Editor's Note & Premise:
The very notion of 'Black' crime suggests a racial cause for anti-social behavior.
There is no genetic cause for violence or violent crime or anything that can
be correlated to race. The principles of our open society reject the premise.
The American justice system, therefore should not recognize race in that regard,
nor should the general public . The fundamental mistake in discussing black
crime is that most people come to these as a result of very shoddy thinking
which is created by the haphazard use of criminal statistics. The stereotype
is against violent blacks who seek to harm whites. This prejudice, which is
widely held, skews politics and changes the effect of the Justice system which
results in abuses against black criminals, suspects and ordinary civilians.
There are indeed thousands upon thousands of black criminals, but there are
tens of millions more black Americans who have nothing to do with crime, violent
or otherwise. One has nothing to do with the other.
M.D.C.Bowen - May 2001
- The Original "Angry White Math"
- Debunked interactively in SCAA by the editor. This argues against figures promulgated by Pat Buchanan and Ed Koch which appear on the net from time to time.
- Some Interesting Correlation Stats
- These statistics can be convincing in correlating (black) race to violent crime however the exceptions seem so out of place as to bring this level of analysis into question.
State Court Felony Conviction Statistics, 1994
Crime & Victimization Stats - 1998
Fox Butterfield
- Other References:
The Rage of a Privileged Class
- Moynihan read James Q. Wilson into the congressional record as he said that the "best way to reduce racism... is to reduce the black crime rate"
'Koch contend that "eventhous who feel deeply about discrimination against blacks...feel estranged from the black community" as a consequnce of "black violence." According to Koch's [and Jared Taylor's] calculations blacks, who make up 12% of the poplation are committing 45 percent of violent crimes. And since "for the most part only maels are committing the crimes of violence...roughly 6% of the population is committing 45 percent of the crimes." Even if one accepts Koch's statistics, one must judge his conclusions perposterous, for it would mean that every black male in America - the 6 percent in his equation - is engaged in acts of mayhem. In other words, even black lawyers, accountants, teachers and salesment who put in long hours at work are apparently getting their jollies (during their lunch breaks, one supposes) by cracking hapless innocents of the head or "wilding" in big city parks.
It is true, as Koch indicates that blacks account for about 45 percent of those arrested for America's violent crimes. But it is not true that most black males are vicious. FBI statistics show that blacks were arrested 245,437 times in 1991 for murder, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault. The country's total population then was just under 249 million, including nearly 31 million blacks and roughly 15 million black males. If we assume that each arrest represents the apprehension of a separate individual, blacks arrested for violent crimes made up less than 1 percent of the black population 1n 1991 - and just under 1.7 percent of the black male population (less, in fact, since the aggregate figure of 245,437 includes [arrests of] females). In other words, less than one-tenth of a percent of the population - not 6 percent - is committing 45 percent of violent crimes. These numbers are not completely accurate, since the FBI population base is somewhat smaller than the entire US population, and since it is not correct to infer that thoses arrested in any one year make up the total population of violent criminals. But they are accurate enough to show the inanity of implying that most black males are sociopaths.
To many thoughtful people, certainly to many blacks, arguments like Koch's seen not only absurd but fundamentally unfair. For they suggest that discrimination against an entire race, if not exactly sanctioned is acceptable because of the sins of a relative few. They also suggest that blacks who do not commit crimes bear a special responsibility for those who do.
...These days, no serious thinker in the field of criminal justice would propose that the answer to violent crime among whites is for up-and-coming white executives to make crime prevention their special mission. Nor would anyone propose, for instance, that until the murder rate among twenty-something whites was made equal to the murder rate among seventy-something whites, all young whites deserved to be ostracized and scorned...yet that is precisely the the approach many reputable people are now recommending in regard to blacks. And it is a most percnicious proposition. To contend that we should penalize all members of a racial or ethnic group because some members are engaged in egregious behavior is to enter into a pact with the devil whose evil has no end."