Whites abuse drugs just as often as blacks? Nope.

[Angry Floof]

You need to be more clear about what you mean by "sentencing would be higher." If courts are unfairly sentencing blacks to tougher sentences than whites for the same crimes, then the percentage of blacks in the black population committing crimes compared to the percentage of whites in the white poputlation committing crimes is irrelevant.

In other words, if courts are unfairly sentencing blacks to tougher sentences than whites for the same crimes, then they are punishing blacks for being black and not for committing that particular crime.

Yes, that seems reasonable, too.

So has anyone showed you the research that finds undeniable racial disparity in sentencing in US judicial system?

If not, start here: http://www.sentencingproject.org/doc/publications/rd_sentencing_review.pdf

Findings:

· Young, black and Latino males (especially if unemployed) are subject to particularly harsh sentencing compared to other offender populations;
· Black and Latino defendants are disadvantaged compared to whites with regard to legal-process related factors such as the “trial penalty,” sentence reductions for substantial assistance, criminal history, pretrial detention, and type of attorney;
· Black defendants convicted of harming white victims suffer harsher penalties than blacks who commit crimes against other blacks or white defendants who harm whites;
· Black and Latino defendants tend to be sentenced more severely than comparably situated white defendants for less serious crimes, especially drug and property crimes.

Courts also show favor to white victims:

Studies that examine death-penalty cases have generally found that:
· In the vast majority of cases, if the murder victim is white, the defendant is more likely to receive a death sentence;
· In a few jurisdictions, notably the federal system, minority defendants (especially blacks) are more likely to receive a death sentence

More on how blacks are more likely to get the death penalty for the same crimes where whites are more likely to get life or a lesser sentence: http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/race-and-death-penalty

And to think that this topic of the justice system is just a sliver of the great nebulous social environment of blacks in the US. The message is "Blacks are not valued. Blacks deserve punishment. No one cares about black skin compared to white skin," etc. This environment is largely invisible to people who are not directly affected by it (i.e., the majority of whites).

ApostateAbe, if you lived in such a social environment, you would also be more likely to abuse drugs and commit crimes. Understanding this requires these studies and research and years of dedicated work to pull the facts out of the fabric of cultural bias we all live in. It also requires the willingness to change your mind and be open to other possibilities based on new information. If you're focused on justifying what you already think to be true, you will never notice these facts even when obvious. Take this opportunity to examine the possibility that crime and drug use are not problems inherent to any skin color or ethnicity, but to culture at large, many cultures, the cultures of many making up a nebulous and complex social environment that impinges on all of us in myriad ways.

 

[ApostateAbe]

Thank you, hylidae, I am happy to investigate such knowledge further. No knowledge is off limits to me.

 

[Godless Raven]

Thank you, hylidae, I am happy to investigate such knowledge further. No knowledge is off limits to me.

Until a couple of days from now. When you pretend this didn't happen and start another thread, right? I'm sure you'll be happy to ignore the next one too.

 

[ApostateAbe]

Thank you, hylidae, I am happy to investigate such knowledge further. No knowledge is off limits to me.

Until a couple of days from now. When you pretend this didn't happen and start another thread, right? I'm sure you'll be happy to ignore the next one too.

I think it is worth one's time to invest in such topics only if one is willing to shift one's opinions in favor of the evidence, not if one clings to a single opinion with extreme defensive emotional zeal. Most people are better staying away.

 

[Bomb#20]

In other words, if courts are unfairly sentencing blacks to tougher sentences than whites for the same crimes, then they are punishing blacks for being black and not for committing that particular crime.

That doesn't follow. We already know black people in America tend to be disproportionately poorer than non-black people. The prima facie interpretation is that courts are punishing blacks for not being able to afford good lawyers. You'd have to control for SES in order to conclude they're getting punished for being black.

 

[Godless Raven]

Until a couple of days from now. When you pretend this didn't happen and start another thread, right? I'm sure you'll be happy to ignore the next one too.

I think it is worth one's time to invest in such topics only if one is willing to shift one's opinions in favor of the evidence, not if one clings to a single opinion with extreme defensive emotional zeal. Most people are better staying away.

What have you changed your mind on regarding this issue over the last 5 years? You're selling yourself as open minded and having an insatiable quest for knowledge. When have you been wrong and changed?

 

[RavenSky]

Until a couple of days from now. When you pretend this didn't happen and start another thread, right? I'm sure you'll be happy to ignore the next one too.

I think it is worth one's time to invest in such topics only if one is willing to shift one's opinions in favor of the evidence, not if one clings to a single opinion with extreme defensive emotional zeal. Most people are better staying away.

And yet you don't. You start thread after thread after thread wherein you refuse to shift your opinions in favor of the evidence, instead clinging to a single really odious opinion with extreme defensive emotional zeal

 

[ApostateAbe]

I think it is worth one's time to invest in such topics only if one is willing to shift one's opinions in favor of the evidence, not if one clings to a single opinion with extreme defensive emotional zeal. Most people are better staying away.

And yet you don't. You start thread after thread after thread wherein you refuse to shift your opinions in favor of the evidence, instead clinging to a single really odious opinion with extreme defensive emotional zeal

I actually have shifted my opinions in favor of the evidence on several recent occasions, and I have said so. Human races are a very large set of issues that are complexly interrelated, and, if one isn't frequently adjusting his or her own opinions in favor of the evidence upon continuing to investigate the topic, then it could only be because of the typical strength of ideology on the matter.

 

[ApostateAbe]

I think it is worth one's time to invest in such topics only if one is willing to shift one's opinions in favor of the evidence, not if one clings to a single opinion with extreme defensive emotional zeal. Most people are better staying away.

What have you changed your mind on regarding this issue over the last 5 years? You're selling yourself as open minded and having an insatiable quest for knowledge. When have you been wrong and changed?

One example is that I made a thread about blacks being more likely to drown due to greater body density. I claimed that encouraging blacks to learn to swim is like encouraging the public to learn to juggle chainsaws to make it a safe hobby. I now think that is a wrong analogy, because elite swimmers have body densities equal to the typical young black men, and the body density difference is still less than a standard deviation, so swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority but not the majority.

 

[Godless Raven]

What have you changed your mind on regarding this issue over the last 5 years? You're selling yourself as open minded and having an insatiable quest for knowledge. When have you been wrong and changed?

One example is that I made a thread about blacks being more likely to drown due to greater body density. I claimed that encouraging blacks to learn to swim is like encouraging the public to learn to juggle chainsaws to make it a safe hobby. I now think that is a wrong analogy, because elite swimmers have body densities equal to the typical young black men, and the body density difference is still less than a standard deviation, so swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority but not the majority.

How big of you. If you keep taking baby steps like that one, and humans find a way to live forever, you could get there some day! I have faith.

You know...whatever differences there are between what were calling "races" are so negligible in the big picture of what makes us human, I think you're spending a large portion of your time on Earth worrying about something that's not that big of a difference. Instead of honestly considering why most elite swimmers are White or Asian, you've gone and blown it way out of proportion, like your chainsaw analogy. Which, frankly, is just goofy.

Ever wonder why Black boxers easily dominate White boxers? Is it because the races are so different and Black boxers are just way better...and that getting a White boxer to dominate in boxing (with a few exceptions) is like speed skating uphill?

Well...it's not. It has to do with opportunity and options. There used to be great fighters of Jewish, Irish, Italian descent. Some of the greatest of all-time. (I'm not talking about those who would not "Cross the color line" and fight blacks like Jack Dempsey.

If one took a look at real statistical data from 1970-2000, they would probably come away thinking that Black's are simply better at boxing, or their bodies are more adaptable to that sport. 3 decades of data.

And in the end...that data would mean nothing.

Just like it used to be poor Jewish/Irish/Italian boxers, fighting to get out of poverty, and then Black fighters doing the same, now, from 2000-2015 you can see a massive rise in Latin American contenders and champions as well as Eastern European fighters that dominate entire divisions. It turns out, those groups are also impoverished and that has more to do with why they were "tougher", more adaptable to the sport, have more "heart". When it's a fight to get out of being dirt poor, a person will do almost anything, including risk injury or beat the shit out of another person if that's what it takes.


Being so open minded and being open to changing your opinion, that swimming example can't be the biggest one that sticks out to you, is it? How about something more significant, where you had to challenge a very deep belief and you realized you were dead wrong.

I normally wouldn't challenge someone to come up with examples like these because people are uber resistant to changing their core beliefs, and it's all uphill. But you're one of the first people I've seen openly claim to be very interested in counter information and open to changing their mind, so I think it's fair in this case.

 

[RavenSky]

What have you changed your mind on regarding this issue over the last 5 years? You're selling yourself as open minded and having an insatiable quest for knowledge. When have you been wrong and changed?

One example is that I made a thread about blacks being more likely to drown due to greater body density. I claimed that encouraging blacks to learn to swim is like encouraging the public to learn to juggle chainsaws to make it a safe hobby. I now think that is a wrong analogy, because elite swimmers have body densities equal to the typical young black men, and the body density difference is still less than a standard deviation, so swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority but not the majority.

Something you never said in that thread, nor have you actually changed your racist ideology if you are still trying to claim that "swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority". Swimming is more dangerous for those who have not learned to swim, no matter what their body density or skin color.

 

[ApostateAbe]

One example is that I made a thread about blacks being more likely to drown due to greater body density. I claimed that encouraging blacks to learn to swim is like encouraging the public to learn to juggle chainsaws to make it a safe hobby. I now think that is a wrong analogy, because elite swimmers have body densities equal to the typical young black men, and the body density difference is still less than a standard deviation, so swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority but not the majority.

Something you never said in that thread, nor have you actually changed your racist ideology if you are still trying to claim that "swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority". Swimming is more dangerous for those who have not learned to swim, no matter what their body density or skin color.

No, I said it in that thread.

 

[ApostateAbe]

Anti-racism is perhaps the most powerful and most popular ideology in the western world. If there are any exceptions made to the freedom of expression of moral/political/scientific opinions, this is it: can't say anything racist. In many otherwise-free democratic white republics, saying something racist is the one type of moral/political/scientific expression that is against the law. For so many whites, "stupid" and "racist" is redundant, as is "evil" and "racist," or "wrong" and "racist." The word "racist" is just shorthand for any belief you would like to stay far away from. So, the strongest reasonable argument will not possibly matter, because "racist" and "reasonable" are at opposing ends of the spectrum. If it is racist, it can not possibly be reasonable, and the best racist arguments absolutely must fail.

The opposing ideological reaction is even worse. Take a look at the VDARE forum or the Stormfront forum, for white supremacists. They are like a cult, fearful and hateful of outside criticism. When racism was mainstream, they were not like these people.

The best path is no ideology at all. Ideologies are a disease, so vaccinate yourself. If you ever find yourself disliking a claim about objective reality because the bad moral implications of the claim, that should be a tip-off.

 

[RavenSky]

Something you never said in that thread, nor have you actually changed your racist ideology if you are still trying to claim that "swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority". Swimming is more dangerous for those who have not learned to swim, no matter what their body density or skin color.

No, I said it in that thread.

Link

 

[RavenSky]

The best path is no ideology at all. Ideologies are a disease, so vaccinate yourself. If you ever find yourself disliking a claim about objective reality because the bad moral implications of the claim, that should be a tip-off.

Given that none of your threads on this topic has ever presented "objective reality"...

 

[ApostateAbe]

No, I said it in that thread.

Link

Here is the quote:

I am part black (My dad was black).

I grew up in the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles. Was given a couple swimming lessons at a swim school as a child and had a neighbor with kids and a swimming pool that I was in often. I was bumped ahead from 2nd to 3rd grade so thereafter I was generally a year younger than everybody else in my grade level. I was also nearly the smallest in my grade.

In grade school I and another kid could do the most pull ups. Going into junior high summer school I remember a class where all the boys arm wrestled each other and I could beat everybody.

In junior high every year for gym period they gave us running and sit-up tests and divided us all into 3 classes based upon the results. I always easily qualified for the top of the 3 classes. And despite having asthma and like I said generally being the smallest in that class I was among the best middle distance runners.

When we rotated around to where the class was doing swimming though it was a whole different story. When it came to speed in swimming laps I was at the bottom of the class, along with all the black kids (almost all of whom were bused in).

A couple years out of college I signed up for a wind surfing class. We were required to go to a pool ahead of time and get signed off that we could tread water for a certain amount of time (My memory is hazy, but I believe it was for 2 minutes). I could not pass this simple test.

A buddy of mine used to recount a story of his Navy boot camp. They had one test where they were all required to jump into a pool. He says all the white boys jumped in and bobbed right up to the top. The black boys jumped in and sunk to the bottom.

A liberal cannot deny that on average, for example, Samoans are much bigger and taller than Japanese. But for some reason when it comes to differences that are not apparent to the eye, such as buoyancy, they do mental gymnastics to argue against any of the differences possibly being racially based. Somehow to them despite races evolving separately their arguments assume that the bell curves in any area are somehow magically the same, with differences being attributable only to "environment", "upbringing" and "culture" etc.

Thanks for sharing, and welcome to the forum. Did you find this thread by doing a Google search? Are you interested in racial differences?

I have talked about this topic elsewhere on the Internet. It is always the white liberal groups, especially atheists, who react most strongly against this argument, or against talk of racial differences of any sort. This forum is to be commended for allowing such discussions, albeit restricted to the "Pseudoscience" poisoned well. The more common reactions of white liberals are not just venomous hatred but also censorship. They don't budge in their opinions even in the face of a strong mathematical physical argument, but this argument in their minds qualifies as just as bad as all the other "racist" arguments, if not worse (I have elsewhere argued with them about racial intelligence differences). It doesn't matter if the hypothesis would save black lives if it were correct, because to them that is just a cheap thin mask. My generation of whites was raised that way from a young age: all races are the same on the inside, and anyone who makes a point about racial differences beneath the skin is gullible, stupid and/or evil, like the KKK and the Nazis. Any apparent lack of stupidity must be accounted for by an increase in evil. The white liberals should be corrected for their error but not hated: ideology is a part of the human condition, something they did not choose, like any epidemic. They almost certainly will not change their minds, but they have not been completely useless. They helped me fully develop my own argument, and they helped me bring it to moderacy (I no longer think the chainsaw analogy is a good one).

So, I am aware of how this argument tends to be received among whites, but I am unsure of how it is received among blacks. Would it tend to be received with a similar level of hatred, in your opinion? Or would it be accepted as obvious? Or something else?

 

[RavenSky]

Link

Here is the quote:

Thanks for sharing, and welcome to the forum. Did you find this thread by doing a Google search? Are you interested in racial differences?

I have talked about this topic elsewhere on the Internet. It is always the white liberal groups, especially atheists, who react most strongly against this argument, or against talk of racial differences of any sort. This forum is to be commended for allowing such discussions, albeit restricted to the "Pseudoscience" poisoned well. The more common reactions of white liberals are not just venomous hatred but also censorship. They don't budge in their opinions even in the face of a strong mathematical physical argument, but this argument in their minds qualifies as just as bad as all the other "racist" arguments, if not worse (I have elsewhere argued with them about racial intelligence differences). It doesn't matter if the hypothesis would save black lives if it were correct, because to them that is just a cheap thin mask. My generation of whites was raised that way from a young age: all races are the same on the inside, and anyone who makes a point about racial differences beneath the skin is gullible, stupid and/or evil, like the KKK and the Nazis. Any apparent lack of stupidity must be accounted for by an increase in evil. The white liberals should be corrected for their error but not hated: ideology is a part of the human condition, something they did not choose, like any epidemic. They almost certainly will not change their minds, but they have not been completely useless. They helped me fully develop my own argument, and they helped me bring it to moderacy (I no longer think the chainsaw analogy is a good one).

So, I am aware of how this argument tends to be received among whites, but I am unsure of how it is received among blacks. Would it tend to be received with a similar level of hatred, in your opinion? Or would it be accepted as obvious? Or something else?

Nope. Godless Raven asked you:

What have you changed your mind on regarding this issue over the last 5 years? You're selling yourself as open minded and having an insatiable quest for knowledge. When have you been wrong and changed?

You claimed:

One example is that I made a thread about blacks being more likely to drown due to greater body density. I claimed that encouraging blacks to learn to swim is like encouraging the public to learn to juggle chainsaws to make it a safe hobby. I now think that is a wrong analogy, because elite swimmers have body densities equal to the typical young black men, and the body density difference is still less than a standard deviation, so swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority but not the majority.

Even though that is not really even an example of you admitting that you were wrong and had actually changed your mind, what you now link as your "evidence" is even less so.

All you did in that quote is bad mouth the people of this board while trying to portray yourself as the poor misunderstood put upon victim.

 

[ApostateAbe]

Here is the quote:

Thanks for sharing, and welcome to the forum. Did you find this thread by doing a Google search? Are you interested in racial differences?

I have talked about this topic elsewhere on the Internet. It is always the white liberal groups, especially atheists, who react most strongly against this argument, or against talk of racial differences of any sort. This forum is to be commended for allowing such discussions, albeit restricted to the "Pseudoscience" poisoned well. The more common reactions of white liberals are not just venomous hatred but also censorship. They don't budge in their opinions even in the face of a strong mathematical physical argument, but this argument in their minds qualifies as just as bad as all the other "racist" arguments, if not worse (I have elsewhere argued with them about racial intelligence differences). It doesn't matter if the hypothesis would save black lives if it were correct, because to them that is just a cheap thin mask. My generation of whites was raised that way from a young age: all races are the same on the inside, and anyone who makes a point about racial differences beneath the skin is gullible, stupid and/or evil, like the KKK and the Nazis. Any apparent lack of stupidity must be accounted for by an increase in evil. The white liberals should be corrected for their error but not hated: ideology is a part of the human condition, something they did not choose, like any epidemic. They almost certainly will not change their minds, but they have not been completely useless. They helped me fully develop my own argument, and they helped me bring it to moderacy (I no longer think the chainsaw analogy is a good one).

So, I am aware of how this argument tends to be received among whites, but I am unsure of how it is received among blacks. Would it tend to be received with a similar level of hatred, in your opinion? Or would it be accepted as obvious? Or something else?

Nope. Godless Raven asked you:

What have you changed your mind on regarding this issue over the last 5 years? You're selling yourself as open minded and having an insatiable quest for knowledge. When have you been wrong and changed?

You claimed:

One example is that I made a thread about blacks being more likely to drown due to greater body density. I claimed that encouraging blacks to learn to swim is like encouraging the public to learn to juggle chainsaws to make it a safe hobby. I now think that is a wrong analogy, because elite swimmers have body densities equal to the typical young black men, and the body density difference is still less than a standard deviation, so swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority but not the majority.

Even though that is not really even an example of you admitting that you were wrong and had actually changed your mind, what you now link as your "evidence" is even less so.

All you did in that quote is bad mouth the people of this board while trying to portray yourself as the poor misunderstood put upon victim.

I said, "They almost certainly will not change their minds, but they have not been completely useless. They helped me fully develop my own argument, and they helped me bring it to moderacy (I no longer think the chainsaw analogy is a good one)."

I think that should end it. I am kinda losing patience.

 

[ApostateAbe]

I just remembered that I don't argue with mods. Oops.

 

[ApostateAbe]

One example is that I made a thread about blacks being more likely to drown due to greater body density. I claimed that encouraging blacks to learn to swim is like encouraging the public to learn to juggle chainsaws to make it a safe hobby. I now think that is a wrong analogy, because elite swimmers have body densities equal to the typical young black men, and the body density difference is still less than a standard deviation, so swimming is more dangerous for a significant minority but not the majority.

How big of you. If you keep taking baby steps like that one, and humans find a way to live forever, you could get there some day! I have faith.

You know...whatever differences there are between what were calling "races" are so negligible in the big picture of what makes us human, I think you're spending a large portion of your time on Earth worrying about something that's not that big of a difference. Instead of honestly considering why most elite swimmers are White or Asian, you've gone and blown it way out of proportion, like your chainsaw analogy. Which, frankly, is just goofy.

Ever wonder why Black boxers easily dominate White boxers? Is it because the races are so different and Black boxers are just way better...and that getting a White boxer to dominate in boxing (with a few exceptions) is like speed skating uphill?

Well...it's not. It has to do with opportunity and options. There used to be great fighters of Jewish, Irish, Italian descent. Some of the greatest of all-time. (I'm not talking about those who would not "Cross the color line" and fight blacks like Jack Dempsey.

If one took a look at real statistical data from 1970-2000, they would probably come away thinking that Black's are simply better at boxing, or their bodies are more adaptable to that sport. 3 decades of data.

And in the end...that data would mean nothing.

Just like it used to be poor Jewish/Irish/Italian boxers, fighting to get out of poverty, and then Black fighters doing the same, now, from 2000-2015 you can see a massive rise in Latin American contenders and champions as well as Eastern European fighters that dominate entire divisions. It turns out, those groups are also impoverished and that has more to do with why they were "tougher", more adaptable to the sport, have more "heart". When it's a fight to get out of being dirt poor, a person will do almost anything, including risk injury or beat the shit out of another person if that's what it takes.


Being so open minded and being open to changing your opinion, that swimming example can't be the biggest one that sticks out to you, is it? How about something more significant, where you had to challenge a very deep belief and you realized you were dead wrong.

I normally wouldn't challenge someone to come up with examples like these because people are uber resistant to changing their core beliefs, and it's all uphill. But you're one of the first people I've seen openly claim to be very interested in counter information and open to changing their mind, so I think it's fair in this case.

"How about something more significant, where you had to challenge a very deep belief and you realized you were dead wrong."

If I were to look back over the last five years of thinking about such topics, I figure it would be an evolution of my thinking about human races from discrete groupings to fuzzy sets. The books that introduced me to the topic of race were Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel and Stephen J. Gould's The Mismeasure of Man. I loved Jared Diamond's book, providing the first coherent explanation I have seen for inequalities among the races. Stephen J. Gould's book, though it was widely popular among the people I loved, did not sit nearly so well with me. I expected a good rebuttal of scientific racism, and instead I got rebuttals of historical figures and arrogant ideological rhetoric. From Gould's book, I expected that the scientific racists were right. So, I checked out Herrnstein and Murray's The Bell Curve, and those expectations were met. It was a very good statistical case for the theory that there are intelligence differences both within and between races, those differences were largely genetic, and they were a strong causal effect on wealth differences. They wrote positively of J. Philippe Rushton, a psychologist who wrote a book that explained an evolutionary theory of races, so I read that book, too, and the case seemed complete. But, there was one essential point where those books had misled me: they wrote as though races were discrete sets with sharp boundaries between them. Those authors were not evolutionary biologists (Stephen J. Gould was an evolutionary biologist but did not discuss the biology of races) so I went about with the wrong idea about races. I figured maybe I could find a good taxonomic family tree of the races, with branches and sub-branches representing the taxonomic divisions of the human species, with the three major branches on the top and all the small divisions below. I was slow to discover, however, that races did not work that way. Races are fundamentally spectral, they always mixed with their geographic neighbors, and they can not be accurately represented with family trees, but they must be represented with cluster analyses or principal component analyses of allele combinations. And I discovered that this is the way biological races have long been understood among evolutionary biologists. It should have been obvious to me, as such a model of races is essential for evolutionary divergence to lead to speciation (and I have long argued in favor of the theory of evolution).