Bill Bennett on Black Crime Rates
 

On his radio call in show, former Regan Education Secretary Bill Bennett had this to say about decreasing the crime rate:

:eek:

Re: Bill Bennett on Black Crime Rates
 

Cite? I'm not necessarily disputing that he said it, I just want to see the conversation that lead to this.

While I am SHOCKED that he said that, sadly his "idea" may not be full of it. I'm not trying to turn this into a pro-life/pro choice debate, but according to the Center's for Disease Control (non-partisan and no slant) , blacks are having abortions at twice the rate of any other groups. I know there are tons of contributing factors to that, but the fact remains - we are.


Legal abortions

In 2000
White - 16.7
Black or Af Am - 50.3
Hispanic - 22.5
Not Hispanic - 25.2

In 2001
White - 16.5
Black or Af Am - 49.1
Hispanic - 23
Not Hispanic - 23.3


http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus04trend.pdf#016
(go to page 60 for all the detail)

So while I want to immediately say that he's talking crazy, the conspiracy theorist in me pauses for a moment.......

ETA: to fix my graph

If we aborted EVERY baby [read Black, white, pink, green, whatever] then the crime rate would go down. Less people born =less criminals born........period.

His including the race part just made it a soundbite (and either displayed his own prejudices or reliance on statistics which may or may not be accurate that tell us that Black Americans commit more crimes when in actuality we really just get prosecuted and investigated more vigorously).

You got the first part right.

Now the other part is if you aborted the children of poor people, the crime rate would go down.

Race is yet another factor.

Yes I understand it's disturbing to even think someone might find this acceptable, but it's a topic that's been very much investigated quantitatively.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...books&n=507846

-Rudey

Rudey pointed out most of what I was going to say, but I want to point out that there may very well be causation/correlation issues at work here - but the second part must be considered separate from the first (quantification may not be possible).

Audio clip here

We can all just agree to disagree. I don't think aborting poor or Black people would make any of the following go down:

Extortion
Money Laundering
Coke usage
Heroin usage
Murder for hire
Tax Fraud
EVERY CRIME DADDY'S MONEY GETS DISMISSED

So, it basically goes back to how you define crime which to me goes back to the personal prejudices I spoke about earlier. So because I highly doubt you even thought of any of these crimes before you affirmed the "statistics" that Blacks commit more crimes we can, as I said before, agree to disagree.

Your assumptions regarding my mindstate notwithstanding, I would really like to hear what you're basing your feelings on - statistics? Figures? Do you have studies that disprove the statistics you're deriding?

My mindset is not set in stone - I view this only from the statistical end, and realize the limitations of statistics. However, if you can prove another side, I'm more than willing to accept that side, because I'll admit that I know very little about the subject.

So convince me, and we can agree to agree.

Email Bill:

http://www.bennettmornings.com/programhighlights

Here is something:

While it does not explicitly address the crimes I mentioned, other than money laundering and embezzlement, it definitely makes the point that I was trying to.http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-poorcrime.htm

ETA: if my assumption that you had not thought about the racial disparity of the crimes I mentioned was offensive, I apologize. To offend, was not my intention. I just get sick of people assuming that b/c I'm an American Black I'm a criminal, when in reality I can't stand a liar, let alone a thief, and am on my way to a law degree in 225 days (can you tell I'm excited?).

For more info on my detest of theft check out the FL and gun thread.

OK - I see where this is coming from much more clearly. Thanks.

The difference comes in how we're defining 'crime' for all intents and purposes. Most crime statistics view each crime as a discrete event, rather than viewing global outcomes (such as total amount stolen, or total deaths) then breaking them down into categories based on socioeconomic status or race.

My issue with using 'global' measures is that it does not accurately account for how the actions take place. It essentially shifts the burden to "the rich therefore the white" rather than "the poor therefore the black" - and I think either assumption is unsound from a causative standpoint. It's also somewhat disingenuous, to my mind, but that's just an opinion.

No offense taken - I've put considerable thought into the disparities you've mentioned. While I can't comiserate or understand your anger at racist assumptions, I do see where you're coming from. I can also see where you'd assume I viewed things another way - but that assumption is short-sighted, which is why I'd like to have this kind of discussion.

I just want to make sure we're not inadvertantly affirming things that are not true, or denying things that may be useful to study, due to emotion, if that makes sense.

Race isn't a factor. If you aborted all white or hispanic or asian or black children ( :confused: :eek: :mad: at aborting any children - but that's another thread) crime would go down.
If you aborted all the children of rich people crime would go down. If you exterminated any particular group of people - yeeeaaaars later - crime would go down.

Sidebar: Considering the fact that crime has gone down (http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/gazette/2...istics-fbi.php) , but poverty has gone up (http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/pover...4/pov04hi.html), is it safe to say the poor aren't the ones committing the most crimes?

I'm not really sure what you're trying to get at, but this is already proven and it's not up for conjecture... Levitt talks about it in Freakonomics.

-Rudey