The US conception of “race” is a direct outcome of the unique status of the United States as a slave holding republic. While slavery itself has long been abolished, its dynamics were replicated in Jim Crow segregation and later in the urban ghetto. The Jim Crow regime reworked the racial boundary between slaves and free into a segregated societies. Despite the he abolition of “statues segregation”, it seems that new ways have been thought in order to hold minorities from the mainstream society. Another ‘peculiar institution’, born of the adjoining of the hyperghetto with the cerebral system, is reorganizing the social meaning and significance of ‘race’ in agreement with the dictates of the deregulated economy and the post-Keynesian state.
White people fear and mistrust people of color .They think of black people’s lower-class members as the causes of social disorder, sexual dissolution, school dissolution, school deterioration, welfare profiteering, neighborhood decline, economic regression, and most significant violent crime. Americans are more afraid of being victimized by black strangers, rather than white ones. Meanwhile, some studies have shown that young black men are more positively associated with the belief that street crime is a serious problem. By the 1980’ there was the idea of” siege mentality” was integrated into the black districts and was suggesting to be aware of the unfamiliar black people in a given residency. This creates the strategy of avoiding younger African Americans. In past few years American courts have provoked the idea of stopping people and using race as “ a negative signal of increased risk of criminality”. For the past few weeks we were able to witness some of the vivid examples for this statement, such as Michael Brown’s and Erick Garner’s deaths. The equation in the article ”Race as Civic felony” ,”Young+Black+Male” brings some negative feeling and frustration, however; the bitter true is that people actually are being judged by this equation. The US Supreme Court permitted police officers to stop an individual based on solely upon “reasonable suspicion”. Unfortunately every officer sees those suspicious reasons differently due to the lack of manual that gives specific description of those “reasonable suspicions”.
Civiliter Mortuus: the Triple Exclusion of Convicts
- Prisoners are denied the access to institutionalized cultural capital(130): It is thought that these will take away a lot of money from “honest and hard-working Americans” who do not have the chance of college educations too. This is also explained that some people might commit a crime just to get a free education. This statement particularly seemed to be a nonsense. Why would someone want to have a mark on their lives as felons just for free education. The actual fact that someone was charged of felony is pushing away the employees, so I don’t see why one would want to get higher education in prison.
- Prisoners are systematically excluded from social redistribution and public aid(131). Everyone who has been in detention for more than 60 days is denied the help. Is this a correct thing to do? I don’t think so. If someone is charged for something that is not as dangerous as others, then I don’t think should be denied the help.Why are these people given the mark on their resumes as felonies and plus the they are denied any type of support. Don’t you think this automatically creates more criminals? What can one do to support his/her family if every door is closed for them?
- Convicts are banned from political participation via “criminal disenfranchisement”(132). I support the idea that people who are imprisoned for murder or other types of violent crimes don’t have to vote. However; those people who committed far less dangerous crimes or at least they are freed should have the right to vote. I doubt this a little bit because I don’t think that everyone who is in prison is guilty. Some people were arrested based on wrong proves.
The word felony is derived from latin word fello meaning villain or wicked and designated as evil person.(135) The article suggests that the word felony was meant to be “ a symbolic act of political banishment, an assertion of the state’s power to exclude those who violated prevailing norms”, before it was explained as perpetrator on an infamous crime. Race or as article states the blackness is properly understood as America’s primeval civic felon. Not in a rhetorical or in metaphorical sense but more like in Durkheimian conception of the crime.(136) In this case America’s idealized .It is represented as a land of freedom, equality and self-determination. I constantly think about this idea of idealized America recently, especially after all these recent incidents. America seems such a friendly and racism country to me. I would see that people of different color and ethnic background appeared in movies and pop sphere. However, when I lived here for few years now, I realized that the race and ethnicity factor is highlighted very much. Everything is analyzed through the help of racism. For the first sight it is a little frustrating because obviously not every action is based on the ideas of racism. However, when deeper analysis are done I can clearly see why so much mistrust towards everything and every action. If someone can be imprisoned just to be kept away from the mainstream society its scary to think what else can be expected.
*Throughout the summery I have few questions that I answered in my own way.Please, feel free to comment about your ideas.
SOC320: Law, Society and Civil Rights 