN article is crap.

Its crap because reality exists in the world tho many discount it to allow for mitigating factors tho the same bird shit falls on the just as the unjust. Its irrelevant why a cop arrests you...he can be right as rain or brain damaged or mistaken or a psycho racist (like me) or obedient to his inner unicorn. Regardless of your arrest you get an arraignment within 24 hours for a judge to examine the probable cause arrest warrant and judge it up or down. Unicorns and lucky stars and the devil and your better angels aren't relevant, and the cop better have evidence to support the arrest or the defendant walks. But the bottom line is the cop owns your ass for a full day if needs be and your ass is arrested till he or a judge lets you go. Doesn't matter if Wilson was headed to a KKK marsh mellow roast, Brown was arrested, resisted arrest, then resisted arrest with violence. Why doesn't fucking matter. Law exists apart from our druthers.

 

[PoppingTom]

The reason why us (hood) blacks do what we do is simple. We have to much value of quality things to be poor. We want to wear 250$ sneakers and 200$ pair of jeans. We are flashy, and you can't be flashy when you are broke. And the people in our neighborhood, who are flashy, is the drug dealers, murderers and gang bangers. And becoming a criminal is the easiest job in the world. They are no background checks, no drug testing, no prior experience, no interview and you will get the job automatically. It's the easy way out. I'm a victim of this saying and I know 100 others who say and feel the same way. " Why go to school for all them years just to START making money, when I could make it now." We know the risks but we fall in love with the rewards.

Well, that's how crime rises: poverty and lack of alternatives. With the alternatives, the acceptance for crime decrease.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Well, that's how crime rises: poverty and lack of alternatives. With the alternatives, the acceptance for crime decrease.

You assume whites owe blackie a free ride, that negroes are entitled to more because they want more. IRL its root hog or die.

 

[domroger]

Wow, okay. This is the one. The one that puts you on ignore. Bye.

Agreed .

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Citation is needed or this is pure bullshit pulled out of your ass.

The government can never have enough nigger counters. Apply today.

 

[PoppingTom]

You assume whites owe blackie a free ride, that negroes are entitled to more because they want more.

No, I say if you got nothing and no change to get anything and everybody let you know you're nothing because you don't have anything and people telling you the solution is crime and it's OK, bc everybody does it in some way - you do it. No matter what color.

Blacks in our country aren't as criminal as others. Seems you did something wrong.

 

[Ishmael]

Well, that's how crime rises: poverty and lack of alternatives. With the alternatives, the acceptance for crime decrease.

A lot of people keep harping on poverty and it's just not true that it's the primary factor. Millions of Americans live in technical poverty without resorting to crime.

"Understanding Poverty"

You can either grouse about the source or you can actually read the report and trace the where the statistics come from. But the point is that what is referred to as poverty in the US is not quite what it seems. We measure poverty like no other nation on Earth. The overwhelming majority of the "poverty stricken" are not destitute and desperate.

Smoothing's post pointed to part of the problem in a round about way. Rather than be satisfied with a $30 pair of athletic shoes from Target, they want the $300 Nike's. I guess that would be nice to have, but is it a necessity? Is the difference so profound that the Nike's are worth killing for? (And people have been murdered for their shoes.) Stealing for? Worth risking prison for?

I'm not buying the poverty argument and I'll counter with a misplaced sense of values argument.

Ishmael

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

No, I say if you got nothing and no change to get anything and everybody let you know you're nothing because you don't have anything and people telling you the solution is crime and it's OK, bc everybody does it in some way - you do it. No matter what color.

Blacks in our country aren't as criminal as others. Seems you did something wrong.

What it is, is lazy fucks cutting corners. My grandson, black, just won a 100K academic scholarship. Two of the people who sponsored him played in World Series MLB competition.

 

[domroger]

The puritanical streak in the US is partially to blame for the current state of affairs .
Because of gambling and prostitution bans organised crime was given its base .
Then came Prohibition which increased their revenue base enormously .
When that was repealed the gangs looked for another source of revenue and started pushing drugs which apart for marijuana were not widely used at the time.
Before various acts in the early part of the last century it was possible to buy the drug of your choice over the counter .
Legalising drugs would cut the criminal element revenue base and cut the amount spent on policing it .
I know this is simplistic but banning drugs has like Prohibition has been a miserable failure .

 

[PoppingTom]

A lot of people keep harping on poverty and it's just not true that it's the primary factor. Millions of Americans live in technical poverty without resorting to crime.

I said: poverty and lack of alternatives.

The question is not if anybody wants 20 or 200$ sneakers. The question is: are you going for crime or not? If you do, you take the 200ers, off course.

If you got a good life without them, you don't care much, but if you got nothing, you always want the best you can get. And sooner or later, you go the way to get them.

 

[PoppingTom]

My grandson, black, just won a 100K academic scholarship. Two of the people who sponsored him played in World Series MLB competition.

Off course, everybody not capable of doing this is a lazy ass. No matter if he's black or white.

You got a lot of lazy asses in your country. Even of white color.

 

[Ishmael]

I said: poverty and lack of alternatives.

The question is not if anybody wants 20 or 200$ sneakers. The question is: are you going for crime or not? If you do, you take the 200ers, off course.

If you got a good life without them, you don't care much, but if you got nothing, you always want the best you can get. And sooner or later, you go the way to get them.

Then your point is that everyone that can't afford the $300 Nike's should just turn to crime?

And the whole "got nothing" statement is specious, they have nearly everything they need. So it get's right down to wants, doesn't it? "I want this but I can't afford it, so I'll turn to crime to get it." That's a value statement, not a poverty statement.

Ishmael

 

[PoppingTom]

Then your point is that everyone that can't afford the $300 Nike's should just turn to crime?

It isn't mine. It's that of the criminals looking for members.

And if you could reach the Nike's without crime, you go for it. That's the alternative question.

And the whole "got nothing" statement is specious, they have nearly everything they need.

It's a question of acceptance. People in Nepal got less than most Americans, but the acceptance of poverty is much higher, so the need to come up is lowered, compared to American people.

The best way to turn America into a crime-free zone is to make everybody equally poor and tell anybody it's a good thing. As long as you're not willing to do so: don't judge other people's needs.

 

[DooleyDarter]

The puritanical streak in the US is partially to blame for the current state of affairs .
Because of gambling and prostitution bans organised crime was given its base .
Then came Prohibition which increased their revenue base enormously .
When that was repealed the gangs looked for another source of revenue and started pushing drugs which apart for marijuana were not widely used at the time.
Before various acts in the early part of the last century it was possible to buy the drug of your choice over the counter .
Legalising drugs would cut the criminal element revenue base and cut the amount spent on policing it .
I know this is simplistic but banning drugs has like Prohibition has been a miserable failure .

Got it, free flow of drugs is the answer to all our problems. has Obama asked you about the vacant Sect of Def job he has open?

 

[possum123]

The reason why us (hood) blacks do what we do is simple. We have to much value of quality things to be poor. We want to wear 250$ sneakers and 200$ pair of jeans. We are flashy, and you can't be flashy when you are broke. And the people in our neighborhood, who are flashy, is the drug dealers, murderers and gang bangers. And becoming a criminal is the easiest job in the world. They are no background checks, no drug testing, no prior experience, no interview and you will get the job automatically. It's the easy way out. I'm a victim of this saying and I know 100 others who say and feel the same way. " Why go to school for all them years just to START making money, when I could make it now." We know the risks but we fall in love with the rewards.

One of the best posts so far.