The criminal justice system punishes those who can't adapt to capitalism

[rousseau]

I've been listening to a lot of hip-hop in the last year, and outside of the artistic aspect of it, it's actually taught me a good amount about the 'underground economy' and the economics of being poor. A few notable things I've realized from it:

- a lot of people commit muggings because they're poor and starving and have no other options
- a lot of people enter the illicit drug industry because they're poor and starving and have no other options

So we've built a society that systemically discriminates against both people of colour, and people with no education, to the point that there's a huge subset of society that needs to do anything they can to survive. So they turn to illegal activities, and when they get caught they're put in prison, worsening their life even further.

So in effect we've created a society based on pure competition, where we not only force the losers into poverty, but we put them in prison too.

That's fucked up.

 

[barbos]

Starving? in US? I am sorry I am not buying.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

No.

Even if you have no source of money you don't need to commit muggings to get enough to live. Burglary is safer and produces enough. People commit muggings to get enough money to feed their drug addictions.

And most people enter the illicit drug industry at an age when they don't actually need money in the first place.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

I won't go too far to say people don't go hungry, etc. But music does tend to romanticize acts.

"I muuged because I was hungry" sounds better than "I mugged because I didn't want to stand along the interstate ramp".

So we've built a society that systemically discriminates against both people of colour, and people with no education, to the point that there's a huge subset of society that needs to do anything they can to survive. So they turn to illegal activities, and when they get caught they're put in prison, worsening their life even further.

So in effect we've created a society based on pure competition, where we not only force the losers into poverty, but we put them in prison too.

That's fucked up.

I agree that we've built a society that systemically discriminates against both people of colour, and people with no education, but disagree that it has gotten bad enough that they'll do anything to survive. We are not close to that point yet.

 

[ronburgundy]

I've been listening to a lot of hip-hop in the last year, and outside of the artistic aspect of it, it's actually taught me a good amount about the 'underground economy' and the economics of being poor.

Nothing valid about the causes of crime can follow from using Hip-hop lyrics as your empirical basis.

- a lot of people commit muggings because they're poor and starving and have no other options
- a lot of people enter the illicit drug industry because they're poor and starving and have no other options

And if Trump wrote song lyrics, they would say that the 1% got there purely by working harder than everyone and never doing anything immoral.

Most muggers and drug dealers got into those acts before they put in any sincere effort to determining whether they could make a legal living.
The reality is that Hip-hop itself, and bands like NWA in particular, have likely led many a young man into a criminal life who might have chosen otherwise, if that "art" did not seek to rationalize and glorify criminality as "the only way" and even a righteous path.

 

[Derec]

I've been listening to a lot of hip-hop in the last year, and outside of the artistic aspect of it,

Artistic aspect? In hip hop?

it's actually taught me a good amount about the 'underground economy' and the economics of being poor.

From what I know about hip hop lyrics most of them are about conspicuous wealth (cars, houses, bling, high maintenance hoes) and not really about "economics of being poor".
Examples

- a lot of people commit muggings because they're poor and starving and have no other options

BS. They commit muggings because they see that as an easier way to make money than actually working for a living.

- a lot of people enter the illicit drug industry because they're poor and starving and have no other options

Also wrong. They hope that by dealing drugs they have a chance at moving on up the chain and making big bucks down the line. So they can make it rain on dem hoes or something.

So we've built a society that systemically discriminates against both people of colour, and people with no education, to the point that there's a huge subset of society that needs to do anything they can to survive.

Where do you see "discrimination against people of colour"? If anything, they are advantaged through things like affirmative action. And secondary education in US is free - there is zero excuse, certainly no economic excuse, for anybody not to graduate high school. Yet 19% overall, 24% of hispanics and incredible 32% of blacks and Indians fail to clear even that rather low hurdle.
Public High School Graduation Rates
And beyond high school, there are low cost college options as well as financial aid.

So they turn to illegal activities, and when they get caught they're put in prison, worsening their life even further.

Imagine that, putting muggers and drug dealers in prison. Pure racism I tell you.

So in effect we've created a society based on pure competition, where we not only force the losers into poverty, but we put them in prison too.

Nobody is forced to rob, steal or deal drugs. Nothing, other than people's laziness prevents anybody from graduating high school. It's not exactly difficult.

That's fucked up.

Your excuses for thugs are what's fucked up. I think you've been listening to too much rap.

 

[rousseau]

Artistic aspect? In hip hop?

I mean, nowhere in your head could it dawn on you that there are men and women in the world making hip-hop with thoughtful lyrics, and superior musicianship? Your very first thought is to down-play the legitimacy of an entire culture? Check your racism and sexism dude, seriously.

 

[Derec]

I mean, nowhere in your head could it dawn on you that there are men and women in the world making hip-hop with thoughtful lyrics,

You have an example of these "thoughtful lyrics"? I hope it's better than "I'm in this bitch with the terror got a handful of stacks Better grab an umbrella I make it rain on them hoes"

and superior musicianship?

No, all I see is rappers sampling music done by actual musicians or using computer generated beats. You don't see rappers playing actual instruments.

Your very first thought is to down-play the legitimacy of an entire culture? Check your racism and sexism dude, seriously.

There are people of all races and genders making rap. Besides, I do not care much for country either, does that make me racist against white people?

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Nothing valid about the causes of crime can follow from using Hip-hop lyrics as your empirical basis.

Yes, because no artist who comes from the streets could ever possibly have anything valid to say about the streets.

- a lot of people commit muggings because they're poor and starving and have no other options
- a lot of people enter the illicit drug industry because they're poor and starving and have no other options

And if Trump wrote song lyrics, they would say that the 1% got there purely by working harder than everyone and never doing anything immoral.

Most muggers and drug dealers got into those acts before they put in any sincere effort to determining whether they could make a legal living.
The reality is that Hip-hop itself, and bands like NWA in particular, have likely led many a young man into a criminal life who might have chosen otherwise, if that "art" did not seek to rationalize and glorify criminality as "the only way" and even a righteous path.

Legal living doing what? And where?

For an example of the problem, let's take a look at Camden NJ, the poorest city in America.

Camden is just across the Delaware River from the brick and polished cobblestone streets of downtown Philadelphia, where oblivious tourists pour in every year, gobbling cheese steaks and gazing at the Liberty Bell, having no idea that they're a short walk over the Ben Franklin Bridge from a full-blown sovereignty crisis – an un-Fantasy Island of extreme poverty and violence where the police just a few years ago essentially surrendered a city of 77,000.

All over America, communities are failing. Once-mighty Rust Belt capitals that made steel or cars are now wastelands. Elsewhere, struggling white rural America is stocking up on canned goods and embracing the politics of chaos, sending pols to Washington ready to hit the default button and start the whole national experiment all over again.

But in Camden, chaos is already here. In September, its last supermarket closed, and the city has been declared a "food desert" by the USDA. The place is literally dying, its population having plummeted from above 120,000 in the Fifties to less than 80,000 today. Thirty percent of the remaining population is under 18, an astonishing number that's 10 to 15 percent higher than any other "very challenged" city, to use the police euphemism. Their home is a city with thousands of abandoned houses but no money to demolish them, leaving whole blocks full of Ninth Ward-style wreckage to gather waste and rats.

It's a major metropolitan area run by armed teenagers with no access to jobs or healthy food, and not long ago, while the rest of America was ranting about debt ceilings and Obamacares, Camden quietly got pushed off the map. That was three years ago, when new governor and presumptive future presidential candidate Chris Christie abruptly cut back on the state subsidies that kept Camden on life support. The move left the city almost completely ungoverned – a graphic preview of what might lie ahead for communities that don't generate enough of their own tax revenue to keep their lights on. Over three years, fires raged, violent crime spiked and the murder rate soared so high that on a per-capita basis, it "put us somewhere between Honduras and Somalia," says Police Chief J. Scott Thomson.

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/culture...as-most-desperate-town-20131211#ixzz3y5ub90jO
Follow us: @rollingstone on Twitter | RollingStone on Facebook

 

[TV and credit cards]

I've been listening to a lot of hip-hop in the last year, and outside of the artistic aspect of it, it's actually taught me a good amount about the 'underground economy' and the economics of being poor. A few notable things I've realized from it:

- a lot of people commit muggings because they're poor and starving and have no other options
- a lot of people enter the illicit drug industry because they're poor and starving and have no other options

So we've built a society that systemically discriminates against both people of colour, and people with no education, to the point that there's a huge subset of society that needs to do anything they can to survive. So they turn to illegal activities, and when they get caught they're put in prison, worsening their life even further.

So in effect we've created a society based on pure competition, where we not only force the losers into poverty, but we put them in prison too.

That's fucked up.

There is no starving. It does discriminate against people with no education but not necessarily colour as you present it here. And you want an education on capitalism? Research the illicit drug trade. See who's making the money. Any knucklehead can sell on the street and he ain't getting paid shit for it. The money's at the top. It doesn't take long for even a poor uneducated teen to figure out he's got about as much chance at making it in the drug trade as he does making it in professional sports. At least in pro sports, you're not going to die trying.
It's about finding it within yourself to do the best you can with what you have to work with and having a code that you live by.

 

[laughing dog]

Most muggers and drug dealers got into those acts before they put in any sincere effort to determining whether they could make a legal living.

Please link to your double-blind peer reviewed scientifically valid studies. How were the samples determined? How did the researchers insure they had valid random samples of incipient (i.e. people before they made the determination to become) muggers and of drug dealers? How did the identify those incipient muggers and drug dealers How do they scientifically measure "sincere effort" and "legal living"? And what determines how one "determines" whether one can make such a living? How percentage of muggers and drug dealers constitutes "most"?

Without disinterested and rigorous answers to those questions, your response simply is an example of shoddy social science.

 

[skepticalbip]

.....
So in effect we've created a society based on pure competition, ....

"We" didin't create it. Natural evolution and life in general is competition. Species that couldn't successfully compete became extinct.

 

[Frikki]

Artistic aspect? In hip hop?

it's actually taught me a good amount about the 'underground economy' and the economics of being poor.

From what I know about hip hop lyrics most of them are about conspicuous wealth (cars, houses, bling, high maintenance hoes) and not really about "economics of being poor".
Examples

- a lot of people commit muggings because they're poor and starving and have no other options

BS. They commit muggings because they see that as an easier way to make money than actually working for a living.

- a lot of people enter the illicit drug industry because they're poor and starving and have no other options

Also wrong. They hope that by dealing drugs they have a chance at moving on up the chain and making big bucks down the line. So they can make it rain on dem hoes or something.

So we've built a society that systemically discriminates against both people of colour, and people with no education, to the point that there's a huge subset of society that needs to do anything they can to survive.

Where do you see "discrimination against people of colour"? If anything, they are advantaged through things like affirmative action. And secondary education in US is free - there is zero excuse, certainly no economic excuse, for anybody not to graduate high school. Yet 19% overall, 24% of hispanics and incredible 32% of blacks and Indians fail to clear even that rather low hurdle.
Public High School Graduation Rates
And beyond high school, there are low cost college options as well as financial aid.

So they turn to illegal activities, and when they get caught they're put in prison, worsening their life even further.

Imagine that, putting muggers and drug dealers in prison. Pure racism I tell you.

So in effect we've created a society based on pure competition, where we not only force the losers into poverty, but we put them in prison too.

Nobody is forced to rob, steal or deal drugs. Nothing, other than people's laziness prevents anybody from graduating high school. It's not exactly difficult.

That's fucked up.

Your excuses for thugs are what's fucked up. I think you've been listening to too much rap.

Derec the thug with his insight on African American culture.

 

[Derec]

Derec the thug with his insight on African American culture.

Well I almost dated a female black rapper once you know.

But do you have any opinion about rousseau's rap-lyric inspired hypothesis that blacks can't get an education due to capitalism and are forced to mug people and deal drugs in order to not starve?
Or do you just feel the need to respond to anything I post in a knee-jerk fashion and call me names?

 

[Derec]

Please link to your double-blind peer reviewed scientifically valid studies.

You were conspicuously silent with your demands for "double-blind peer reviewed scientifically valid studies" when it came to the original thesis that people have to resort to muggings and drug dealing in order to not starve.

 

[fromderinside]

Please link to your double-blind peer reviewed scientifically valid studies.

You were conspicuously silent with your demands for "double-blind peer reviewed scientifically valid studies" when it came to the original thesis that people have to resort to muggings and drug dealing in order to not starve.

wrong thread

 

[laughing dog]

Please link to your double-blind peer reviewed scientifically valid studies.

You were conspicuously silent with your demands for "double-blind peer reviewed scientifically valid studies" when it came to the original thesis that people have to resort to muggings and drug dealing in order to not starve.

You are responding to a part of a response and taking it out of context by omitting the rest of the post. I made a specific response to a specific poster who routinely demands such evidence whenever anyone makes a comment about society with which he disagrees and/or disparages remarks or studies because they are based on poor social science.

I made no comment on the actual observation that "a lot of people" have no other option but to mug or deal drugs because I don't know what "a lot of people" means and the poster clearly identified that these were ideas that he realized from listening to a specific genre of music.

 

[untermensche]

Capitalism of course is entirely a man-made situation. It is an artificial situation.

Some adapt to it's artificiality better than others.

Sociopathic egotists adapt very easily. Since it is a system of exploiting others to gain wealth for yourself.

Those that cringe at the idea of exploiting others have difficulties.

 

[Derec]

Yes, because no artist who comes from the streets could ever possibly have anything valid to say about the streets.

Doesn't everybody come from a street?

Legal living doing what? And where?

Anything, anywhere.

For an example of the problem, let's take a look at Camden NJ, the poorest city in America.

Yeah, let's.

I been shot six times," says Raymond, a self-described gangster I meet standing on a downtown corner. He pulls up his pant leg. "The last time I got shot was three years ago, twice in the femur." He gives an intellectual nod. "The femur, you know, that's the largest bone in the leg."

It's almost as if being a gangster had something to do with him getting shot all the time. You'd think Raymond the intellectual could connect those dots. On the bright side, maybe his new-found knowledge of anatomy will inspire him to seek work in the medical field. (needs to work on that grammar though)

"I've seen people shot and gotten blood on me," says Thomas Bayard Townsend III, a friendly convicted murderer with a tear tattoo under his eye. "If you turn around here, and your curiosity gets the best of you, it can cost you your life."

Just your friendly neighborhood murderer giving some life advice.

But in Camden, chaos is already here. In September, its last supermarket closed, and the city has been declared a "food desert" by the USDA.

Grocery stores are not some mustache twirling racist comic book villains who want to deprive inner city blacks from having access to fresh food. They'd gladly put a Publix or something if they can turn a profit. If they can't it either means there are not enough people shopping there or the costs are too high due to crime or some combination of the two. In any case, capitalism is not depriving people of fresh food.

The place is literally dying, its population having plummeted from above 120,000 in the Fifties to less than 80,000 today. Thirty percent of the remaining population is under 18, an astonishing number that's 10 to 15 percent higher than any other "very challenged" city, to use the police euphemism.

Which means too many people are having too many babies they can't afford. That is not the fault of capitalism. After all, capitalist pigs will sell you condoms, IUDs, birth control pills, diaphragms ...

Once the jobs started to disappear, racial tensions rose. Disturbances broke out in 1969 and 1971, the first in response to a rumor about the beating of a young black girl by police, the second after a Hispanic man named Rafael Gonzales really was beaten by two officers. Authorities filed charges against the two cops in that case, but they initially kept their jobs. The city exploded, with countless fires, three people shot, 87 injured. "Order" was eventually restored, but with the help of an alarmist press, the incidents solidified in the public's mind the idea that Camden was a seething, busted city, out of control with black anger.

Yeah, I guess burning down your city in a riot is not that great an idea. Who'd have thought that? You can't really blame the companies for not wanting to rebuild or locate to a city like that. Should be a warning to cities like Ferguson and Baltimore where those who wished to destroy were given room to do that.

Then, this year, after two years of chaos, Christie and local leaders instituted a new reform, breaking the unions of the old municipal police force and reconstituting a new Metro police department under county control. [...]
Predictably, the new Camden County-run police began to turn crime stats in the right direction with a combination of beefed-up numbers, significant investments in technology, and a cheaper and at least temporarily de-unionized membership. Whether the entire thing was done out of economic necessity or careful political calculation, Christie got what he wanted – county-controlled police forces seemed to be his plan from the start for places like Camden.

Sounds reasonable. If the city can't run their own affairs the county should take over rather than the state continuing to subsidize city's incompetence.

No matter what side of the argument you're on, the upshot of the dramatic change was that Camden would essentially no longer be policing itself, but instead be policed by a force run by its wealthier and whiter neighbors, i.e., the more affluent towns like Cherry Hill and Haddonfield that surround Camden in the county. The reconstituted force included a lot of rehires from the old city force (many of whom had to accept cuts and/or demotions in order to stay employed), but it also attracted a wave of new young hires from across the state, many of them white and from smaller, less adrenaline-filled suburban jurisdictions to the north and east.

The horror!

And whereas the old city police had a rep for not wanting to get out of the car in certain bad neighborhoods, the new force is beginning to acquire an opposite rep for overzealousness. "These new guys," complains local junkie Mark Mercado, "not only will they get out of the car, they'll haul you in just for practice."

There is just no pleasing some people ...

Energized county officials say they have a plan now for retaking Camden's streets one impenetrable neighborhood at a time, using old-school techniques like foot patrols and simple get-to-know-you community interactions (new officers stop and talk to residents as a matter of strategy and policy). But the plan also involves the use of space-age cameras and military-style surveillance, which ironically will turn this crumbling dead-poor dopescape of barred row homes and deserted factories into a high-end proving ground for futuristic crowd-control technology.

Not to mention possible gentrification. Camden, NJ, the next hot neighborhood ...

The two rookies ended up catching the suspect on foot and were trying to get him cuffed when Martinez started to sense a problem. A crowd of about a hundred formed in the blink of an eye and started pelting the cops with bottles and rocks. Martinez ended up chasing onto a porch a teenager who'd thrown a bottle.
Next thing Martinez knew, he was jumped by "women, older women, men, kids. . . . As soon as I grabbed the kid, everybody started trying to forcibly take him from me. They're punching me in the back, on the side of the head. . . .In the struggle, Martinez and the kid ended up crashing backward through the porch railing and tumbling to the street, where Martinez suddenly found himself looking up at 100 furious people, with an angry teenager on top of him, reaching for the gun in Martinez's thigh holster. The three other cops rushed to his aid – the two rookies making another mistake in the process. They'd cuffed the original suspect and put him in the back of the car, but in the rush to save Martinez, they again left the cruiser unlocked. Backup arrived a few moments later, but when Martinez got back to his feet, he realized the crowd had left them all a big surprise.
"We go back to the original police car where that drug-dealing suspect was, and the back door is open and he's gone," Martinez recounts. The neighborhood had taken the suspect back, cuffs and all. "But I'll take that."
The moral of the story: Arrests in North Camden, the most stricken part of town, sometimes just don't take. Many cops here have stories about busts that either didn't happen or almost didn't happen when the streets made an opposite ruling. "Ninth and Cedar. I remember chasing a guy a block and a half – he had a Tec-9," says Joe Wysocki, a quiet, soft-spoken 20-year Camden vet. "Handcuffing him, I remember looking up and there were, like, 60 people around me.

Un-fucking-believable. Capitalism is not responsible for Camden's problems. Neither is Chris Christie. It's pro-criminal residents like these.

 

[untermensche]

Un-fucking-believable. Capitalism is not responsible for Camden's problems. Neither is Chris Christie. It's pro-criminal residents like these.

Who were born in a vacuum.