Guardian article on Detroit, guns and race

[eno]

An article in today's Guardian details the question of guns and race and the capacity of the Detroit Police to protect it's citizens.

http://www.theguardian.com/money/201...es?CMP=ema_565

[iheartthed]

Regarding economic consequences for the city, Roman’s words are unforgiving.“I think it’s a disaster. How do you grow a city when you say to people who are thinking about moving there: ‘When you move here, bring a weapon.’ Who’s going to want to move there?”

That about sums it up.

[Jimaz]

Thanks for the link.

About the author:

Rose Hackman is a British freelance journalist based in Detroit. Her work appears on both sides of the Atlantic in English, Italian and French. She keeps an account of her encounters with Detroit's [[mostly) charming residents on her blog, dogdaysdetroit.com

About the article:

While Craig likes to cite an armed populace as being a deterrent to crime, [Mark Fancher, a racial justice staff attorney at Michigan’s ACLU,] says it is worth considering how stand-your-ground laws statistically tend to help protect white shooters over black ones.

Implicit in Craig’s statements and residents’ understanding of those statements is that should good Detroiters shoot, they would be in the right, protected by the law.

But in a 2013 study analyzing FBI data and stand-your-ground laws across the United States, John Roman, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute, found that stand-your-ground laws in practice disproportionately protected white shooters, and held black shooters – regardless of race of the person they’ve shot – more likely to be found guilty.

The starkest of differences was found between cross-racial shootings. A white shooter of a black victim is 10 times more likely to have his or her homicide ruled justified compared to the homicide of a black shooter on a white victim.

These differences are so strong that it is almost impossible to conclude racial bias does not play a role, says Roman the author of the study, who is also executive director at the District of Columbia Crime Policy Institute....

Uh-oh. The prison-packing profiteers are going to have a feeding frenzy with this situation. It makes one wonder to what extent the prison industry was involved with setting this stage.

[Inkadinkado]

The city is overwhelming black, suggesting that unless thugs deliberately target people of a different race the expected good guy vs bad guy encounters of the future will probably resemble those of recent experience: predominantly black vs black encounters. And if there are legal implications for shooters then just who in the hell do you expect to comprise the jury of one's peers in this predominantly black city? The handwringing over race isn't necessary in this case.

Normal folk ruining the days of the feral is a good thing.

[antongast]

I was just thinking to myself that the biggest problem in Detroit is that not enough of us are shooting each other with guns.

[gvidas]

And if there are legal implications for shooters then just who in the hell do you expect to comprise the jury of one's peers in this predominantly black city? The handwringing over race isn't necessary in this case.

The 36th district court doesn't handle violent crime. If there were legal consequences that went to trial, that trial would probably be held in the 3rd Circuit Court, which draws jurors from across Wayne county, which is about 40% black.

[Chicago48]

I live in Chicago formerly from Detroit and I can tell you a lot of people here & there are thinking - why don't we just line them up and let them shoot each other. That way we get rid of the thugs and the bad people.
What's disturbing to me is the gun runners are white; and the NRA promotes everybody having a gun no questions asked.

[Dan Wesson]

What's disturbing to me is the gun runners are white; and the NRA promotes everybody having a gun no questions asked.

Huh?????????

[Oddz313]

The author neglects the fact that Detroit is 80% plus African American, is he talking about metro Detroit? Something crappy is afoot with the media and race these days. I read an article today in Time by Kareem abdul-jabbar, talking about a race war,protests,mike brown and underlying issues. It's interesting and he has a really good grasp on some issues

[Wesley Mouch]

The author neglects the fact that Detroit is 80% plus African American, is he talking about metro Detroit? Something crappy is afoot with the media and race these days. I read an article today in Time by Kareem abdul-jabbar, talking about a race war,protests,mike brown and underlying issues. It's interesting and he has a really good grasp on some issues

Great article. I didn't think of KAJ this way. Just as a sports-brain.

I don't agree with all of his conclusions, but its a balance and fair discussion -- rare today.

Highly recommend reading, especially if you're a conservative: http://time.com/3132635/ferguson-com...class-warfare/

[Oddz313]

Highly recommend reading, especially if you're a conservative: http://time.com/3132635/ferguson-com...class-warfare/

Lol, ya but I think any regular conservative can agree with some of his conclusions. Not a conservative that has Koch money but a down the street one

[Inkadinkado]

I was just thinking to myself that the biggest problem in Detroit is that not enough of us are shooting each other with guns.

No, not citizens shooting one another, rather citizens firing from the last ditch of defense and pushing back the barbarians. If thugs feared the police and prison then none of this would be necessary, but they don't so it is.

[antongast]

No, not citizens shooting one another, rather citizens firing from the last ditch of defense and pushing back the barbarians. If thugs feared the police and prison then none of this would be necessary, but they don't so it is.

I'm not aware that we have more than one class of citizenship in this country.

[mwilbert]

Obviously there are multiple effects of having more guns around. A lot of people have opinions on how big these different effects might be, but the research into the consequences of gun ownership has been starved of funding for a long time, so as far as I can tell no one really has a good handle on it. It may well be that it makes more sense to arm everyone in Detroit than most other places, but personally I don't have a lot of confidence in people's decision making under stress.

[Inkadinkado]

I'm not aware that we have more than one class of citizenship in this country.

Sociology 101