It happens even to those who do not outsource their opinions to conspiracy theorists and rabble rousers. It is always easier to pursue simple solutions, treat systems and not the underlying disease, when dealing with complex problems. If medical doctors chose that path, and many do, there would be many more sick and dying people in the world. And sometimes the simple and obvious solution – like feeding a starving population – is exceptionally difficult to implement. Or simple but profoundly ugly: eliminate crime by executing all criminals.
Over the millennia, society has vacillated between enlightenment and expeditious autocracy, between kindness and tolerance, on the one hand, and cruelty and wrongful blame, on the other. Yet we have evolved in our knowledge base, our understanding of physics and chemistry and our growth of comprehending social patterns and individual physiological and psychological truths. Add a giant dollop of change, a tsunami if you will, and watch vast waves of humanity regress into destructive patterns of collective ignorance and wrongful blame, rationalization, denial, marginalization and false explanations of facts. History is replete with examples of failed and often arrogant thinking leading to wars, cruelty, death and destruction.
We are in an era of an extreme rise in populism, nationalism (especially religiously based), racism and unsupported assumptions of moral superiority. The earth is experiencing profound, life changing aspects of climate change, over-population in some areas and de-population in others, reaching the limit of habitable land masses and available resources. Some escape with drugs and alcohol, others actually migrate to distant lands while others linger, blame and suffer. But there are always winners and losers in any social structure. In most social structures, it is the relatively wealthy who smile and thrive.
Would Hamas and related terrorists have risen in a world where everyone had a nice home, access to good transportation, satisfying work, sufficient quality food and even a discretionary income? Do criminals born within the harsh conditions of poverty feel justified dealing drugs, killing for profit and stealing from those with “more”? Are incarceration and even execution the solution to high crime rates? Does the five and six figure annual cost per inmate in our criminal justice system produce results? Our bleak recidivism rates say otherwise. Our fully disintegrated opportunity of upward mobility and our highest rates of income inequality in history also scream otherwise.
An academic study supported by WalletHub.com and presented by Adam McCann, released on January 23rd, addressed one of those obvious realities: “Some key factors driving the racial wealth gap include unequal access to higher education and employment for minorities, as well as residential segregation that still persists… [WalletHub Analyst Cassandra Happe adds:] “Even decades after the Civil Rights Movement, there is still a high degree of wealth inequality among racial groups in America. These gaps persist not just in held wealth, but also in wages, poverty rates, homeownership rates and unemployment rates. Part of this wealth disparity is due to unequal access to education, which can put some people on a better financial footing from the start.” The poster city for the link between income inequality and crime is our nation’s capital.
Writing for the February 29th FastCompany.com, Micheal Shank, an adjunct professor at New York University’s Center for Global Affairs and George Mason University’s Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution, drilled down on the study’s focus on Washington, D.C.: “[The] the District of Columbia has the highest overall wealth inequality in the United States as well as rising (not falling) violent crime rates—and yet, that science seems to have little impact on how the local government determines policy.
“Rather than doubling down on investments that reduce the median household-income gap, the homeownership-rate gap, and the poverty-rate gap, for example—which would have a preventative effect on violent crime—the city continues to invest in reactionary and punitive policies.
“The nation’s capital already has one of the country’s largest police-per-capita rates, and the latest pursuit of a heavy-handed ‘Secure DC’ bill is just another illustration of how off the mark the city is in tackling violent crime’s root cause. Secure DC, an omnibus package positioned as the District’s comprehensive answer to the crime crisis, does little to leave the city more secure because it does little to address any of the inequality above. Yes, these gaps require longer-term planning; but with this bill, the city is making clear where its spending priorities are: in reactive, not preventive, approaches…
“Currently, Black residents in the nation’s capital are earning 65% less than their white counterparts. Their poverty rate is more than 350% higher than their white counterparts. And they are more than 480% more likely to be unemployed compared to their white counterparts.
“As if that wasn’t enough, one in three D.C. residents lives in food insecurity—which means they don’t know where their next meal is coming from—with nearly 20% of residents living in “severe food insecurity.” How does that land vis-à-vis racial inequality? Examine the data further: Half of the Black and Hispanic residents face food insecurity, and that’s compared to only 14% of their white counterparts… Those are some devastating statistics.
““In the city’s 2024 budget, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser tried to cut funding for programs that advanced racial justice and helped people meet their basic needs, and D.C.’s City Council left vital socioeconomic programs unfunded or underfunded. In slashing funding for key programs, it’s becoming apparent that the city’s leadership isn’t keen to tackle inequality and the root cause of violent crime.
“City leadership, meanwhile, supported tax breaks for developers, which undermines the city’s equity efforts but illustrates well that when there’s a will there’s a way. If the city wanted to find and funnel funds to fix inequality in this city, it could. If the city wanted to address growing racial and economic inequities, it could… What is D.C. doing instead? Throwing its attention and resources toward a bill that erroneously claims to be about violence prevention, and that criminal justice reform advocates say won’t keep the city safe…
“The nation’s capital, instead, is scaling up ‘crime fighting’ activities that, in fact, do little to prevent crime, according to the ACLU and other experts criticizing the latest security efforts. What the city will witness, with a move like this, is an escalation of police activity but with little concomitant attention, investment, and resources focused on the drivers of violence. With this kind of imbalance, the city is almost guaranteed to witness more violence, not less. There will be blowback.” And a rise in seething anger and increasing justification under a Robin Hood notion of grassroots fairness.
I’m Peter Dekom, and my hometown appears to be repeating the same behavior and expecting entirely different results… which is the very definition of governance insanity.
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