Life Expectancy: Why I Should I Be Worry?
The year, 2016, is one of the most interesting year of my entire life. Starting the year as a senior who was graduating then as a freshmen in one on the top college in Texas, my life had been turn upside down and side to side with every struggle as of that of the young millennial who struggling to find out a path in the world. Adding to the struggle, I had gotten injured many time, more than I could count. From falling hurting my back then tripping on almost every crack or pothole on the street, this year, my life have suck and the year’s Presidential election doesn 't make it better. With the recent election result, I became more concern about my future living here in the United States but more about how long am I going to live. As a liberal arts major, hoping to get to med school, I am currently taking many class that involves the study of life and how disease are developed among people life health and society. Along with the health class, I am also taking the UGS class called Mass Incarceration where we study why and how people end up in prison. As both classes required me to read several articles every week one, article stood out to me the most. The article “Death Rate Rising for Middle-Aged White Americans, Study Finds” is written by Gina Kolata of the New York Times was about the newly discovered phenomena where it was found that Middle white American was actually dying earlier than their expected life expectancy caused by
Mass incarceration is an issue that defines us as a society. Today, the United States of America makes up about five percent of the world’s population and has twenty-five percent of the world’s prisoners. Also, one of every one hundred adults are locked up, and one in every thirty-seven adults in the United States is under some form of correctional supervision: in addition, African Americans are incarcerated at more than five times the rate of whites. Young black people went through many difficulties; however, they are still called super predators by Hillary Clinton. One of many difficulties is the African slavery, although it was over a century ago, it left a scar and a horrible memory in everyone's mind. All the phenomenons that occurred in our country during the last century gathered thoughts and escalated the problem of mass incarceration which made the people including the police look differently at African American people. I am against the mass incarceration issue. Opposing Donald Trump, I think we should reduce the number of people behind bars with cautions, because It is a complex subject that has many causes and effects in the long term to the people inside and outside the prison.
African-American people should look at these studies and want to make a difference, if not for them, then for the future of the African-American race that have to suffer the consequences for the actions of others.
For my final project I chose to focus on Race and sentencing. The United States is about 5% of the world’s population but when it comes to world prisoners the Unites States is about 25%. In the United States African Americans are incarcerated 5 times more than whites in state prisons throughout the country and also 10 times more than whites in 5 states. In this paper I am going to research and study specific articles and studies that document the rate of incarceration for African Americans and Whites. This is not only a problem state by state sentencing but it is also problem for federal sentencing as well. Not only am I going to look at race and sentencing but I am going to also
Racism effects the the high incarceration rates according to Michelle Alexander, the author of “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. This scholar writes about how the civil rights movement has been taken back by the mass incarceration of black Americans in the war on drugs. Alexander also explains how the severe consequences that these black men carry on after being incarcerated, for example not being able to get school grants or housing. The author continues to argues that all it takes is a major social movement to end americas new caste system and that it is inhumane to treat any race less then the other. Agreeing with Alexander, I believe that every race deserves equal opportunity and that high mass incarceration rates are the way they are because of racism by the criminal justice system.
In his book “Punishment and Inequality in America” Western discusses the underlying racial disparities that have lead to a mass incarceration in the United States. He states that incarceration rates have increased by a substantial amount. The race and class disparities viewed in impromesment are very large and class disparities have grown by a dramatic amount. In his book he argues that an increase in mass incarceration occured due to a significant increase in crime. The increase in mass incarceration can also be correlated with urban street crime that proliferated as joblessness in inner-city communities increased (Western, 2006). He also states that an increase in incarceration rates may be due to the changes in politics and policy which have intensified criminal punishment even though criminal offending did not increase. Although these are substantial reasons as to why incarceration has increased significantly in the US there are many underlying issues. The incarceration rates amongst young black men have increased the most in the United states, black men are more likely to go to prison than white and Hispanic men (Western, 2006). This may be largely due to factors such as unemployment, family instability, and neighborhood disorder which combine to produce especially high rates of violence among young black men in the United States (Western, 2006). A rise in incarceration rates may also be largely due to to increased drug arrests which represent the racial disparity.
Mass incarceration became a public policy issue in the United States in the 2000s. Now in 2016, there are still many questions about America’s incarceration rate, 698 prisoners per 100,000 people, which is only surpassed by Seychelle’s at 868 for every 100,000. They concern the phenomenon’s beginning, purpose, development, and essentially resolution. In her book published this year, assistant professor of history and African and African-American studies at Harvard Elizabeth Hinton challenges popular belief that mass incarceration originated from Reagan’s War on Drugs. Mass incarceration’s function as a modern racial caste system is discussed in a 2010 book by Michelle Alexander, an associate professor of law at Ohio State University, civil
Of the many tribulations that plague Americans today, the increase in the amount of African American men and women in prisons is unbelievable. It would be naïve to say that the increase is due to the fact that more African Americans are committing crimes now than before. When in actuality it has very prevalent connections to a systematic plan to incarcerate a race of people by creating harsh drug laws to
Nunn, K (2002). Race, Crime and the Pool of Surplus Criminality: or Why the War on
There have been 100,000 African Americans in prison since Brown vs Board of education. The article states that the trend will continue, 1 of every 3 African American males are apparently born today can expect to go to prison in their time, 1 in 6 Latino males, compared to 1 in every 17 White males. But for women, it is much lower, but the ethnicity does not change: 1 out of 18 African Americans, 1 out of 45 Hispanics, and finally 1 of every 111 White females, are expected to serve some time in prison. At any given day, 1 in every 13 African American males between 30 to 39 will incarcerated in a state or federal prison on any given day. This compares to the demographics of the group because in communities of color they are not affected only by incarceration but by high
In the United States during the LBJ administration, one of the biggest cultural issues at the time happening in the American population was about civil rights. A big portion of the Great Society efforts to fixing civil rights was based on the difference in prison rates based upon different races and genders, hoping they could bring these rates closer together. At the time the male rate of imprisonment was significantly higher than the rate of female imprisonment (Doc. 4). As well as the gender inequality, blacks and Latinos were the biggest two male races imprisoned also being the highest two ethnic groups imprisoned on the female side (Doc. 4). Many reports have been made showing the progress that the Great Society reform of the jailing system has made since the mid 1920s to the 2000s as the white population imprisonment rate have slowly risen through the years while seeing a
The literature concerning of Mass Incarceration is relatively new; and when discussing racism most scholars have focused the discussion on matters of Jim Crow or Slavery. Mass incarceration or Mass Imprisonment, is defined as a rate of imprisonment that has reached numbers that are above the historical norm. Mass Incarceration is a term most sociologists used to describe the extremely high rate in which the United States has imprisoned individuals, and its impact during the 21st century. In contrast, according to Gilda Graff author of “Redesigning Racial Caste in America via Mass Incarceration”, she describes Mass incarceration as a new tactic in the history of racism. To Most Americans, Mass Incarceration is not a problem because it is
Michelle Alexander talks about racial justice and mass incarceration in The New Jim Crow. There is such a high rate of incarceration in the United States. The drug war today is doomed to fail, especially because drugs dealers will replace one another. This war consists of drug related crimes and violence. Suspects of drug wars are racially discriminated by law enforcement officials. Most dealers and users are white. Three out of four of imprisoners for drug offenders are Latino or African American. Police subject the poor and look into ghettos for drugs. In the 1980s, police officers focused on white crack users rather than black, later shifted its attention and gave everyone
As a matter of fact, I believe telling your patient that they have a terminal illness with no cure and will likely die in a certain amount of time is the proper thing to do.Doctors often find themselves in a struggle trying to figure out whether or not to tell a patient they will soon die.
Many aspects of life could be significantly improved because of the accumulated life experience of human livings on the earth. Based on the achievements of many scientists and researchers, it is reasonable to believe that the average life expectancy over 100 years of age is not a miracle to achieve. However, although scientists have made a big contribution to the life issue, I believe the developed technologies still lack reliability and validity in many aspects, which requires deeper research and investigation. In this essay, I will discuss The Life Expectancy Calculator (LEC).
Mass incarceration is one of very many huge problems in the United States. The United States has the highest incarceration rate in many countries around the world. The drug war and racial profiling is a huge cause to mass incarceration. Some individuals believe that mass incarceration is not the blame for the war on drugs. The Jim Crow law was more than just a series of severe anti-black laws, it became a way of life. Michelle Alexander is an author who wrote The New Jim Crow, states that, "The mass incarceration of people of color is a big part of the reason that a black child born today is less likely to be raised by both parents than a black child born during slavery” (740). Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow covers many issues with the U.S criminal justice system. This period called Jim Crow was the name of the racial caste system up in till mid-1960s. Under Jim Crow, African Americans were positioned to the status of second class citizens. The name Jim Crow is a fictional name that was term used for blacks. There is an enormous prison problem in the United States. More than 1 out of 100 Americans are behind bars and the U.S is the largest prison population in the world. An author name Michael Vitiello wrote an article about Mass Incarceration and says, “Its reduction in its prison population...the state's prison health care and mental health systems were so inadequate that the state was violating the prisoners' Eighth Amendment rights to be free from cruel and