Not many, according to John Edwards:
Question: What would you do to help eliminate inner city kids from partaking in violence?”
John Edwards: That’s a good question.
…I don’t think their’s a silver bullet to this. We start with the president of the United States saying to America, “We cannot build enough prisons to solve this problem.”
And, the idea that we are going to just keep incarcerating and incarcerating, soon we’re not going to have a young African-American male population in America. They’re all going to be in prison or dead.
This is yet another example of how liberals view minorities. The full video can be found here.
“We cannot build enough prisons to solve this problem. And the idea that we can keep incarcerating and keep incarcerating - pretty soon we’re not going to have a young African-American male population in America. They’re all going to be in prison or dead. One of the two.”
The question was what the solution was to inner city youths exposed to violence.
His answer is saying that we can’t keep incarcerating them.
But the point is that the majority of young black males do not commit or are exposed to crime…the only way his statement makes sense is if he assumes they do.
LP - Thanks for clearing up the out of context quote. It is obvious that he is saying that building more prisons is not going to resolve this problem that there needs to be solutions to avoid inner city youths getting into touble in the first place.
What do conservatives think of minorities? they don’t at all. The three leading republican presidential candidates refused to participate in a debate hosted by a black moderator at a predominately black school because they had “scheduling conflicts”. The same thing for a Univision debate.
The leading spokesman for the Republican Party expresses his utter suprise that minorities are able to behave themselves when they go out to dinner at a black-owned restaurant.
The only purpose the Republican party has for minorities is to frighten their base of white conservative voters.
Michael,
How is the quote taken out of context? I included the full context of the quote and if you follow the links you will see a video of the question and answer.
Of course he is saying that building more prisons is not going to solve the problem…my dispute is not that, my dispute is in the conclusion: “the idea that we are going to just keep incarcerating and incarcerating, soon we’re not going to have a young African-American male population in America. They’re all going to be in prison or dead.”
Please explain to me how locking up criminals, even just black criminals, will ever lead to not having a young African-American male population in America? The only way you can arrive at that conclusion is if you believe that all black youths are criminals (there are, FYI, many successful middle and upper class black families - the ghettos is the exception, not the norm).
With that said, I am not one to defend the GOP. I am a realist when it comes to politics. I strongly believe that there are racist on both sides - neither side is morally superior when it comes to race. The only difference between the two sides, IMHO, is that they manifest their racism in different ways. Republican racist tend to be much more openly hostile about their racism, their racism also stems in large part to minorities being falsely associated with many Republican evils (ie, welfare, crime, entitlement, anti-Americanism etc)…but with that comes a much more willingness to believe that those who steer clear of such evils have the same capacity as anybody else to do good.
Democrat racism, on the other hand, is much more subtle. It is a view of minorities as children, as inferior, as in need of guidance and a helping hand. It is much more like pity than hatred.
This is why, for example, die hard Democrats like Howard Dean and Michael Moore hire so few minorities. Since we are children in need of care, we can’t be put in charge of serious things like campaigns and movie production - we gotta leave that for the smart white people. Republicans, on the other hand, don’t suffer from such problems, see here.
It’s as I tell my friends - I’d rather be hated for the wrong reasons than be pitied.
As far as Republicans not going on Univision or visiting the NAACP - its politics as usual. Republicans don’t do it cuz there is little votes to be won and possibly votes to be lost by doing so and Democrats do it for the opposite reasons…to think otherwise is to romanticize politics, IMHO.
Edwards is guilty of phrasing poorly.
Liberals are indeed sometimes guilty of caring too much.
And HP is guilty of rationalizing Republican bigotry.
I respectfully disagree with HP that the maternalistic tendencies of some Democrats are worse than the bigotry of some Republicans.
Well its a difference in preference…some prefer pity over hatred, others the opposite.
Either way, the overwhelming force behind each party and politician is political calculations. Which is why I hold no party superior to the other. They are both in it for their own self interest…and the quicker people realize that the sooner we can move past partisan politics to evaluating policies on their merits - not simply based on what party supports what.
HP, He was asked about what to do with violence and inner city kids. The quote you took was out of context in the first place.
The question was put: “what would you do to eliminate inner city kids partaking in violence?” His answer is not to do jails or build more b/c they’ll just end up there or be dead.
I don’t get what is the problem. And his answer doesn’t say anything about inner city kids not partaking in violence. So this whole thing is a stretch, leap and jump.
Michael, you got it.
Laurence, lol
The part I have a problem with is his following statement, “And, the idea that we are going to just keep incarcerating and incarcerating, soon we’re not going to have a young African-American male population in America. They’re all going to be in prison or dead.”
Explain to me how would dealing with violence and inner city kids ever lead to the elimination of a young African-American male population? The only way you can arrive at that conclusion is by assuming that all, or atleast a majority, of blacks in the inner city are criminals (and hence, would be incarcerated).
I pasted the full context of the quote above. Here is the video of the full question and answer:
http://www.mtv.com/overdrive/?id=1570672&vid=178269
I’d like for you to point out what part I left out that changes the context of what he said.
You can say he phrased his response poorly, which is what LaurenceB claims, and that’s fine. He probably did. My point here is not to say he meant to conclude that a majority of blacks in the inner city are criminals…but that is what his statement concludes.
Given my experience of liberals, I take it as a Freudian slip, others might take it as a sloppy wording…but either way, his assumptions are clear.
Foucault would venture towards an effective history: The question is not when black men will become extinct rather why do we have the issue at all?
Young black men are disproportionately represented in the following; special education, high school drop/push out, homicide, incarceration.
Critical Race Theorists would say what we often avoid- racism is dead center in this debate.
p.s. found you through loteria
Welcome Lo!
I will add you to my blogroll.
I don’t think the quote was taken out of context at all. HP posted the entire question, answer, and then for good meassure he threw in a link to the video.
And I can’t believe I’m going to type this… but I kind of agree with HP on this one.
While Edwards comment may have been about how to correct, or how NOT to correct inner-city violence, it does have some hints of racism in it. That’s not to say John Edwards is a racist, or liberals are racist. I’m just saying that that there were some elements of racial ignorance in that statement.
And as HP pointed out, it’s on BOTH sides of the two major parties in different forms… Believe it or not that’s a pretty fair and balanced assessment from HP.
I agree with Edwards that building more prisons is not the answer, but to say “…we’re not going to have a young African-American male population in America,” rubs me the wrong way. It implys that all young black men live in the inner city and not only that, but they can’t stay out of trouble… that’s not dropping the ‘N’ word or anything, but it certainly sounded a little funny to me.
Thanks Joel. I thought I was going crazy over here.
Btw, glad to have you back in the blogosphere. We greatly missed you!