Film '13th' traces path from slavery to U.S. mass incarceration

As the article states, black men comprise 6.6% of the US population. However, the FBI statistics show that black men commit over 50% of all the murders in the US.

"...so, what do you do about it?"

One way to reduce the number of black men in prison is for black men to stop committing crimes.

"One way to reduce the number of black men in prison is for black men to stop committing crimes."

Agreed.

As the article states, black men comprise 6.6% of the US population. However, the FBI statistics show that black men commit over 50% of all the murders in the US. "...so, what do you do about it?" One way to reduce the number of black men in prison is for black men to stop committing crime<

Can you hear the whoosh sound as things go right over your head or what?? The issue isn't about black men committing crime. Black men commit crime. White men commit crime. Asians, hispanics, etc., The issue is that black men are targeted more by law enforcement. The issue is that there is an institutionalized racism that sees more black men arrested, prosecuted and imprisoned than any other race. They get singled out easily and have longer prison sentences. And over any of that, there is a REASON why black communities see more crime.

There is institutionalized racism that makes it harder for black people to leave poor communities, attend good schools, get respectable jobs and so on. So your "stop committing crime" idea isn't easy. They're stuck in a lifestyle where bad things happen. White people took them from their homes, beat and raped them, forced them into hard labor and then set them free in the world with absolutely nothing. No money, no land, no respect, no understanding, no sense of belonging, NOTHING. We took everything and gave NOTHING. And people like you can sit there and act like they're equals when deep down you're holding racist thoughts. You can act like they're "free" now and not even try to understand why black communities are the way they are. You can act like it's all the fault of black people that their communities are rife with crime and not try to help or care or even sympathize. You can say "its been 150 years since slavery ended eyeroll" and absolve yourself of any wrongdoing. And that, in a nutshell, is privilege.

gc0925.

So the black community is completely free of blame?

Qwerty....I thought it was more than 50% or maybe that is just violent crime.

More Statistics......from humanevents.com

When Holder delivered his 2009 “nation-of-cowards” speech blaming racism for racial separation, Manhattan Institute’s Heather Mac Donald suggested that our attorney general study his crime statistics.

In New York from January to June 2008, 83 percent of all gun assailants were black, according to witnesses and victims, though blacks were only 24 percent of the population. Blacks and Hispanics together accounted for 98 percent of all gun assailants. Forty-nine of every 50 muggings and murders in the Big Apple were the work of black or Hispanic criminals.....end paste.

These types of stats go on year after year....yet many people seem to think it is the Whites faults. Do you ever hear anyone say thanks for the over 300 thousand soldiers that died on the Northern side fighting against Slavery during the Civil War?

Pants up don't Loot.

However, the FBI statistics show that black men commit over 50% of all the murders in the US.

Guess who also has the highest poverty rate.

One way to reduce the number of black men in prison is for black men to stop committing crimes.

Agreed.

@qwertyjapan and MikeL

The best solution is to stop allowing members of the KKK infiltrate the police and military. Like, they have been doing for decades.

http://fusion.net/story/245527/police-history-kkk-connections/

So, they can falsely accuse, abuse and imprison innocent black men. Something that Black men and women have known for decades, and the main reason that there is a culture of mistrust among the African-American community.

http://thefreethoughtproject.com/cops-cross-thin-blue-line-leak-info-showing-racist-officers-planted-drugs-guns-1000-black-men/

Technology has allowed a lot this to come the light than in decades past.

Basically the problem lies in the imbalance in distribution of wealth where 1% of the population controls 80+%.

The US system is broke with the black population never having access except for the fortunate few.

Silvafan: The best solution is to stop allowing members of the KKK infiltrate the police and military. Like, they have been doing for decades. http://fusion.net/story/245527/police-history-kkk-connections/

The link lists two recent cases of cops who were fired or resigned for KKK ties, an old scandal in LA from the early nineties (citizens vs. deputies, with deputies saying the complainants were disgruntled gang members), one cop who resigned for speaking at a white supremacist group's meeting, one case of an apparently Japanese LA deputy with a 'white supremacist' Lynwood Vikings tattoo (Tanaka, later a mayor of Gardena, says he got the tattoo years before the controversy). Link has no other definite cases of KKK / supremacist infiltration of law enforcement. That's not to say there aren't any. (Wasn't there a cop fired due to his Facebook posts not too long ago?) But it doesn't prove the problem it says exists.

There is extreme poverty in neighborhoods of new Asian immigrants to the US too. But, within one generation, they end up being more educated, earn more money and commit less crime than any racial group in the US.

Now how do we use poverty as an excuse?

@turbotstat

I knew someone would mention that it was outdated. For that reason, I posted two links which you seemed to ignore the other one. It is more recent, and those officers are currently in positions of power including the Director for Homeland Security in Alabama. I post it again, so no one accuse you of picking and choosing.

http://thefreethoughtproject.com/cops-cross-thin-blue-line-leak-info-showing-racist-officers-planted-drugs-guns-1000-black-men/

In addition, the FBI warned of this years ago.

http://thegrio.com/2015/05/12/fbi-white-supremacists-law-enforcement/

The freethoughtproject article has a dead link to the report it is citing, from the Alabama Justice Project. And the very liberal Washington Post retracted some (maybe most) of its support for the claims made in your first link, due to lack of documentation or followup on claims made by the "Alabama Justice Project". Retraction here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2015/12/03/serious-doubts-raised-about-report-that-dothan-ala-police-planted-drugs-on-young-black-men/)

Doubts raised about report that Dothan, Ala. police planted drugs on young black men - December 3, 2015

And googling news for the top shows only a few other articles around the same time, that appear to be echoes of the initial article. If there were much substance to the topic there'd be lots of articles by now.

Leaving you with the same scarcity of datapoints as mentioned before. A little city with some racist cops. Not widespread law enforcement attachment to the KKK.

Searching for "Andy Hughes Dothan" on google news doesn't turn up much (Hughes is the Asst Dir of Homeland Security mentioned). There is one article that contains the initial accusations but also counterpoints from officials, including claims that the claims of planted evidence are false. There is also a photo at the link that claims to have various people including Hughes at a 'Sons of Confederate Veterans' meeting, but it doesn't say how this is a virulently racist organization, just from the name it could be more like the DAR: http://boingboing.net/2015/12/02/corrupt-alabama-police-planted.html

And the thegrio article still only mentions a few cops in a few cases. Not adding up to wipespread.

Americans in general are ignorant about the ramifications of amendments and legislation that have virtually stunted growth in the black community in general. A reply to people who give the "pick yourself up by your bootstraps" is, easily, the Homestead Act, which gave free land to whites (at the expense of Native Americans)-- a type of welfare, if you will. When black people in the U.S. have striven for economic and social prosperity, unfortunately, they've experienced terrorism--google Tulsa Oklahoma, Black Wallstreet ( and do we need even mention the KKK?), and COINTELPRO which infiltrated and essentially dismantled the Black Panthers (contrary to Tomi Lahren, they were NOT a terrorist group).

My only hope is that these films can educate Americans--black, white, yellow, green, red, purple,indigo, etc.

The more comments I read about how it's this group's fault for this and let's cite crime statistics to prove my point, the more I can see how self-inflicted the racial divide is in the U.S.

13th sounds like a very good/important flick, hope I get a chance to see it.

The US really does have some very serious issues wrt to its black people & also other minorities. Just look at trump supporters, the majority I will bet have NO CLUE the hurdles that black people face in living in the US, its takes an incredible determination to escape from the poor situations/communities far too many black people are born into.

Here's to hoping things get better & QUICKLY!! Lot of work needed all round

institutionalized racism that sees more black men arrested, prosecuted and imprisoned than any other race.

Mr Noidall is right, Then stop committing crimes, and don't keep playing the race card as an excuse, like the pro-OJ community who cheered when he was acquitted for brutally murdering two white people, later to be held responsible. It didn't matter that he killed two people, they just wanted the famous black man to go free.

OJ kiilled two white people and everyone holds him up and says ''see.''　For hundreds of years whites all over the globe killed with impunity and were almost never held responsible. Spare me! Whites are lucky they never have to face the (in)justice blacks past and present have gotten on a regular basis. This newspaper's server isn't big enough to handle the case loads of stories. Why is the Ku Klux Klan and every other white supremacist group still operating freely, spewing hate, etc? Because they are white. Get up in arms over Black Lives Matter but stay silent on the hundreds of white hate groups. Most of the biggest names in American history were racists. Why should a black man respect a constitution that has treated him like a second-class citizen and shown him mostly injustice for over 200 years? You can still find stories almost every day (in 2016!) on many newspapers' websites or Facebook, etc. of white cops targeting blacks, teachers trying to keep black kids out of top schools, people like Trump refusing to rent to blacks, whites in black face thinking it is funny, whites disparaging one of America's greatest heroes (MLK) or politicans calling the Obamas gorillas, etc. The list is endless. The black community has work to do, that is for sure, but think of how really great America could have been if you had treated someone with repect and fairness from centuries ago instead of throwing a few crumbs at him now and saying slavery is over and the playing field is level when we all know that is far from the case. You are the ones playing the race card. My pants have always been up and I have never looted.

Mocheake: The black community has work to do?

According to the FBI:

90% of black homicide victims were killed by blacks.

Far more whites then blacks are killed by police.

Almost 80% of black children are born out of wedlock.

That's not "work to do," that's not even a community.

This is the new racism, its anti-racist on its surface and hides behind a veneer of concern for the victims of racism. But make no mistake, this narrative is just part of a larger movement that is seeking to use race, in the USA, as a means of pushing a neo-marxist agenda. They don't want to get past race because they need the victim in order to obtain power with which they will attack the status quo. So, black men are the victims of some prison industrial complex conspiracy...the proof is all stats of course, meant to push your logical thinking brain aside in the face of real numbers...but of course we know that stats can be manipulated to make anything seem legitimate, even Frankfurt school/critical race theory arguments like this film utilize. In reality the issues faced by the "black" population are in fact the same ones faced by the poor of all races...of course this Marxist rhetoric always justifies the proletariat, in this case black men/black people and so we have to squint really hard to see its not the socialization in the family, or lack their off, its not the socialization of the streets, with its glorification of violence and there is not free will it all boils down to a desire to lock up and keep "enslaved" blacks. These type of arguments have been around university campuses, praying on the young and naive, for decades. Until the media saw the money to be made with this subject most logical oriented adults understood this to be what it is, a byproduct of a radicalized social science activist professors. Racism is real and life is pragmatic. What we need more of is self responsibility and stability both economically and socially, i.e. inside the black family, and less calls to the barricades and to join activist movements. But, hey, where the money to be made in that....I suggest that the simple answer is to ignore these type of movements. Don't watch their films, buy into their rhetoric or support their politicians or causes. Racism is not nearly the problem that the activist wants you to believe it is...their loyalty is to the cause not truth.

@qwertyjapan

Almost 80% of black children are born out of wedlock.

That's not "work to do," that's not even a community.

This subject keeps cropping up and is totally misunderstood. Let's put that 80% into perspective

In other words, no one disputes that 70 percent of black babies are born out of wedlock--or maybe they do, I never have. What we dispute are the reasons why. One notion that's gained quite a bit of currency is that over the last 40 years, black mothers have, for whatever reason, decided that they'd much rather be single mothers. But the facts don't back this up. As the data shows unmarried black women are having less, not more, kids then they were having 40 years ago. Furthermore, the number of unmarried black women having kids is declining, while the number of unmarried women--overall--having babies is increasing.

Now, you can argue, that double is still too high. What you can't argue is for any sort of "moral decline."

How can it be true that unmarried black women are having less kids, and yet the number of black babies born out of wedlock is 80 percent? Well, that question only looks at half the equation it never asks, "What is the behavior of maried black women?"Birth rates for married black women haven't just declined, they're actually lower than for married white women To summarize--there is no data to show that the black "illegitimacy" figure of 70 percent has been caused by unmarried black women having more kids than they did in the past. In fact, the trend is the exact opposite. What is clear is that the behavior of married black women has changed, to the point that married black women are actually having less kids than married white women.

I'll live for the day when all these social conservatives who think that the 80 percent figure is the cause of all that's wrong in black America, start hectoring married black people to have more kids.

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2009/02/the-math-on-black-out-of-wedlock-births/6738/

qwertyjapan, maybe we must have missed the memo that says being born out of wedlock makes you a criminal or doomed to failure. I guess no white kids are in that position. Just giving raw percentages means nothing. Hlw many whites were killed while on the ground, unarmed or with their hands in the air?

If you really want to know the answer go to YouTube and type in White Audience left speechless. This lady gives the real reason why!

misunderstood: If you really want to know the answer go to YouTube and type in White Audience left speechless. This lady gives the real reason why!

Comments say why "speechless".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNjg3HyNJA8

Comments

sanford sklansky - 2 months ago - Was this a college audience? No one in their right mind would stand up and humiliate themselves.

verywellthoughtover username - 2 months ago - It’s a trick question because all these kids know they’ll be branded a racist xenofobic nazi before they stretched their knees halfway through.

@turbostat

What about the FBI warning that the police forces across America are increasingly infiltrated by Right Wing racists, KKK, and Neo Nazi groups? Something African-Americans knew since the Jim Crow laws were enacted right after slavery ended.

The only difference is technology which makes it easier to prove. I suggest you read about the history of policing that originally started from slave patrols and later kept poor people who were not slaves in check.

http://plsonline.eku.edu/insidelook/brief-history-slavery-and-origins-american-policing

@Silvafan

Well but this is 2016, and the article you linked about the FBI was written in 2015 but only had an FBI quote from 2006, ten years ago, that seems based on the Lynwood deputies in LA metro from early 90's (one of whom was Japanese).

And I already posted about the ""Alabama Justice Project" / Dothan / "Andy Hughes" stuff. There's not much evidence available for that, that AJP has gone incommunicado, apparently, almost no hits on the web, and the Washington Post has published a retraction of most of their article on the topic.

Once in a while we hear about Klansmen or white supremacists turning up among cops, or cops making white supremacist social media posts, but then we hear about the cops being fired or resigning. Once in a very great while.

There are around 1.3 million law enforcement officers in the USA (fed, state, and local, according to wikipedia). No doubt some tiny fraction of that are secretly-avowed white supremacists or in sympathy with white supremacism.

Black Americans have had a very difficult history for a very long time but the time for excuses is over.

A reply to people who give the "pick yourself up by your bootstraps" is, easily, the Homestead Act, which gave free land to whites (at the expense of Native Americans)-- a type of welfare, if you will.

A disproportionate amount of government welfare financing since the onset of the 'War on Poverty' over 50 years ago have gone to black Americans. There has been a great deal of discrimination in favor of black Americas via affirmative action in education, employment, and government contracting over this same period of time. Those that were able to take advantage of this largess and generosity on the part of the American public have fared well in America (US President, Senators, Congressmen, lawyers, businessmen, surgeons, you name it).

However the elephant in the room is an extremely high illegitimacy rate among the poor - especially black Americans. Combine that with a culture of self-defeating victimhood and a tendency to bring down others who "act white" and you have a disaster on your hands. No one bats an eye at a popular culture that demeans women and attacks authority. This takes place in public - not in the privacy of the locker room with the fella's. You could make every police officer in America black and allow Black Lives Matter run the cities and it will not change the overwhelming odds for failure that too many are destined for.

Yes, picking yourself up by the bootstraps is the only way out. Even if you have to borrow the bootstraps. Blaming a white kid born today for the intransigent problems in the black community cannot lead to any progress. There are no laws that allow for discrimination against any minorities. The only real institutional racism is aimed at white Americans (i.e. affirmative action law). Too many blacks have been successful in America to excuse the poor behavioral choices of those who have not. But don't get me wrong, I don't mean to dump on only blacks. The same pattern has emerge for white Americans that Patrick Moynihan identified for black 50 years ago. It isn't going to get better for anyone folks.