Social Problems Final Essay
There are many social problems in our world today. The United States in particular has a wealth of social problems, some of which are created through specific legislation. Three of the main social problems facing our nation today have been created by our government. The war on drugs, mass incarceration, and the increased militarization and violence of police forces. Our justice system has always been based on a deep rooted discrimination, which has been made tangible by certain laws throughout our countries history.
After the emancipation proclamation, there were a series of laws, commonly called the “Jim Crow'' laws which sought to enforce segregation and create a disadvantage for the recently freed African-American community. Through the Civil Rights movement of the mid-1900’s, significant progress was made in repealing these laws, and the overt racism in America was finally acknowledged on a larger scale. This led lawmakers to try more subversive, covert methods in their discriminatory legislation. There have been many laws passed that have helped create this, but the War on Drugs, started by the Reagan administration, has been one of the most detrimental to our society. The stated goal was to create “an international society free of drug abuse”. While this may sound like a nice ideal to strive for, that phrase is actually a political statement with no grounding in reality. It began a long, futile, violent campaign that has plagued our society for nearly a half-century. The vilification of drug use has taken away real effort from going into addiction treatment and overdose prevention policies, instead creating a distinct focus on punishment and incarceration. This effort has disproportionately affected those that are marginalized in our society, such as people who are poor, indigenous, and people already discriminated against due to their sexual orientation, ethnicity, race, or a variety of other factors. The clearest example of this, is the mandatory sentences that were put in place for crack cocaine. Although chemically powder and crack cocaine are the exact same drug, crack cocaine users experienced much more severe sentences. Additionally, 80% of users convicted were African-American, while evidence suggests that usage was the same between races (America's war on drugs is rooted in 'racist policies,'). This created a racially targeted law enforcement battle against drugs. The war on drugs has replaced slavery, de-jure segregation, the Jim Crow laws as one of the primary means of continuing racial oppression in the U.S.
Mass incarceration in our nation has become one of the biggest social problems related to the government that faces our society today. The United States imprisons more people per capita than any other nation in the world by a large margin. This is for a variety of reasons, namely the fact that the government contracts with private companies to run prisons, and both the government and private companies benefit from the unpaid labor done by inmates. The privatization of our penal system has created the prison industrial complex, where companies benefit financially from each additional person that is incarcerated. This creates incentive to put people behind bars, with these companies lobbying for more strict laws and sentencing. Additionally, many prisons have labor programs where the prisoners are required to work for no pay. This is essentially modern day slavery. As political economist John Flateau graphically described it, "Metaphorically, the criminal justice pipeline is like a slave ship, transporting human cargo along interstate triangular trade routes from Black and Brown communities; through the middle passage of police precincts, holding pens, detention centers and courtrooms; to downstate jails or upstate prisons; back to communities as unrehabilitated escapees; and back to prison or jail in a vicious recidivist cycle" (Flateau, 1996). There are also extreme racial disparities in incarceration rates. Black people are locked up at a rate that is five times higher than their white counterparts (America’s War on Drugs is Rooted in Racist Policies). Also, black individuals are much more likely to be detained, found guilty, receive longer sentences, an receive the death penalty. Our system of incarceration in the United States is a bloated, structurally racist, sadistic for-profit endeavor by our government working with private companies.
The police force in the United States is another area of government that creates social problems. In recent years, local law enforcement has seen a drastic increase in funding, higher grade weaponry, and more violent tactics. From 1980 to 2000, the number of SWAT teams has seen a 1500% increase, and instead of being special responders to emergency situations, are called to conduct drug searches more than any other incident (Poisoning Our Police). Police routinely wear helmets, carry assault rifles, and are transported in impenetrable armored vehicles. This increased arming of the police has also marked a change in mindset, that officers often feel at war with the communities they are sworn to serve and protect. Studies have shown that police precincts with more military style gear are more likely to use excessive force (Militarization and Police Violence). Unfortunately, this violence is directed at black and brown bodies at an alarmingly higher rate than white people. This year has resulted in many tragic deaths at the hand of police officers, and the peaceful protests that follow are increasingly met with violence from police, in the form of riot gear, tear gas, beatings, and shootings. This all shows the increased militarization of the police in the U.S. that has occurred in recent years and violence that spawns from that.
The three areas that I discussed: the war on drugs, mass incarceration, and the increased militarization and violence of police forces, all disproportionately affect communities of people of color. This illustrates a large-scale system of racial oppression at work in the United States, created by lawmakers and influenced by lobbyists. The “law and order” of our society is based on racist values and policies, creating a more difficult society for people of color to live in. One of the predominant ways these social problems create personal problems is through the wealth gap in America. There are many factors that contribute to this, including inequality in housing, the labor market, education, healthcare, and the disproportionate incarceration of minorities. Statistics help illustrate how big this gap really is “In 2016, the median net worth of non-Hispanic white households was $143,600. The median net worth of Black households was $12,920.” (Racial Wealth Gap: Statistics, Causes, and How to Close It). Being low income and having few assets clearly creates personal problems for families and individuals. Being poor makes it harder to maintain steady employment, eat in a health conscious way, attend higher education, find consistent transportation, and keep quality housing. All of these contribute to the continued wealth gap as well, creating a vicious cycle of racial generational poverty that is incredibly difficult to escape from.
Public attitudes are clearly not the main concern of politicians in positions of power. Representatives seem to have less and less concern for representing their constituents and fighting for their needs. Instead, most determine their stances on issues based on partisanship, ties to lobbyists, and re-election bids. However, there are rare moments where collective action creates a voice that is too loud for policy makers to ignore. For example, earlier this year there were mass protests around the country in response to police brutality, specifically the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. This gave a national stage to a movement that has been building for years, spearheaded by the Black Lives Matter organization. One of the primary goals that came out of this is attempting to re-prioritize local budgets to allocate more towards community building, addiction treatment and recovery, mental health, youth programs, and other constructive programs. The amount of cities budgets that go towards policing is extremely high, typically ranging from 20-45% of all funding. This has been very controversial, in part due to the polarizing hashtag that has been used “#DefundthePolice”. However it is starting to gain some traction, with Seattle leading the nation by proposing to cut $45 million from their police budget, and institute a new full time position, Office of Police Accountability Investigations supervisor (Proposal would cut $49 million from Seattle police budget).
There are many social problems relating to and created by government policy. However the most unjust and detrimental to our communities are in the form of mass incarceration, racist policies, and violent policing. These contribute to the creation of the racial wealth gap in America, which creates personal problems for the majority of people of color. And although public opinion usually cannot affect policy, every once in a while through intense collective action and individual lobbying of our representatives, the people are heard and positive change is made.
Works Cited
(KING5), Author: Sebastian Robertson. “Proposal Would Cut $49 Million from Seattle Police Budget as Officers Leave in Record Numbers.” king5.Com, 20 Oct. 2020, www.king5.com/article/news/local/seattle/seattle-budget-committee-to-consider-proposed-police-budget-cuts/281-8fd1edd9-5fe8-41a3-92c6-3f01cb6e6bc3.
Amadeo, Kimberly. “How to Close the Racial Wealth Gap in the United States.” The Balance, www.thebalance.com/racial-wealth-gap-in-united-states-4169678.
Authors: Wayne McElrath
Wayne McElrath is a Senior Investigative Advisor to POGO., and Author
Sarah Turberville
Sarah Turberville is the Director of the Constitution Project at POGO. “Poisoning Our Police: How the Militarization Mindset Threatens Constitutional Rights and Public Safety.” Project On Government Oversight, www.pogo.org/analysis/2020/06/poisoning-our-police-how-the-militarization-mindset-threatens-constitutional-rights-and-public-safety/.
Wayne McElrath is a Senior Investigative Advisor to POGO., and Author
Sarah Turberville
Sarah Turberville is the Director of the Constitution Project at POGO. “Poisoning Our Police: How the Militarization Mindset Threatens Constitutional Rights and Public Safety.” Project On Government Oversight, www.pogo.org/analysis/2020/06/poisoning-our-police-how-the-militarization-mindset-threatens-constitutional-rights-and-public-safety/.
Flateau, John. The Prison Industrial Complex: Race, Crime & Justice in New York. Medgar Evers College Press, 1996.
Lyons, Saralyn. “America's War on Drugs Is Rooted in 'Racist Policies,' Columbia University Expert Says.” The Hub, 19 Apr. 2017, hub.jhu.edu/2017/04/19/carl-hart-drug-policy-race-forums/.
Josh McDonald
Research assignment
The article that I chose to read and respond to is titled “Cynical Beliefs About Human Nature and Income”. It does a cross cultural and longitudinal analysis of the effect of one’s outlook on individuals human nature, and understanding of society as a whole. They went about this by surveying individuals over the course of 10 years in 5 different studies, and 41 countries. Eventually, they were able to determine that the scores on the Big 5 personality traits of the surveyed individuals was not affecting their income data. This showed that the more cynical one’s outlook on society is, the less their base income is. The idea of social cynicism was coined by Kwok Leung in a 2002 study and is defined as a negative beliefs about people and social institutions. This cynicism can unknowingly affect a multitude of aspects of one’s life, including income. The dichotomy between social outlooks in relation to income is clear and the traits that accompany cynicism make it vivid that it is more difficult to make money. Cynical people are less trusting of others and opportunities, making them shy away from collaboration for the sake of avoiding potential exploitation. This causes them to miss out on what could be valuable opportunities and partnerships to make money, due to their innate beliefs. There are many factors in this intricate issue; good self esteem has been linked to career success, and cynicism has a negative relationship with self esteem. The factor that may have the most effect is the effect on mood. Cynics are more likely to be neurotic, are less extroverted, and less agreeable than their more positive peers. These traits have been shown in the past to have a negative correlation with income and career success. Cynicism not only affects monetary aspects of one’s life, those who are less positive in their outlook are also less likely to report a positive mood and more likely to suffer from depression. These individuals also have more health problems and higher mortality rates, as well as a higher reported level of interpersonal and social conflict, because they receive and give less social support. Social cynicism has a negative impact on an individual's income level due to many factors including distrust.
I found this study to be a fascinating, but expected correlation between two factors. It reminded me most of the psychological idea that we briefly discussed this year about personal control and how one frames the bad things that happen to you. In class it was shown that the way one thinks about oneself, and how they react or not in the face of bad events has a large impact on all areas of their life. Those who framed things in a more negative light would see a bad or stressful event as affecting their whole person, would feel helpless about their situation, and pity their misfortune. This has been proven to lead to a more negative mood, worse physical health, and poorer academic success. Negative thinking about past events also was shown to have a longer lasting effect on one’s emotional state than positive. If one processes information and events in a negative light, it drastically impacts one’s ability to perform at a high level. Since this study initially was conducted with college students and it showed a positive relationship between grades and cynicism, it follows that those students would be affected in a similar way in a workplace environment.
