Madness? This is London!

[JPreston]

According to the article, blacks are stopped 600% as much as whites.

The NBPA say that this is counterproductive, and taking only the effect on crime prevention and detection into account, judge that the damage done to community relations outweighs the benefit of the extra checks and maybe blacks should be less disproportionately stopped, maybe 500% or maybe to the proportion suggested by actual crime rates across ethnic groups (which would not be anywhere near as high).

The outgoing president said that stop and search is having no deterrent effect on gun crime specifically, and that blacks should be stopped even more disproportionately, say 700%.

You could argue either way, although on balance I think that random stop and search with racial profiling is never going to be effective at combatting gun crime, cooperation to encourage more witnesses coming forward undisputedly would be.

I don't think that we need to fully liberalise gun ownership in order to keep the UK's population of mexicans down to a manageable level, but it's an interesting suggestion I suppose.

[excalibur2]

I don't think that we need to fully liberalise gun ownership in order to keep the UK's population of mexicans down to a manageable level, but it's an interesting suggestion I suppose.

...................but subjects which are Protestants may have arms for their defence suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law......erm Mexicans are catholics.

BILL of RIGHTS, 1689

An Act Declaring the Rights and Liberties of the Subject and Settling the Succession of the Crown.

http://britannia.com/history/docs/rights.html

[BEANFro Elite]

Its often TOO easy to put down the Police as a civilian, if you put yourself in the boots of a Police[wo]man, you have to consider what is at stake.

For example, someone can be mugged and the description of the perps can be as vague as "tall, slim, black male, wearing a hoodie".

If you go to a place like Brixton where there is an abundence of young, black, males, wearing hoodies, how can you do your job fairly and without ruffling feathers?

You can't stop white youths as thats not part of the description and sadly, the majority of the crimes that go on in Brixton are shootings commited by young black males.

Being a young black male myself, I'm at risk of being shot in a case of mistaken identity although, having said that, I rarely wear a hoodie and I never put the hood up unless its VERY cold or raining.

So its a two way system, if we want an effective Police force then we have to keep in mind how hard the job is already and so co-operate, in return the Police can do their job as we have to remember that they are progressively being bogged down in endless amounts of red tape and paper work as well as political correctness that many Police[wo]men are scared to stop and search the perps that just by some coincidence fit the descriptions they've been given for fear of being labelled racist.

Apparently young Muslim males are stopped and searched under the Anti-Terrorism Act interesting that eh?

The bottom line is that if a specific race or section of society is guitly of a large portion of a given crime than others in a certain area such as Brixton then it only makes sense to target that demographic in the appropriate proportion, I don't mind being stopped and searched, its only happened twice but I don't get grouchy as I can only imagine how hard their job is.

The day the Police become psychic, is when we can complain about being targetted unfairly

And about the alienation, they alienate themselves from society with help of rubbish parenting and a failing education system; if you have no will to empower and better yourself then you won't, if you constantly live with the notion that someone, namely the Government and society, owes you something then you'll sink deeper and deeper into your hole, I'm talking about black people but it applies to all races

[TooNice]

Whether they, and how much they are alienated, probably depends on whether the community in question recognise there is a problem. If they frequently hear that a crime has been committed in the neighbourhood by one of 'their own', they'll probably recognise that those people are giving their racial profile a bad name, and be less intolerant to searches. On the other hand, if they feel that they do not perceive any problem at all, then I can only imagine the reaction to be "WTH".

[virokka]

its a difficult situation for the police but something certainly needs to be done by customs to stop as many firearms as possible coming in and harsher sentence for people who are modifying replicas

[chuckskull]

Very well put beanfro, a lot of people seem far to keen to jump on the "omg the police are racists" bandwagon. At the end of the day if you're in an area with a large black/white/asian/whatever population you're going to search a lot of black/white/asian/whatever people.

I've been stop searched quite a few times and from what I could tell the officers who stopped me couldn't care less about race or creed, they just wanted to get their job done and find the guy, for the record I'm so white people run up to me and ask what's wrong.

No race has a monopoly on crime nor one on innocence.

[chicken]

Just something that sprang to mind when I read the OP was Car Insurance.

Why is it perfectly acceptable to charge a 19 year old lad through the nose for car-insurance because he falls into a category of people who are more likely to have an expensive collision, but unacceptable to search a black kid in London for guns despite the fact the same sort of statistics apply?

Who cares what the feature that gets him in that category is, if it's a category that means he is more likely to have a gun then it's a category that requires more cautionary measures to be taken to prevent gun-crime.

Why should skin-colour suddenly provide a problem with policing people? You don't see the police searching 80-year-old grannies for guns, maybe they're being ageist?!

[arbitor]

Racism has been huge over the years, and still will always be more important than any other discrimination... apartheid, holocaust. Also most war is around it in some way, if not directly, then a religion that is native to a particular race/country

You simply can not put it in the same catogory as something like age disrminiation or sexism... its much much bigger.

[usxhe190]

ibm, you are suucch a smart cookie and i totally agree - Britain should use profiling (i.e. search for a future crime with no evidence) for EVERYTHING (racical/cultural/age/religious).

e.g
the following people should be subjected to more checks (e.g. police, employment, education, immigration, etc)

black people = more likely to commit crime
white people = more likely to be pedofiles
old people = more likely to have accidents
people from manchester = more likely to steal
people buying FPS games = more likely to be violent
women = more likely to be pregrant
men = more likely to get drunk
people watching die hard/transformers = more likely to be violent
homo sapiens = more likely to swear/be stupid/violent/etc

we should implement the above immediately?!?! lol

edit - btw - just to emphasis one thing, they want to use profiling BEFORE any crime is commited and with no evidence. Profiling to catch a criminal AFTER a crime has been commited has always been done and noone complains about that.

and, ibm, since you advocate profiling for future actions, i hope you like to be profiled yourself!!

[arbitor]

pmsl

[chicken]

Racism has been huge over the years, and still will always be more important than any other discrimination... apartheid, holocaust. Also most war is around it in some way, if not directly, then a religion that is native to a particular race/country

You simply can not put it in the same catogory as something like age disrminiation or sexism... its much much bigger.

You can't lump checking someone for a gun in with such extreme examples as holocaust and war! They're not intending to harm anyone in any way, just keeping more of an eye on them because they fall into a category that makes them more likely to carry a gun. It makes sense as it saves police time.

I'm sure skin-colour isn't the only decision factor in that category. For example they're likely to center around the male youth area. Hence my example of the 80 year old grannies.

There would be absoloutely no point in checking an 80 year old granny because her age and gender make her much less likely to be carrying a gun. So why aren't these being discussed also? If this is discrimination rather than just dealing with the facts then ageism and sexism should be factored in it too.

[nimbu]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7054917.stm

And even then only when they have a suspicion that person might have committed an offence or have reason to carry a weapon.

I think this is the the main point for me. In the last few years I have been pulled over twice outside my own home after getting a new car. First time the officers were so rude, I chatted to a friend of mine thats in the force and he went as far to say what they said was outta line and I had good grounds for a complaint. Second time they were nothing but very curtious, which I didnt mind at all.

Also the "random" additional security at airports, being an indian, i know that i fit the profile, so please dont tell me its random. I totally accept the fact that it needs to be done, just be polite and professional and you will find that people wont mind.

[arbitor]

i mean, racism is totally not socially accepted in the uk at the moment.. and is probably at its highest point..

to the point where your afriad to say "black" in public... So i dont think its going to float, and whether its right or not will be rejected because its not pc

[usxhe190]

to the point where your afriad to say "black" in public... So i dont think its going to float, and whether its right or not will be rejected because its not pc

i am not afraid to say black - i say it all the time...mainly coz i have a black car with black interior

[arbitor]

im not arfraid to say it, its about time we told it how it is, a person with black skin is black the same as we are white... but a lot of other people are like this..

[usxhe190]

i have some black friends at work and they dont care if you use the word black - like everything else in life, it is how you use the word and its context...same as any other word in the English vocab