Racism/Racial Disparities/Racial Profiling

House Bill 2712 and Senate Bill 6608, together referred to as the Gang Bill, are long pieces of legislation that would increase incarceration, increase racial profiling, create a state-wide database of people labeled gang members, and criminalize youth culture.

The Children’s Defense Fund released a report at the end of 2007 titled "America’s Cradle to Prison Pipeline." The report looks at the connections between race, poverty, health and incarceration and demands that the United States stop channeling young people of color into its prisons.

As of September 30, 2007, Portland’s exclusion zones are no more. The city decided not to renew the zones after a report suggested that racism was a factor in who received exclusions.

Two recent developments may finally signal the end of the vast difference between sentences for crack cocaine and powder cocaine. The inequities in sentences for crack cocaine vs. powder cocaine offenses, and the significant racial disparities in the prison population they generate, are again gaining national attention this summer.

Our focus here at Crime Survivors for Community Safety is preventing the sort of violence that happened to us from happening to anyone else, to create a different world. In order to fully realize that different world, it’s important for crime survivors to pay attention to the racism that drives the criminal justice system and how it shapes our responses to violence.