Many on the Right are using the recent tragedies to promote the fallacy that blacks are more prone to criminality than others.
Blacks prone to criminality? The rhetoric of the past?
A CNN panel erupted when a panelist said that Blacks are prone to criminality while speaking about their disproportionate dealings with the criminal justice system. This type of false rhetoric making its way on national TV is dangerous but allowed to happen to maintain the status quo, to paint a fallacy that justifies systemic racism.
Marc Lamont Hill pointed out that just like it is possible to say there are systemic problems in schools one should not cloak the systemic racism in police departments as some attack on all police. Harry Houck used the opportunity to skew New York crime data in a manner to promote a narrative of Blacks being prone to criminality.
There is all kind of data out there. I am not going to examine the data Houck is throwing out as I have done so ad nauseam. Here is the reality. If police concentrate its arrests in minority areas, then more minorities enter the criminal justice system. In my very conservative white town, young men drink, shoot guns in the park, speed, vandalize property, etc. However, they are generally not presented to the criminal justice system and as such, they do not appear in any stats. Likewise, New York has one of the worst economic disparities in the country. Crime follows poverty. If poverty is minority base, is there any doubt why the results he touts for Blacks is ‘explainable?’
I wrote a blog post a few months ago titled “What If White Violence Was Covered Like Minority Violence?” based on a Chris Hayes segment. It is a must watch. The continual fight against a system that continues to keep a boot on one’s neck is tiring, but it is a must.
