'if the facts' was taken from the paper linked by the author - it's verbatim from the academic text Tim put in the article. So let's take a step back and have a look at the argument I'm making and not the argument you think I'm making.
What the academic paper says is that there's more research that needs to be done to suggest why white people are more disproportionately likely to kill black aggressors and then be acquitted for self defence. Tim's conclusion is that the judicial system is racist - that's a fair conclusion to make prima facie - but I don't think it answers the question.
What you think I'm saying is 'black people are more likely to be involved in street crime than white people because black people are inherently bad' - and that's racist and I should go and look up history, psychology and statistics etc.
What I'm actually saying is.... there could be further complications here and we shouldn't draw any solid conclusions. This number could be down to the fact that white people are disproportionately more likely to be armed and more likely to use a gun in self-defence (which I think is probably true). That'll skew the figures.
It may be that white people have less need to attack wealthy black people rather than the other way round. In which case the problem you have is one of wealth distribution across the population. Although there are ten times as many white people as black people, black people are ten times more likely to be in poverty. This may mean there's more street crime by black people relative to the population. Middle class white folks committing insurance fraud aren't likely to find themselves at the wrong end of a loaded weapon.
If black men are disproportionately likely to be sent to prison (and they are) then they're also very likely to struggle to get to work when they come out. Recidvism rates are high because employment opportunities are low. That's a problem with the criminal justice system and an over-reliance on punishment rather than rehabilitation. That's likely to have an effect.
My answer to Tim wasn't 'oh and black people are all awful and can be stereotyped as criminal' - it was, this needs a bit more unpicking. The same conclusion that the academic text came to. Pushing and pulling at a legal system might not be the answer. It may be America needs to work on it's social work programmes, work on it's local policing, work on gun control, work on job schemes for young offenders and work on community integration. It may be that the courts system is biased, or it may be that America itself has a deeper rooted bias and the court system and this statistic is merely a symptom. If you've got lung cancer, it's probably best not to medicate with cough medicine.
My views on race aren't in line with Tim's. That doesn't mean I think he's wrong on all counts, but I think he has a tendency towards being wrong. I'm more in Steve QJ camp - and if you haven't found his work, I'd highly recommend it. In the meantime, if you want to know where I stand on a lot of stuff to do with race, here's a few starter articles for you.
https://medium.com/lucid-nightmare/nuh-uh-penguins-arent-race-blind-7f1f9d7c6e16
Thanks for joining in and carrying on the discussion. You seem relatively new to Medium (based on your follower count) so welcome! :o)
