Instigator / Con

1890

rating

debates

93.37%

won

Topic

#3875

The majority of current policing racial disparities in the United States are a result of police racism

Status

Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics

Better arguments

Better sources

Better legibility

Better conduct

After 2 votes and with 14 points ahead, the winner is...

Novice_II

Tags

Politics

Parameters

Publication date: 11.09.2022 01:41PM
Last updated date: 12.04.2022 03:00AM
Type: Standard
Number of rounds: 4
Time for argument: Two days
Max argument characters: 10,000
Voting period: One week
Point system: Multiple criterions
Voting system: Open

Contender / Pro

catcat

1497

rating

debates

0.0%

won

Description

Resolution: The majority of current policing racial disparities in the United States are a result of police racism.

A racial disparity is a statistical disparity between two racial groups that can be caused by a number of factors. The majority will be established as over 50% for this debate. Policing racial disparities are racial disparities that pertain only to the actions and conduct of the United States police force in interaction with society and the community at large. Police racism is racism committed by the United States police alone pertaining to their actions or conduct/interaction with society at large. This excludes other systems such as the judicial system, beyond the point in which an arrest has been made. With respect to "current," in this debate, police racism can be evaluated from the year 2000 and upwards. Pro argues that these disparities are majorly due to police racism, con argues against this.

The police are the civil force of a national or local government, responsible for the prevention and detection of crime and the maintenance of public order. No other system will be debated in this engagement. Attempting to do so will result in a conduct violation. As a default, sources may not be posed in the comments, and doing so will result in an automatic loss.

Factors or variables outside of racism are factors that are not racism. Racism will be defined as prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against a person or people on the basis of their membership in a particular racial or ethnic group, typically one that is a minority or marginalized. Our debate places the burden of proof on pro. Conclusively, these definitions set the framework of our debate, and con accepts all terms and definitions upon acceptance of this challenge.

Con waives round one, pro waives round four.

The users FLRW, Shila, and Barney may not vote on this debate.
This is in order to limit the pool of potential voters to those competent.
Bop is shared.

Round 1

Novice_II

11.17.2022 05:11PM

Con

Waive.

catcat

11.19.2022 05:11PM

Pro

Forfeited

Round 2

Novice_II

11.20.2022 07:11AM

Con

x. Framework/burdens

Set by the description of the debate.

y.1 Age: The average black American is significantly younger than the average white one (see. population pyramid). This is an important factor to consider in our analysis of any police disparity for a number of reasons.

Offending rates are highest in the late teens and early twenties and decline thereafter. Accordingly, "people in the 15–24 age range account for about 40 percent of all arrests even though they comprise only about 14 percent of the population" [2], younger people commit much more crimes than older ones.
Younger people are more likely to speed and be involved in motor accidents. As speeding is the main factor behind traffic stops, this will subsequently explain many of these disparities.

a. Police killings

On the face of it, the most fundamental and mainstream racial disparities within the conduct of the police is the number of people killed by them being disproportionately black Americans. This may appear veracious on the face of it, however, as per the subject of our debate, we must consider factors and variables outside of racism. Assuming a racial bias based on this information alone is simply a disparity fallacy or assuming that a disparity is the result of bias/discrimination.
Put simply, evidence shows that black people are not disproportionately killed by the police when the rate of police interaction through violent crime is controlled for. It is also found that when controlling for the rate of violent crime being committed, these "anti-black racial disparities" in police conduct disappear. "However, using population as a benchmark makes the strong assumption that White and Black civilians have equal exposure to situations that result in FOIS. If there are racial differences in exposure to these situations, calculations of racial disparity based on population benchmarks will be misleading (20, 21). Researchers have attempted to avoid this issue by using race-specific violent crime as a benchmark, as the majority of FOIS involve armed civilians (22). When violent crime is used as a benchmark, anti-Black disparities in FOIS disappear or even reverse (20, 23–25)" [1].
Conclusively, our verdict is that the racial disparity in police killings is not a result of racism in the conduct of the police.

a.1 Analysis: We can also in turn apply the violent crime benchmark to most other police racial disparities.
a.2 "Bias," as incoherency: Within the police's conduct, one would expect that if the police are indeed racist white people would surely show bias against black people, right? Even if the police as a whole don't. This isn't the case either. In fact, "white officers are not more likely to shoot minority civilians than non-white officers." Additionally, simulational evidence from a Washington University study shows that officers are more hesitant to shoot black suspects.

b. Arrest

Following from a.1, black people are arrested more on average because they commit more violent crimes on average. This can be observed with FBI crime data statistics selecting face as the factor of offender analysis.

c. Traffic stops

Like other police racism disparities, the racial disparity in traffic stops is explained with a number of factors that make it apparent as to why said disparity exists.

First, recall y.1. Black people are younger on average and we have already shown younger people are much more likely to speed on the road, which would naturally lead to more speeding tickets and police interactions. "Young drivers were more likely to be pulled over by police than older drivers."

For one, a study commissioned by the New Jersey state attorney himself found that "black drivers speed twice as much as white drivers, and speed at reckless levels even more" [5].
Black drivers are also significantly more likely to engage in texting and driving [6]

Conclusion

In round one, I analyzed the 3 most prominent aspects of the police's interaction with the community at large. As I have shown, the disparities within these interactions are a result of other factors and not racism or discrimination by the police. Evidently, I have illustrated our resolution to be a fact of reality.

Sources

https://www.pnas.org/
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/ [If you are stopped by a paywall, opening the source in an incognito window will allow you to read it]
https://crime-data-explorer.fr.cloud.gov/
https://www.city-journal.org/
https://sci-hub.se/
https://www.brookings.edu/
http://www.justicestudies.com/

catcat

11.22.2022 07:11AM

Pro

Forfeited

Round 3

Novice_II

11.23.2022 02:57AM

Con

Extend.

catcat

11.25.2022 02:57AM

Pro

Forfeited

Round 4

Novice_II

11.25.2022 03:00AM

Con

Extend.

catcat

11.27.2022 03:00AM

Pro

Forfeited

PREZ-HILTON

11.14.2022 11:37AM

It's also not enforceable and if the mods start enforcing things like that, than they should consider resigning.

Mharman

11.14.2022 01:26AM

I can understand why you don't want Shila and FLRW to vote on this, but having that same requirement against Barney is ridiculous. Barney is a quality voter.

RationalMadman

12.01.2022 01:45PM

Criterion

Con

Tie

Pro

Points

Better arguments

3 point(s)

Better sources

2 point(s)

Better legibility

1 point(s)

Better conduct

1 point(s)

Reason:

Pro FF

YouFound_Lxam

11.28.2022 04:22AM

Criterion

Con

Tie

Pro

Points

Better arguments

3 point(s)

Better sources

2 point(s)

Better legibility

1 point(s)

Better conduct

1 point(s)

Reason:

Because Con actually debated lol.