I'm sorry if this sounds racist but. . .

[Jebus]

are blacks in the U.S. disproportionately killed by white cops?

There is no doubt that George Floyd was murdered and I hope the dick who killed him gets put away for many years. However, I am unhappy about all the news media who quickly point out that the murderer was white and the victim was black so this must be a racially motivated crime. From what I've seen on social media, this seems to be what most people believe.

I don't know whether or not this was an example of racism. I would tend to believe it wasn't. Most cops in the U.S. are white and a high percentage of crimes are committed by blacks which is why we so often see cases like this. Also, wouldn't a racist white cop do his best to hide this unpopular characteristic when performing an arrest on a black man in full view of others?

I suspect the media over reports police violence when the perpetrator is white and the victim is black. Police brutality seems to be a big problem in the U.S. is a big problem and I would like to see it treated as such.

I suspect it is hard to know for sure but do American blacks commit more crimes than whites relative to their population sizes (once income has been controlled for)? If we have a relative idea of the amount of crimes committed on average by each racial group, is one race stopped and checked at a disproportionate rate than the other? Is one arrested more often than the other? And finally, does one fall victim to police brutality more often than the other?

With regards to the title of this thread, someone once told me that if you want someone's full attention, always start a sentence with "I'm sorry if this sounds racist" or Ï know this may sounds racist." Every person in the vicinity will pin back his/her ears.

[Cloppy]

Well, there has always been a bit of racism amongst the authorities and this goes even as far as in death penalty where there is often racial bias. I'm pretty sure there are more white people who commit crimes in the US than black people and white people make the majority, I wouldn't say crime to race ratio is a good way to measure this.

[brimstoneSalad]

The ratio is skewed by socioeconomics AND location, no easy way to control for that. Urban poor are primarily minorities, while rural poor are more white. It's Urban poor due to the poverty and the population density where you create ideal conditions for gang and criminal activity. Hillbillies cooking meth are barely on the radar since they're so far away from anybody who cares or law enforcement.

Police probably can't really help but develop implicit associations in these circumstances, and particularly when they're making split second decisions in the presence of (and using) firearms that's more likely to go wrong against black citizens. There's a relatively easy fit to prevent most deaths (although not this kind of murder), which is simply no guns. If police don't carry guns they can't shoot anybody by accident, and also if they don't carry guns then criminals will be less likely to shoot at them which makes police safer. Body cams can help a lot too, but the officers have to be unable to turn them off -- still not 100%, when they're in the dark and get scared they're shooting people body cam or no. Only thing to reduce the accidental shootings to near zero is get rid of the guns.

[Jebus]

Well, there has always been a bit of racism amongst the authorities and this goes even as far as in death penalty where there is often racial bias.

Do you mean more death penalties are carried out among blacks on death row, or do you mean blacks receive the death penalty more often for the same crime? Do you have any stats for that?

I'm pretty sure there are more white people who commit crimes in the US than black people and white people make the majority.

According to this, the only crimes where blacks are in a majority are murders and robberies. However, they punch above their (13%) rate on all listed crimes. This makes sense since poor people commit more crimes and the blacks are over represented among the poor. It could also mean that they are targeted more often than whites.

https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/20 ... s/table-43

[Cloppy]

Well, there has always been a bit of racism amongst the authorities and this goes even as far as in death penalty where there is often racial bias.

Do you mean more death penalties are carried out among blacks on death row, or do you mean blacks receive the death penalty more often for the same crime? Do you have any stats for that?

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar_url?ur ... i=scholarr

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source= ... k3pWDA-gTU

[teo123]

Well, there has always been a bit of racism amongst the authorities and this goes even as far as in death penalty where there is often racial bias. I'm pretty sure there are more white people who commit crimes in the US than black people and white people make the majority, I wouldn't say crime to race ratio is a good way to measure this.

I think I've read somewhere whites are more likely to get death penalty for the same crime than blacks are. So, that's obviously not something that can be reached by reason, and the claim should probably be dismissed. The only real knowledge s one that's independent of the experience. You can't know without experience if there is racism in death penalty, therefore you can't ever really know it.

[Jebus]

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source= ... k3pWDA-gTU

Racial equality in the U.S. has made a lot of progress over the last half century. I think we need something a bit more recent than this before we can determine if there is institutional racism in the American legal system.

[Jebus]

I think I've read somewhere whites are more likely to get death penalty for the same crime than blacks are.

If Teo read something somewhere it must certainly be true.

You can't know without experience if there is racism in death penalty, therefore you can't ever really know it.

We already know that there are racists in the American legal system. Some of them are white, some are brown, and some are black. Hence, someone's experience wouldn't teach us anything other than, perhaps, that s/he was unlucky to come across one of these racists. I would like to know if one group as a whole is treated more unfairly than another.

If we assume that all groups are treated somewhat fairly, it is evident that blacks commit more crimes than whites per capita. However, we don't know if this is the case once economy is controlled for. As @brimstoneSalad pointed out, this is very difficult to determine.

Something that is possible to determine is if groups who have committed similar crimes receive similar punishments. This is one way of determining if there is institutional racism in the U.S. In the case of the death penalty, if given the stats, we can also determine if the punishment is carried out consistently, or if death row inmates from one group gets his/her sentence reduced more often than those from another group.

[Cloppy]

Racial equality in the U.S. has made a lot of progress over the last half century. I think we need something a bit more recent than this before we can determine if there is institutional racism in the American legal system.

Here is a page that talks about it for the more recent years seems like it still exist. I've always been against penalty whether there would have been racial bias or not because of the chance that innocents will be executed and that it doesn't make a significant difference in crime rates which would make it unnecessary and immoral in this case and I'd say non-vegan to be in support of it.

[teo123]

If Teo read something somewhere it must certainly be true.

I wanted to say it's obviously a controversial empirical topic, and we can't take for granted there is racism in death penalty.

The race of defendants executed in the U.S. since 1976 is 56 percent white; 35 percent black; 7 percent Hispanic; 2 percent other.

If that source is to be trusted (which is again a complicated empirical problem, and I hate dealing with such problems), most of those who were executed were whites. And since most of those convicted of murder are whites, this is exactly what we would expect if there were no racism. If there were racism, we would expect most of the executed to be of some other race, right?