Racism Effects Of Racism

Alexander’s main premises focuses on the large majority of African American men imprisoned today, as she reflects on the direct result of it that “young black men today may be just as likely to suffer discrimination in employment, housing, public benefits. And jury service as a black man in the Jim Crow era- discrimination that is perfectly legal, because it is based on one’s criminal record.” (Alexander, 181) Alexander points out not only how a significant portion of black men are ending up in prison, but how when released they face discrimination because of their criminal record making them unable to rehabilitate their lives and putting them back into the ghetto. Discrimination is a main factor which puts people of color in the penal system, and a main factor which when getting out keeps them from changing their lifestyle for the better.

Later in history, the Civil Rights Movement challenged the injustices of Jim Crow and began advocating for legal reforms. However, systemic inequalities persisted and there is still a continued overrepresentation of people of color within the prison system. An article titled ‘The Chains of Slavery Still Exist in Mass Incarceration” by Kica Matos says that “Mass incarceration has picked up where slavery left off, separating families and dehumanizing and traumatizing the descendants of enslaved people. In the 156 years since slavery was abolished, Black people in the United States have gone from being considered less than human under the law to being treated as less than human by a criminal legal system that still punishes them more harshly than white people at every stage. This attribute of the incarceration system strongly reflects slavery and segregation.

The unfortunate truth of incarceration during the era of mass imprisonment is that African Americans are seven times more likely to be incarcerated than whites. Blacks were more likely than whites to go to prison, at least since the 1920’s (Western 2006: 4). By analyzing the rates of prison admission for blacks and whites at different levels of education, it shows that class inequalities in imprisonment increased as the economic status of low-education men deteriorated. Among young black men, particularly those with little schooling, the level of incarceration was increasingly high. So, why is it that young African American men are incarcerated at much higher rates than their counterparts?

Although we would like to believe the world is not as racially charged in 2013 as it was in the 1960s, a look in our penal system would show that minorities are still arrested and incarcerated at a higher rate than whites. The United States has experienced a rise in its prison population over the last 40 years and our incarceration rate is nearly 5 times higher than any other country. Even though 13% of the US population are African American males, they make up 38% of the prison population. Contributing factors to these numbers are mandatory minimum sentences, high crime and poverty areas, and lack of rehabilitative resources within our system (p.77-78).

"Black men are seven times likely to go to prison than are white men; black women are eight times likely to go than are white women. The lifetime likelihood of incarceration for aggregate numbers requires some getting used to. If today's imprisonment stays stable, nearly one-third of black males

Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness goes into great detail on race related issues that were specific to black males, the mass incarceration, and how that lead to the development of institutionalized racism in the United States. She compares the Jim Crow with recent phenomenon of mass incarceration and points out that the mass incarceration is a network of laws, policies, customs and institutions that have been working together to warrant the subordinating status of black males. In this paper I will go into a brief examination of the range of issues that she mentions in her book that are surrounding the mass incarceration of black male populations.

Two million African Americans are presently under the criminal-justice system, in prison, or on probation. The past few decades, millions of more people have been in and out of the System. To be 100 percent; nearly 70 percent of people released from prison are re-arrested within three years. Most people appreciate that millions of African Americans were locked into a second-class status during slavery and Jim Crow. These earlier systems of racial control made a reminder of Political, social, and economic discrimination that this nation is still haven’t overcome. This non-ending; disturbing issue to this day; has a widely effect many families and communities. Prisoners are released and fear is increased.

Racism in the United States has not remained the same over time since its creation. Racism has shifted, changed, and shaped into unrecognizable ways that fit into the fabric of the American society to render it nearly invisible to the majority of Americans. Michelle Alexander, in her book, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness shatters this dominantly held belief. The New Jim Crow makes a reader profoundly question whether the high rates of incarceration in the United States is an attempt to maintain blacks as an underclass. Michelle Alexander makes the assertion that “[w]e have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it” using the criminal justice system and colorblind rhetoric. (Alexander 2). The result is a population of Black and Latino men who face barriers and deprivation of rights as did Blacks during the Jim Crow era. Therefore, mass incarceration has become the new Jim Crow.

The trend of African American males between the ages of 25 and 29 has seen a dramatic increase of incarceration. Attention has been focusing on areas of housing, education, and healthcare but the most prominent problem for African American males is the increase in the incarceration rate. African American males between the ages of 25 and 29 incarceration rate has been thought, by many, to be caused by economic factors such as under employment or unemployment, poor housing, lack of education, and lack of healthcare. Yet, others believe it is due to the imbalance of minorities within the criminal justice system, such as judges, lawyers, and lawmakers.

There are large racial disparities in incarceration and related detainments for African Americans. They are more likely to be under the supervision of the Department of Corrections than any other racial or ethnic group (H.West, Sabol, & Greenman, 2010). Institutional racism is believed to be the reason why African Americans, especially males, are disproportionately represented in the criminal justice system. On balance, the public believes that discrimination against black people is based on the prejudice of the individual person, correlates to the discrimination built into the nation’s laws and institutions (Pew’s Research Center, 2017). This belief is actually supported through several experimental studies that provide evidence that African Americans are to be seen as more criminal and threatening than others thus more likely to be arrested or even shot (Greenwald, Oakes, & Hoffman, 2003). Racism within the criminal justice system very much exists and is still relevant.

There are disproportionately more black men in the prison system in the United States. African Americans are incarcerated in state prisons across the country at more than five times the rate of whites, and at least ten times the rate in five states. This is caused by biased policies and practices such as overt and implicit discrimination. In Maryland the total number of sentenced prisoners is 20,733 of which seventy two percent

In his pointed analysis of urban life in the United States, sociologist Elijah Anderson (2013) posits that public awareness in America is fundamentally color-coded in that white skin is commonly associated with trustworthiness and civility while black skin tends to epitomize crime and incivility. In a country where more than a third of black men in their twenties are under state control at any given time, official criminality is not only attached to individual offenders but also to an entire social group (Pettit & Western, 2004; Roberts, 2004). For poor, undereducated black men, who represent the fastest growing segment of the nation’s prison population, incarceration is a common and almost predictable life experience (Roberts, 2004). It is our hypothesis that by effectively eroding several critical keystones of normative functioning, discriminatory policing and imprisonment creates a cyclical pathway for black men to return to the criminal justice system. This chapter reviews and evaluates the existing research on the long-term consequences of incarceration on African American men, focusing specifically on a) economic opportunities and mobility, b) social networks and connections, and c) civic and social citizenship.

“The United States imprisons a larger percentage of its black population than South Africa did at the height of apartheid. In Washington, D.C., our nation’s capitol, it is estimated that three out of four young black men (and nearly all those in the poorest neighborhoods) can expect to serve time in prison” (Alexander, 2012). The numbers tell the story better than words can: black people are more likely to go to prison than any other race in the United States, shown by the fact that more than 60% of the prison population is composed of people of color (The Sentencing Project, 2016). These statistics can be traced back to several different cause, including the Era of Jim Crow and the War on Drugs, both of which led to higher policing in minority areas.

Incarceration rates are a definite proof that racial discrimination occurs. “Incarceration rates in the United States have risen sharply since 1980”, stated Filip Spagnoli, “the racial distribution of inmates in the U.S. is highly negative for black Americans. Whereas they only make up 12% of the total U.S. population, they represent more than 40% of inmates”

In America there is a problem with racism and it is affecting our country. In the U.S there is a problem about how people are being racist towards other people who are different color. Some people who are different can't get jobs just because they are different color. Martin Luther king Jr. And rosa parks tried to help stop all the racism that was going on in our country. But then it seemed that anything they did it didn't seem to stop everything that was happening with all the racism.