[Magdalen] Yet another case of race abuse?

[James Oppenheimer-Crawford]

I don't know many Black people either even though I worked with hundreds of
them through my life. So I don't know, aside from those I've taught English
or theology in prison, the millions of blacks who have been incarcerated at
an incredibly high rate, compared with whites. That does not make them
matter any less, at least in my obviously distinctly minority opinion.

James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
*“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy

On Fri, Oct 2, 2015 at 12:08 PM, Sibyl Smirl <polycarpa3 at ckt.net> wrote:

> On 10/1/15 8:50 PM, James Oppenheimer-Crawford wrote:
>
>> The number of Blacks in prison is far and away greater than their actual
>> behavior.  It's a matter of give the white boy a pass and when the Black
>> kid comes before the bar, throw the damn key away.
>>
>> When I taught in prison, it was like it was a Black prison.  I could be
>> the
>> only white face in sight, excepting, of course all the white guards (they
>> hate being called guards.  They prefer to be called correction officers.)
>>
>
> That's odd.  The people who go to jail from here are almost all white, or
> maybe Latino.  We're doing race in this thread, so I should mention that
> the "whites" here are frequently part Indian, but they usually don't _look_
> Indian at all, unlike the Latinos.  I see the pictures in the papers.  They
> go for everything from drugs (meth, usually, around here, lots of kitchens,
> though we have some grass kicking around too), burglary, drunk driving with
> resulting death, domestic violence, on up to murder.  We do get some nasty
> stuff happening, like the boy who went to prison last summer (white).  He
> got badly beaten up at a beer party, by a somewhat older young man, went
> home and got his gun, went back to the party, and shot him.  The picture in
> the paper at the kid's arrest (I think he's 19-20) showed the battered
> condition of his face from the beating.  I got the impression from the
> newspaper stories that it was one of those post-adolescent macho pride
> things.  Admittedly, we don't have a high proportion of black people, but
> not one of my friend Joyce's dozen or so kids (black) have ever been in
> prison (that I know of).  I don't know a black person in this county (of
> course, I don't know everyone in the county) who has been in jail.
>
>
>
> --
> Sibyl Smirl
> I will take no bull from your house!  Psalms 50:9a
> mailto:polycarpa3 at ckt.net
>