Deficit vs Agency Framework:
"Maybe black people/minority groups don't work as hard/are less intelligent."
"Black people commit more crime."
- This framework is ignorant, unproductive, and removes all agency from institutions responsible for ensuring the success of our future. It is also patently false. When desegregation of schools ended, within 30 years the SAT score gap had shrunk from 240 points to 189 points. In a more recent experiment, in 2005 the Broward County Department of Education, which had formerly assigned children to normal, remedial, or gifted classrooms solely according to their teachers’ assessments, decided to administer a standardized test instead to facilitate the assigning. As a result, the number of gifted African American children in the district soared 80 percent, and that of gifted Hispanic children immediately skyrocketed 130 percent. Shortly thereafter, the policy shift resulted in a tripling of both black and Hispanic “gifted” students. Ignoring the impact of educational policies and environments is irresponsible.
(Harriet A. Washington. 2019. "A Terrible Thing to Waste: Environmental Racism and Its Assault on the American Mind" Little, Brown.)
"Black people commit more crime."
- This framework is ignorant, unproductive, and removes all agency from our law enforcement. It is also patently false. Since whites are the racial majority, whites commit the most crime. In particular, whites are responsible for the vast majority of violent crimes. With respect to aggravated assault, whites led blacks 2-1 in arrests; in forcible-rape cases, whites led all racial and ethnic groups by more than 2-1. And in larceny theft, whites led blacks again, more than 2-1. Whites commit way more crime (7 million incidences vs 2.8 million for blacks) in the United States, yet it is blacks that are arrested and make up our prison population. According to U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics in 2013 black males accounted for 37% of the total male prison population, yet white males only 32%
It is more accurate to say that blacks are disproportionately arrested. In another example, between 1980 and 2000, the U.S. black drug arrest rate rose from 6.5 to 29.1 per 1,000 persons; during the same period, the white drug arrest rate increased from 3.5 to 4.6 per 1,000 persons. Yet the disparity between the increase in black and white drug arrests does not correspond to any significant disparity in black drug activity. In 2012, for instance, the National Institute on Drug Abuse published a study surveying drug usage among secondary school students in the United States from 1975-2011. The study found that white students were slightly more likely to have abused an illegal substance within the past month than black students. Yet from 1980- 2010, black youth were arrested for drug crimes at rates more than double those of white youth.
(http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/crime-in-the-u.s.-2010/tables/table-43)
(Katherine Beckett et al., Race, Drugs, and Policing: Understanding Disparities in Drug Delivery Arrests, 44 Criminology 105, 106 (2006).)
(National Institute on Drug Abuse, Monitoring the Future: National Survey Results on Drug Use, 1975-2011, 130 tbl.4-7 (2012).) (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Law Enforcement and Juvenile Crime, available at http://www.ojjdp.gov/ojstatbb/crime/JAR_Display.asp?ID=qa05274 (Dec. 2012).)
Legitimacy:
"Is this research valid? Is this data credible?"
With consulting firms, top academic institutions, and parties managing the distribution of billions of dollars in funds towards improving equal opportunity, is it time to reevaluate my personal opinion on the matter? Vast numbers of studies and research teams point towards evidence of racial based inequality in the United States, why does that not persuade me?
With consulting firms, top academic institutions, and parties managing the distribution of billions of dollars in funds towards improving equal opportunity, is it time to reevaluate my personal opinion on the matter? Vast numbers of studies and research teams point towards evidence of racial based inequality in the United States, why does that not persuade me?
Empathy & Compassion:
Imagine seeing your kind being killed for no reason being publicized on national television on a regular basis. Imagine seeing your teenage son being killed (12 year old Tamir Rice, 17 year old Laquan McDonald), and the city admitting no wrongdoing, only bending and firing the officer when under immense social pressure. Imagine trusting the police when there is footage of them planting a taser next to your husband's dead body and claiming that he tried to tase him (Walter Scott in North Charleston, S.C.).
In a study done by Robert Brame et. al in the journal Crime and Delinquency, by the age of 23, 49% of black males have been arrested. If nothing is done, one of every 3 Black males born today can expect to go to prison in his lifetime, as can one of every six Latino males. Imagine what this does in regards to job opportunities? In regards to family stability? Most of these arrests are for non-violent drug use, a crime that whites also commit but receive proportionally much fewer punishments for. What do you do when state sanctioned violence continually dismantles and disrupts your community?
(http://cad.sagepub.com/content/early/2013/12/18/0011128713514801.full.pdf+html)
(https://www.sentencingproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Race-and-Justice-Shadow-Report-ICCPR.pdf fbclid=IwAR32C3aFS1y2nObYheH4DcIyrn_Myw-qfKO8qSuC307EB49WWpchlReRgVA)
In a study done by Robert Brame et. al in the journal Crime and Delinquency, by the age of 23, 49% of black males have been arrested. If nothing is done, one of every 3 Black males born today can expect to go to prison in his lifetime, as can one of every six Latino males. Imagine what this does in regards to job opportunities? In regards to family stability? Most of these arrests are for non-violent drug use, a crime that whites also commit but receive proportionally much fewer punishments for. What do you do when state sanctioned violence continually dismantles and disrupts your community?
(http://cad.sagepub.com/content/early/2013/12/18/0011128713514801.full.pdf+html)
(https://www.sentencingproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Race-and-Justice-Shadow-Report-ICCPR.pdf fbclid=IwAR32C3aFS1y2nObYheH4DcIyrn_Myw-qfKO8qSuC307EB49WWpchlReRgVA)
Economic:
Systemic racism and educational oppression is preventing America from reaching it's greatest potential. Wanting inner city kids, kids in poor rural areas, or minority kids to be able to receive a high quality education or to not be killed and arrested at an early age isn't simply a liberal or left-wing ideal; it is how we keep America competitive in a global economy. By eliminating inequality we reduce the reliance on imported talent. Foreign powers have much to gain from manipulating social media and pitting us against one another. By pushing each other down and preventing equal opportunity, we lose academic minds and skilled talent. The more spots available at our best Universities and highest paying jobs, the more foreign countries can push their citizens to reap those resources.
Model Minority/AAPI:
"I'm a minority and I managed to do it, why can't they?"
Our equal opportunity is purely conditional and can change at a drop of a dime.
A letter by a Yale Student to the Chinese American community puts it succinctly:
"Though we cannot compare the challenges faced by Asian Americans to the far more violent atrocities suffered by Black Americans, we owe everything to them. It is because of the work of Black Americans—who spearheaded the civil rights movement—that Asian Americans are no longer called “Orientals” or “Chinamen.” It is because of Black Americans, who called for an end to racist housing policies, that we are even allowed to live in the same neighborhoods as White people. It is because of Black Americans, who pushed back against racist naturalization laws, that Asian Americans have gained official citizenship and are officially recognized under the law. It is because of Black activism that stories like Vincent Chin’s are even remembered. We did not gain the freedom to become comfortable “model minorities” by virtue of being better or hard-working, but from years of struggle and support from other marginalized communities."
Until all minorities receive equal protection and treatment under the law as our white brethren, none of us are truly safe.
(A Letter from a Yale Student to the Chinese American Community.
https://chineseamerican.org/p/31571?fbclid=IwAR2yDL3XD7m3PAGbGKK4i-rQeGHKKQZsmsDDvneok_2urjiYcGKs7cEJdZs)
Our equal opportunity is purely conditional and can change at a drop of a dime.
- When the LA Riots happened, Koreantown was blockaded off together with the poor neighborhoods and left to burn. The cops didn't do anything to protect Asian American communities.
- When Pearl Harbor happened, Japanese Americans (and many other Asian Americans!) were shipped off into internment camps, experiencing untold trauma and significant loss of life, liberty, and property.
- "Chinatowns" were not naturally formed, they were a product of Asian Americans denied the right to legal personhood - which was only granted to “free white persons“ - until 1965, resulting in being denied housing and community in white neighborhoods. Chinatowns exist due to discrimination and being prevented access to jobs, goods, and services, resulting in those Asian Americans establishing completely self-sufficient communities in order to fend for themselves.
- "On June 19, 1982, Vincent Chin, a 27-year-old Chinese American, entered a bar to celebrate his upcoming wedding. Ronald Ebens, a laid-off White autoworker, and his stepson, Michael Nitz, were there as well. They followed Chin as he left the bar and cornered him in a McDonald’s parking lot, where they proceeded to bludgeon him with a metal baseball bat until his head cracked open. “It’s because of you motherf––ers that we are out of work,” they had said to Chin. Later, as news of the murder got out, Chinese Americans were outraged, calling for Ebens and Nitz’s conviction. Chin’s killers were only charged for second-degree murder, receiving only charges of $3,000—and no jail time. “These weren’t the kind of men you send to jail,” County Judge Charles Kaufman said."
A letter by a Yale Student to the Chinese American community puts it succinctly:
"Though we cannot compare the challenges faced by Asian Americans to the far more violent atrocities suffered by Black Americans, we owe everything to them. It is because of the work of Black Americans—who spearheaded the civil rights movement—that Asian Americans are no longer called “Orientals” or “Chinamen.” It is because of Black Americans, who called for an end to racist housing policies, that we are even allowed to live in the same neighborhoods as White people. It is because of Black Americans, who pushed back against racist naturalization laws, that Asian Americans have gained official citizenship and are officially recognized under the law. It is because of Black activism that stories like Vincent Chin’s are even remembered. We did not gain the freedom to become comfortable “model minorities” by virtue of being better or hard-working, but from years of struggle and support from other marginalized communities."
Until all minorities receive equal protection and treatment under the law as our white brethren, none of us are truly safe.
(A Letter from a Yale Student to the Chinese American Community.
https://chineseamerican.org/p/31571?fbclid=IwAR2yDL3XD7m3PAGbGKK4i-rQeGHKKQZsmsDDvneok_2urjiYcGKs7cEJdZs)