tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post2270728019158688478..comments2024-02-17T07:59:18.705-08:00Comments on Grad Student Madness: Jail TimeRufushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17762279210783841414noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post-13583334741790519432007-08-09T10:16:00.000-07:002007-08-09T10:16:00.000-07:00In general, I think there's not a great amount of ...In general, I think there's not a great amount of parental authority in any group. I find myself teaching working class white kids whose relationship with their parents seems to be fairly slight. I don't think they exhibit the same pathologies, but I definitely notice a great amount of fuzziness on ethical questions.Rufushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17762279210783841414noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post-67214180618302614312007-08-06T23:27:00.000-07:002007-08-06T23:27:00.000-07:00Sure, it comes back to that not getting caught thi...Sure, it comes back to that not getting caught thing. "White" rich kids aren't well represented in jails because it's assumed that they are adequately "policed" by their own communities, where it's assumed that "black" and "brown" communities are not self-policing, or in fact are nurturing badness. I've no idea about how police regard other communities, because it never comes up. I'm sure if it was decided by whoever decides these things that it's absolutely necessary to keep a closer eye on ANY given group, suddenly the criminal statistics for that group would shoot up.<BR/><BR/>Except probably the Amish. I'm willing to believe they're not doing anything, even when someone isn't watching.<BR/><BR/>(I've put the colors in quotes because it's not actually a matter of phenotype, but of group identification. Rapper Eminem is "black" in this sense--he's a member of a community that gets a lot of jail time, anyway.)Hollyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10593117152792976823noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post-87581385151995768092007-08-06T13:31:00.000-07:002007-08-06T13:31:00.000-07:00By which I mean rate of crimes actually committed ...By which I mean rate of crimes actually committed as opposed to arrest rates.Rufushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17762279210783841414noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post-56191073081722332372007-08-06T13:29:00.000-07:002007-08-06T13:29:00.000-07:00Statistics should definitely be taken with a grain...Statistics should definitely be taken with a grain of salt. My relatives will talk about how there are neighborhoods in DC where you can find such and such percentage of the kids on drugs on any Saturday night. I always thought: "That sounds like the same percentage of kids in my dorm using drugs when I was in university." The difference was that the police didn't stake out our campus. <BR/><BR/>But the big difference is that there are neighborhoods in DC where my cop relatives assume that everyone's guilty of something, and neighborhoods like the one I grew up in, where they assume they aren't. Aside from violent crime, I'd be skeptical that the actual crime rates are much different.Rufushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17762279210783841414noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post-71335387583775044702007-08-06T13:13:00.000-07:002007-08-06T13:13:00.000-07:00Law enforcement agencies in the U.S. circulate sta...Law enforcement agencies in the U.S. circulate statistics indicating which ethnic groups commit which types of crimes, and why. I have seen these statistics, so it's not a matter of guessing what your cop relatives believe to be true. <BR/><BR/>Statistics are regarded as facts, no matter how much a person knows about how easy it is to manipulate statistics.Hollyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10593117152792976823noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post-71090047896014308422007-08-06T11:43:00.000-07:002007-08-06T11:43:00.000-07:00Actually, the cops in my family are fairly certain...Actually, the cops in my family are fairly certain that certain ethnic groups are composed mostly of ciminals. No points for guessing which ones.Rufushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17762279210783841414noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10166090.post-47904659290803604902007-08-06T10:22:00.000-07:002007-08-06T10:22:00.000-07:00American prisons are a) Caught in a vicious cycle....American prisons are <BR/><BR/>a) Caught in a vicious cycle. I'd going to take a shot in the dark and say, this started with a backlash against 60's drug culture. Privatization of corrections undoubtedly influences the situation, as soon as someone is profiting from incarceration, you're gonna see more incarceration. Period.<BR/><BR/>b) A Somebody Else's Problem field for the unpretty things. Americans have serious denial issues about a lot of things, and walled compounds are totally in vogue right now. Prisons are pretty low on the radar for most people. Who cares about <I>criminals</I> when they're having trouble paying their own bills?<BR/><BR/>c) Difficult to unwind from economy at this point. It'd come down to freedom for large numbers of people, at the expense of the livelihoods of others. Since those "others" are groups of people who are already not popular in the country generally, this question is not likely to come up. Not just the jobs of prison employees, but all law enforcement in many branches, and employees of the judicial system. There are a LOT of paycheck hours wound up in this issue. Not only that, but if you let all those people out of jail, <I>they need jobs too</I>! What a disaster.<BR/><BR/>d) Americans hold the inexplicable opinion that getting caught committing a serious crime is somewhat like leprosy--it's terrible, and distasteful, and while it's somewhat treatable, you don't want to socialize with those people. You don't want them living in your neighborhood. You don't want them working in your office. You don't want them at your PTA meetings. Except cheating on your taxes; that's OK, as long as you don't get caught. This has somehow given rise to the notion that misdemeanors aren't <I>really</I> crimes. Especially if no one was watching.<BR/><BR/>The number of times I've heard educated, apparently intelligent adults express the view that one or another ethnic group is comprised mostly of criminals leads me to believe that, despite the rhetoric of equality and tolerance, Americans are having trouble viewing people as individuals. Rather, they are groups, and groups are not considered by the best case, but at best, by the median, and more often by the worst case.Hollyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10593117152792976823noreply@blogger.com