Most Long Overdue Crime News Ever?

CONGRESS PASSES BILL TO REDUCE DISPARITY IN CRACK, POWDER COCAINE SENTENCING DISPARITY

From WaPo:

Congress on Wednesday changed a 25-year-old law that has subjected tens of thousands of African Americans to long prison terms for crack cocaine convictions while giving far more lenient treatment to those, mainly whites, caught with the powder form of the drug.

The House, by voice vote, approved a bill reducing the disparities between mandatory crack and powder cocaine sentences, sending the measure to President Obama for his signature. During his presidential campaign, Obama said that the wide gap in sentencing "cannot be justified and should be eliminated." The Senate passed the bill in March.

The measure changes a 1986 law, enacted at a time when crack cocaine use was rampant and considered a particularly violent drug. Under the law, a person convicted of crack cocaine possession got the same mandatory prison term as someone with 100 times the same amount of powder cocaine. The new legislation reduces that ratio to about 18 to 1.

The bill also eliminates the five-year mandatory minimum for first-time possession of crack, the first time since the Nixon administration that Congress has repealed a mandatory minimum sentence. It does not apply retroactively.

This is exceedingly welcome news, even if it does mean I have to revise my cocaine unit for my drug policy class this fall!

I know that many folks are displeased that the ratio wasn't equalized at 1:1, but given the highly-charged political nature of the federal cocaine sentences, I think we should be happy that the disparity was cut by a factor of five. It's progress, no doubt.

I'm surprised not to find a lot of commentary on the legislation from around the blogosphere (save for this post from Outside the Beltway, a political science blog). I did find a related article about the War on Drugs and America's new racial caste system at The Crime Report that is worth a read.

I will update with more commentary as it becomes available.

Ode to the Tea Baggers

A while back we had an exchange on this blog about how much institutionalized hatred there is to anything conservative in academics. Some of my more liberally-inclined friends seemed a bit surprised (shocked) that conservatives would report a sense of strong institutional forces against their viewpoints, and therefore, quite unwelcomed in the Academy.

So I am in a lunch meeting yesterday with several faculty/administrators talking about new faculty orientation – this is a University committee. I leave for a second to get lunch (yes, life has not changed….I love to eat) and I return to a conversation about those “tea baggers.” I still am not sure why these conversations surprise me, but the level of presumed comfort that academics have with assuming political views of their colleagues is simply incredible to me. In the conversation about the “tea baggers” (which I found just a tad of irony was from a homosexual colleague…just struck me as somewhat ironic), another started to explain simply how stupid and uninformed those darn people are. After about 2 minutes of this I interjected, and in the end, we had a very thoughtful but spirited debate about the issues surrounding this “movement.” I really enjoyed the conversation but it got me thinking (which is painful for me).

What struck me as so obvious during that conversation is how “Tea Baggers” is now the newest version of the words redneck, hillbilly, cracker, and just about any other pejorative term to denigrate non-minorities (read: those stupid, hateful, inbred white people). It struck me as so obvious about how any hint of disparaging group-level images directed at protected classes is met with SUCH righteous indignation, but is not only tolerated but celebrated when it is directed at other groups. My liberal friends often damage their hands congratulating each other on how creative they can get with the Tea Bagger metaphors. I have gone back to read what is still one of the greatest assigned books I read in grad school, The Redneck Manifesto, by Jim Goad. One of the only good things Kevin Kelly ever taught me!

Institutionalized bias remain alive and well in the Academy. That should help some of you sleep very well tonight!

Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. ... Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

~Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community? (1967)

The tough mind is sharp and penetrating, breaking through the crust of legends and myths and sifting the true from the false. The tough-minded individual is astute and discerning. He has a strong austere quality that makes for firmness of purpose and solidness of commitment.Who doubts that this toughness is one of man's greatest needs? Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.

~Strength to Love (1963)

One has not only a legal, but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

~Letters From a Birmingham Jail (1963)

Tenure and Faculty of Color

Yes...it's me again today.

There is a great story in the Boston Globe today about tenure at a local university - Emerson College (liberal arts communication university). The story is about racial disparities in the granting of tenure (although as always, the Globe presents only half the story...they fail to draw any comparisons to white faculty).

The story is quite interesting. I am not sure what to draw from it besides just an interesting "factoid." Needless to say, the story hits a little close to home for me. Interestingly, the article states an outside panel will be convened to review how promotion and tenure policies are applied to minority candidates. I guess I found that interesting...how about how they are applied to all candidates?

I really don't have much of a reaction beyond that. I guess part of me (maybe just being naive) finds it hard to believe that university tenure and promotion guidelines would discriminate (intentionally or otherwise) against minorities. Especially at small liberal arts institutions and especially in places like Boston.

I am curious to hear thoughts about this case.

Brew D'Etat

Yesterday evening President Obama (and Vice President Biden) sat down with Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Sgt. James Crowley to broker a truce in the Gatesgate arrest debacle over a few cold ones on the White House back lawn. The meeting was private (the press was stationed out of earshot), so the content of the conversation is unknown. However, we are privy to the most pertinent information from the evening: each man's beer selection. Herewith, a brief analysis:

Obama: Bud Light
This reeks of political calculation to me. Let's face it: given the nation's current economic woes, Obama had little choice but to order a domestic, working-class everybrew. I mean, he can't very well be the People's President -- the very embodiment of American hope, for crying out loud! -- and have ordered a Guinness. (Much as that would have ruled.) But still...a Bud Light? Isn't that an awfully pedestrian choice for the leader of the free world? The official beer of ball games and high school graduation parties is not terribly befitting of efforts to induce national racial reconciliation, in my view. If he wanted to stay with a domestic brew, he could have given his Chicago folk some love and ordered a Honker's Ale. Still, I'd have liked to see him show a sense of humor about the whole situation by ordering a black-and-tan. Ha!

Biden: Buckler (non-alcoholic)
Does Biden have an alcohol problem of which I'm unaware? Hmm...perhaps it's best to reserve judgment on this one. Maybe the gaffe-prone Biden just didn't want to loosen his famously loose lips any further?

Gates: Sam Adams Light
A solid -- if disappointingly obvious -- choice for the Harvard man. (Isn't it codified somewhere that all Boston-area residents must love to drink Sam Adams?) While the Boston Lager is a good, patriotic selection, I'm a bit put off that he ordered the Light. And, if he'd really wanted to impress he'd have gone with a Cherry Wheat.

Crowley: Blue Moon
Nice! I'm a big fan of Blue Moon, so of the four Crowley's is the selection I'd have made had I been invited to the racial summit of the century. Though, the cynic in me wonders if this wasn't a calculated choice as well. C'mon, the "boy in blue" orders a Blue Moon? It's almost too perfect. Still, I can't fully assess Crowley's choice until I know whether or not he took it with orange (he loses points if he did).

Please feel free to share your thoughts about this extremely pressing matter of national importance in the comments.

The Henry Louis Gates Arrest

I felt compelled to chime in on the recent arrest of acclaimed Harvard historian Henry Louis Gates, but I haven't followed the story closely enough to write thoughtfully about it. So, I'll let NewSocProf and Crooked Timber write thoughtfully about it for me.

Scoob, you're in the area: what's the local coverage like?

Jena Six Back in the News

I was just listening to CNN and heard that 5 of the 6 defendants in the Jena 6 case are close to entering pleas relating to the case. I was curious if any of the six were charged with hate crimes and was surprised to find out that the answer to this question was no. Even more surprising, my very quick scan of the news articles I searched indicated the only "hate crime" discussion was around the original incident when the noose was hung from the tree. It seems that this original incident did not result in hate crime charges because of the age of the defendants (all juveniles not eligible to be certified as adults - fyi, I am embarrassed to say I only recently learned juveniles cannot be charged in federal court....good or bad I will not conclude. I just didn't realize that was the case).

Maybe there was a discussion on charging the "Jena 6" with hate crimes (age notwithstanding) and I missed it, but I simply cannot believe anyone would conclude this did not meet any such definition. For what is worth, I don't think anyone should be charged with hate crimes, including the Jena 6. I think it is quite simply the worst piece of federal (political) legislation ever written. Ok, maybe "worst" is a bit strong but it is close at a minimum.

PS: Dr. H, I MISSED the man-step post you did a while back. That quite simply is the best commerical of all time! As you suggest, you need to lighten up!

Another Lightning Round

There are several items about which I've been meaning to blog lately, and these stories make up our most recent Lightning Round! (See previous entries here.)

Item 1: University of Georgia Murders
The fatal shootings at the University of Georgia campus in Athens, GA on April 25th at first appeared to be similar to other university shootings. Then came news that the alleged shooter was not a student but a faculty member, George Zinkhan, and that one of the three victims was Zinkhan's wife -- and so the story unfolded as an all-too-familiar case of intimate partner homicide. But then Zinkhan disappeared, and a weeks-long manhunt turned up no trace of him until this past weekend when cadaver dogs discovered his body in a concealed grave he apparently dug for himself immediately before committing suicide. And then, I think, it became clear that this story is quite unlike others we've heard:

Zinkhan's body was found in a small dugout area in the ground, covered with leaves and debris, and it was apparent that he took significant steps to try to conceal his body from being located," a statement from Athens police said.

Law enforcement officials determined that Zinkhan, 57, committed suicide after killing his wife, Marie Bruce, 47, Thomas Tanner, 40, and Ben Teague, 63, outside a theater in Athens on April 25.

Another University of Georgia professor, Barbara Carroll, believes that she was also targeted by Zinkhan but escaped because she was at a movie theater the day of the slayings.

In an e-mail obtained by CNN, Carroll had warned her colleagues at the university's Terry College of Business that Zinkhan, a marketing professor, was "dangerous." The e-mail was sent after the shootings but before Zinkhan's body was found.

I don't really have much commentary to add, other than to say that I'm puzzled about why he went to such lengths to conceal his body. While suicide is very often the final result of male-perpetrated domestic homicide, I can't quite make out why he would have wanted nobody to find his body. A final act of cowardice? The consequence of a deeply disturbed mental state? Who knows? It certainly is unusual, though.

Item 2: The Pending SCOTUS Nomination
Now that Justice David Souter has announced his retirement, President Obama is poised to make his first Supreme Court nomination. There is a rare consensus in the political blogosphere that the nominee will be a woman (and also, possibly, a lesbian). Indeed, no less an authority than Justice Ginsburg has bemoaned the current gender imbalance on the Supreme Court bench. While the predictable wave of "Why can't we judge the nominees by their records and not their chromosomes?!" hand-wringing has already begun, I agree with Justice Ginsburg that the appointment of a woman is of paramount importance:

Ginsburg said having just one woman on the Supreme Court sends a disheartening message to Americans about women's roles in society. She stressed the contrast between the Supreme Court and international courts, many of which have higher percentages of women.

The nine-member Supreme Court of Canada, for example, has four women justices, including the chief justice. Ginsburg also pointed to state courts in the USA, where, according to the National Center for State Courts, 20 top state benches, including those in Florida, Michigan and Wisconsin, are led by female chief justices.

The "worst part," Ginsburg said, is the image a single woman at the high court projects, particularly to young people visiting the court: "Young women are going to think, 'Can I really aspire to that kind of post?'"

Item 3: New Issue of the ANNALS on Race, Crime, & Justice

The May issue of the ANNALS might be of particular interest to folks who study and/or teach about race/ethnicity and crime. Entitled "Race, Crime, and Justice: Contexts and Complexities" and edited by race and crime experts Lauren Krivo and Ruth Peterson, this issue grew out of the Racial Democracy, Crime, and Justice Network workshops that Krivo and Peterson coordinate at Ohio State University. The featured articles look terrific, and I can't resist mentioning that one of them was co-authored by fellow Spartan and friend of the blog Jeff Cancino!

MLK, Obama, and Criminal Justice Reform

Amid all of the hoopla yesterday appeared a Detroit Free Press editorial calling for the twin celebrations of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and President Obama's inauguration to prompt reform of the criminal justice system. I was pleasantly surprised to see the phrase "criminal justice system" among the inauguration-themed headlines, and thought others might be interested to read the editorial, too. A few excerpts:

A nation where millions of African Americans couldn't vote 50 years ago has elected its first black president and embraced the change he represents. Still, King's dream of racial equality remains unfulfilled. The world's most powerful democracy is also its leading incarcerator. African Americans -- 13% of the population -- make up nearly half of all those in jail or prison. The nation that elected its first black president also has 1 million black men behind bars....

No doubt, we need prisons. But when too many young men grow up in neighborhoods where most of their peers go to prison or jail, it's time to consider where the get-tough policies of the last 35 years have taken us.

Getting the number of incarcerated to a rational level will take more than re-entry and training programs. It will take serious reforms in sentencing. Figuring out who should go to prison -- and for how long -- and who should not, must become part of a new urban and civil rights agenda, backed by the nation's leader.

"Change Has Come"

Photo credit: NPR

Change has come.

This morning it doesn't seem any more real than it did last night. I don't know that I even have words to adequately express what I am feeling this morning. Pride tops my emotional list -- this is indeed a moment of tremendous pride for the United States. The election of a bi-racial man who has familial roots that trace across the globe and who has lived in cultures and communities far outside the heartland of America is an historic departure from tradition in this country. That a Harvard-educated Black woman from a working-class family will become the nation's First Lady -- less than two years after a group of university-educated Black women was effortlessly dismissed as "nappy-headed hos" -- fills my eyes with tears and my heart with joy. The sight of two families -- one Black, one white -- embracing one another without apprehension or apology as they celebrate and prepare to lead, together, the United States of America assures me that we are witnessing genuine, tangible progress being forged in this country.

Change has come, and the world is watching. Did you ever think you'd see the day?

On Normative Whiteness

In my experience, one of the most challenging concepts for students to grasp (or, perhaps more accurately, one that they are most reluctant to grasp) is normative whiteness. The idea behind normative whiteness is that white people are socialized to perceive white skin as "morally neutral, normative, and average," to quote Peggy McIntosh. That is, when white people see other white people in print advertisements, on television and movie screens, on the street, or elsewhere, they do not perceive those white people as having "race". Because whiteness is the default category, white skin does not register as being "raced" in any way. Conversely, when white people see people of color, they immediately perceive them as having race because people of color do not fall into the racially-neutral or normative category.

Normative whiteness is a somewhat abstract concept, therefore it is difficult for many students to comprehend. However, for students who have never grappled with issues of race and white-skin privilege, the concept of normative whiteness also challenges their perceptions of themselves as "colorblind," which makes comprehension even more difficult. So, I like to use concrete examples to illustrate this concept in class.

Consider the old Allstate Insurance commercials -- you know, "You're in good hands with Allstate." At the end of these commercials appears a pair of cupped human hands. I show this clip and then ask my students, "What was shown at the end of the commercial?" They respond, "A pair of hands." Then I ask them, "How many of you observed a pair of white hands? Or did you just see a pair of hands?" This is generally greeted by uncomfortable silence. I continue, "OK, imagine if it had been a pair of Black hands at the end of the commercial. How many of you would have noticed that it was a pair of Black hands? Most of you, right? And that's the point. You didn't notice that the white hands were white because whiteness is normative -- the default category. But when a person (or, in this instance, a body part) differs from that norm, you notice. That's because non-white skin is non-normative."

I am always on the lookout for examples that illustrate the concept of normative whiteness. Turns out I had to look no further than that exemplar of colorblindness, Bill O'Reilly, for a truly superb example.

Consider the exchange from last night's O'Reilly Factor with Temple University professor Marc Lamont Hill:

On Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor last night, Temple University professor Marc Lamont Hill argued that when politicians like Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin invoke “Joe Six Pack,” they are using a “code word” that excludes African-Americans. “Why can’t an African- American guy be Joe six pack?” asked O’Reilly.

HILL: What I’m saying is that when people think of Joe Six Pack, when — the immediate image that comes to your mind is not a Black man. It is often a white man.

O’REILLY: The immediate image - no, the immediate image that comes to my mind is a guy of no color with a six pack of Bud. No color.

HILL: [laughs] You might be the only person in the galaxy who is able to imagine a raceless human being. For most people our images of people are racialized. And oftentimes the index of the normal average American is a white person.

Watch the exchange here:



It is perhaps the greatest luxury of white-skin privilege for a person to be able to say, with a straight face, that he can visualize in his mind's eye a "guy of no color". Indeed, a "guy of no color" really means a "guy of white color" in a world where whiteness is the absence of color. That is precisely the point Dr. Hill was trying to make.

I can't imagine why it evaded Mr. O'Reilly.

Minority Scholars

OK, I really I am setting myself up on this one but I have never let that stop me in the past. I am really curious about this and I honestly don't know how I feel. I happened to be on the ASC website today (rumor has it I might be on the job market soon....) and I see a link to "Directory of Minority Ph.D. Criminologists." Am I the only one who finds that a little bothersome? I am afraid the answer is yes....

Where is the line between being supportive and racists? This is a serious question, honestly.

Friday CJ Funnies: NSFW Edition!

I've been feeling surly lately. Maybe it's the crappy weather we've been having that foiled our plans to go up north this weekend. Or maybe it's the shamelessly racist and sexist coverage of Michelle Obama (a.k.a. Barack's "Baby Mama" a.k.a. the "Angry Black Woman") over on Fox News that's got me so grumpy. Or maybe it's pent-up angst over the decision to move the upcoming season of Project Runway from NY to LA. Who knows? Whatever the cause, no fluffy piece of CJ humor was going to tickle my funny bone today. Not even the wicked wit of my beloved Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert could satisfy me. Instead, I craved comedy that's as surly as I feel, and only one person can provide it: Chris Rock.*

Below is a link to one of my favorite bits from the Chris Rock Show: "How not to get your ass kicked by the police". Be warned: it is entirely NSFW, which is why I linked to the video instead of embedding it. It contains strong language (multiple f-bombs!), simulated beatings, and drug references...but it's also viciously funny in typical Rock fashion.

Watch the clip on YouTube here.

*Of course, Dave Chappelle offers equally surly comedy. Perhaps next week's Friday CJ Funny post will be courtesy of Mr. Chappelle...

Thoughts on Philly Police Video?

Some of you may have seen the recent video of more than a dozen (white) Philadelphia police officers using extreme, and most likely excessive, force against three (Black) shooting suspects:



This situation is being described by many as an instance of police brutality. To help understand why, here is some important contextual information:

According to the Ground Report,

The grim event took place in the Huntington Park section of one of the United States' biggest cities (by population). Recently, in the close-by Port Richmond part of town, 12-year law enforcement veteran Sergeant Stephen Liczbinski, 39 years of age, was gunned down, making him the third Philly law enforcement member killed while on duty in the last two years...

According to police officers on the scene, the three men are all suspects in a drug-dealing ring and possibly in the killing of the police officer and they were observed firing guns from their car, shots which resulted in the injury of at least three citizens on a street corner. There was a fourth suspect but he ran away from the scene on foot, according to observers.

And, from the Philadelphia Inquirer:

The video shows as many as 15 officers, all of them white, rushing the vehicle of the three black suspects, yanking them from the car, and kicking and beating them after they were prone....

The news of sanctions against seven more officers came just hours after police captured Eric DeShawn Floyd, 33, the last of three men suspected in Saturday's slaying of Police Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski - and shortly before the beginning of last evening's viewing for the 12-year police veteran in Northeast Philadelphia....

Among other developments yesterday, D. Scott Perrine, the attorney for Dawayne Dyches, one of the three men beaten and arrested Monday night, said police had pursued Dyches because they believed he was Floyd....

Police have said the three men - Dyches, 24, of the 2000 block of North Marshall Street in North Philadelphia; Brian Hall, 23, of the 1900 block of North Marshall Street; and Pete Hopkins, 19, of the 2000 block of East Firth Street in Kensington - were arrested after they drove from Fourth and Annsbury Streets, the scene of the shooting in North Philadelphia's Feltonville section, shortly after 10 p.m. Monday.

Police say a fourth man had arrived with the three suspects and fled on foot after firing into a crowd. Police said that 15 spent 9mm casings had been found at the scene, but that no weapon had been recovered from the vehicle, which was stopped about two miles away in the 3700 block of North Second Street.

At that point, the video shows officers charging to the suspects' vehicle with guns drawn. In the next minute, the officers pull the three from the car, beating them after they have been forced to the street. The beatings take up about one minute of the video.

So, Philadelphia officers' emotions were understandably running high after the tragic death of Sgt. Liczbinski, and the three men shown being beaten in the video -- who allegedly had fired shots from their moving vehicle, injuring several people -- were believed to be connected to Sgt. Liczbinski's slaying. Add to this the racial implications of yet another instance of white police officers using extreme force against Black suspects, and it is easy to see why this situation has garnered so much media attention.

Not being a policing or use of force expert, I'm curious to hear from Scoob, Cranks, or the NY Kid -- have you been following this case? What are criminologists who study use of force saying about this incident?

A Story of Rape, Race, and Healing

Yesterday I joked about blog-writing as therapy. Today, though, I want to share a very serious -- and moving -- essay about one rape survivor's journey toward healing and understanding by writing publicly about an assault she had kept secret for decades.

Joanna Connors, a writer for the Cleveland-based Plain Dealer newspaper, was raped in the summer of 1984. Though she told her family and friends about the attack and immediately reported it to the authorities, in the years that followed she discussed her ordeal less and less until it became a secret she harbored from everyone who knew her. Recently, though, she came to realize that true healing only could be achieved by writing about and sharing her experiences with others.

The six-part story that ran in a special section of last Sunday's Plain Dealer offers an emotional, honest, and extremely powerful analysis of many of the issues we deal with as criminologists: violent crime, sexual assault, victimization, and career criminality. It also offers a sociological analysis as well. Connors is a white woman who was raped by a Black man; accordingly, her essay addresses issues of race, class and gender; of privilege and power, poverty and disadvantage. Perhaps most movingly, it chronicles the restorative power of the relationships Connors forged with her attacker's relatives all these years later, and of the understanding that resulted from learning about his life and deciphering how and why their lives collided in such a brutal way more than two decades ago.

I hope that folks will take time to read this essay and share their comments about it here. It is extremely well-written and could be useful for facilitating in-class discussions, especially surrounding issues of race, class, power, and privilege as they relate to violent crime. One important warning, though: the description of the attack is graphic and could potentially serve as a trigger for sexual assault survivors.

• Introduction & Editor's Note
• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three
• Part Four
• Part Five
• Part Six: Epilogue
  

"Not The Enemy"

The current (April 14th) issue of Newsweek features a really fascinating "My Turn" essay. For those who aren't regular readers, each issue of Newsweek contains a first-person essay intended to share one person's experiences with a particular topic, ranging from the universal (aging, caring for an ill or dying loved one, parenthood, etc.) to the unusual (being a passionate penny collector, for example). The "My Turn" essays are one of my favorite parts of the magazine because you never know what subject the author will address. (Yes, I am a huge dork.)

Anyway, this week's essay is called, "I Am Not the Enemy" by Felicia J. Nu'Man, who is a Black woman and a prosecutor in Louisville, KY and who writes in the teaser to her essay that she "put[s] people in jail because they break the law, not because I'm a puppet of a racist judicial system."

This essay caught my attention for obvious reasons, and I thought it was worth sharing. I especially like what she had to say about the duty she feels to stand up for the rights of Black crime victims, even when that means prosecuting Black offenders:

My question to these black people who believe me to be a traitor is, when will you connect the dots?...There is a disconnect in the minds of many black people. My great-grandfather was murdered in Kentucky back in the 1940s. There was no investigation. There was no prosecution of the people involved. There was only a funeral, a widow and fatherless children. This would never happen today...We have the most perfect imperfect system on earth."

GBOC Lightning Round

Between the Easter holiday weekend, a recent out-of-town trip, and pre-school spring break, I have had little time to post lately. This is especially unfortunate because there are several items I've been meaning to post about. Rather than write separate blog entires for each of these items as I had originally planned, I decided to offer a brief blurb about each one here. Without further ado...the very first GBOC Lightning Round!


Item 1: Detroit Mayor Indicted
This past Monday Wayne County prosecutor Kym Worthy announced that she was bringing charges against Kwame Kilpatrick and his former Chief of Staff Christine Beatty for perjury, obstruction of justice, and a variety of other felonies, giving Kilpatrick the dubious honor of being the first sitting Detroit mayor to be indicted. (Full coverage of the whole sordid tale can be found here.) There is not a great deal to say about this situation, other than that the mayor's tastelessness, arrogance, and seeming lack of remorse or dignity truly boggles the mind. It is a low point for a city that has had its fair share of low points; the fact that the (alleged) crimes were committed using taxpayer dollars makes the mayor's actions even more reprehensible. You know things are bad when folks are citing Eliot Spitzer as someone whose lead the mayor should follow. At least Spitzer had the decency to resign when he saw that the jig was up....

Item 2: Professors Who Blog
The New York Times ran this interesting story last week about the increasing number of faculty members who write blogs, maintain social networking pages, or otherwise use the Internet to make their lives an "open book". While some professors believe that making (benign) personal information available online humanizes faculty members and facilitates communication with students, others fret that these professors are trying too hard to get students to like them at the expense of maintaining appropriate professional boundaries. I had a few thoughts about this piece when I first read it, but they've long since flown from my brain. What say all of my fellow PWBs (Professors Who Blog)?

Item 3: Barack Obama's "Race Speech"
By now everyone surely has watched the video or read the transcript of Barack Obama's speech about U.S. race relations. If you haven't yet seen or read the senator's remarks, you need to. In fact, I think this address should be mandatory viewing for every single solitary person in the United States.

I knew that a wide variety of commentators had heaped praise on the senator's remarks. It was not until I watched it for myself, however, that I appreciated just how remarkably reasoned and candid an analysis of race relations Senator Obama offered. Never in my lifetime have I heard a politician so plainly and intelligently address complex issues of race and inequality that too often avoid discussion in college classrooms, let alone in presidential campaigns.

In particular, some of his remarks were especially relevant to criminologists. Some excerpts:

So when [whites] are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time...

Like the anger within the black community, these resentments [among whites] aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism...

But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it - those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations - those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings...

In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper...

That's it for now. Stay tuned for another Lightning Round in the future!

Race and Juvenile Justice Processing

I'm not sure why, but lately I have been inundated with papers to review on this topic. I understand why I'm getting them (they all cite me. Yay!), but it just seems like there's increased interest all of a sudden in examining how race conditions the effects of other variables on processing. Any thoughts on why that is?

Also, if you're interested in this topic, check out Nancy Rodriquez's latest piece in JQ.

Where's the Beef?

From NPR -

The USDA recalls 143 million pounds of meat from a California slaughterhouse where some of the cows were crippled. Much of the beef went to schools, and a good bit of it has likely already been eaten.

Hearing this story reminded me of a post by Chris Uggen - see video below.


This video and NPR story raise a few issues -
1) Inmates get better food then our school children. I think this is another example of how mass imprisonment continues to leech from other institutions (like schools).

2) Class and nutrition - public schools offer food services for children of lesser means. For our school, this means that many of the children who are bussed in from Big City are getting food services for breakfast and lunch. I think these programs are fantastic and provide an important service to young children; however, the inadequacy of the food provided to these children is troubling. For a nice discussion of urbanism, class, race, and food - see this book.

3) On a personal note, I really like having the ease of having the big boy eat at school once and awhile. For example, last week I left the brown bag lunch on the counter while getting the kids ready for school. Guess what, big boy - the dogs ate your lunch so you can buy today. He was thrilled. It is hard to be perfect mommy all the time, and watching these videos and reports really makes me concerned. Any brown bag suggestions, friends?

Feminism & Politics

I am always pleasantly surprised when scholars (particularly those I admire) are interviewed by, provide analysis for, or otherwise find exposure outside of academia in the mainstream news media. Such is the case with this recent editorial written by Kimberle Crenshaw and Eve Ensler for the Huffington Post. (OK, OK. So the HuffPo isn't exactly mainstream media -- NPR it ain't -- but you get my point.)

I have mentioned before how influential Kimberle Crenshaw's work has been in shaping both my feminism and my research on violence against women. (I've read her 1991 Stanford Law Review article, "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color," probably a dozen times.) Thus, I was pleased to read the essay she wrote with Eve Ensler (whose work with V-Day I've also blogged about) criticizing the stance taken by some contemporary feminists that support for Hillary Clinton is the only authentically feminist political position:

Drawing their feminist boundaries in the sand, they interrogate, chastise, second-guess and even denounce those who escape their encampment and find themselves on Obama terrain. In their hands feminism, like patriotism, is the all-encompassing prism that eliminates discussion, doubt and difference about whom to vote for and why. Armed with indignant exasperation, this "either/or" camp converts the undeniable misogyny of the media into an imperative to vote for Clinton. The balanced reflections and gentle warnings that were voiced months ago have been jettisoned for a one-sided brief about why voting for Clinton is the only sensible thing for women to do.

I was especially excited to see that themes expressed in Crenshaw's academic work -- about the intersections of race- and gender-based oppression, for example -- are echoed in the editorial:

For many of us, feminism is not separate from the struggle against violence, war, racism and economic injustice. Gender hierarchy and race hierarchy are not separate and parallel dynamics.

Indeed, the relentless pitting of RACE (Obama) vs. GENDER (Clinton) in mainstream political coverage has made me wish many times over that I was teaching a course on feminism or race, class, and gender this semester. Though feminists of color have been writing for decades about the fundamental unfairness of being asked to declare allegiance to either their race or their gender (e.g., "Do you identify more as an African American or as a woman?" "Are you a woman or an Asian American first?" "Which is more important to you, your gender or your race?"), rarely has this discourse occurred beyond academic circles. Suddenly, though, with the Democratic presidential race serving as a literal manifestation of the "race-vs.-gender" dichotomy, this discourse has been thrust center stage in a national (and international) forum. As a feminist scholar, I view this as an exciting development as it offers a rare opportunity to discuss feminism using everyday examples with which most people are readily familiar.

P.S. Mary Poppins has been playing quite regularly at our house since the girls received it as a Christmas gift, which made me wonder: perhaps it was inevitable that I would become a feminist, given how many times I watched that movie as a child and that I was especially fond of the "Sister Suffragette" scene. (Choice lyric: Though we adore men individually/we agree that as a group they're rather stupid. Ha ha!)