The Anything But Racism Argument.

[Jimmy Higgins]

Here is a link to the MO Attorney General Report for Ferguson in St. Louis County. And it conflicts with something that I have said and may have misheard.

For 2013:
- 5384 pullovers (686 for whites, 4632 for blacks) Blacks represent about 2/3s of the population

The mistake for what I've stated regards arrests, not citations.
- About 1 in 10 pullovers lead to arrests for blacks. 5ish% for whites. This seems bad, but the majority of arrests are for outstanding warrants for blacks.

For citations, about 4200 for blacks, 600 for whites. Similar percentages for those pulled over. The reasons for the pullovers are 5x for
moving" and 10+x for "equipment", "license", and "investigative" (warrant?) for blacks than whites.

The only things that appears to stand out are the arrests for traffic violations (other than the higher percentages of pullovers in general), as blacks were arrested at 13 times the rate than whites were.

And searches, blacks were searched at about a 10 time greater rate than whites, but that could be skewed because of the outstanding warrant arrests.

The stats raise questions, but aren't as damning as I previously suggested.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

This is the problem... your drunk grandpa didn't shot an unarmed person. A cop just did.

What you are talking about is part of the problem however.

1. Some people want to think that "sorry" is enough, when they aren't actually sorry or feel that it is their business to care.
2. There are still racists out there.
3. Some white people are oblivious to what blacks still have to deal with. One black guy gets shot, blacks protest and then there are dogs out with the police!

And if passive racism wasn't a problem that needed to be dealt with today, then there would be a point there. Something like 90% of blacks pulled over in the area of the shooting weren't charged with anything. So either the cops are very lenient or ...

I don't understand how any of your post follows from (or relates to) what I expressed.

You were saying some people are tired of saying they are sorry for social ills of the past. The teen was killed by a cop last week. Blacks protested and cops came out in battle gear and had angry dogs with them. I don't recall seeing any of that with recent marches in DC. So the position that all that shit was long ago doesn't have the legs some want to believe it does, especially in places like Missouri.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Here is a link to the MO Attorney General Report for Ferguson in St. Louis County. And it conflicts with something that I have said and may have misheard.

For 2013:
- 5384 pullovers (686 for whites, 4632 for blacks) Blacks represent about 2/3s of the population

The mistake for what I've stated regards arrests, not citations.
- About 1 in 10 pullovers lead to arrests for blacks. 5ish% for whites. This seems bad, but the majority of arrests are for outstanding warrants for blacks.

For citations, about 4200 for blacks, 600 for whites. Similar percentages for those pulled over. The reasons for the pullovers are 5x for
moving" and 10+x for "equipment", "license", and "investigative" (warrant?) for blacks than whites.

The only things that appears to stand out are the arrests for traffic violations (other than the higher percentages of pullovers in general), as blacks were arrested at 13 times the rate than whites were.

And searches, blacks were searched at about a 10 time greater rate than whites, but that could be skewed because of the outstanding warrant arrests.

The stats raise questions, but aren't as damning as I previously suggested.

Except for the fact that blacks are 2/3rds of the population but 5/6th of all pullovers. The "oustanding warrant" thing doesn't give a pass either, since it doesn't reflect a) how many of those arrests are mistaken identity (e.g. someone with a similar name who gets arrested anyway) or b) someone who is arrested but never actually charged with anything or otherwise never brought to trial.

It vaguely reflects the claims by residents that there is a culture of presumption of guilt within that police department when dealing with black suspects. An officer assumes they must be guilty of SOMETHING, and that starting presumption shapes their entire approach to enforcement.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Here is a link to the MO Attorney General Report for Ferguson in St. Louis County. And it conflicts with something that I have said and may have misheard.

For 2013:
- 5384 pullovers (686 for whites, 4632 for blacks) Blacks represent about 2/3s of the population

The mistake for what I've stated regards arrests, not citations.
- About 1 in 10 pullovers lead to arrests for blacks. 5ish% for whites. This seems bad, but the majority of arrests are for outstanding warrants for blacks.

For citations, about 4200 for blacks, 600 for whites. Similar percentages for those pulled over. The reasons for the pullovers are 5x for
moving" and 10+x for "equipment", "license", and "investigative" (warrant?) for blacks than whites.

The only things that appears to stand out are the arrests for traffic violations (other than the higher percentages of pullovers in general), as blacks were arrested at 13 times the rate than whites were.

And searches, blacks were searched at about a 10 time greater rate than whites, but that could be skewed because of the outstanding warrant arrests.

The stats raise questions, but aren't as damning as I previously suggested.

Except for the fact that blacks are 2/3rds of the population but 5/6th of all pullovers. The "oustanding warrant" thing doesn't give a pass either, since it doesn't reflect a) how many of those arrests are mistaken identity (e.g. someone with a similar name who gets arrested anyway) or b) someone who is arrested but never actually charged with anything or otherwise never brought to trial.

The outstanding arrest would seem to even the arrests from driving between whites and blacks though.

It vaguely reflects the claims by residents that there is a culture of presumption of guilt within that police department when dealing with black suspects. An officer assumes they must be guilty of SOMETHING, and that starting presumption shapes their entire approach to enforcement.

The total number of pullovers would seem to be evidence for that. But with regards to outstanding warrants, an outstanding warrant is an outstanding warrant. So unless they are getting lucky, those pullovers would appear to be legit. The other 85% of them, however, seem to have issues, based on the rates for pullovers.

 

[doubtingt]

What is this stat referring to? Is it referring to the stop/search/arrest stats in the other thread or to stops more directly related to and since the shooting?

In general, the stat, as offered on NPR was referring to annual statistics. I'll try and find backup to the claim. ETA: The info is posted in a following post.

If the former, then its totally false because about 90% of blacks pulled over in Ferguson are given at least a citation, and the same goes for whites.

ETA: Nevermind.

It is also rather odd "logic" to point to a low % of blacks being "charged" with anything as evidence of racism. So then, if the cops found a reason to arrest every black person they pulled over, then you would take this as evidence that the cops are NOT racist, right? Confirmation bias has a funny way of making every piece of data look like its evidence for a hypothesis, logic be damned.

Cops don't typically just pull people over. It is hard to see 9 in 10 of pullovers being just let go as being either extremely lenient police or a fishing expedition.

Okay, but high arrest numbers are also used as evidence for racist cops just "making up" false reasons for arrest. It cannot be both. Either their racism leads them to invent charges and thus the % of stops with charges should be high, or their racism leads them to pull over people, look for evidence of crime, but for some reason inconsistent with their racism, not be willing to make up charges and just let them go.
The "racist" theory needs to have clear a priori predictions about what outcomes are evidence as "racist", otherwise confirming the theory is itself just a "fishing expedition". BTW, sincere thanks for actually responding to the data. Its a rarity in these parts.

 

[doubtingt]

Here is a link to the MO Attorney General Report for Ferguson in St. Louis County. And it conflicts with something that I have said and may have misheard.

For 2013:
- 5384 pullovers (686 for whites, 4632 for blacks) Blacks represent about 2/3s of the population

The mistake for what I've stated regards arrests, not citations.
- About 1 in 10 pullovers lead to arrests for blacks. 5ish% for whites. This seems bad, but the majority of arrests are for outstanding warrants for blacks.

For citations, about 4200 for blacks, 600 for whites. Similar percentages for those pulled over. The reasons for the pullovers are 5x for
moving" and 10+x for "equipment", "license", and "investigative" (warrant?) for blacks than whites.

The only things that appears to stand out are the arrests for traffic violations (other than the higher percentages of pullovers in general), as blacks were arrested at 13 times the rate than whites were.

And searches, blacks were searched at about a 10 time greater rate than whites, but that could be skewed because of the outstanding warrant arrests.

The stats raise questions, but aren't as damning as I previously suggested.

Except for the fact that blacks are 2/3rds of the population but 5/6th of all pullovers.

By definition, those with outstanding warrants have either been convicted of a prior crime that they refused to pay for (e.g., unpaid traffic tickets) or are in the system as strongly suspected and wanted for questions for a prior crime. Guess what predicts whether you are in the act of committing a violation of the law and thus have grounds for being pulled over?? Whether you did so in the past. The best predictor of future (and current) behavior is past behavior.
If cops were pulled people over without any racist bias, they would still pull over a disproportionate % of blacks, because every relevant stat predicts that blacks are more likely to have license/registration, equipment, and moving violations. Not to mention they are driving more in areas with ongoing just reported crimes, so there are more likely to be cops in those areas looking for suspects.

The "oustanding warrant" thing doesn't give a pass either, since it doesn't reflect a) how many of those arrests are mistaken identity (e.g. someone with a similar name who gets arrested anyway) or b) someone who is arrested but never actually charged with anything or otherwise never brought to trial.

None of that is relevant. When cops pull someone over and they have an outstanding warrant, they arrest them, and searching is incidental to arresting someone.
They have little leeway in that once a warrant comes up.

It vaguely reflects the claims by residents that there is a culture of presumption of guilt within that police department when dealing with black suspects. An officer assumes they must be guilty of SOMETHING, and that starting presumption shapes their entire approach to enforcement.

No, as I explained multiple times, the data clearly refute this theory. It is the arrests and searches without an outstanding warrant that most involve the cops subjective suspicion. Yet, in those cases without a pre-existing warrant, it whites that are more likely to be searched and more likely to be arrested.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

The "oustanding warrant" thing doesn't give a pass either, since it doesn't reflect a) how many of those arrests are mistaken identity (e.g. someone with a similar name who gets arrested anyway) or b) someone who is arrested but never actually charged with anything or otherwise never brought to trial.

None of that is relevant. When cops pull someone over and they have an outstanding warrant, they arrest them, and searching is incidental to arresting someone.

You seem to have me confused with someone else (I'm not talking about searches).

I'm talking about cases where a person is arrested for an "outstanding warrant" that turns out to be for someone else entirely. While not overly common, those cases are not as rare as one would like to think. If we knew the number of arrests that actually resulted in legal action -- even if it's merely the suspension of a license or a paying of a fee -- it would be easier to determine to what extent those outstanding arrests were legitimate stops for, say, unpaid tickets or were a case of the more traditional and just-as-well known "Fits the description of the guy we're looking for." The former is a type of enforcement, the latter is harassment.

It vaguely reflects the claims by residents that there is a culture of presumption of guilt within that police department when dealing with black suspects. An officer assumes they must be guilty of SOMETHING, and that starting presumption shapes their entire approach to enforcement.

No, as I explained multiple times, the data clearly refute this theory. It is the arrests and searches without an outstanding warrant that most involve the cops subjective suspicion.

That depends on the disposition of those arrested and searched. The number of arrests that lead to confirmed legal action should scale linearly with the number of stops and arrests. If it does not, then the pattern is from the presumption of guilt rather than the reality of guilt.

 

[doubtingt]

None of that is relevant. When cops pull someone over and they have an outstanding warrant, they arrest them, and searching is incidental to arresting someone.

You seem to have me confused with someone else (I'm not talking about searches).

You responded to Jimmy, who is referencing data on stops, searches, and arrests. Plus whether you want to talk about searches or not, the racial bias assumptions makes a clear prediction that blacks should get searched more often, when no prior basis for arrest exists (i.e., no warrant). If the that prediction fails (and it does), it undermines the plausibility of racial bias as an account for any of the other data you want to selectively focus upon because it appears minimally consistent with your a priori bias.

I'm talking about cases where a person is arrested for an "outstanding warrant" that turns out to be for someone else entirely. While not overly common, those cases are not as rare as one would like to think. If we knew the number of arrests that actually resulted in legal action -- even if it's merely the suspension of a license or a paying of a fee -- it would be easier to determine to what extent those outstanding arrests were legitimate stops for, say, unpaid tickets or were a case of the more traditional and just-as-well known "Fits the description of the guy we're looking for." The former is a type of enforcement, the latter is harassment.

My critique still applies. If cops are going out of there way to invent "warrants" for people to whom they know they don't apply, then that theory clearly predicts that they would invent excuses to search and/or arrest people where there is no "close enough" warrant. The fact that whites are more likely to be "harassed" in this way, refutes the theory. In fact, wrongful arrest based on a warrant applied to someone else is much easier to prove and sue for, than is wrongful search based upon subjective suspicion. So, any plausible theory of racism would predict the cops would be more likely to show racial bias is searches and arrests of people without warrants than of arresting the wrong people with the wrong warrant.

No, as I explained multiple times, the data clearly refute this theory. It is the arrests and searches without an outstanding warrant that most involve the cops subjective suspicion.

That depends on the disposition of those arrested and searched. The number of arrests that lead to confirmed legal action should scale linearly with the number of stops and arrests. If it does not, then the pattern is from the presumption of guilt rather than the reality of guilt.

The searches themselves (those unrelated to warrants) are actions based upon suspicion of guilt, and an attempt to seek evidence of that guilt, prior to knowing the reality of guilty. Thus, racial bias would show clear effects upon the frequency of such searches. Since whites are searched more often, I assume you will take that as evidence of anti-white racism since you are so easy to accept anything remotely consistent with anti-black bias.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I think it's perhaps a bit more complicated than that. See, I think i'ts more like being the grandchild of an alcoholic. Yes, you're aware of the horrible things that your drunkard grandpa did at those parties, and the times he peed on the neighbor's roses, and all the rest. You've been shown the videos of your grandpa's poor behavior and that time he ran over Mrs. Jenkin's dog. You understand that the whole town hates your grandpa, and you don't blame them - he was a jerk. But you are not your grandpa, and after the first couple of times saying "Yeah, I'm sorry my grandpa was such a jerk", you get a bit tired of people expecting you to keep on apologizing for what someone else did. And you start to think maybe it's just a bit unseemly that the whole town seems to think you ought to be out making amends for what someone else did, and taking responsibility for his actions, and basically beating yourself up for it as if you were the one who called Mr. Collin's baby boy an ugly lump of lard!

The truth is probably somewhere in between, and includes seventeen other possible interpretations as well...

Damn you! You write too many rep-worthy posts! I still have to spread it around more before I can rep you again!

 

[Loren Pechtel]

what if you grandpa wasn't a drunk.

What if your grandpa was a loan shark?

You grew up in a nice home, went to private school, have a job at the finance company your grandpa founded. You supplement your income with the trust fund your grandpa set up for you.

And then you find out that the money that has made you life so pleasant did not come from the finance company (that was a front and a money laundering scheme) but loan sharking, blackmail, protection rackets, fraud, and even murder.


Would you feel the same way?

The reality is that most people inherit little and what they do inherit is generally late enough in life that they've already made their own position by then. The number of people with trust funds is a drop in the bucket.

I know both of my parents put themselves through college with no help from family--he inherited nothing at all, she inherited some scraps of land that still sit there uselessly for 40 years now and were worth only a few $k at the time. That's that, there's no way I benefited one bit from slavery. In fact, one grandfather did things (I never found out what) that put him at risk from the KKK.

You'll find an awful lot of whites are in the same position I am--at some point in their past any possible chain of benefit is gone.

What does matter is attitudes. They don't cost anything, though.

 

[maxparrish]

I think it's perhaps a bit more complicated than that. See, I think i'ts more like being the grandchild of an alcoholic. Yes, you're aware of the horrible things that your drunkard grandpa did at those parties, and the times he peed on the neighbor's roses, and all the rest. You've been shown the videos of your grandpa's poor behavior and that time he ran over Mrs. Jenkin's dog. You understand that the whole town hates your grandpa, and you don't blame them - he was a jerk. But you are not your grandpa, and after the first couple of times saying "Yeah, I'm sorry my grandpa was such a jerk", you get a bit tired of people expecting you to keep on apologizing for what someone else did. And you start to think maybe it's just a bit unseemly that the whole town seems to think you ought to be out making amends for what someone else did, and taking responsibility for his actions, and basically beating yourself up for it as if you were the one who called Mr. Collin's baby boy an ugly lump of lard!

The truth is probably somewhere in between, and includes seventeen other possible interpretations as well...

what if you grandpa wasn't a drunk.

What if your grandpa was a loan shark?

You grew up in a nice home, went to private school, have a job at the finance company your grandpa founded. You supplement your income with the trust fund your grandpa set up for you.

And then you find out that the money that has made you life so pleasant did not come from the finance company (that was a front and a money laundering scheme) but loan sharking, blackmail, protection rackets, fraud, and even murder.

Would you feel the same way?

Better yet, what if it was not your grandpa that ran the loan company, nor your great grandpa, nor your great, great grandpa. It was was some other guy who happened to live in the same town in 1923 that did the misdeeds, but due to the color of their skins they are both blamed?

Worse yet, as a (great) grandchild of a guy who lived in the same town you are expected to feel guilt. Nonsense.

Blood guilt (or blood recrimination as justice) is absurdly primitive.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Here is a link to the MO Attorney General Report for Ferguson in St. Louis County. And it conflicts with something that I have said and may have misheard.

For 2013:
- 5384 pullovers (686 for whites, 4632 for blacks) Blacks represent about 2/3s of the population

The mistake for what I've stated regards arrests, not citations.
- About 1 in 10 pullovers lead to arrests for blacks. 5ish% for whites. This seems bad, but the majority of arrests are for outstanding warrants for blacks.

For citations, about 4200 for blacks, 600 for whites. Similar percentages for those pulled over. The reasons for the pullovers are 5x for
moving" and 10+x for "equipment", "license", and "investigative" (warrant?) for blacks than whites.

The only things that appears to stand out are the arrests for traffic violations (other than the higher percentages of pullovers in general), as blacks were arrested at 13 times the rate than whites were.

And searches, blacks were searched at about a 10 time greater rate than whites, but that could be skewed because of the outstanding warrant arrests.

The stats raise questions, but aren't as damning as I previously suggested.

Except for the fact that blacks are 2/3rds of the population but 5/6th of all pullovers. The "oustanding warrant" thing doesn't give a pass either, since it doesn't reflect a) how many of those arrests are mistaken identity (e.g. someone with a similar name who gets arrested anyway) or b) someone who is arrested but never actually charged with anything or otherwise never brought to trial.

It vaguely reflects the claims by residents that there is a culture of presumption of guilt within that police department when dealing with black suspects. An officer assumes they must be guilty of SOMETHING, and that starting presumption shapes their entire approach to enforcement.

1) Mistaken identity doesn't have a racial component, it's not evidence of racism.

2) If you have a warrant out on you somebody has already charged you with something. Not being charged with something isn't a possible outcome.

3) You're assuming they are equally good drivers.

 

[maxparrish]

what if you grandpa wasn't a drunk.

What if your grandpa was a loan shark?

You grew up in a nice home, went to private school, have a job at the finance company your grandpa founded. You supplement your income with the trust fund your grandpa set up for you.

And then you find out that the money that has made you life so pleasant did not come from the finance company (that was a front and a money laundering scheme) but loan sharking, blackmail, protection rackets, fraud, and even murder.


Would you feel the same way?

The reality is that most people inherit little and what they do inherit is generally late enough in life that they've already made their own position by then. The number of people with trust funds is a drop in the bucket.

I know both of my parents put themselves through college with no help from family--he inherited nothing at all, she inherited some scraps of land that still sit there uselessly for 40 years now and were worth only a few $k at the time. That's that, there's no way I benefited one bit from slavery. In fact, one grandfather did things (I never found out what) that put him at risk from the KKK.

You'll find an awful lot of whites are in the same position I am--at some point in their past any possible chain of benefit is gone.

What does matter is attitudes. They don't cost anything, though.

Even among the rich the inter generational wealth chain usually lasts only three generations. Frankly, as most of us older folk can attest, our parents grew up in the great depression as poor. On one side my grandfather sold shoes, the other my grandfather had many jobs (he dropped out of school in the 8th grade), taught himself electronics and ended life at a prison teaching prisoners how to repair radios (etc.). One side left nothing, the other left 125K to their four children...and I am still waiting for my god damn mother (who I love) to die SO I can get what's left of her share.

Besides, 3/4 my family is from Canada, part of which lived in sod huts in the Dakotas as farmers (my grand-dad was born in a sod hut).

Should I feel guilty? Nonsense.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Even among the rich the inter generational wealth chain usually lasts only three generations. Frankly, as most of us older folk can attest, our parents grew up in the great depression as poor. On one side my grandfather sold shoes, the other my grandfather had many jobs (he dropped out of school in the 8th grade), taught himself electronics and ended life at a prison teaching prisoners how to repair radios (etc.). One side left nothing, the other left 125K to their four children...and I am still waiting for my god damn mother (who I love) to die SO I can get what's left of her share.

Besides, 3/4 my family is from Canada, part of which lived in sod huts in the Dakotas as farmers (my grand-dad was born in a sod hut).

Should I feel guilty? Nonsense.

Exactly. Both of my parents grew up during the depression.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Even among the rich the inter generational wealth chain usually lasts only three generations. Frankly, as most of us older folk can attest, our parents grew up in the great depression as poor. On one side my grandfather sold shoes, the other my grandfather had many jobs (he dropped out of school in the 8th grade), taught himself electronics and ended life at a prison teaching prisoners how to repair radios (etc.). One side left nothing, the other left 125K to their four children...and I am still waiting for my god damn mother (who I love) to die SO I can get what's left of her share.

Besides, 3/4 my family is from Canada, part of which lived in sod huts in the Dakotas as farmers (my grand-dad was born in a sod hut).

Should I feel guilty? Nonsense.

Exactly. Both of my parents grew up during the depression.

Were the Jim Crow laws abolished at the end of the Great Depression?

 

[Emily Lake]

Acknowledging privilege, and understanding the impact that it has on one's life, as well as the challenges faced by those who lack those same privileges is important. Expecting people to feel inherently guilty for having them; condemning people because they are the recipients of privilege? To me, that is not productive.

Here's the thing though: nobody actually does that. Most of the recognitions of the EXISTENCE of racism are being made by people who are looking to advocate some kind of constructive reform and would prefer to have a dialog on how to move forward.

The problem is, a conversation starts with:
"So, you started with an inherent advantage over everyone else that your family obtained by exploiting my family..."
Is usually interrupted by the other side saying:
"I fail to see how holding me accountable for the actions of my family, and expecting me to feel guilt and remorse over what someone else did, accomplishes or furthers that goal."

The introduction of defensiveness is where the entire dialog shuts down. Because you are insecure about what you have and whether or not you really deserve it, you are much less comfortable discussing a subject of how to help people who didn't have that same advantage; there's always that fear, never far from the surface, that YOU are somehow going to end up being held accountable for the disparity.

The defensiveness occurs, in my opinion, because the topic is introduced in an accusatory manner. YOU have an UNFAIR advantage because YOUR people EXPLOITED MY people. The message being given is that YOU specifically did something BAD AND WRONG AND SHAMEFUL and that you have something that you shouldn't have and have no right to - that your having it is tantamount to theft because it is ill-gotten. And because it's couched in divisive accusatory terms, it is fairly normal human nature to be defensive - especially when the person at the receiving end didn't actually do anything from their point of view.

Perhaps if the conversation started with "A part of our history involved a systematic discrimination against a group of people for no reason except the color of their skin and their racial heritage. As a result of that systematic historical discrimination, many problems persist in our society that haven't been fully addressed."

See how there's no "you" or "your" and no "my" or "I"? There's no divisiveness, and there's no call to current gain as being unwarranted or unfair. It allows for dialog to happen in the context of 1) historical actions that our society took (yes, we are both part of that society), and 2) it allows for all of us to be part of addressing change without necessarily being held up as a bad guy or a victim. Whether it is your intention or not, divisive language creates division . And in this case, it creates a victim and a perpetrator. Since the actual actions were likely to have been perpetrated by someone else, it creates a natural defensiveness. Using broader, more inclusive language avoids that contentious atmosphere and allows for constructive discourse to occur.

- - - Updated - - -

I don't understand how any of your post follows from (or relates to) what I expressed.

You were saying some people are tired of saying they are sorry for social ills of the past. The teen was killed by a cop last week. Blacks protested and cops came out in battle gear and had angry dogs with them. I don't recall seeing any of that with recent marches in DC. So the position that all that shit was long ago doesn't have the legs some want to believe it does, especially in places like Missouri.

I would have expected that comment to be in that thread. I understand the relevance... but the fact remains that I don't believe anyone on this board is a cop in Ferguson... so the ire seems misplaced.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

http://www.rcgd.isr.umich.edu/prba/perspectives/winter2000/mthomas.pdf

Anything But Race: The Social Science Retreat From Racism

Melvin Thomas, North Carolina State University

 

[doubtingt]

http://www.rcgd.isr.umich.edu/prba/perspectives/winter2000/mthomas.pdf

Anything But Race: The Social Science Retreat From Racism

Melvin Thomas, North Carolina State University

Can you summarize what we should take from this unpublished, non peer-reviewed, data-free essay written by someone with zero 1st author publications in the last 20 years, and only 7 in his entire 30 year career?

Here is his concluding idea: (I corrected his typo since no reviewers or editors have read his essay in order to point out the error)

The challenge for social scientists in is to abandon the search for alternative explanations
and involve themselves in the study of how racism is created, sustained and the
mechanisms through which it impacts all of our lives.

IOW, do the exact opposite of what is the very heart of all rational thinking and all of science by ignoring any and all ideas except your preconceived notions. Spoken like a true pseudo-intellectual post-modern religionist who knows that opposing the principles of rational thought is the only way to defend his faith-based beliefs.

I will be sure to warn people NC State is not a good place for a valid education in Sociology.

 

[Trausti]

Exactly. Both of my parents grew up during the depression.

Were the Jim Crow laws abolished at the end of the Great Depression?

The further we get into the future, the tighter the leftists hold on to the past. Bitter clingers.

 

[Trausti]

Can you summarize what we should take from this unpublished, non peer-reviewed, data-free essay written by someone with zero 1st author publications in the last 20 years, and only 7 in his entire 30 year career?

Here is his concluding idea: (I corrected his typo since no reviewers or editors have read his essay in order to point out the error)

The challenge for social scientists in is to abandon the search for alternative explanations
and involve themselves in the study of how racism is created, sustained and the
mechanisms through which it impacts all of our lives.

IOW, do the exact opposite of what is the very heart of all rational thinking and all of science by ignoring any and all ideas except your preconceived notions. Spoken like a true pseudo-intellectual post-modern religionist who knows that opposing the principles of rational thought is the only way to defend his faith-based beliefs.

I will be sure to warn people NC State is not a good place for a valid education in Sociology.

Ouch. It's embarrassing that now in academic it is acceptable to promote ignorance as a virtue. It's like the medieval church permitting inquiry, so long as such inquiry doesn't deviate from church doctrine. Idiocracy has definitely arrived at American universities.