Crime quiz

Hailee Rincon, 516 words

Hailee Rincon

516 Words

Crime

The first article I read in regards to crime was titled, "The enduring racial divide in death penalty support." In this article talked about the differences in the way Whites vs Blacks viewed capital punishment, the death penalty. Stating that Whites favor and support the death penalty way more than Blacks do. However, Blacks that do support it have similar characteristics to Whites; such as being married and having a high income rather than being single and having a low income. For the rest of the Blacks, being minorities, it talks about how they do not trust and are unhappy with the criminal justice system and this is why they do not support the death penalty. Thus, the study done in this article looked at things such as economic statuses, political parties, and subcultural differences between Whites and Blacks but found that those were not the primary reasons for the gap in whether or not they supported the death penalty. It was because of things such as belief in racial inequality and discrimination, experiences with the criminal justice system, and fear of crime and victimization experience. This is because of the fact that Blacks are familiar with being discriminated against and are more than often the victims of crime and therefore rely on the system to protect them. Whereas Whites are not. In fact, they support the death penalty because of being afraid of violence at the hands of Blacks. Overall, the gap is based off of their social and cultural influences/differences.

The other article I read in regards to crime was titled, "Perceived Racial and Ethnic Composition of Neighborhood and Perceived Risk of Crime." This article talked about how the neighborhoods in which Whites, Blacks, and Hispanics live shape their perceptions about crime. Also, discussing how Whites are threatened by Blacks and Hispanics just because of their race; when they feel outnumbered by them. Their study was done in different parts of Florida where this seems to be a real issue. It was found that whether or not they felt safe in their neighborhood was based off of who they lived around, or at least thought they lived around. When asked to give the percentage of Blacks living in the neighborhood, Whites tended to overestimate. Thus, minorities being or the thought of being present in their neighborhood perceived threat of crime.  However, in a certain part of Florida it was said that the perceived risk of crime was based off of if Hispanics lived nearby or not. Besides race, some other reasons for people not feeling safe in their neighborhood could be because of things such as age, gender, and household income. For example, females are said to have higher perceived fear especially when asked if they would walk alone at night in their neighborhood. When looking at the charts in the article you could also conclude that having victim experiences will also shape your fear, however it was only shown that way for Whites. Overall, the threat is really based off of perception and could very well be discrimination.