Response to chapter 16: Race, Mass Incarceration, and Wrongful Convictions
America is one of the most racial countries in the world and mostly dominated by the white population. The minority groups being the victims of racial discrimination, especially the African American population. According to this excerpt, African Americans have fallen victims of mass incarcerations and wrongful convictions ever since they were freed from slavery. Most of them fall victim to drug crime, and the reason for this is that the police force has enforced strict and vigorous laws against the black population.
It is evident because there are cases where black individuals have been arrested with white individuals. Still, the surprise is that the white individuals might be exonerated and the black individuals being blamed and convicted. I think this type of hatred has never ended since the end of slavery in America. The white people still consider black people as their subordinates, and there is no way they are going to be equals. This is why when they find a slight reason to blame them, they use it to the fullest. They defend their kind and find a way to blame the minority groups for their mistake. That is the reason why most of the black population has been framed for mistakes that they did not commit.
According to statistics, it has been determined that most of the blacks that have been incarcerated are probably innocent and that they were framed or wrongly blamed. Police officers have increased the intensity of drug-laws on the African American population, and most of them are rounded up in the streets and forcefully searched for drugs. If they try to resist, they get shot, or they planted with guns or drugs to act as evidence. This has been a common act among the black population, and the most intense one was the one of 1999-2000 when a group of Los Angeles Police Department framed about 200 black individuals for crimes they did not commit. They planted drugs and guns on them and forced them to plead guilty.
Even though racism among the black population is decreasing today, most of them are still incarcerated for the crimes they did not commit. The court seems to be favoring the white people, and they impose fewer penalties on them compared to the black people. Some have argued that the whites get exonerated because they can comfortably afford legal representation compared to the blacks, but I think this is not the case. From my viewpoint, I think racism is the main contributor to black people’s incarceration, and most of them are forced to confess to the crimes they did not commit.
Reading through the except, I thought that hatred and racism are among the pure black people only, but I was surprised that even those who are half-black still fall victim to racial discrimination. In America, if an individual has any links with the black blood, then they are considered black even though they have a lighter skin tone. I usually thought that if a child was born of a white father and a white mother, then the child is considered White. However, my thoughts were wrong, according to this except, if an individual got a tiny drop of black blood, then he or she is considered black. This is clear evidence of the racial hatred between the black and white populations in America.
There was a part in the except that seemed to disturb my emotions about how blacks were treated in prison after the civil war ended. It is said that after they were convicted of tiny crimes such as stealing from their masters because of desperation, they were taken to prison. Later on, they were sold by the prison and forced to work as railroad construction laborers without being paid. When they died, their bodies were sold to medical schools for students to practice on. The thought of how the white people were inhuman to the black population troubles me. Reading this part of the excerpt disturbed my emotions, and at some point, I thought if the white people are to be treated this way, how will they have reacted. Nonetheless, American is not a place for minority groups, especially African Americans.