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Criminology
is the interdisciplinary study of crime and deviant behaviour. Criminology is a multidisciplinary field in both the behavioural and social sciences, which draws primarily upon the research of sociologists, political scientists, economists, legal sociologists, psychologists, philosophers, psychiatrists, social workers, biologists, social anthropologists, scholars of law and jurisprudence, as well as the processes that define administration of justice and the criminal justice system.

(See also "Politics" (USA)
(See also "Natural and Man-Made Disasters"
(See also "War and Other Military Conflicts"

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CriminologyPictured below: What is criminology? The study of crime and the criminal mind
Criminology (from Latin crimen, 'accusation', and Ancient Greek -λογία, -logia, from λόγος logos, 'word, reason') is the interdisciplinary study of crime and deviant behaviour.

 Criminology is a multidisciplinary field in both the behavioural and social sciences, which draws primarily upon the research of: 
The interests of criminologists include the study of:
  • nature of crime and criminals,
  • origins of criminal law, 
  • etiology of crime,
  • social reaction to crime,
  • and the functioning of law enforcement agencies and the penal institutions.

It can be broadly said that criminology directs its inquiries along three lines:
  • first, it investigates the nature of criminal law and its administration and conditions under which it develops;
  • second, it analyzes the causation of crime and the personality of criminals;
  • and third, it studies the control of crime and the rehabilitation of offenders.

Thus, criminology includes within its scope the activities of legislative bodies, law-enforcement agencies, judicial institutions, correctional institutions and educational, private and public social agencies.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for additional information:







9/11 Terrorist Attacks on September 11, 2001 ("9/11")

YouTube Video of the Live Coverage - CBS 9 Washington (08:52am-11:17am) - September 11th 2001

Pictured: A montage of eight images depicting, from top to bottom, the World Trade Center towers burning, the collapsed section of the Pentagon, the impact explosion in the south tower, a rescue worker standing in front of rubble of the collapsed towers, an excavator unearthing a smashed jet engine, three frames of video depicting airplane hitting the Pentagon. (Courtesy of the following
[Your Webhost: I was living in New Jersey at the time of the 9/11 attacks: While travelling to my job in the morning, I could see the Twin Towers on fire. Later in the day, as I was returning home from work , the towers were gone and all you could see was smoke! It was awful!]


​The September 11 attacks (also referred to as 9/11) were a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda on the United States on the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001.

The attacks killed 2,996 people and injured over 6,000 others and caused at least $10 billion in property and infrastructure damage and $3 trillion in total costs.

Four passenger airliners operated by two major U.S. passenger air carriers (United Airlines and American Airlines)—all of which departed from airports on the northeastern United States bound for California—were hijacked by 19 al-Qaeda terrorists.

Two of the planes, American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175, were crashed into the North and South towers, respectively, of the World Trade Center complex in New York City.

Within an hour and 42 minutes, both 110-story towers collapsed, with debris and the resulting fires causing partial or complete collapse of all other buildings in the World Trade Center complex, including the 47-story 7 World Trade Center tower, as well as significant damage to ten other large surrounding structures.

A third plane, American Airlines Flight 77, was crashed into the Pentagon (the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense) in Arlington County, Virginia, leading to a partial collapse of the building's western side.

The fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, initially was steered toward Washington, D.C., but crashed into a field in Stonycreek Township near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after its passengers tried to overcome the hijackers.

9/11 was the deadliest incident for firefighters and law enforcement officers in the history of the United States, with 343 and 72 killed respectively.

Suspicion for the attack quickly fell on al-Qaeda. The United States responded to the attacks by launching the War on Terror and invading Afghanistan to depose the Taliban, which had harbored al-Qaeda.

Many countries strengthened their anti-terrorism legislation and expanded the powers of law enforcement and intelligence agencies to prevent terrorist attacks. Although al-Qaeda's leader, Osama bin Laden, initially denied any involvement, in 2004 he claimed responsibility for the attacks. 

Al-Qaeda and bin Laden cited U.S. support of Israel, the presence of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia, and sanctions against Iraq as motives. Having evaded capture for almost a decade, bin Laden was located and killed by SEAL Team Six of the U.S. military in May 2011.

The destruction of the World Trade Center and nearby infrastructure caused serious damage to the economy of Lower Manhattan and had a significant effect on global markets, closing Wall Street until September 17 and the civilian airspace in the U.S. and Canada until September 13.

Many closings, evacuations, and cancellations followed, out of respect or fear of further attacks. Cleanup of the World Trade Center site was completed in May 2002, and the Pentagon was repaired within a year.

On November 18, 2006, construction of One World Trade Center began at the World Trade Center site. The building was officially opened on November 3, 2014.

Numerous memorials have been constructed, including the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York City, the Pentagon Memorial in Arlington County, Virginia, and the Flight 93 National Memorial in a field in Stonycreek Township near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Could the 9/11 Attacks have been prevented? See New York Times 9/10/12 article: President George W. Bush had advance notice of an imminent attack as early as August 6, 2001, a full month before the 9/11 attack.


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WikiLeaks: Enemy?
(Also see Washington Post Editorial by Fareed Zakaria)
YouTube Video: WikiLeaks Top 10
Pictured: WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange

[Your Website Host: As this is a highly-contentious topic, given that WikiLeak releases have compromised America's security --including possibly costing Hillary Clinton the 2016 Presidential election, it has been added to this "Infamy" web page.]

Washington Post Editorial by Fareed Zakaria (March 9, 2017 issue)
"This week, we have watched the perfect example of a country fighting the last war. The Trump administration has devoted weeks of energy and political capital to rolling out its temporary travel ban against citizens of six Muslim-majority countries, none of whom, according to the libertarian Cato Institute, have committed a single deadly terrorist attack in the United States over the past four decades. Meanwhile, the White House’s response to a devastating barrage of WikiLeaks disclosures that will compromise U.S. security for years was a general vow to prosecute leakers.

The WikiLeaks revelations are designed to uncover and cripple U.S. intelligence operations of any kind, against any foe — including Russia, China, the Islamic State or al-Qaeda. WikiLeaks claims to be devoted to exposing and undermining centralized power, yet it has never revealed anything about the intelligence — or domestic policing — operations of the Russian or Chinese governments, both highly centralized dictatorships with extensive and advanced cyber-intelligence units. Indeed, WikiLeaks has chosen as its obsessive target the United States, which probably has more democratic oversight of its intelligence agencies than any other major power does.

Since the North Korean government’s 2014 attacks on Sony Pictures Entertainment, many in the intelligence community, including Adm. Michael S. Rogers, have warned that “we’re at a tipping point.” Rogers, head of the National Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Command, testified to Congress in 2015 that the country had no adequate deterrent against cyberattacks. He and many others have argued for an offensive capacity forceful enough to dissuade future threats."

WikiLeaks is an international non-profit organisation that publishes secret information, news leaks, and classified media from anonymous sources. Its website, initiated in 2006 in Iceland by the organization Sunshine Press, claims a database of 10 million documents in 10 years since its launch.

Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist, is generally described as its founder, editor-in-chief, and director.

The group has released a number of significant documents that have become front-page news items. Early releases included documentation of equipment expenditures and holdings in the Afghanistan war and a report informing a corruption investigation in Kenya.

In April 2010, WikiLeaks published gunsight footage from the 12 July 2007 Baghdad airstrike in which Iraqi journalists were among those killed by an AH-64 Apache helicopter, known as the Collateral Murder video.

In July of the same year, WikiLeaks released Afghan War Diary, a compilation of more than 76,900 documents about the War in Afghanistan not previously available to the public. 

In October 2010, the group released a set of almost 400,000 documents called the "Iraq War Logs" in coordination with major commercial media organisations. This allowed the mapping of 109,032 deaths in "significant" attacks by insurgents in Iraq that had been reported to Multi-National Force – Iraq, including about 15,000 that had not been previously published.

In April 2011, WikiLeaks began publishing 779 secret files relating to prisoners detained in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. In November 2010, WikiLeaks collaborated with major global media organisations to release U.S. State Department diplomatic "cables" in redacted format.

During the 2016 US presidential election campaign, WikiLeaks released e-mails and other documents from the Democratic National Committee and from Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, John Podesta alleging improper conduct against senator Bernie Sanders. These releases caused significant embarrassment to the Clinton campaign and may have contributed to the Democratic Party's loss.

The U.S. intelligence community expressed "high confidence" that the leaked e-mails had been hacked by Russia and supplied to WikiLeaks, while WikiLeaks denied their source was Russia or any other state. During the campaign, WikiLeaks was accused of promoting conspiracy theories about Clinton and the Democratic Party on Twitter.

WikiLeaks has also been criticized for inadequately curating its content and violating the personal privacy of individuals. WikiLeaks has, for instance, revealed Social Security numbers, medical information, credit card numbers, and other sensitive personal information.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about WikiLeaks:
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Alt-Right Extreme Conservative Movement including Steve Bannon, former adviser to the Trump Administration and a List of Hate Groups
YouTube Video: Alex Jones* Rants as an Indie Folk Song
​* Alex Jones
​Pictured: (L) Donald Trump and the KKK who endorsed Trump; (R) Steve Bannon and Breitbart News

Click here for a List of organizations designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as hate groups.

The alt-right, or alternative right, is a loose group of people with far-right ideologies who reject mainstream conservatism in favor of white nationalism, principally in the United States, but also to a lesser degree in Canada and Europe.

Paul Gottfried is the first person to use the term "alternative right", when referring specifically to developments within American right-wing politics, in 2008. The term has since gained wide currency with the rise of the so-called "alt-right". 

​White supremacist Richard Spencer coined the term in 2010 in reference to a movement centered on white nationalism, and has been accused by some media publications of doing so to excuse overt racism, white supremacism, and neo-Nazism. The term drew considerable media attention and controversy during and after the 2016 US presidential election.
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Alt-right beliefs have been described as isolationist, protectionist, antisemitic, and white supremacist, frequently overlapping with Neo-Nazism, nativism and Islamophobia, antifeminism and homophobia, right-wing populism, and the neo-reactionary movement. 

The concept has further been associated with multiple groups from American nationalists, neo-monarchists, men's rights advocates, and the 2016 presidential campaign of Donald Trump.

The alt-right has its roots on Internet websites such as 4chan and 8chan, where anonymous members create and use Internet memes to express their ideologies. It is difficult to tell how much of what people write in these venues is serious and how much is intended to provoke outrage. 

Members of the alt-right use websites like Alternative Right, Twitter, Breitbart, and Reddit to convey their message. Alt-right postings generally support Donald Trump and oppose immigration, multiculturalism and political correctness.

The alt-right has also had a significant influence on conservative thought in the United States, such as the Sailer Strategy for winning political support, along with having close ties to the Trump Administration. It has been listed as a key reason for Trump's win in the 2016 election. The Trump administration includes several figures who are associated with the alt-right, such as White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon. In 2016, Bannon described Breitbart as "the platform for the alt-right," with the goal of promoting the ideology.

Background:

In November 2008, self-described paleoconservative philosopher Paul Gottfried addressed the H. L. Mencken Club about what he called "the alternative right". This was republished in December of that year under the title "The Decline and Rise of the Alternative Right" in the conservative Taki's Magazine, making this the earliest published usage of the phrase in its current context according to Slate. In 2009, two more posts at Taki's Magazine, by Patrick J. Ford and Jack Hunter, further discussed the alternative right. The term, however, is most commonly attributed to Richard B. Spencer, president of the National Policy Institute and founder of Alternative Right.

Beliefs:

​The Associated Press stated that the 'alt-right' or 'alternative right' is a name currently embraced by some white supremacists and white nationalists to refer to themselves and their ideology, which emphasizes preserving and protecting the white race in the United States in addition to, or over, other traditional conservative positions such as limited government, low taxes and strict law-and-order.

The movement has been described as a mix of racism, white nationalism and populism ... criticizes "multiculturalism" and more rights for non-whites, women, Jews, Muslims, gays, immigrants and other minorities. Its members reject the American democratic ideal that all should have equality under the law regardless of creed, gender, ethnic origin or race.

There is no formal organization and it is not clear if the alt-right can be considered as a movement; according to a 2016 description in the Columbia Journalism Review: "Because of the nebulous nature of anonymous online communities, nobody's entirely sure who the alt-righters are and what motivates them.

It's also unclear which among them are true believers and which are smart-ass troublemakers trying to ruffle feathers."  Many of its own proponents often claim they are joking or seeking to provoke an outraged response. Andrew Marantz of The New Yorker describes it as "a label, like 'snob' or 'hipster,' that is often disavowed by people who exemplify it".

It has been said to include elements of white nationalism, white supremacism, antisemitism, right-wing populism, nativism, and the neoreactionary movement. 

Andrew Marantz includes "neo-monarchists, masculinists, conspiracists, belligerent nihilists".

Newsday columnist Cathy Young noted the alt-right's strong opposition to both legal and illegal immigration and its hard-line stance on the European migrant crisis. Robert Tracinski of The Federalist has written that the alt-right opposes miscegenation and advocates collectivism as well as tribalism.

Nicole Hemmer stated on NPR that political correctness is seen by the alt-right as "the greatest threat to their liberty".

Milo Yiannopoulos claims that some "young rebels" are drawn to the alt-right not for deeply political reasons but "because it promises fun, transgression, and a challenge to social norms".

According to The New Yorker, "testing the strength of the speech taboos that revolve around conventional politics-of what can be said, and how directly", is a major component of alt-right identity. The beliefs that make the alt-right perceptible as a movement "are in their essence not matters of substance but of style", and the alt-right's tone may just be concealing "a more familiar politics".

Ties to white nationalism:

​White supremacist Richard Spencer coined the term in 2010 in reference to a movement centered on white nationalism, and has been accused by some media publications of doing so to excuse overt racism, white supremacism, and neo-Nazism. Spencer has described the alt-right as “identity politics for white Americans and for Europeans around the world".

While the label of white nationalism is disputed by some political commentators including Allum Bokhari and Milo Yiannopoulos, prominent alt-right figures such as Andrew Anglin of The Daily Stormer and Marcus Halberstram of Fash the Nation have embraced the term as the core philosophy their movement is based on. 

​In response to a Washington Post article that portrayed the movement as "offensiveness for the sake of offensiveness", Anglin said "No it isn't. The goal is to ethnically cleanse White nations of non-Whites and establish an authoritarian government. Many people also believe that the Jews should be exterminated."

Anti-feminism:

The alt-right is often described as "misogynistic" and supporting an "anti-woman" view. Opposition to feminism and intersectionality are common. The alt-right has a significant overlap in supporters with the men's rights movement.
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Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the "Alt-Right" Movement:​ ___________________________________________________________________________

Steve Bannon, Stephen Kevin "Steve" Bannon (born November 27, 1953) is an American media executive, political thinker, and former investment banker, who is executive chairman of Breitbart News. He served as the White House Chief Strategist (a newly created position) in the administration of US President Donald Trump during the first seven months of his term. 

In this capacity, he attended the Principals Committee of the U.S. National Security Council from January 28, 2017 to April 5, 2017. On August 17, 2016, in the later months of the campaign, Bannon joined Trump's 2016 presidential bid, taking the position of chief executive officer.

Prior to taking a leave of absence in August 2016, he had been executive chair of Breitbart News, a far-right news, opinion, and commentary website which he described in 2016 as "the platform for the alt-right". Bannon left his position in the Trump administration on August 18, 2017; he then rejoined Breitbart News.

Bannon was an officer in the United States Navy for seven years in the late 1970s and early 1980s, serving on the destroyer USS Paul F. Foster as well as at the Pentagon. After his military service, he worked at Goldman Sachs as an investment banker in the Mergers and Acquisitions department. When he left the company, Bannon held the position of vice president. In 1993, he became acting director of the Earth-science research project Biosphere 2. In the 1990s, he became an executive producer in the Hollywood film and media industry; he produced 18 films between 1991 and 2016.

Click here for more about Steve Bannon.







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​Religious Violence
YouTube Video: Not in God's Name: Confronting Religious Violence by the Brookings Institution

Religious violence is a term that covers phenomena where religion is either the subject or the object of violent behavior. Religious violence is, specifically, violence that is motivated by or in reaction to religious precepts, texts, or doctrines. This includes violence against religious institutions, people, objects, or events when the violence is motivated to some degree by some religious aspect of the target or by the precepts of the attacker. Religious violence does not refer exclusively to acts committed by religious groups, but includes acts committed by secular groups against religious groups.

Violence is a very broad concept and it is also difficult to define since it can be used against non-human objects. Furthermore, the term can denote a wide variety of experiences such as blood shedding, physical harm, forcing against personal freedom, passionate conduct or language, or emotions such as fury and passion.

Religion is a complex and problematic concept. It is a modern western-compartmentalized concept that was not found anywhere before the 1500s and despite it being recently invented, there is no scholarly consensus over what a religion is.

In general, religion is conceived as an abstraction which entails beliefs, doctrines, and sacred places even though the ancient cultures that wrote Holy Scriptures (e.g. Bible Quran, etc) did not have such a concept in their language or in their history.

Decades of anthropological, sociological, and psychological research have shown that the assumption that religious beliefs and values are tightly integrated in an individual's mind or that religious practices and behaviors follow directly from religious beliefs, is actually rare.

People’s religious ideas are fragmented, loosely connected, and context-dependent just like in all other domains of culture and life.

In general, religions, ethical systems, and societies rarely promote violence as an end in itself since violence is universally undesirable. At the same time, there is a universal tension between the general desire to avoid violence and the acceptance of justifiable uses of violence to prevent a "greater evil" that permeates all cultures. Religious violence, like all violence, is a cultural process that is context-dependent and very complex.

Oversimplifications of religion and violence often lead to misguided understandings and exaggerations of causes for why some people commit violence and why most do not commit violence.

Religious violence is primarily the domain of the violent "actor", which may be distinguished between individual and collective forms of violence. Overall, religious violence is perpetrated for a wide variety of ideological reasons and is generally only one of the contributing social and political factors that leads to unrest.

Studies of supposed cases of religious violence often conclude that violence is strongly driven by ethnic animosities rather than by religious worldviews. Recently, scholars have questioned the very concept of "religious violence" and the extent to which religious, political, economic, or ethnic aspects of a conflict are even meaningful.

Some observe that the very concept of "religion" is a modern invention and not something that is universal across cultures or historical and thereby makes "religious violence" a myth. Since all cases of violence and war include social, political, and economic dimensions and since there is no consensus on definitions of "religion" among scholars and no way to isolate "religion" from the rest of the more likely motivational dimensions, it is incorrect to label any violent event as "religious".

Numerous cases of supposed acts of religious violence such as the Thirty Years War, the French Wars of Religion, the Protestant-Catholic conflict in Ireland, the Sri Lankan Civil War, 9/11 and other terrorist attacks, the Bosnian War, and the Rwandan Civil War were all primarily motivated by social, political, and economic issues rather than religion.

For more about Religious Violence, click on any of the following blue hyperlinks:






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​Institutional Racism
YouTube Video Understanding Systematic Oppression and Institutional Racism
By Kyol Blakeney | TEDxYouth@Sydney
Pictured: Institutional Racism: the Continued War on Black America

Institutional racism (also known as institutionalized racism) is a form of racism expressed in the practice of social and political institutions. Institutional racism is also racism by individuals or informal social groups, governed by behavioral norms that support racist thinking and foment active racism.

It is reflected in disparities, among other things, regarding: 
Whether implicitly or explicitly expressed, institutional racism occurs when a certain group is targeted and discriminated against based upon race. Institutional racism is mostly implicit in our ideas and attitudes, so it is often unnoticed by the individual expressing it (see implicit bias).

Institutional racism was explained in 1967 by Kwame Ture (formerly Stokely Carmichael) and Charles V. Hamilton in Black Power: The Politics of Liberation, stating that while individual racism is often identifiable because of its overt nature, institutional racism is less perceptible because of its "less overt, far more subtle" nature.

Institutional racism "originates in the operation of established and respected forces in the society, and thus receives far less public condemnation than [individual racism]". They go on to give examples:
"When white terrorists bomb a black church and kill five black children, that is an act of individual racism, widely deplored by most segments of the society. But when in that same city--Birmingham, Alabama—five hundred black babies die each year because of the lack of power, food, shelter and medical facilities, and thousands more are destroyed and maimed physically, emotionally and intellectually because of conditions of poverty and discrimination in the black community, that is a function of institutional racism.

When a black family moves into a home in a white neighborhood and is stoned, burned or routed out, they are victims of an overt act of individual racism which most people will condemn. But it is institutional racism that keeps black people locked in dilapidated slum tenements, subject to the daily prey of exploitative slumlords, merchants, loan sharks and discriminatory real estate agents. The society either pretends it does not know of this latter situation, or is in fact incapable of doing anything meaningful about it."

Institutional racism was defined by Sir William Macpherson in the 1999 Lawrence report (UK) as: "The collective failure of an organization to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their color, culture, or ethnic origin. It can be seen or detected in processes, attitudes and behavior which amount to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethnic people."

The concept of institutional racism re-emerged in political discourse in the late 1990s after a long hiatus, but has remained a contested concept that has been critiqued by multiple constituencies. 

Institutional racism is the differential access to the goods, services, and opportunities of society. When the differential access becomes integral to institutions, it becomes common practice, making it difficult to rectify. Eventually, this racism dominates public bodies, private corporations, public and private universities, and is reinforced by the actions of conformists and newcomers.

Another difficulty in reducing institutionalized racism is that there is no sole, true identifiable perpetrator. When racism is built into the institution, it emerges as the collective action of the population.
Professor James M. Jones postulates three major types of racism: (i) Personally mediated, (ii) internalized, and (iii) institutionalized. 

Personally mediated racism includes the specific social attitudes inherent to racially prejudiced action (bigoted differential assumptions about abilities, motives, and the intentions of others according to), discrimination (the differential actions and behaviors towards others according to their race), stereotyping, commission, and omission (disrespect, suspicion, devaluation, and dehumanization). 

Internalized racism is the acceptance, by members of the racially stigmatized people, of negative perceptions about their own abilities and intrinsic worth, characterized by low self-esteem, and low esteem of others like them.

This racism can be manifested through embracing "whiteness" (e.g. stratification by skin color in non-white communities), self-devaluation (e.g., racial slurs, nicknames, rejection of ancestral culture, etc.), and resignation, helplessness, and hopelessness (e.g., dropping out of school, failing to vote, engaging in health-risk practices, etc.).

Persistent negative stereotypes fuel institutional racism, and influence interpersonal relations. Racial stereotyping contributes to patterns of racial residential segregation and redlining, and shape views about crime, crime policy, and welfare policy, especially if the contextual information is stereotype-consistent.

Institutional racism is distinguished from racial bigotry by the existence of institutional systemic policies, practices and economic and political structures which place minority racial and ethnic groups at a disadvantage in relation to an institution's racial or ethnic majority.

One example is public school budgets in the U.S. (including local levies and bonds) and the quality of teachers, which are often correlated with property values: rich neighborhoods are more likely to be more 'white' and to have better teachers and more money for education, even in public schools. 

Restrictive housing contracts and bank lending policies have also been listed as forms of institutional racism. Other examples sometimes described as institutional racism are racial profiling by security guards and police, use of stereotyped racial caricatures, the under- and mis-representation of certain racial groups in the mass media, and race-based barriers to gainful employment and professional advancement.

Additionally, differential access to goods, services, and opportunities of society can be included within the term institutional racism, such as unpaved streets and roads, inherited socio-economic disadvantage, and "standardized" tests (each ethnic group prepared for it differently; many are poorly prepared).

Some sociological investigators distinguish between institutional racism and "structural racism" (sometimes called structured racialization). The former focuses upon the norms and practices within an institution, the latter upon the interactions among institutions, interactions that produce racialized outcomes against non-white people. An important feature of structural racism is that it cannot be reduced to individual prejudice or to the single function of an institution.

The United States:

Click on any of the following for more about Institutionalized Racism: ​







​Race and Crime in the United States
YouTube Video: Ferguson, MO: Michael Brown Shooting: Surveillance Video Shows Ferguson Officer After Shooting by ABC News 11/15/2014
Pictured: Stats for Blacks and Police in America (July 10, 2016)

Webhost Note: I live in the St. Louis Metro area, which includes Ferguson, MO, where Police Officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Michael Brown on August 9, 2014, sparking the Ferguson riots. From the statistics above, you see that Afro-American males cause a disproportional number of crimes in the United States than white males. Below, we will amplify on the circumstances that cause such a disparity.

The relationship between race and crime in the United States has been a topic of public controversy and scholarly debate for more than a century. The incarceration rate of blacks (African Americans) is more than three times higher than their representation in the general population. Research suggests that the over-representation of some minorities in the criminal justice system is due to disproportionate crime rates, socioeconomic factors and racial discrimination by the criminal justice system.

​Methodology

In the United States, crime data are collected from three major sources: law enforcement agency crime reports, collected monthly by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and processed annually as Uniform Crime Reports (UCR); victimization surveys, collected biannually by the Bureau of Justice Statistics and processed annually in the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS); and self-report surveys.

The Uniform Crime Reports represent the primary source of data used in the calculation of official statistics regarding serious crimes such as murder and homicide, which is supplemented by the information provided through the NCVS and self-report studies, the latter being the best indicator of actual crime rates for minor offenses such as illegal substance abuse and petty theft. These crime data collection programs provide most of the statistical information utilized by criminologists and sociologists in their analysis of crime and the extent of its relationship to race. Another form of data is that regarding the prison population.

Uniform Crime Reports (UCR):
Further information: Uniform Crime Reports

Established in 1927, the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) program iis a summary-based reporting system that collects data on crime reported to local and state law enforcement agencies across the United States. The UCR system indexes crimes under two headings: Part I and Part II offenses.

Part I offenses include: murder and non-negligent homicide; non-lethal violent crimes comprising robbery, forcible rape and aggravated assault; and property crimes comprising burglary, larceny/theft, motor vehicle theft and arson.

Part II offenses include fraud, forgery/counterfeiting, embezzlement, simple assault, sex offenses, offenses against the family, drug and liquor offenses, weapons offenses and other non-violent offenses excluding traffic violations.

There are fundamental limitations of the UCR system, including:
  • Inaccuracy: UCR statistics do not represent the actual amount of criminal activity occurring in the United States. As it relies upon local law enforcement agency crime reports, the UCR program can only measure crime known to police and cannot provide an accurate representation of actual crime rates.
  • Misrepresentation: The UCR program is focused upon street crime, and does not record information on many other types of crime, such as organized crime, corporate crime or federal crime. Further, law enforcement agencies can provide inadvertently misleading data as a result of local policing practices. These factors can lead to misrepresentations regarding the nature and extent of criminal activity in the United States.
  • Manipulation: UCR data are capable of being manipulated by local law enforcement agencies. Information is supplied voluntarily to the UCR program, and manipulation of data can occur at the local level.
  • Race and Ethnicity: The UCR tracks crime for the racial category of "White" to include both Hispanic and non-Hispanic ethnicities. According to the ACLU, with over 50 million Latinos residing in the United States, this hides the incarceration rates for Latinos vis-à-vis marijuana-related offenses, as they are considered "White" with respect to the UCR.

As a response to these and other limitations, a new system of crime data collection was established in 1988 as an outgrowth of the UCR system.

The National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS) is an incident-based reporting system that will collect more comprehensive and detailed data on crime from local, state and federal law enforcement agencies. As it is still under development, NIBRS coverage is not yet nationwide.

National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS):
Further information: National Crime Victimization Survey

The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) program, established in 1972, is a national survey of a representative sample of households in the United States which covers the frequency of crime victimization and the characteristics and consequences of victimization.

The primary purpose behind the NCVS program is to gather information on crimes that were not reported to police, though information is also collected on reported crimes. The survey collects data on rape, assault, robbery, burglary, personal and household larceny and motor vehicle theft. The NCVS also includes supplemental questions which allow information to be gathered on tangentially relevant issues such as school violence, attitudes towards law enforcement or perceptions regarding crime.

There are fundamental limitations to the NCVS program, including:
  • Reliability: NCVS statistics do not represent verified or evidenced instances of victimization. As it depends upon the recollection of the individuals surveyed, the NCVS cannot distinguish between true and fabricated claims of victimization, nor can it verify the truth of the severity of the reported incidents. Further, the NCVS cannot detect cases of victimization where the victim is too traumatized to report. These factors can contribute to deficits in the reliability of NCVS statistics.
  • Misrepresentation: The NCVS program is focused upon metropolitan and urban areas, and does not adequately cover suburban and rural regions. This can lead to misrepresentations regarding the nature and extent of victimization in the United States.

Comparison of UCR and NCVS data:

According to the NCVS for 1992–2000, 43% of violent criminal acts, and 53% of serious violent crime (not verbal threats, or cuts and bruises) were reported to the police. Overall, black (49%) and Native Americans (48%) victims reported most often, higher than whites (42%) and Asians (40%). Serious violent crime and aggravated assault against blacks (58% and 61%) and Native Americans (55% and 59%) was reported more often than against whites (51% and 54%) or Asians (50% and 51%). Native Americans were unusually unlikely to report a robbery (45%), as with Asians and a simple assault (31%).

Despite the differences in the amount of crime reported, comparisons of the UCR and NCVS data sets show there to be a high degree of correspondence between the two systems. This correspondence extends to the racial demography of both perpetrators and victims of violent crime reported in both systems.

Classification of Hispanics:

The UCR classifies most Hispanics into the "white" category. The NCVS classifies some Hispanic criminals as "white" and some as "other race". The victim categories for the NCVS are more distinct.

According to a report by the National Council of La Raza, research obstacles undermine the census of Latinos in prison, and “Latinos in the criminal justice system are seriously under-counted. The true extent of the over-representation of Latinos in the system probably is significantly greater than researchers have been able to document.

Lack of empirical data on Latinos is partially due to prisons’ failures to document race at intake, or recording practices that historically have classified Latinos as white.

Overall the FBI didn't include a 'Latino' or 'Hispanic' category until recently and 93% of Hispanics are classified as "white" by law enforcement officers (irrespective of their ancestry) often inflating actual white criminal statistics.

Crime Rate Statistics:
Further information: Crime statistics

There is general agreement in the literature that blacks are more likely to commit violent crimes than are whites in the United States. Whether this is the case for less serious crimes is less clear.

Prison data:
Further information: Incarceration in the United States § Ethnicity

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, blacks accounted for 39.4% of the prison and jail population in 2009, while non-Hispanic whites were 34.2%, and Hispanics (of any race) 20.6%. The incarceration rate of black males was over six times higher than that of white males, with a rate of 4,749 per 100,000 US residents.

According to the 2010 US Census, Hispanics constituted 16.3% of the US population. According to the BJS, the black incarceration rate in state and federal prisons declined to 3,161 per 100,000 and the white incarceration rate slightly increased to 487 per 100,000. In 2009, Native Americans and Alaskan Natives were jailed, paroled, or on probation at 932 per 100,000, 25% higher than for non-Natives (747), up 5.6% that year and 12% higher than 2007.

However, crime in general declined during this time down to near 1970 levels, an 18% decrease from the previous decade.

According to a 2013 study conducted by the Pew Research Center, black men were six times as likely as white men to be incarcerated in 2010. The incarceration rates of each race varied from state to state. Oklahoma was shown to have the highest incarceration rates of black people with 2,625 black inmates per 100,000 residents. New Jersey also had high rates with 12.2 black people for every white person in its prison system. Hawaii had the lowest incarceration rates.

​Arrests and sentencing:

A 2011 study which examined violent crime trends between 1980 and 2008 found that racial imbalances between arrest and incarceration levels were both small and comparably sized across the study period. The authors argued that the prior studies had been confounded by not separating Hispanics from Whites.

Another recent study in 2012 raises a different concern, showing that Hispanics and blacks receive considerably longer sentences for the same or lesser offenses on average than white offenders with equal or greater criminal records.

A 2012 University of Michigan Law School study found that African Americans are given longer federal sentences even when factoring prior criminal records, and that African American jail sentences tend to be roughly 10% longer than white jail sentences for the same crimes.

The study found that federal prosecutors of African American and Hispanic defendants are almost twice as likely to push for mandatory minimum sentences, leading to longer sentences and disparities in incarceration rates for federal offenses.

According to the US Census Bureau as of the year 2000, there were 2,224,181 blacks enrolled in college. In that same year, there were 610,300 black inmates in prison according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. The results are highly correlated with education. 30 percent of those without college education and nearly 60 percent of high school dropouts had prison records.

The probability of arrest given the commission of a crime is higher for whites than it is for blacks for robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault, whereas for rape the probability of arrest is approximately equal across offender race.

The disparity in arrest rate between criminals who are white and black (and presumably other races) is an interesting fact. On the one hand, it suggests that the over-representation of blacks in the criminal justice system is not consistent with the interpretation that black criminals are more likely to be targeted for arrest.

But, the differential arrest rate may indicate disparities in allocation of police resources, with fewer resources being devoted to solving crimes in predominantly black neighborhoods. In other words, statistics on race and crime may be difficult to interpret without controlling for correlations between poverty and race, and poverty and crime.

​Incarceration by race and ethnicity:
Further information: Incarceration in the United States

Crime trends:

Some studies have argued for smaller racial disparities in violent crime in recent times. However, a study of government data from 1980–2008 found that the reduction in Black violent crime relative to White violent crime was an artifact of those previous studies, which was due to Hispanic offenders being counted as White in the comparison.

The Hispanic population has been increasing rapidly and Hispanics have violence rates higher than that of Whites but lower than that of Blacks.

Homicide:

According to the US Department of Justice, African Americans accounted for 52.5% of all homicide offenders from 1980 to 2008, with whites 45.3% and "Other" 2.2%. The offending rate for African Americans was almost 8 times higher than whites, and the victim rate 6 times higher.

Most homicides were intraracial, with 84% of white victims killed by whites, and 93% of African Americans victims were killed by African Americans.

In 2013, number and percentage of murder arrests by race were:
  • Black or African Americans 4,379 = 52.2%
  • White Americans (including Hispanic Americans) 3,799 = 45.3%
  • American Indians or Alaska Natives 98 = 1.06%
  • Asian Americans 101 = 1.2%

Inversely, the percentage of individuals in each racial demographic arrested for murder in 2013 was:
  • 0.01% of Black or African American population (4,379/38,929,319)
  • 0.0017% of White American and Hispanic American population (3,799/223,553,265)
  • 0.0033% of American Indian or Alaska Native population (98/2,932,248)
  • 0.0007% of Asian American population (101/14,674,252)
  • 0.001% of Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander population (6/540,013).

Youth crime:

The "National Youth Gang Survey Analysis" (2011) state that of gang members:
  • 46% are Hispanic/Latino,
  • 35% are black,
  • 11.5% are white,
  • and 7% are other race/ethnicity.

According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reports, in the year 2008 black youths, who make up 16% of the youth population, accounted for 52% of juvenile violent crime arrests, including 58.5% of youth arrests for homicide and 67% for robbery. Black youths were over-represented in all offense categories except DUI, liquor laws and drunkenness.

Robbery:

According to the National Crime Victimization Survey in 2002, the black arrest rate for robbery was 8.55 times higher than whites, and blacks were 16 times more likely to be incarcerated for robbery than non-Hispanic whites. Robberies with white victims and black offenders were more than 12 times more common than the reverse.

Victim surveys:

In 1978, Michael Hindelang compared data from the National Crime Victimization Survey (then known as the National Crime Survey, or NCS) to data from the Uniform Crime Reports, both from 1974. He found that NCS data generally agreed with UCR data in regards to the percent of perpetrators of rape, robbery, and assault who were black.

For instance, Hindelang's analysis found that both the NCS and UCR estimated that 62% of robbery offenders were black in the United States in 1974. A 2004 National Crime Victimization Survey report which analyzed carjacking over 10 years found that carjacking victims identified 56% of offenders as black, 21% as white, and 16% as Native American or Asian.

Hispanics:

According to a 2009 report by the Pew Hispanic Center, in 2007 Latinos "accounted for 40% of all sentenced federal offenders-more than triple their share (13%) of the total U.S. adult population". This was an increase from 24% in 1991. 72% of the Latino offenders were not U.S. citizens.

For Hispanic offenders sentenced in federal courts, 48% were immigration offenses and 37% drug offenses. One reason for the large increase in immigration offenses is that they exclusively fall under federal jurisdiction.

Racially-motivated hate crime:

The federal government publishes a list annually of Hate Crime Statistics, 2009. Also published by the federal government is the Known Offender's Race by Bias Motivation, 2009.

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation Uniform Crime Report database, in 2010 58.6% of reported hate crime offenders were white, 18.4% of offenders were black, 8.9% were of individuals of multiple races and 1% of offenders were Native Americans. The report also reveals that 48% of all hate crime offenders were motivated by the victim's race, while 18% were based on the victim's religion, and another 18% were based on the victim's sexual orientation. 

The report states that among hate crime offenses motivated by race, 70% were composed of anti-black bias, while 17.7% were of anti-white bias, and 5% were of anti-Asian or Pacific Islander bias.

Racial composition of geographic areas:

Studies have examined if ethnic/racially heterogeneous areas, most often neighborhoods in large cities, have higher crime rates than more homogeneous areas. Most studies find that the more ethnically/racially heterogeneous an area is, the higher its crime rates tend to be.

Studies examining the relationship between percentages of different races in an area and crime rates have generally either found similar relationships as for nationwide crime rates or no significant relationships. Most often studied are correlations between black and Hispanic populations in a given area and crime. Such data may reveal a possible connection, but is functionally inconclusive due to a variety of other correlating factors which overlap with race and ethnicity.

Race and socioeconomic status

While there is a correlation between blacks and Hispanics and crime, the data imply a much stronger tie between poverty and crime than crime and any racial group, when gender is taken into consideration. 

The direct correlation between crime and class, when factoring for race alone, is relatively weak. When gender, and familial history are factored, class correlates more strongly with crime than race or ethnicity.

Studies indicate that areas with low socioeconomic status may have the greatest correlation of crime with young and adult males, regardless of racial composition, though its effect on females is negligible. 

A 1996 study looking at data from Columbus, Ohio found that differences in disadvantage in city neighborhoods explained the vast majority of the difference in crime rates between blacks and whites, and two 2003 studies looking at violent offending among juveniles reached similar conclusions.

Theories of Causes:

Historically, crime statistics have played a central role in the discussion of the relationship between race and crime in the United States.

As they have been designed to record information not only on the kinds of crimes committed, but also on the individuals involved in crime, criminologists and sociologists have and continue to use crime rate statistics to make general statements regarding the racial demographics of crime-related phenomena such as victimization, arrests, prosecutions, convictions, and incarceration.

Regardless of their views regarding causation, scholars acknowledge that some racial and ethnic minorities are disproportionately represented in the arrest and victimization reports which are used to compile crime rate statistics. There is, however, a great deal of debate regarding the causes of that disproportionality.

As noted above, scholars acknowledge that some racial and ethnic minorities, particularly African Americans, are disproportionately represented in the arrest and victimization reports which are used to compile crime rate statistics in the United States.

The data from 2008 reveals that Black Americans are over-represented in terms of arrests made in virtually all types of crime, with the exceptions of "Driving under the influence", "Liquor laws" and hate crime. Overall, Black Americans are arrested at 2.6 times the per-capita rate of all other Americans, and this ratio is even higher for murder (6.3 times) and robbery (8.1 times).

Schools of thought:
Main article: Criminology

​The relationship between race and crime has been an area of study for criminologists since the emergence of anthropological criminology in the late 19th century. 

Cesare Lombroso, founder of the Italian school of criminology, argued that criminal behavior was the product of biological factors, including race. He was among the first criminologists to claim a direct link between race and crime. 

This biological perspective, sometimes seen as racist and increasingly unpopular, was criticized by early 20th century scholars, including Frances Kellor, Johan Thorsten Sellin and William Du Bois, who argued that other circumstances, such as social and economic conditions, were the central factors which led to criminal behavior, regardless of race.

Du Bois traced the causes of the disproportional representation of Blacks in the criminal justice system back to the improperly handled emancipation of Black slaves in general and the convict leasing program in particular. In 1901, he wrote:

"There are no reliable statistics to which one can safely appeal to measure exactly the growth of crime among the emancipated slaves. About seventy per cent of all prisoners in the South are black; this, however, is in part explained by the fact that accused Negroes are still easily convicted and get long sentences, while whites still continue to escape the penalty of many crimes even among themselves. And yet allowing for all this, there can be no reasonable doubt but that there has arisen in the South since the [civil] war a class of black criminals, loafers, and ne'er-do-wells who are a menace to their fellows, both black and white."

The debate that ensued remained largely academic until the late 20th century, when the relationship between race and crime became a recognized field of specialized study in criminology. Helen T. Greene, professor of justice administration at Texas Southern University, and Shaun L. Gabbidon, professor of criminal justice at Pennsylvania State University, note that many criminology and criminal justice programs now either require or offer elective courses on the topic of the relationship between race and crime.

Sociologist Orlando Patterson has explained these controversies as disputes between liberal and conservative criminologists in which each camp focuses on mutually exclusive aspects of the causal net, with liberals focusing on factors external to the groups in question and conservatives focusing on internal cultural and behavioral factors.

​Modern theories of causation: Conflict theory:
Further information: Conflict theory, Conflict criminology, and Marxist criminology

​Conflict theory is considered "one of the most popular theoretical frameworks among race and crime scholars". Rather than one monolithic theory, conflict theory represents a group of closely related theories which operate on a common set of fundamental assumptions.

As a general theory of criminal behavior, conflict theory proposes that crime is an inevitable consequence of the conflict which arises between competing groups within society. Such groups can be defined through a number of factors, including class, economic status, religion, language, ethnicity, race or any combination thereof. Further, conflict theory proposes that crime could be largely eliminated if the structure of society were to be changed.

The form of conflict theory which emphasizes the role of economics, being heavily influenced by the work of Karl Marx and sometimes referred to as Marxist criminology, views crime as a natural response to the inequality arising from the competition inherent in capitalist society.

Sociologists and criminologists emphasizing this aspect of social conflict argue that, in a competitive society in which there is an inequality in the distribution of goods, those groups with limited or restricted access to goods will be more likely to turn to crime.

Dutch criminologist Willem Adriaan Bonger, one of the first scholars to apply the principles of economic determinism to the issue of crime, argued that such inequality as found in capitalism was ultimately responsible for the manifestation of crime at all levels of society, particularly among the poor.

Though this line of thinking has been criticized for requiring the establishment of a utopian socialist society, the notion that the disproportionality observed in minority representation in crime rate statistics could be understood as the result of systematic economic disadvantage found its way into many of the theories developed in subsequent generations.

Culture conflict theory, derived from the pioneering work of sociologist Thorsten Sellin, emphasizes the role of culturally accepted norms of conduct in the formation of cultural groups and the conflicts which arise through their interaction.

Culture conflict theory argues that the group with the most power in any society ensures that their values, traditions and behaviors, which Sellin referred to as "conduct norms", are those to which all other members of society are forced to conform, and any actions which conflict with the interests of the dominant group are identified as deviant and/or criminal in nature.

Sellin's original ideas continued to be developed throughout the 20th century, most notably by George Vold in the 1950s and Austin Turk in the 1960s, and continue to influence the contemporary debate. 

The recent work of Gregory J. Howard, Joshua D. Freilich and Graeme R. Newman applies culture conflict theory to the issue of immigrant and minority crime around the world.

According to their research, while culturally homogeneous groups experience little to no cultural conflict, as all the members share the same set of "conduct norms", culturally heterogeneous groups, such as modern industrial nations with large immigrant populations, display heightened competition between sets of cultural norms which, in turn, leads to an increase in violence and crime. Societies which have high levels of cultural diversity in their population, it is claimed, are more likely to have higher rates of violent crime.

According to conflict theorists such as Marvin Wolfgang, Hubert Blalock and William Chambliss, the disproportionate representation of racial minorities in crime statistics and in the prison population is the result of race- and class-motivated disparities in arrests, prosecutions and sentencing rather than differences in actual participation in criminal activity, an approach which has also been taken by proponents of critical race theory. 

This line of argumentation is generally seen as part of a wider approach to race-related issues referred to as the Discrimination Thesis, which assumes that differences in the treatment received by people of minority racial background in a number of public institutions, including the criminal justice, education and health care systems, is the result of overt racial discrimination.

Opposed to this view is the Non-Discrimination Thesis, which seeks to defend these institutions from such accusations.

At the time it was first proposed, conflict theory was considered outside the mainstream of more established criminological theories, such as strain theory, social disorganization theory and differential association theory.

Barbara D. Warner, associate professor of criminal justice and police studies at Eastern Kentucky University, notes that conflict theory has been the subject of increasing criticism in recent years. Recent studies claim that, while there may have been real sentencing differences related to non-legal characteristics such as race in the 1960s, sentencing discrimination as described by the conflict theorists at that time no longer exists.

Criticism has also pointed to the lack of testability of the general theory. While much research has been done to correlate race, income level and crime frequency, typically of less serious criminal behavior such as theft or larceny, research has shown there to be no significant correlation between race, income level and crime seriousness.

Thus, conflict theory encounters difficulties in attempting to account for the high levels of violent crime such as murder, homicide and rape, in minority populations.

Strain (anomie) theory:
Further information: Strain theory (sociology) and Anomie 

Strain theory, which is largely derived from the work of Robert K. Merton in the 1930s and 1940s, argues that social structures within society which lead to inequality and deprivation in segments of its population indirectly encourage those segments to commit crime. According to strain theory, differences in crime rates between races are the result of real differences in behavior, but to be understood as an attempt to alleviate either absolute or relative deprivation and adapt to the existing opportunity structure.

A more recent approach to strain theory was proposed by Steven F. Messner and Richard Rosenfeld in the 1990s. In their version of the theory, which they refer to as institutional anomie theory, Messner and Rosenfeld argue that the dominance of materialistic concerns and measurements of success manifested in the American Dream weakens the effectiveness of informal social control mechanisms and support processes, which encourages economic gain by any means, legal or illegal.

In those segments of the population which experience the greatest relative deprivation, therefore, there is readiness to turn to crime to overcome inequality and eliminate relative deprivation.

Critics of strain theory point to its weaknesses when compared with actual criminal behavior patterns. Michael R. Gottfredson and Travis Hirschi argue that strain theory "misconstrue(s) the nature of the criminal act, supplying it with virtues it does not possess." They further point out that, while strain theory suggests that criminals should tend to target people in a more advantageous economic situation than themselves, they more often victimize individuals who live in the same economic circumstances.

General strain theory:
Main article: General strain theory

Multiple studies have found evidence that Agnew's general strain theory explains much of the difference in crime between blacks and whites.

Racial segregation:

A 1996 study found a strong association between black-white spatial isolation and rates of black violence, consistent with the hypothesis that segregation is responsible for higher rates of black crime. Multiple other studies have reached similar conclusions.

Social disorganization theory:
Further information: Social disorganization theory

Social disorganization theory proposes that high rates of crime are largely the result of a heterogeneous and impoverished social ecology. 

Proponents of the theory point to the process of urban decay as a major contributing factor to the breakdown of healthy urban communities which would normally curb the spread of many forms of criminal behavior.

The diversity of minority cultures present in poverty-stricken neighborhoods prevents the formation of strong social bonds and leaves inhabitants uninterested in maintaining positive community relationships. This has been observed to increase the likelihood of crime in certain urban areas, which can lead to increased policing and a further breakdown of familial structures as a result of arrests, which, in turn, precipitates more crime.

Social disorganization theory has been instrumental in establishing the notion that stable, culturally homogeneous communities have lower rates of delinquency and crime regardless of race.

Macrostructural opportunity theory:

Phillippia Simmons reports that many of the studies which have investigated intra- and interracial crime seek to explain this through a theory of macrostructural opportunity which states that interracial violence is primarily a function of opportunity and access.

According to this theory, intraracial crime rates remain relatively high due to the fact that much of the US remains residentially segregated. She notes that this theory predicts that, if residential areas were more racially integrated, intraracial crime would decrease and interracial crime would increase correspondingly. However, she also notes that not all researchers on the topic of intraracial crime agree with this result, with some pointing to other macrostructural factors, such as income and education, which may negate the effect of race on inter- and intraracial crime.

​Anthony Walsh criticizes the attempt to use the macrostructural opportunity model to explain interracial rape as has been done in studies conducted in the past few decades, pointing out that such a defense is directly contradicted by the data related to homicide.

Walsh argues that the macrostructural opportunity model helps explain why black murderers almost always choose black victims. 

There are disparities in rates of reporting rape where victims of some races are statistically less likely or more likely to report their rape, especially depending on the race of the offender. Black women in America are more likely to report sexual assault that has been perpetrated by a stranger. Black women are more likely to under-report rapes overall as they are more likely to blame themselves, feel they will be blamed or feel they won't be believed.

Structural factors:

Evidence supporting the role of structural factors in high black crime rates comes from multiple studies. For example, Robert J. Sampson has reported that most of the reason violent crime rates are so high among blacks originates mainly from unemployment, economic deprivation, and family disorganization. Specifically, he found that "the scarcity of employed black men increases the prevalence of families headed by females in black communities" and that the increased prevalence of such families in turn results in family disruption that significantly increases black murder and robbery rates.

Sampson et al. and Phillips have reported that at least half of the black-white homicide offending differential is attributable to structural neighborhood factors like parents' marital status and social context. Multiple other studies have found a link between black crime rates and structural factors, such as single-parent families and structural inequality.

Social control theory:
Further information: Social control theory

Social control theory, which is among the most popular theories in criminology, proposes that crime is most commonly perpetrated by individuals who lack strong bonds or connections with their social environment.

​Based upon Travis Hirschi's Causes of Delinquency (1969), social bonding theory pioneered the notion that criminologists can gain useful insight into the motives behind criminal behavior by examining what normally motivates individuals to refrain from crime.

From this it is argued that, in those segments of the population where such motivation is lacking, crime will be more prevalent. Hirschi was explicit in mentioning that he believed his theory held true across all racial boundaries, and subsequent research - both in the US and abroad - seems to confirm this belief. The core idea of social control theory is elaborated upon in several other theories of causation, particularly social disorganization theory.

Subculture of violence theory:
Further information: Subcultural theory

As a theory of criminal behavior, subculture of violence theory claims that certain groups or subcultures exist in society in which violence is viewed as an appropriate response to what, in the context of that subculture, are perceived as threatening situations.

​Building upon the work of cultural anthropologist Walter B. Miller's focal concerns theory, which focused on the social mechanisms behind delinquency in adolescents, sociologists Marvin Wolfgang and Franco Ferracuti proposed that the disproportionally high rate of crime among African Americans could be explained by their possessing a unique racial subculture in which violence is experienced and perceived in a manner different from that commonly observed in mainstream American culture.
​
As to the origins of this subculture of violence among African Americans, sociologists promoting the theory have pointed towards their Southern heritage. As noted in several studies conducted throughout the 1960s and 1970s, there is a traditional North-South discrepancy in the distribution of homicide in the US, regardless of race, and this, it was argued, indicates that lower-class Southern Blacks and Whites share the same subculture of violence.

The empirical basis for the subculture of violence theory, however, has been described as "extremely limited and unpersuasive". Very little has been done to attempt an adequate assessment of supposedly criminogenic subcultural values, and several studies conducted in the late 1970s claimed to falsify the assumptions upon which the subculture of violence theory depends.

More recently, scholars have criticized the theory as potentially racist in nature in its implication of one given ethnicity or culture supposedly being less fit for or less worthy of being qualified as "civilized," the built-in implication of which in turn would denote stereotypically "white" behavior as an objective norm for all societies to follow.

Prosecutorial and police discrimination theory:
Further information: Racial inequality in the American criminal justice system

Research suggests that police practices, such as racial profiling, over-policing in areas populated by minorities and in-group bias may result in disproportionately high numbers of racial minorities among crime suspects.

Research also suggests that there may be possible discrimination by the judicial system, which contributes to a higher number of convictions for racial minorities.

A 2012 study found that "(i) juries formed from all-white jury pools convict black defendants significantly (16 percentage points) more often than white defendants, and (ii) this gap in conviction rates is entirely eliminated when the jury pool includes at least one black member."

Research has found evidence of in-group bias, where "black (white) juveniles who are randomly assigned to black (white) judges are more likely to get incarcerated (as opposed to being placed on probation), and they receive longer sentences."

In-group bias has also been observed when it comes to traffic citations, as black and white cops are more likely to cite out-groups. A 2016 paper by Roland G. Fryer, Jr, found that while there are no racial differences in lethal use of police force, blacks and Hispanics are significantly more likely to experience non-lethal use of force.

Reports by the Department of Justice have also found that police officers in Baltimore, Maryland, and Ferguson, Missouri, systemically stop, search (in some cases strip-searching) and harass black residents.

A January 2017 report by the DOJ also found that the Chicago Police Department had "unconstitutionally engaged in a pattern of excessive and deadly force" and that police "have no regard for the sanctity of life when it comes to people of color".

​In criminal sentencing, medium to dark-skinned African Americans are likely to receive sentences 2.6 years longer than those of whites or light-skinned African Americans. When a white victim is involved, those with more "black" features are likely to receive a much more severe punishment.

A 2013 report by the American Civil Liberties Union found that blacks were "3.73 times more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana possession", even though "blacks and whites use drugs, including marijuana, at similar rates."

A 2016 analysis by the New York Times "of tens of thousands of disciplinary cases against inmates in 2015, hundreds of pages of internal reports and three years of parole decisions found that racial disparities were embedded in the prison experience in New York." Blacks and Latinos were sent more frequently to solitary and held there for longer durations than whites. The New York Times analysis found that the disparities were the greatest for violations where the prison guards had lots of discretion, such as disobeying orders, but smaller for violations that required physical evidence, such as possessing contraband.

A 2016 report by the Sarasota Herald-Tribune found that Florida judges sentence black defendants to far longer prison sentences than whites with the same background. For the same drug possession crimes, blacks were sentenced to double the time of whites.

Blacks were given longer sentences in 60 percent of felony cases, 68 percent of the most serious first-degree crimes, 45 percent of burglary cases and 30 percent of battery cases. For third-degree felonies (the least serious types of felonies in Florida), white judges sentenced blacks to twenty percent more time than whites, whereas black judges gave more balanced sentences.

One judge responded by noting that about ninety-eight percent of sentences are the result of plea bargaining and that sentencing is a complicated issue given the various facts involved, thus no two cases can be compared. Some attorneys note that poorer defendants often rely on public defenders who often receive less favorable plea offers than defendants with private counsel because private attorneys have lighter case loads, are less likely to go to trial with prosecutors, and defendants with means are more likely to present mitigating factors.
​
Another theory proposes that racial inequality in the American criminal justice system is mostly caused by a racial imbalance in decisions to charge criminal defendants with crimes requiring a mandatory minimum prison sentence, leading to large racial disparities in incarceration.

In a 2008 self-published paper Paul Heaton from the RAND Corporation and Charles Loeffler wrote, that some scholars and studies have argued that police discrimination is not an important explanation for racial differences in crime, others state that it is the main cause and some argue that both discrimination and different real crime rates contribute.

They claim that the varying results can be explained to a large degree by the methods being uncertain with many possible confounding factors. As such Heaton and Loeffler proposed a method that they argue would remove all such observable and unobservable problems.

They looked at the arrest rates for assault, robbery, and rape cases where the victims reported a black and white co-offending pair and argue that differences in arrest rates should only reflect police bias. They found that the black offenders were 3% more likely to be arrested.

This suggests some bias, but is insufficient to explain the large racial crime disparities.

Childhood exposure to violence:

Research shows that childhood exposure to violence significantly increases the likelihood to engage in violent behavior. When studies control for childhood exposure to violence, black and white males are equally likely to engage in violent behavior.

Incarceration:
See also: Incarceration in the United States

The United States incarceration rate has increased dramatically in recent times. The deterrent and incapacitating effects of imprisonment, in particular regarding recidivism and the production of career criminals, continue to be debated.

See also:







Rape including Types of Rape Pictured below:
TOP: UNODC : Reported rape by Country per 100,000 population (2011)
BOTTOM: Incidents based on relationship of victim to perpetrator.
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or against a person who is incapable of giving valid consent, such as one who is unconscious, incapacitated, has an intellectual disability or is below the legal age of consent. The term rape is sometimes used interchangeably with the term sexual assault.

The rate of reporting, prosecuting and convicting for rape varies between jurisdictions.

Internationally, the incidence of rapes recorded by the police during 2008 ranged, per 100,000 people, from 0.2 in Azerbaijan to 92.9 in Botswana with 6.3 in Lithuania as the median. 

Worldwide, rape is primarily committed by males. Rape by strangers is usually less common than rape by persons the victim knows, and male-on-male and female-on-female prison rapes are common and may be the least reported forms of rape.

Widespread and systematic rape (e.g., war rape) and sexual slavery can occur during international conflict. These practices are crimes against humanity and war crimes. Rape is also recognized as an element of the crime of genocide when committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a targeted ethnic group.

People who have been raped can be traumatized and develop posttraumatic stress disorder. Serious injuries can result along with the risk of pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. A person may face violence or threats from the rapist, and, in some cultures, from the victim's family and relatives.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Rape:
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Types of Rape:

Rape can be categorized in different ways: for example, by reference to the situation in which it occurs, by the identity or characteristics of the victim, and by the identity or characteristics of the perpetrator.

These categories are referred to as types of rape. The types of rape described below are not mutually exclusive: a given rape can fit into multiple categories, by for example by being both a prison rape and a gang rape, or both a custodial rape and the rape of a child.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for further information about each Type of Rape: 
See also:







​Sexual Harassment featuring  the NY Times 11/11/17 Article
"After Weinstein: A List of Men Accused of Sexual Misconduct and the Fallout for Each​"
YouTube Video: Harvey Weinstein accused of sexual harassment by ABC News (10/6/17)

New York Times, November 11, 2017: "After Weinstein: A List of Men Accused of
Sexual Misconduct and the Fallout for Each"

After multiple women came forward to accuse Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer, of sexual misconduct, at least 20 high-profile men in a variety of industries have also been accused. Since then, a number have resigned, been fired or experienced other fallout after claims ranging from inappropriate text messages to rape.
​
Here is a list of such cases that have been brought to public attention since the Weinstein scandal broke on Oct. 5. We’ll update this list periodically as we get new information.

​Click here to see List

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Sexual harassment is bullying or coercion of a sexual nature, or the unwelcome or inappropriate promise of rewards in exchange for sexual favors. In most modern legal contexts, sexual harassment is illegal.

As defined by the United States' Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), "It is unlawful to harass a person (an applicant or employee) because of that person's sex."

Harassment can include "sexual harassment" or unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical harassment of a sexual nature. The legal definition of sexual harassment varies by jurisdiction. Sexual harassment is subject to a directive in the European Union.

Although laws surrounding sexual harassment exist, they generally do not prohibit simple teasing, offhand comments, or minor isolated incidents—that is, they do not impose a "general civility code". In the workplace, harassment may be considered illegal when it is so frequent or severe that it creates a hostile or offensive work environment or when it results in an adverse employment decision (such as the victim being fired or demoted, or the victim quitting the job). The legal and social understanding of sexual harassment, however, varies by culture.

In the context of US employment, the harasser can be the victim's supervisor, a supervisor in another area, a co-worker, or someone who is not an employee of the employer, such as a client or customer, and harassers or victims can be of any gender.

It includes a range of actions from mild transgressions to sexual abuse or sexual assault. Sexual harassment is a form of illegal​ employment discrimination in many countries, and is a form of abuse (sexual and psychological) and bullying. For many businesses or organizations, preventing sexual harassment, and defending employees from sexual harassment charges, have become key goals of legal decision-making.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Sexual Harassment:







​James O'Keefe including the Washington Post 11/27/17 Article "A woman approached The Post with dramatic — and false — tale about Roy Moore. She appears to be part of undercover sting operation"
YouTube Video: James O’Keefe Tried To Scam The Washington Post
Pictured: The James O’Keefe (Center Photo) - Donald Trump - Breitbart News Nexus

The Washington Post Article:
A woman who falsely claimed to The Washington Post that Roy Moore, the Republican U.S. Senate candidate in Alabama, impregnated her as a teenager appears to work with an organization that uses deceptive tactics to secretly record conversations in an effort to embarrass its targets.

In a series of interviews over two weeks, the woman shared a dramatic story about an alleged sexual relationship with Moore in 1992 that led to an abortion when she was 15.

During the interviews, she repeatedly pressed Post reporters to give their opinions on the effects that her claims could have on Moore’s candidacy if she went public.

The Post did not publish an article based on her unsubstantiated account. When Post reporters confronted her with inconsistencies in her story and an Internet posting that raised doubts about her motivations, she insisted that she was not working with any organization that targets journalists.

But on Monday morning, Post reporters saw her walking into the New York offices of Project Veritas, an organization that targets the mainstream news media and left-leaning groups. The organization sets up undercover “stings” that involve using false cover stories and covert video recordings meant to expose what the group says is media bias.

James O’Keefe, the Project Veritas founder who was convicted of a misdemeanor in 2010 for using a fake identity to enter a federal building during a previous sting, declined to answer questions about the woman outside the organization’s offices on Monday morning shortly after the woman walked inside.
“I am not doing an interview right now, so I’m not going to say a word,” O’Keefe said.

In a follow-up interview, O’Keefe declined to answer repeated questions about whether the woman was employed at Project Veritas. He also did not respond when asked if he was working with Moore, former White House adviser and Moore supporter Stephen K. Bannon, or Republican strategists.
​
The group’s efforts illustrate the lengths to which activists have gone to try to discredit media outlets for reporting on allegations from multiple women that Moore pursued them when they were teenagers and he was in his early 30s. Moore has denied that he did anything improper. 
A spokesman for Moore’s campaign did not respond to a message seeking comment.

The woman who approached Post reporters, Jaime T. Phillips, did not respond to calls to her cellphone later Monday. Her car remained in the Project Veritas parking lot for more than an hour.

The Post positioned video reporters outside the group’s office in Mamaroneck, N.Y, after determining that Phillips lives in Stamford, Conn., and realizing that the two locations were just 16 miles apart. Two reporters followed her from her home as she drove to the office.

After Phillips was observed entering the Project Veritas office, The Post made the unusual decision to report her previous off-the-record comments.

“We always honor ‘off-the-record’ agreements when they’re entered into in good faith,” said Martin Baron, The Post’s executive editor. “But this so-called off-the-record conversation was the essence of a scheme to deceive and embarrass us.

The intent by Project Veritas clearly was to publicize the conversation if we fell for the trap. Because of our customary journalistic rigor, we weren’t fooled, and we can’t honor an ‘off-the-record’ agreement that was solicited in maliciously bad faith.”

​Phillips’s arrival at the Project Veritas office capped a weeks-long effort that began only hours after The Post published an article on Nov. 9 that included allegations that Moore once initiated a sexual encounter with a 14-year-old named Leigh Corfman. 

Post reporter Beth Reinhard, who co-wrote the article about Corfman, received a cryptic email early the next morning.

“Roy Moore in Alabama . . . I might know something but I need to keep myself safe. How do we do this?” the apparent tipster wrote under an account with the name “Lindsay James.”
 
The email’s subject line was “Roy Moore in AL.” The sender’s email address included “rolltide,” the rallying cry of the University of Alabama’s sports teams, which are nicknamed the Crimson Tide. 

Reinhard sent an email asking if the person was willing to talk off the record.
“Not sure if I trust the phone,” came the reply. “Can we just stick to email?” 

“I need to be confident that you can protect me before I will tell all,” the person wrote in a subsequent email. “I have stuff I’ve been hiding for a long time but maybe it should stay that way.”

The tipster’s email came amid counterattacks by Moore supporters aimed at The Post and its reporters.

That same day, Gateway Pundit, a conservative site, spread a false story from a Twitter account, @umpire43, that said, “A family friend in Alabama just told my wife that a WAPO reporter named Beth offer her 1000$ to accuse Roy Moore.” The Twitter account, which has a history of spreading misinformation, has since been deleted.

The Post, like many other news organizations, has a strict policy against paying people for information and did not do so in its coverage of Moore.

On Nov. 14, a pastor in Alabama said he received a voice mail from a man falsely claiming to be a Post reporter and seeking women “willing to make damaging remarks” about Moore for money. No one associated with The Post made any such call.

In the days that followed the purported tipster’s initial emails, Reinhard communicated with the woman through an encrypted text messaging service and spoke by phone with the person to set up a meeting. When the woman suggested a meeting in New York, Reinhard told her she would have to know more about her story and her background. The woman offered that her real name was Jaime Phillips. 

Phillips said she lived in New York but would be in the Washington area during Thanksgiving week and suggested meeting Tuesday at a shopping mall in Tysons Corner, Va. “I’m planning to do some shopping there so I’ll find a good place to meet before you get there,” Phillips wrote in a message sent via Signal, the encrypted messaging service. 

When Reinhard suggested bringing another reporter, Phillips wrote, “I’m not really comfortable with anyone else being there this time.”

Reinhard arrived to find Phillips, wearing a brown leather jacket and with long red hair, already seated in a booth in the restaurant. 

The 41-year-old said she had been abused as a child, Reinhard said. Her family had moved often. She said she moved in with an aunt in the Talladega area of Alabama and started attending a church youth group when she met Moore in 1992, the year he became a county judge. She said she was 15. She said they started a “secret” sexual relationship.

“I knew it wasn’t right, but I didn’t care,” she said.

She said that she got pregnant, that Moore talked her into an abortion and that he drove her to Mississippi to get it.

In the interview, she told Reinhard that she was so upset she couldn’t finish her salad.
Phillips said she had started thinking about coming forward after the allegations about Hollywood film producer Harvey Weinstein surfaced. Then she said she saw the news about Moore flashing across the television screen while in a break room at her job at a company called NFM Lending in Westchester County, N.Y., Reinhard said.

Phillips also repeatedly asked the reporter to guarantee her that Moore would lose the election if she came forward. Reinhard told her in a subsequent text message that she could not predict what the impact would be. Reinhard said she also explained to Phillips that her claims would have to be fact-checked. Additionally, Reinhard asked her for documents that would corroborate or support her story.

Later that day, Phillips told Reinhard that she felt “anxiety & negative energy after our meeting,” text messages show. “You just didn’t convince me that I should come forward,” she wrote. 

Reinhard replied, “I’m so sorry but I want to be straight with you about the fact-checking process and the fact that we can’t guarantee what will happen as a result of another story.”
Phillips was not satisfied. On Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving, she suggested meeting with another Post reporter, Stephanie McCrummen, who co-wrote the initial article about Corfman. “I’d rather go to another paper than talk to you again,” Phillips told Reinhard. 

Back at the newsroom, Reinhard became concerned about elements of Phillips’s story. Phillips had said she lived in Alabama only for a summer while a teenager, but the cellphone number Phillips provided had an Alabama area code. Reinhard called NFM Lending in Westchester County, but the company said a person named Jaime Phillips did not work there. 

Alice Crites, a Post researcher who was looking into Phillips’s background, found a document that strongly reinforced the reporters’ suspicions: a Web page for a fundraising campaign by someone with the same name. It was on the website GoFundMe.com under the name Jaime Phillips.

“I’m moving to New York!” the May 29 appeal said. “I’ve accepted a job to work in the conservative media movement to combat the lies and deceipt of the liberal MSM. I’ll be using my skills as a researcher and fact-checker to help our movement. I was laid off from my mortgage job a few months ago and came across the opportunity to change my career path.”

In a March posting on its Facebook page, Project Veritas said it was seeking 12 new “undercover reporters,” though the organization’s operatives use methods that are eschewed by mainstream journalists, such as misrepresenting themselves. 

A posting for the “journalist” job on the Project Veritas website that month warned that the job “is not a role for the faint of heart.”

The job’s listed goal: “To adopt an alias persona, gain access to an identified person of interest and persuade that person to reveal information.”

It also listed tasks that the job applicant should be able to master, including: “Learning a script,” “Preparing a background story to support your role,” “Gaining an appointment or access to the target of the investigation,” and “Operating concealed recording equipment.”

Project Veritas, founded in 2010, is a tax-exempt charity that says its mission is to “investigate and expose corruption, dishonesty, self-dealing, waste, fraud and other misconduct.” It raised $4.8 million and employed 38 people in 2016, according to its public tax filing. It also had 92 volunteers.

O’Keefe’s criminal record has caused the charity problems in some states. Mississippi and Utah stripped the group of a license to raise money in those states because it failed to disclose O’Keefe’s conviction on state applications, records show.

Also working at Veritas is former television producer Robert J. Halderman, who was sentenced to six months in jail in 2010 after he was accused of trying to blackmail late-night host David Letterman. Halderman was with O’Keefe outside the Project Veritas offices Monday as a reporter tried to ask about Phillips’s role with the organization.

Because Jaime Phillips is a relatively common name, it wasn’t a certainty that the GoFundMe page that Crites found was created by the same woman who approached The Post. But there was another telling detail, in addition to the name. One of two donations listed on the page was from a person whose name matched her daughter’s, according to public records.

McCrummen agreed to meet Phillips that afternoon. Phillips suggested meeting somewhere in Alexandria, Va., saying she was shopping in the area. Post video reporters accompanied McCrummen, who brought a printout of the fundraising page to the interview.

Again, Phillips had arrived early and was waiting for McCrummen, her purse resting on the table. When McCrummen put her purse near Phillips’s purse to block a possible camera, Phillips moved hers.

The Post video reporters sat separately, unnoticed, at an adjacent table. 
Phillips said she didn’t want to get into the details of what she had said happened between her and Moore. 

She said she wanted McCrummen to assure her that the article would result in Moore’s defeat, according to a recording. McCrummen instead asked her about her story regarding Moore.

Phillips complained that President Trump had endorsed Moore. 

“So my whole thing is, like, I want him to be completely taken out of the race,” she said. “And I really expected that was going to happen, and now it’s not. So, I don’t know what you think about that.” 

McCrummen asked Phillips to verify her identity with a photo identification. Phillips provided a Georgia driver’s license. 

McCrummen then asked her about the GoFundMe page.

“We have a process of doing background, checking backgrounds and this kind of thing, so I wanted to ask you about one thing,” McCrummen said, pulling out a copy of the page and reading from it. “So I just wanted to ask you if you could explain this, and I also wanted to let you know, Jaime, that this is being recorded and video recorded.” 

“Okay,” Phillips said. “Um, yeah, I was looking to take a job last summer in New York, but it fell through,” Phillips said. “Yeah, it was going to be with the Daily Caller, but it ended up falling through, so I wasn’t able to do it.”

When asked who at the Daily Caller interviewed her, Phillips said, “Kathy,” pausing before adding the last name, “Johnson.”

Paul Conner, executive editor of the Daily Caller, said Monday that no one with the name Kathy Johnson works for the publication and that he has no record of having personally interviewed Phillips. Conner later said in an email that he had asked other top editors at the Daily Caller and the affiliated Daily Caller News Foundation about Phillips.

“None of us has interviewed a woman by the name Jaime Phillips,” Conner wrote.
At the Alexandria restaurant on Wednesday, Phillips also told The Post that she had not been in contact with the Moore campaign. As the interview ended, Phillips told McCrummen she was not recording the conversation.

“I think I probably just want to cancel and not go through with it at this point,” Phillips said at Souvlaki Bar shortly before ending the interview. 

“I’m not going to answer any more questions,” she said. “I think I’m just going to go.”
She picked up her coat and bag, returned her drink to the front counter and left the restaurant.

By 7 p.m. the message on the GoFundMe page was gone, replaced by a new one.
“Campaign is complete and no longer active,” it read.
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​
James Edward O'Keefe III (born June 28, 1984) is an American conservative political activist. He produces secretly recorded undercover audio and video encounters with figures and workers in academic, governmental and social service organizations, purporting to show abusive or allegedly illegal behavior by employees and/or representatives of those organizations. 

​O'Keefe has been criticized for selectively editing videos to misrepresent the context of conversations and the subjects' responses, creating the false impression that people said or did things they did not.

He gained national attention for his video recordings of workers at Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) offices in 2009, his arrest and guilty plea in 2010 for entering the federal office of then-U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) under false pretenses, and the release of videos of conversations with two high-ranking, now former, NPR executives in 2011.

When his videos portraying ACORN workers seemingly aiding a couple in criminal planning hit the 24-hour cable news cycle, the U.S. Congress quickly voted to freeze funds for the non-profit. The national controversy resulted in the non-profit also losing most of its private funding before investigations of the videos concluded no illegal activity occurred.

In March 2010, ACORN was close to bankruptcy and had to close or rename most of its offices. Shortly after, the California State Attorney General's Office and the US Government Accountability Office released their related investigative reports.

The Attorney General's Office found that O'Keefe had misrepresented the actions of ACORN workers in California and that the workers had not broken any laws. A preliminary probe by the GAO found that ACORN had managed its federal funds appropriately. One of the fired ACORN workers sued O'Keefe for invasion of privacy; O'Keefe issued an apology and agreed to pay $100,000 in a settlement.

O'Keefe gained support from conservative media and interest groups. In 2009, Andrew Breitbart commissioned him for the option to publish new videos exclusively on BigGovernment.com.

​In June 2010, O'Keefe formed a 501(c)(3) organization, Project Veritas, with the stated mission to "investigate and expose corruption, dishonesty, self-dealing, waste, fraud and other misconduct."

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Larry Nassar
YouTube Video: Victims' Father lunges at Larry Nassar in court by CNN
Pictured: Larry Nassar Sentenced to 40 to 175 Years In Prison For Sexual Abuse of More Than 150 Women (by Sports Illustrated January 24, 2018)

​Lawrence Gerard Nassar (born August 16, 1963) is an American convicted serial child molester who was the USA Gymnastics national team doctor and an osteopathic physician at Michigan State University.

Nassar's cumulative criminal acts of assault composed the USA Gymnastics sex abuse scandal, in which he was accused of molesting at least 250 underage girls, including a number of well-known Olympic gymnasts, dating as far back as 1992. He has admitted to at least ten of the accusations.

In July 2017, Nassar was sentenced to 60 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to child pornography charges. On January 24, 2018, Nassar was sentenced to 40 to 175 years in a state prison in Michigan after pleading guilty to the sexual assault of minors. He will serve the federal and state sentences consecutively.

For more about Larry Nassar, click on any of the following:







Assassination of John F. Kennedy
YouTube Video Who killed JFK? Behind the scenes of Warren Commission
Pictured below: President Kennedy with his wife, Jacqueline, and Texas Governor John Connally with his wife, Nellie, in the presidential limousine, minutes before the assassination

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States, was assassinated on Friday, November 22, 1963, at 12:30 p.m. in Dallas, Texas, while riding in a presidential motorcade through Dealey Plaza. Kennedy was riding with his wife Jacqueline, Texas Governor John Connally, and Connally's wife, Nellie when he was fatally shot. Governor Connally was seriously wounded in the attack. The motorcade rushed to Parkland Memorial Hospital where President Kennedy was pronounced dead about thirty minutes after the shooting; Connally recovered from his injuries.

Former U.S. Marine Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested by the Dallas Police Department 70 minutes after the initial shooting. Oswald was charged under Texas state law with the murder of Kennedy as well as that of Dallas policeman J. D. Tippit, who had been fatally shot a short time after the assassination.

At 11:21 a.m. Sunday, November 24, 1963, as live television cameras covered his transfer to the Dallas County Jail, Oswald was fatally shot in the basement of Dallas Police Headquarters by Dallas nightclub operator Jack Ruby. Oswald was taken to Parkland Memorial Hospital where he soon died.

Ruby was convicted of Oswald's murder, though it was later overturned on appeal, and Ruby died in prison in 1967 while awaiting a new trial.

After a ten-month investigation, the Warren Commission concluded that Oswald assassinated Kennedy, that Oswald had acted entirely alone, and that Ruby had acted alone in killing Oswald. Kennedy was the eighth US President to die in office and the fourth (following those of Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley) and most recent to be assassinated.

Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson automatically became President upon Kennedy's death.

In contrast to the conclusions of the Warren Commission, the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded in 1979 that Kennedy was "probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy". The HSCA agreed with the Warren Commission that the injuries that Kennedy and Connally sustained were caused by Oswald's three rifle shots, but they also determined the existence of an additional gunshot based on the analysis of a dictabelt audio recording and therefore "... a high probability that two gunmen fired at [the] President."

The Committee was not able to identify any individuals or groups involved with the possible conspiracy. In addition, the HSCA found that the original federal investigations were "seriously flawed" with respect to information-sharing and the possibility of conspiracy. As recommended by the HSCA, the acoustic evidence indicating conspiracy was subsequently re-examined and rejected.

In light of the investigative reports determining that "reliable acoustic data do not support a conclusion that there was a second gunman," the U.S. Justice Department concluded active investigations and stated "that no persuasive evidence can be identified to support the theory of a conspiracy in ... the assassination of President Kennedy."

However, Kennedy's assassination is still the subject of widespread debate and has spawned numerous conspiracy theories and alternative scenarios. Nonetheless, polls conducted from 1966 to 2004 found that up to 80 percent of Americans have suspected that there was a plot or cover-up.

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Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy
YouTube Video about the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy
Pictured below: Robert F. Kennedy lies mortally wounded on the floor immediately after the shooting. Kneeling beside him is 17-year-old busboy, Juan Romero, who was shaking Kennedy's hand when Sirhan Sirhan fired the shots.

On June 5, 1968, presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy was mortally wounded shortly after midnight PDT at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. Earlier that evening, the 42 year-old junior Senator from New York was declared the winner in the South Dakota and California presidential primaries in the 1968 election. He was pronounced dead at 1:44 AM on June 6, about 26 hours after he had been shot.

Following dual victories in the California and South Dakota primary elections for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States, Senator Kennedy spoke to journalists and campaign workers at a live televised celebration from the stage of his headquarters at the Ambassador Hotel.

Shortly after leaving the podium and exiting through a kitchen hallway, he was mortally wounded by multiple shots fired from a handgun. Kennedy died in the Good Samaritan Hospital 26 hours later.

The shooter was 24 year-old Palestinian/Jordanian immigrant, Sirhan Sirhan. In 1969, Sirhan was convicted of murdering the senator and sentenced to death. His sentence was commuted to life in prison in 1972. A freelance newspaper reporter recorded the shooting on audio tape, and the aftermath was captured on film.

Kennedy's remains were taken to St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York for two days of public viewing before a funeral Mass was held on June 8. His funeral train traveled from New York City to Washington, DC, and throngs of spectators lined the route to view the journey. His body was interred at night in Arlington National Cemetery near his brother John.

His death prompted the United States Secret Service to protect presidential candidates. Vice President Hubert Humphrey was also a presidential candidate; he went on to win the Democratic nomination but ultimately lost the election to Republican Richard Nixon.

The assassination of Robert Kennedy and the circumstances surrounding it have spawned a variety of conspiracy theories. Kennedy and Huey Long of Louisiana (in 1935) are the only two sitting United States Senators to be assassinated.

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Donald Trump Administration's Family Separation Policy 
vs. President Trump's use of undocumented immigrant labor: Is anyone surprised?​ (by the Washington Post, 12/6/2018) Pictured below: 
LEFT: A protester compares child detention by the government to the Nazi concentration camps (Courtesy of Wikipedia)
RIGHT: ​Detained children sitting within a wire mesh compartment in the Ursula detention facility in McAllen, Texas
Click here to read the article by the Washington Post about Donald Trump's hiring of illegal Immigrants.


The Trump administration family separation policy, described by the Trump administration as part of its "zero tolerance" policy, was an aspect of U.S. President Donald Trump's immigration policy.

The new guidelines were implemented in April 2018, and, following immense public opposition and political pressure, were suspended for an indefinite period of time on June 20, 2018, through an executive order.

Under the zero tolerance protocol, federal authorities separated children from their parents, relatives, or other adults who accompanied them in crossing the border.

Despite documented cases of children being separated when lawfully presenting at ports of entry, the Trump administration said this only happened in cases of protecting children or human trafficking.

The policy involved prosecuting all adults who were detained at the U.S.–Mexico border, sending the parents to federal jails, and placing children and infants under the supervision of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. According to government officials, the policy led to the separation of almost 3,000 children from their parents.

The Trump administration sought to justify the new policy while also blaming Congress for it, with President Trump referring to "the Democrats’ law" and calling for a change to existing immigration laws. Democrats, and many Republicans, spoke out forcefully against the policy.

No law forced the government to separate families. Attorney General Jeff Sessions defended the policy, citing a passage from the Bible. Other administration officials argued that the policy was intended to deter immigration or be used as political leverage to force Democrats and moderate Republicans to accept hard-line immigration legislation.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Physicians and the American Psychiatric Association condemned the policy, with the American Academy of Pediatrics saying that the policy has caused "irreparable harm" to the children. On June 30, a national protest was held which drew hundreds of thousands of protesters from all 50 states to demonstrate in more than 600 towns and cities.

Authorities made the decision to take children from their parents without a plan to reunite families, resulting in numerous cases of parents and children having no contact since being forcefully separated.

Following national and international criticism, on June 20 President Trump signed an executive order ending family separations at the border. Following the suspension of the policy, Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar  testified that the Department would only reunite children with their detained parents if Congress passed legislation lifting the 20-day limit on family detention required under the Flores settlement.

On June 26, responding to an ACLU class action lawsuit, a federal judge ordered all separated children, except where not appropriate, be reunited with their parent within 30 days.

On July 26, the Trump administration said that 1,442 children had been reunited with their parents while 711 remained in government shelters. Officials said they will work with the court to return the remaining children, including 431 parents of those children who have already been deported without their children. As of August 20, 528 of the children — about a fifth — have still not been reunited with their parents.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the Trump Administration's 







Human Trafficking in the United StatesPictured below: Asia Is the Largest Source of Human Trafficking in the U.S.
Human trafficking is the modern form of slavery, with illegal smuggling and trading of people, for forced labor or sexual exploitation.

Trafficking is officially defined as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring, or receipt of persons by means of coercion, abduction, fraud, deception, or abuse of power of a position of vulnerability for the purpose of exploitation. Human trafficking is not synonymous with forced migration or smuggling.

In the United States, human trafficking tends to occur around international travel-hubs with large immigrant populations, notably California, Texas and Georgia. The U.S. Justice Department estimates that 35,500–170,500 people are trafficked into the country every year.

The 2016 Global Slavery Index estimates that including U.S. citizens and immigrants 57,700 people are victims of human trafficking. Those being trafficked include young children, teenagers, men and women and can be domestic citizens or foreign nationals.

Under federal law (18 USC § 1589), it is a crime to make people work by use of force, coercion or fear. U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in "Tier 1" in 2017.

On April 11, 2018, U.S. President Donald Trump signed the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act into law, which is aimed at closing websites that enable the crime to occur, and prosecuting their owners and users.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Human Sex Trafficking in the United States:







Jeffrey EpsteinPictured Below: A prison worker on duty at the time of Jeffrey Epstein's death was offered a plea deal, sources say
​Jeffrey Edward Epstein (January 20, 1953 – August 10, 2019) was an American financier and convicted sex offender. Epstein began his professional life as a teacher but then switched to the banking and finance sector in various roles, working at Bear Stearns before forming his own firm. He developed an elite social circle and procured women and many underage girls who were then sexually abused by Epstein and some of these contacts.

​In 2005, police in Palm Beach, Florida began investigating Epstein after a parent complained that he had sexually abused her 14-year-old daughter. Epstein pleaded guilty and was convicted in 2008 by a Florida state court of procuring an underage girl for prostitution and of soliciting a prostitute. He served almost 13 months in custody, but with extensive work release. He was convicted of only these two crimes as part of a plea deal; federal officials had in fact identified 36 girls, some as young as 14 years old, whom Epstein had sexually abused.

Epstein was arrested again on July 6, 2019 on federal charges for the sex trafficking of minors in Florida and New York. He died in his jail cell on August 10, 2019. The medical examiner ruled the death a suicide, although Epstein's lawyers have disputed the ruling. Because his death eliminates the possibility of pursuing criminal charges, a judge dismissed all criminal charges on August 29, 2019.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Jeffrey Epstein:
​





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Bayer AG and the Pesticide  Roundup, including Bayer's product Neonicotinoid and its impact on the Bee population. Pictured below:
TOP Row:
(L): Roundup weed killer may play role in widespread bee deaths, study finds (CBS News)
(R): Third US jury finds Roundup weed killer likely caused cancer, awarding couple $2 billion
BOTTOM Row: Chart: Bayer AG proposed takeover of Monsanto could create three crop-chemicals giants
[Your WebHost: while Bayer offers a wide variety of safe pharmaceutical and other products to its customers, nonetheless the company has also been responsible for products that have killed people and even bees!]

Bayer AG is a German multinational pharmaceutical and life sciences company and one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. Headquartered in Leverkusen, Bayer's areas of business include human and veterinary pharmaceuticals; consumer healthcare products; agricultural chemicals, seeds and biotechnology products.

The company is a component of the Euro Stoxx 50 stock market index. Werner Baumann has been CEO since 2016.

Founded in Barmen in 1863 as a dyestuffs factory, Bayer's first and best-known product was aspirin. In 1898 Bayer trademarked the name heroin for the drug diacetylmorphine and marketed it as a cough suppressant and non-addictive substitute for morphine until 1910.

Bayer also introduced phenobarbital; prontosil, the first widely used antibiotic and the subject of the 1939 Nobel Prize in Medicine; the antibiotic Cipro (ciprofloxacin); and Yaz (drospirenone) birth control pills.

In 1925 Bayer was one of six chemical companies that merged to form IG Farben, the world's largest chemical and pharmaceutical company. The Allied Control Council seized IG Farben after World War II, because of its role in the Nazi war effort and involvement in the Holocaust, which included using slave labour from concentration camps and the purchase of humans for dangerous medical testing. It was split into its six constituent companies in 1951, then split again into three: BASF, Bayer and Hoechst.

Bayer played a key role in the Wirtschaftswunder in post-war West Germany, quickly regaining its position as one of the world's largest chemical and pharmaceutical corporations.

In 2006 the company acquired Schering, in 2014 it acquired Merck & Co.'s consumer business, with brands such as Claritin, Coppertone and Dr. Scholl's, and in 2018 it acquired Monsanto, a leading producer of genetically engineered crops, for $63 billion. Bayer CropScience develops genetically modified crops and pesticides.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Bayer AG: ___________________________________________________________________________

​Glyphosate-based herbicides (trade name Roundup)

Glyphosate-based herbicides are usually made of a glyphosate salt that is combined with other ingredients that are needed to stabilize the herbicide formula and allow penetration into plants.

The glyphosate-based herbicide Roundup was first developed by Monsanto in the 1970s. It is used most heavily on corn, soy, and cotton crops that have been genetically modified to be resistant to the herbicide. Some products include two active ingredients, such as Enlist Duo which includes 2,4-D as well as glyphosate.

As of 2010, more than 750 glyphosate products were on the market. The names of inert ingredients used in glyphosate formulations are usually not listed on the product labels.

Glyphosate and glyphosate-based herbicides have low acute toxicity in mammals. They likewise have not been shown to pose a significant risk to human health during normal use, although human deaths have been reported from deliberate ingestion of concentrated RoundUp.

It is difficult to determine how much surfactants contribute to the overall toxicity of each formulation. Glyphosate formulations containing the surfactant polyethoxylated tallow amine (POEA) are sometimes used terrestrially, but are not approved for aquatic use in the US due to their toxicity to aquatic organisms.

There have been multiple lawsuits against Monsanto asserting that exposure to glyphosate herbicides is carcinogenic and that the company did not adequately disclose the risk to consumers.

In 2018 a California jury awarded $289 million in damages (later cut to $78 million on appeal) to a groundskeeper who argued that Monsanto failed to adequately warn consumers of cancer risks posed by the herbicides.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Glyphosate-based herbicides: ___________________________________________________________________________

Neonicotinoid:

​Neonicotinoids (sometimes shortened to neonics) are a class of neuro-active insecticides chemically similar to nicotine.

In the 1980s Shell and in the 1990s Bayer started work on their development.

The neonicotinoid family includes: 
Imidacloprid is the most widely used insecticide in the world. Compared to organophosphate and carbamate insecticides, neonicotinoids cause less toxicity in birds and mammals than insects. Some breakdown products are also toxic to insects.

Neonicotinoid use has been linked in a range of studies to adverse ecological effects, including honey-bee colony collapse disorder (CCD) and loss of birds due to a reduction in insect populations.

Some scientific findings regarding the harm caused to bees by neonics have been conflicting and controversial. This is partly because bees exposed to normal levels of neonicotinoids do not immediately die.

Some sources have proposed that neonicotinoids reduce a bee colony's ability to survive the winter. Most academic and governmental bodies agree that neonicotinoids have had a negative influence on bee populations.

In 2013, the European Union and a few neighboring countries restricted the use of certain neonicotinoids; in 2018, the EU banned the three main neonicotinoids (clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam) for all outdoor uses.

​Several states in the United States have also restricted usage of neonicotinoids out of concern for pollinators and bees.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Neonicotinoid:






​
Teflon’s River of Fear (Fortune 5/24/18) 
(Polytetrafluoroethylene) Pictured below: The Teflon Deception: It Releases Toxic Fumes When Heated
​Teflon’s River of Fear

Chemical giant Chemours is facing off against residents of North Carolina in a battle over a potentially harmful compound used to make nonstick pans. (Fortune 5/24/2018)

"Teflon is the quintessential American product. It was discovered by accident and like many such discoveries was at first simply a creation in search of a purpose. Versions of it are in our frying pans and popcorn bags, our medical devices and electronic gadgets, our pruning shears and our cars. It is ubiquitous and essential. It is part of our vocabulary, uttered with both envy and exasperation to describe politicians and Mafia dons. It even helped win World War II: Teflon was needed to properly seal the pipes in the gaseous diffusion plant where uranium was enriched to make the first atomic bombs.

Teflon is made by Chemours, a chemical manufacturer that was spun out of DuPont in 2015. At that time, many investors thought Chemours was destined—even designed—to fail. It was weighted down with both DuPont’s environmental liabilities and billions in debt. But the company proved critics wrong and has become a stock market darling by selling businesses, cutting costs, and reaping a windfall from widespread adoption of its Opteon line of environmentally friendly refrigerants.

With $6.2 billion in sales, Chemours ranks No. 451 on this year’s Fortune 500, up 31 spots from last year. Its erstwhile parent DuPont, meanwhile, fell off the list this year after completing its merger with Dow Chemical. (The combined ­DowDuPont ranks No. 47 on this year’s 500.) Shares of Chemours have soared more than 400% over the past two years vs. a 33% gain for the S&P 500.

In February 2017, Chemours took a big step toward resolving its environmental problems when it and DuPont were able to settle—without admitting fault or liability—a sprawling class-action litigation with plaintiffs involving a chemical known as C8, a once-vital ingredient for making Teflon that has been linked to certain kinds of cancer and other diseases. The agreement appeared to signal stability and certainty for the young company.

But Chemours (and by extension, DuPont) now finds itself again in legal and regulatory trouble with Teflon. This time it’s over the chemical developed to replace C8—and how it came to be that the companies were for decades discharging this substance from a factory in rural North Carolina into the air and the Cape Fear River, the water supply for more than 250,000 people in and around Wilmington, N.C.

The chemical is called GenX. (Not to be confused with Generation X, the demographic cohort that came after the baby boomers.) GenX is everywhere in and around the Chemours North Carolina factory, known as the Fayetteville Works. It’s in the dirt, falling to the earth with the rain. It is in the wells of nearby residents, say state officials, sparking fear and anger.

“People ask me why I don’t just walk away,” said Mike Watters, who lives near the factory on five acres with a well and property contaminated by Chemours’s discharges and has joined a lawsuit against the company. He has a simple answer: “I didn’t cause this. They did.”

GenX has been linked to cancer in laboratory animals. A 2016 report from the Dutch government—Chemours has a Teflon factory in the Netherlands—said it was less toxic than C8 but still a “suspected human carcinogen.” Other research suggests GenX is safe at low doses. There have been no human epidemiology studies.

The uncertainty has made GenX a symbol of so-called emerging contaminants, or chemicals for which the health risks are not known. It is fueling a national debate over how to regulate an industry in which innovation is often driven by developing replacement chemicals that are said to be safer—if not always actually safe.

This is all taking place as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is under scrutiny, with Administrator Scott Pruitt facing multiple investigations into his spending, travel, and ties to lobbyists while also pursuing policies that could make it harder to control what gets pumped into our air and water. The GenX controversy may show the limits of that strategy:

The Trump administration’s appointee for the EPA section overseeing chemical pollution was forced to withdraw, in part, because he faced stiff resistance for defending GenX in the past.

North Carolina officials, meanwhile, are trying to rein in Chemours through tighter regulation and litigation. In a pending lawsuit, the state claims the company systematically misled its regulators on its emissions. “In fact, information provided by DuPont and Chemours led Division of Water Resources staff to reasonably believe that GenX was not being discharged into the Cape Fear,” the state’s filing says. ­Chemours has not yet responded to or made public comments about the allegations.

Chemours also faces a slew of lawsuits from property owners with allegedly contaminated wells, from residents who rely on public drinking water, and from the local governments that draw their water from the Cape Fear.

“We want an assurance that the things that are going into the river that we can’t filter are safe for our drinking water, and that’s not something that our rate payers should pay for,” says Jim Flechtner, the executive director of the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, which is a plaintiff and is considering whether to build a $46 million treatment plant to filter out GenX and related contaminants.

Chemours declined repeated requests from Fortune for interviews. In court papers, the company has said it followed proper procedures on its discharges and that GenX is not toxic at the amounts released. But the company is now capturing its GenX-contaminated wastewater and sending it off-site for disposal. Chemours has been ordered to provide bottled water to many residents who live near the factory, and it has told the state it will spend $100 million to eliminate virtually all of its tainted-air emissions.

The CEO of Chemours, Mark Vergnano, said on an earnings call in February that there is no cause for concern and that Chemours has purposefully kept a low profile out of respect for the process of finding a long-term solution. “I really want to be clear that we continue to believe that none of the discharges either before we became an independent company in mid-2015 or after have adversely impacted anyone’s health,” he said.

While Vergnano is well-respected in the industry for his discipline and execution skills, good timing has played a part in the company’s recovery. Prices for titanium dioxide—the company’s largest product line—stabilized just as Opteon took off, giving Chemours some needed momentum. “Opteon turned the company around,” says James Butkiewicz, a professor of economics at the University of Delaware who has watched Chemours closely since its spinoff.

But Teflon and GenX are casting a shadow over Chemours’s future prospects. Moody’s said recently that it would be unlikely to consider an upgrade for Chemours debt, now at Ba2, “until the litigation risk has better clarity, or until there are clearer settlement parameters with one or more of the complainants.” For both the company and the residents of Wilmington, resolution might not come anytime soon."

If there’s one thing that sticks to Teflon, it seems, it’s controversy.

[End of Article]
___________________________________________________________________________

Polytetrafluoroethylene

Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) is a synthetic fluoropolymer of tetrafluoroethylene that has numerous applications. The well-known brand name of PTFE-based formulas is Teflon by Chemours. Chemours was a spin-off from DuPont, which originally discovered the compound in 1938. Another popular brand name of PTFE is Syncolon by Synco Chemical Corporation.

PTFE is a fluorocarbon solid, as it is a high molecular weight compound consisting wholly of carbon and fluorine. PTFE is hydrophobic: neither water nor water-containing substances wet PTFE, as fluorocarbons demonstrate mitigated London dispersion forces due to the high electronegativity of fluorine. PTFE has one of the lowest coefficients of friction of any solid.

PTFE is used as a non-stick coating for pans and other cookware. It is nonreactive, partly because of the strength of carbon–fluorine bonds, and so it is often used in containers and pipework for reactive and corrosive chemicals.

Where used as a lubricant, PTFE reduces friction, wear, and energy consumption of machinery. It is commonly used as a graft material in surgical interventions. It is also frequently employed as coating on catheters; this interferes with the ability of bacteria and other infectious agents to adhere to catheters and cause hospital-acquired infections.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Polytetrafluoroethylene:







The War on Drugs: Pictured below:
(L) The Drug War, Mass Incarceration and Race (English/Spanish);
(R) Drug trafficking by the numbers
[Your WebHost: this topic was included under the "Worst of Humanity" web page due to the overall injustice that the United States' War on Drugs perpetuated against innocent Americans whose only crime was to be trapped by the addictive nature of certain drugs: treatment, NOT incarceration, is the only solution!]

The war on drugs is a campaign, led by the U.S. federal government, of drug prohibition, military aid, and military intervention, with the stated aim being to reduce the illegal drug trade in the United States. 

The initiative includes a set of drug policies that are intended to discourage the production, distribution, and consumption of psychoactive drugs that the participating governments and the UN have made illegal. The term was popularized by the media shortly after a press conference given on June 18, 1971, by President Richard Nixon—the day after publication of a special message from President Nixon to the Congress on Drug Abuse Prevention and Control—during which he declared drug abuse "public enemy number one".

That message to the Congress included text about devoting more federal resources to the "prevention of new addicts, and the rehabilitation of those who are addicted", but that part did not receive the same public attention as the term "war on drugs". However, two years prior to this, Nixon had formally declared a "war on drugs" that would be directed toward eradication, interdiction, and incarceration. Today, the Drug Policy Alliance, which advocates for an end to the War on Drugs, estimates that the United States spends $51 billion annually on these initiatives.

On May 13, 2009, Gil Kerlikowske—the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP)—signaled that the Obama administration did not plan to significantly alter drug enforcement policy, but also that the administration would not use the term "War on Drugs", because Kerlikowske considers the term to be "counter-productive". 

ONDCP's view is that "drug addiction is a disease that can be successfully prevented and treated... making drugs more available will make it harder to keep our communities healthy and safe".

In June 2011, the Global Commission on Drug Policy released a critical report on the War on Drugs, declaring: "The global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world.

Fifty years after the initiation of the UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, and years after President Nixon launched the US government's war on drugs, fundamental reforms in national and global drug control policies are urgently needed." The report was criticized by organizations that oppose a general legalization of drugs.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the "War on Drugs":






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Assault Weapons in the United States, including Semi-automatic Firearms, Bump Stocks, as well as Assault Weapons Legislation and the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence Pictured below:
TOP: With AR-15s, Mass Shooters Attack With the Rifle Firepower Typically Used by Infantry Troops
BOTTOM: Banning assault weapons won't solve America's gun problem
[Your WebHost:​ Below along with the next topic (the NRA) we cover the weapons mostly used domestically to kill innocent Americans, many our school children like the Stoneland Douglas High School Shooting]

Assault weapon is a term used in the United States to define some types of firearms.

The definition varies among regulating jurisdictions but usually includes semi-automatic rifles with a detachable magazine, a pistol grip and sometimes other features such as a vertical forward grip, flash suppressor or barrel shroud. 

Some firearms are specified by name. At the time that the now-defunct Federal Assault Weapons Ban passed in 1994, the U.S. Department of Justice said, "In general, assault weapons are semiautomatic firearms with a large magazine of ammunition that were designed and configured for rapid fire and combat use." The origin of the term has been attributed to legislators, gun control groups, the media and the firearms industry.

​It is sometimes conflated with the term "assault rifle", which refers to selective-fire military rifles that can fire in automatic or burst mode.

After the December 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, many news organizations ran stories about assault weapons, explaining their varying definitions and presenting varying opinions about whether they should be banned again at the federal level.

For more about Assault Weapons, click on any of the following blue hyperlinks: ___________________________________________________________________________

A semi-automatic firearm, also called self-loading firearm or autoloading firearm (though fully automatic and selective fire firearms technically are also self-loading), is one that not only fires a bullet each time the trigger is pulled, but also performs all steps necessary to prepare it to discharge again—assuming cartridges remain in the firearm's feed device.

Typically, this includes extracting and ejecting the spent cartridge case from the firing chamber, re-cocking the firing mechanism, and loading a new cartridge into the firing chamber. To fire again, the trigger is released and re-pressed.

Ferdinand Ritter von Mannlicher produced the first successful design for a semi-automatic rifle in 1885, and by the early 20th century, many manufacturers had introduced semi-automatic shotguns, rifles and pistols.

In military use, self-loading rifles were barely used in World War I, and most armies in World War II also still relied upon bolt-action rifles, with the exception of the Americans, who in 1937 had adopted the M1 Garand as the standard-issue infantry weapon.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Semi-automatic Firearms: ___________________________________________________________________________

Bump stocks or bump fire stocks are gun stocks that can be used to assist in bump firing. Bump firing is the act of using the recoil of a semi-automatic firearm or double-action revolver to fire ammunition cartridges in rapid succession, but with a loss of accuracy.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Bump Stocks: ___________________________________________________________________________

Assault weapons legislation in the United States
​
Assault weapons legislation in the United States refers to bills and laws (active, expired, proposed or failed) that define and restrict or make illegal the manufacture, transfer, and possession of assault weapons. How these firearms are defined and regulated varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

The Federal Assault Weapons Ban enacted in 1994 expired in 2004. Attempts to renew this ban have failed, as have attempts to pass a new ban, such as the Assault Weapons Ban of 2013 (AWB 2013). Seven U.S. states have assault weapons bans: three were enacted before the 1994 federal ban and four more passed before the federal ban expired.

The majority of states, forty-three, have no assault weapons ban, although two, Minnesota and Virginia, have training and background check requirements for purchasers of assault weapons that are more stringent than those for ordinary firearms. While there are no statewide assault weapon bans in Colorado and Illinois, local bans exist in certain cities or counties in each of these states.

In 2018, some Americans supported a ban on assault weapons, according to polls. These 3 polls, polled a total of 4246 people (4246 of 325,000,000) with a maximum time window of 5 days. (1) 1992 people, 5 days. (2) 1005 people, 2 days. (3) 1249 people, 4 days.

The 1994 federal and 1989 state ban in California were prompted by the 1989 Cleveland Elementary School shooting in Stockton, California. Existing and proposed weapon bans come under renewed interest in the wake of mass shootings, most recently after the December 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut. In addition to state bans, Washington, D.C. and some U.S. counties and municipalities have assault weapons laws.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Assault Weapons Legislation in the United States: ___________________________________________________________________________

The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence:
The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) and the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence (EFSGV or Ed Fund), its sister organization, are two parts of a national, non-profit gun control advocacy organization that is opposed to gun violence. Since 1974, it has supported reduction in American gun violence via education and legislation.

​Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence:







Mass Shootings in the United States, the 2nd Amendment and National Rifle Association Pictured below: How the NRA Has Responded to Mass Shootings Over the Years
[Your Webhost: This topic added due to the fact that assault weapons are most frequently used for committing mass murder, including children!]

Mass shootings in the United States:

Mass shootings are incidents involving multiple victims of firearm-related violence. The precise inclusion criteria are disputed, and there is no broadly accepted definition.

One definition is an act of public firearm violence—excluding gang killings, domestic violence, or terrorist acts sponsored by an organization—in which a shooter kills at least four victims.

Using this definition, one study found that nearly one-third of the world's public mass shootings between 1966 and 2012 (90 of 292 incidents) occurred in the United States.

Using a similar definition, The Washington Post records 163 mass shootings in the United States between 1967 and June 2019.

Gun Violence Archive, frequently cited by the press, defines a mass shooting as firearm violence resulting in at least four people being shot at roughly the same time and location, excluding the perpetrator. Using this definition, there have been 2,128 mass shootings since 2013, roughly one per day.

According to some studies, the United States has had more mass shootings than any other country. Shooters generally either die by suicide afterwards or are restrained or killed by law enforcement officers or civilians. However, mass shootings accounted for less than two-tenths of 1% (0.2%) of all homicides in the United States between 2000 and 2016.

Definitions:

There is no fixed definition of a mass shooting in the United States. The Investigative Assistance for Violent Crimes Act of 2012, signed into law in January 2013, defines a "mass killing" as one resulting in at least 3 victims, excluding the perpetrator.

In 2015, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) does not define a mass shooting but does define a public mass shooting — for the purposes of its report entitled “Mass Murder with Firearms” — as "a multiple homicide incident in which four or more victims are murdered with firearms, within one event, and in one or more locations in close proximity".

The CRS further states that its report "attempts to refine the relatively broad concept of mass shooting [...] into a narrower formulation: public mass shootings."  A broader definition, as used by the Gun Violence Archive, is that of "4 or more shot or killed, not including the shooter". This definition, of four people shot regardless of whether or not that results in injury or death, is often used by the media, press, and non-profit organizations.

Frequency:
​
Some studies indicate that the rate at which public mass shootings occur has tripled since 2011. Between 1982 and 2011, a mass shooting occurred roughly once every 200 days.

However, between 2011 and 2014, that rate has accelerated greatly with at least one mass shooting occurring every 64 days in the United States.

In recent years, the number of public mass shootings has increased substantially, although there has been an approximately 50% decrease in firearm homicides in the nation overall since 1993. The decrease in firearm homicides has been attributed to better policing, a better economy and environmental factors such as the removal of lead from gasoline.

Differing sources:

A comprehensive report by USA Today tracked all mass killings from 2006 through 2017 in which the perpetrator willfully killed 4 or more people. For mass killings by firearm for instance, it found 271 incidents with a total of 1,358 victims.

Mother Jones listed seven mass shootings, defined as indiscriminate rampages in public places resulting in four or more victims killed, in the U.S. for 2015.

An analysis by Michael Bloomberg's gun violence prevention group, Everytown for Gun Safety, identified 110 mass shootings, defined as shootings in which at least four people were murdered with a firearm, between January 2009 and July 2014; at least 57% were related to domestic or family violence.

Other media outlets have reported that hundreds of mass shootings take place in the United States in a single calendar year, citing a crowd-funded website known as Shooting Tracker which defines a mass shooting as having four or more people injured or killed.

In December 2015, The Washington Post reported that there had been 355 mass shootings in the United States so far that year. In August 2015, The Washington Post reported that the United States was averaging one mass shooting per day. An earlier report had indicated that in 2015 alone, there had been 294 mass shootings that killed or injured 1,464 people.

Shooting Tracker and Mass Shooting Tracker, the two sites that the media have been citing, have been criticized for using a broader criteria – counting four victims injured as a mass shooting – thus producing much higher figures.

​Demographics:

According to The New York Times, the majority of perpetrators they have published stories about are white males who act alone. According to most analyses and studies, the proportion of mass shooters in the United States who are white is slightly less than the proportion of white people in the general population of the US, however the proportion of male mass shooters is considerably greater than the proportion of males.

Contributing factors:

Several possible factors may work together to create a fertile environment for mass murder in the United States. Most commonly suggested include:
  1. Higher accessibility and ownership of guns. The US has the highest per-capita gun ownership in the world with 120.5 firearms per 100 people; the second highest is Yemen with 52.8 firearms per 100 people.
  2. Mental illness and its treatment (or the lack thereof) with psychiatric drugs. This is controversial. Many of the mass shooters in the U.S. suffered from mental illness, but the estimated number of mental illness cases has not increased as significantly as the number of mass shootings. Under 5% of violent behaviors in the U.S. are committed by persons with mental health diagnoses.
  3. The desire to seek revenge for a long history of being bullied at school. In recent years, citizens calling themselves "targeted individual" have cited adult bullying campaigns as a reason for their deadly violence.
  4. The widespread chronic gap between people's expectations for themselves and their actual achievement, and individualistic culture. Some analysts and commentators place the blame on contemporary capitalism and neoliberalism.
  5. Desire for fame and notoriety. Also, mass shooters learn from one another through "media contagion," that is, "the mass media coverage of them and the proliferation of social media sites that tend to glorify the shooters and downplay the victims."
  6. The copycat phenomenon.
  7. Failure of government background checks due to incomplete databases and/or staff shortages.

A panel of mental health and law enforcement experts has estimated that roughly one-third of acts of mass violence — defined as crimes in which four or more people were killed — since the 1990s were committed by people with a serious mental illness. However, the study emphasized that people with serious mental illness are responsible for less than 4% of all the violent acts committed in the United States.

Weapons used:

Several types of guns have been used in mass shootings in the United States. A 2014 study conducted by Dr. James Fox of 142 shootings found that 88 (62%) were committed with handguns of all types; 68 (48%) with semi-automatic handguns, 20 (14%) with revolvers, 35 (25%) with semi-automatic rifles, and 19 (13%) with shotguns.

The study was conducted using the Mother Jones database of mass shootings from 1982 to 2018. High capacity magazines were used in approximately half of mass shootings. Semi-automatic rifles have been used in six of the ten deadliest mass shooting events.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Mass Shootings in the United States: ___________________________________________________________________________

​Second Amendment to the United States Constitution:

[Your WebHost: this topic was only added for a clearer understanding that assault weapon are the primary means of mass murders, and the National Rifle Association cites that ownership of assault weapons are therefore protected by this Second Amendment, even though the only use of assault weapons is to kill other people!]

​The Second Amendment (Amendment II) to the United States Constitution protects the individual right to keep and bear arms. It was ratified on December 15, 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights.

In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the Supreme Court affirmed for the first time that the right belongs to individuals, for self-defense in the home, while also including, as dicta, that the right is not unlimited and does not preclude the existence of certain long-standing prohibitions such as those forbidding "the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill" or restrictions on "the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons." State and local governments are limited to the same extent as the federal government from infringing upon this right.

The Second Amendment was based partially on the right to keep and bear arms in English common law and was influenced by the English Bill of Rights of 1689. Sir William Blackstone described this right as an auxiliary right, supporting the natural rights of self-defense and resistance to oppression, and the civic duty to act in concert in defense of the state.

Any labels of rights as auxiliary must be viewed in the context of the inherent purpose of a Bill of Rights, which is to empower a group with the ability to achieve a mutually desired outcome, and not to necessarily enumerate or rank the importance of rights.

Thus all rights enumerated in a Constitution are thus auxiliary in the eyes of Sir William Blackstone because all rights are only as good as the extent they are exercised in fact.

While both James Monroe and John Adams supported the Constitution being ratified, its most influential framer was James Madison. In Federalist No. 46, Madison wrote how a federal army could be kept in check by state militias, "a standing army ... would be opposed [by] a militia."

Madison argued that state militias "would be able to repel the danger" of a federal army, "It may well be doubted, whether a militia thus circumstanced could ever be conquered by such a proportion of regular troops." He contrasted the federal government of the United States to the European kingdoms, which he described as "afraid to trust the people with arms," and assured that "the existence of subordinate governments ... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition".

By January 1788, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia and Connecticut ratified the Constitution without insisting upon amendments. Several amendments were proposed, but were not adopted at the time the Constitution was ratified. For example, the Pennsylvania convention debated fifteen amendments, one of which concerned the right of the people to be armed, another with the militia.

The Massachusetts convention also ratified the Constitution with an attached list of proposed amendments. In the end, the ratification convention was so evenly divided between those for and against the Constitution that the federalists agreed to the Bill of Rights to assure ratification.

In United States v. Cruikshank (1876), the Supreme Court ruled that, "The right to bear arms is not granted by the Constitution; neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The Second Amendments [sic] means no more than that it shall not be infringed by Congress, and has no other effect than to restrict the powers of the National Government."

In United States v. Miller (1939), the Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment did not protect weapon types not having a "reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia."

In the twenty-first century, the amendment has been subjected to renewed academic inquiry and judicial interest. In Heller, the Supreme Court handed down a landmark decision that held the amendment protects an individual's right to keep a gun for self-defense. 

This was the first time the Court had ruled that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual's right to own a gun. In McDonald v. Chicago (2010), the Court clarified that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporated the Second Amendment against state and local governments.

In Caetano v. Massachusetts (2016), the Supreme Court reiterated its earlier rulings that "the Second Amendment extends, prima facie, to all instruments that constitute bearable arms, even those that were not in existence at the time of the founding" and that its protection is not limited to "only those weapons useful in warfare."

The debate between various organizations regarding gun control and gun rights continues.

Click on any of the following blue  hyperlinks for more about the Second Amendment: ___________________________________________________________________________

​National Rifle Association (NRA):

[Your WebHost added this topic due to the intransigence of the NRA in outlawing the use of assault weapons (whose only purpose is for killing other humans)]

The National Rifle Association of America (NRA) is a gun rights advocacy group based in the United States. Founded in 1871, the group has informed its members about firearm-related legislation since 1934, and it has directly lobbied for and against firearms legislation since 1975.

Founded to advance rifle marksmanship, the modern NRA continues to teach firearm safety and competency. The organization also publishes several magazines and sponsors competitive marksmanship events.

According to the NRA, it has nearly 5 million members as of December 2018, although that figure has not been independently confirmed.
​
Observers and lawmakers see the NRA as one of the three most influential lobbying groups in Washington, D.C. The NRA Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) is its lobbying division, which manages its political action committee (PAC), the Political Victory Fund (PVF).

Over its history the organization has influenced legislation, participated in or initiated lawsuits, blocked research on gun control, and endorsed or opposed various candidates at local, state and federal levels.

The NRA has been criticized by gun control and gun rights advocacy groups, political commentators, and politicians.

The organization has been the focus of intense criticism in the aftermath of high-profile shootings, such as the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting and the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, after which they suggested adding armed security guards to schools.

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​
Violence Against Women including the "Violence Against Women Act" (1994) Pictured: PRESIDENT SIGNS VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN ACT INTO LAW
VAWA Re-Authorization Contains Sen. Whitehouse Provision on Teen Dating Violence
Violence against women (VAW), also known as gender-based violence and sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), are violent acts the victims of which are primarily or exclusively women or girls. Such violence is often considered a form of hate crime, committed against women or girls specifically because they are female, and can take many forms.

VAW has a very long history, though the incidents and intensity of such violence has varied over time and even today varies between societies. Such violence is often seen as a mechanism for the subjugation of women, whether in society in general or in an interpersonal relationship. Such violence may arise from a sense of entitlement, superiority, misogyny or similar attitudes in the perpetrator, or because of his violent nature, especially against women.

The UN Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women states, "violence against women is a manifestation of historically unequal power relations between men and women" and "violence against women is one of the crucial social mechanisms by which women are forced into a subordinate position compared with men."

Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations, declared in a 2006 report posted on the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) website:
Violence against women and girls is a problem of pandemic proportions. At least one out of every three women around the world has been beaten, coerced into sex, or otherwise abused in her lifetime with the abuser usually someone known to her.

Types of violence:

Violence against women can fit into several broad categories. These include violence carried out by individuals as well as states. Some of the forms of violence perpetrated by individuals are: 
There are forms of violence which may be perpetrated or condoned by the government, such as war rape; sexual violence and sexual slavery during conflict; forced sterilization; forced abortion; violence by the police and authoritative personnel; stoning and flogging. Many forms of VAW, such as trafficking in women and forced prostitution are often perpetrated by organized criminal networks.

Histrorically, there have been forms of organized WAV, such as the Witch trials in the early modern period or the sexual slavery of the Comfort women.

The World Health Organization (WHO), in its research on VAW, has analyzed and categorized the different forms of VAW occurring through all stages of life from before birth to old age.

In recent years, there has been a trend of approaching VAW at an international level through means such as conventions or, in the European Union, through directives (such as the directive against sexual harassment, and the directive against human trafficking).

Definition:

A number of international instruments that aim to eliminate violence against women and domestic violence have been enacted by various international bodies. These generally start with a definition of what such violence is, with a view to combating such practices.

The Istanbul Convention (Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence) of the Council of Europe describes VAW "as a violation of human rights and a form of discrimination against women" and defines VAW as "all acts of gender-based violence that result in, or are likely to result in, physical, sexual, psychological or economic harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.

The 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) of the United Nations General Assembly makes recommendations relating to VAW, and the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action mentions VAW. However, the 1993 United Nations General Assembly resolution on the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women was the first international instrument to explicitly define VAW and elaborate on the subject.

Other definitions of VAW are set out in the 1994 Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment, and Eradication of Violence against Women and by the 2003 Maputo Protocol.

In addition, the term gender-based violence refers to "any acts or threats of acts intended to hurt or make women suffer physically, sexually or psychologically, and which affect women because they are women or affect women disproportionately". The definition of gender-based violence is most often "used interchangeably with violence against women", and some articles on VAW reiterate these conceptions by suggesting that men are the main perpetrators of this violence.

Moreover, the definition stated by the 1993 Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women also supported the notion that violence is rooted in the inequality between men and women when the term violence is used together with the term 'gender-based.'

In Recommendation Rec(2002)5 of the Committee of Ministers to member states on the protection of women against violence, the Council of Europe stipulated that VAW "includes, but is not limited to, the following":
  • a. violence occurring in the family or domestic unit, including, inter alia, physical and mental aggression, emotional and psychological abuse, rape and sexual abuse, incest, rape between spouses, regular or occasional partners and cohabitants, crimes committed in the name of honour, female genital and sexual mutilation and other traditional practices harmful to women, such as forced marriages;
  • b. violence occurring within the general community, including, inter alia, rape, sexual abuse, sexual harassment and intimidation at work, in institutions or elsewhere trafficking in women for the purposes of sexual exploitation and economic exploitation and sex tourism;
  • c. violence perpetrated or condoned by the state or its officials;
  • d. violation of the human rights of women in situations of armed conflict, in particular the taking of hostages, forced displacement, systematic rape, sexual slavery, forced pregnancy, and trafficking for the purposes of sexual exploitation and economic exploitation.

These definitions of VAW as being gender-based are seen by some to be unsatisfactory and problematic. These definitions are conceptualized in an understanding of society as patriarchal, signifying unequal relations between men and women.

Opponents of such definitions argue that the definitions disregard violence against men and that the term gender, as used in gender based violence, only refers to women. Other critics argue that employing the term gender in this particular way may introduce notions of inferiority and subordination for femininity and superiority for masculinity.

There is no widely accepted current definition that covers all the dimensions of gender-based violence rather than the one for women that tends to reproduce the concept of binary oppositions: masculinity versus femininity.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Violence Against Women: ___________________________________________________________________________

​​The Violence Against Women Act of 1994 (VAWA) was a United States federal law (Title IV, sec. 40001-40703 of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, H.R. 3355) signed as Pub.L. 103–322 by President Bill Clinton on September 13, 1994 (codified in part at 42 U.S.C. sections 13701 through 14040).

The Act provided $1.6 billion toward investigation and prosecution of violent crimes against women, imposed automatic and mandatory restitution on those convicted, and allowed civil redress in cases prosecutors chose to leave un-prosecuted. The Act also established the Office on Violence Against Women within the Department of Justice.

VAWA was cosponsored by Senator Joe Biden (D-DE) and Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) (R-UT) in 1994 and gained support from a broad coalition of advocacy groups. The Act passed through Congress with bipartisan support in 1994, clearing the United States House of Representatives by a vote of 235–195 and the Senate by a vote of 61–38, although the following year House Republicans attempted to cut the Act's funding.

In the 2000 Supreme Court case United States v. Morrison, a sharply divided Court struck down the VAWA provision allowing women the right to sue their attackers in federal court. By a 5–4 majority, the Court overturned the provision as exceeding the federal government's powers under the Commerce Clause.

VAWA was reauthorized by bipartisan majorities in Congress in 2000 and again in December 2005. The Act's 2012 renewal was opposed by conservative Republicans, who objected to extending the Act's protections to same-sex couples and to provisions allowing battered undocumented immigrants to claim temporary visas, but it was reauthorized in 2013, after a long legislative battle.

As a result of the United States federal government shutdown of 2018–2019, the Violence Against Women Act expired on December 21, 2018. It was temporarily reinstated via a short-term spending bill on January 25, 2019, but expired again on February 15, 2019. The House of Representatives passed a bill reauthorizing VAWA in April 2019 and includes new provisions protecting transgender victims and banning individuals convicted of domestic abuse from purchasing firearms.

In an attempt to reach a bipartisan agreement, Senators Joni Ernst (R-IA) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) led months of negotiation talks that came to a halt in November 2019. Senator Joni Ernst has said she plans to introduce a new version of the bill and hopes it will pass in the U.S. Senate.

The House version of VAWA, H.R. 1585, currently does not include any federal penalties for Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an estimated 513,000 women and girls in the U.S. are at risk of FGM or have already undergone the operation.

Independent Women's Forum has urged Congress to include provisions enhancing penalties for female genital mutilation as well as funding to combat FGM. The House version also does not include measures to deter honor killings, sex trafficking or forced child marriages.

Background:
​
The World Conference on Human Rights, held in Vienna, Austria, in 1993, and the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women in the same year, concluded that civil society and governments have acknowledged that domestic violence is a public health policy and human rights concern.

In the United States, according to the National Intimate Partner Sexual Violence Survey of 2010 1 in 6 women suffered some kind of sexual violence induced by their intimate partner during the course of their lives.

The Violence Against Women Act was developed and passed as a result of extensive grassroots efforts in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Advocates for the battered women's movement included sexual assault advocates, individuals from victim services, law enforcement agencies, prosecutors' offices, the courts, and the private bar. They urged Congress to adopt significant legislation to address domestic and sexual violence.

One of the greatest successes of VAWA is its emphasis on a coordinated community response to domestic violence, sex dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking; courts, law enforcement, prosecutors, victim services, and the private bar currently work together in a coordinated effort that did not exist before at the state and local levels.

VAWA also supports the work of community-based organizations that are engaged in work to end domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking; particularly those groups that provide culturally and linguistically specific services. Additionally, VAWA provides specific support for work with tribes and tribal organizations to end domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking against Native American women.

Many grant programs authorized in VAWA have been funded by the U.S. Congress. The following grant programs, which are administered primarily through the Office on Violence Against Women in the U.S. Department of Justice have received appropriations from Congress:
  • STOP Grants (State Formula Grants)
  • Transitional Housing Grants
  • Grants to Encourage Arrest and Enforce Protection Orders
  • Court Training and Improvement Grants
  • Research on Violence Against Native American Women
  • National Tribal Sex Offender Registry
  • Stalker Reduction Database
  • Federal Victim Assistants
  • Sexual Assault Services Program
  • Services for Rural Victims
  • Civil Legal Assistance for Victims
  • Elder Abuse Grant Program
  • Protections and Services for Disabled Victims
  • Combating Abuse in Public Housing
  • National Resource Center on Workplace Responses
  • Violence on College Campuses Grants
  • Safe Havens Project
  • Engaging Men and Youth in Prevention
​
Debate and legal standing:

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) had originally expressed concerns about the Act, saying that the increased penalties were rash, that the increased pretrial detention was "repugnant" to the U.S. Constitution, that the mandatory HIV testing of those only charged but not convicted was an infringement of a citizen’s right to privacy, and that the edict for automatic payment of full restitution was non-judicious (see their paper: "Analysis of Major Civil Liberties Abuses in the Crime Bill Conference Report as Passed by the House and the Senate", dated September 29, 1994).

In 2005, the ACLU had, however, enthusiastically supported reauthorization of VAWA on the condition that the "unconstitutional DNA provision" be removed. That provision would have allowed law enforcement to take DNA samples from arrestees or even from those who had simply been stopped by police without the permission of a court.

The ACLU, in its July 27, 2005 'Letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee Regarding the Violence Against Women Act of 2005, S. 1197' stated that "VAWA is one of the most effective pieces of legislation enacted to end domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking. It has dramatically improved the law enforcement response to violence against women and has provided critical services necessary to support women in their struggle to overcome abusive situations".

Some activists opposed the bill. Janice Shaw Crouse, a senior fellow at the conservative, evangelistic Christian Concerned Women for America's Beverly LaHaye Institute, called the Act a "boondoggle" which "ends up creating a climate of suspicion where all men are feared or viewed as violent and all women are viewed as victims". She described the Act in 2012 as creating a "climate of false accusations, rush to judgment and hidden agendas" and criticized it for failing to address the factors identified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as leading to violent, abusive behavior.

Conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly denounced VAWA as a tool to "fill feminist coffers" and argued that the Act promoted "divorce, breakup of marriage and hatred of men".

In 2000, the Supreme Court of the United States held part of VAWA unconstitutional on federalism grounds in United States v. Morrison. That decision invalidated only the civil remedy provision of VAWA. The provisions providing program funding were unaffected.

In 2005, the reauthorization of VAWA (as HR3402) defined what population benefited under the term of "Underserved Populations" described as " Populations underserved because of geographic location, underserved racial and ethnic populations, populations underserved because of special needs (such as language barriers, disabilities, alienage status, or age) and any other population determined to be underserved by the Attorney General or by the Secretary of Health and Human Services as appropriate".

The reauthorization also "Amends the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968" to "prohibit officials from requiring sex offense victims to submit to a polygraph examination as a condition for proceeding with an investigation or prosecution of a sex offense."
In 2011, the law expired. In 2012 the law was up for reauthorization in Congress.

Different versions of the legislation were passed along party lines in the Senate and House, with the Republican-sponsored House version favoring the reduction of services to undocumented immigrants and LGBT individuals. Another area of contention was the provision of the law giving Native American tribal authorities jurisdiction over sex crimes involving non-Native Americans on tribal lands.

By repealing a portion of the 1978 Oliphant v. Suquamish ruling, such a provision could alter the constitutional balance between federal, state, and tribal power. Historically Congress has not allowed tribal governments to exercise criminal jurisdiction over non-tribal members.

The two bills were pending reconciliation, and a final bill did not reach the President's desk before the end of the year, temporarily ending the coverage of the Act after 18 years, as the 112th Congress adjourned.

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Charles Manson and his "Manson Family" Pictured below: Who were the Manson Family members, why did they kill actress Sharon Tate and how many people did they kill?​  
Above Photos include Manson Family Members, numbered  #1 through #5, who are identified below, from left to right:
  1. Charles Manson,
  2. Patricia Krenwinkel, 
  3. Manson’s chief lieutenant Charles 'Tex' Watson, 
  4. Susan Atkins,
  5. and Leslie Van Houten
Photo Credit: AP:Associated Pres

​Charles Milles Manson (né Maddox, November 12, 1934 – November 19, 2017) was an American criminal and cult leader. In mid-1967, he formed what became known as the "Manson Family" (see next topic below), a quasi-commune based in California.

His followers committed a series of nine murders at four locations in July and August 1969. According to the Los Angeles County district attorney, Manson plotted to start a race war, though he and others disputed this motive.

In 1971, he was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder for the deaths of seven people. The prosecution conceded that Manson never literally ordered the murders, but they contended that his ideology constituted an overt act of conspiracy Manson was also convicted of first-degree murder for the deaths of Gary Hinman
and Donald Shea.

Manson was an unemployed ex-convict who had spent more than half of his life in correctional institutions at the time when he began gathering his cult following. Before the murders, he was a singer-songwriter on the fringe of the Los Angeles music industry, chiefly through a chance association with Dennis Wilson of the Beach Boys.

In 1968, the Beach Boys recorded Manson's song "Cease to Exist", re-titled "Never Learn Not to Love" as the B-side on one of their singles, but without a credit to Manson.

The Los Angeles district attorney said that Manson was obsessed with the Beatles, particularly their 1968 self-titled album known as the "White Album". He claimed to be guided by his interpretation of the Beatles' lyrics and adopted the term "Helter Skelter" to describe an impending apocalyptic race war.

At trial, the prosecution claimed that Manson and his followers believed that the murders would help precipitate that war. Other contemporary interviews and those who testified during the penalty phase of Manson's trial insisted that the Tate–LaBianca murders were copycat crimes designed to exonerate Manson's friend Bobby Beausoleil.

From the beginning of Manson's notoriety, a pop culture arose around him and he became an emblem of insanity, violence, and the macabre. Recordings were released commercially of songs written and performed by Manson, starting with Lie: The Love and Terror Cult (1970).

Various musicians have covered some of his songs. Manson was originally sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted to life with the possibility of parole after the California Supreme Court invalidated the state's death penalty statute in 1972. He served his life sentence at California State Prison, Corcoran and died at age 83 in late 2017.

Click here for more about Charles Manson.
___________________________________________________________________________

The Manson Family was a desert commune and cult active in California in the late 1960s and early 1970s which was led by Charles Manson (above). The group consisted of approximately 100 of his followers who lived an unconventional lifestyle with habitual use of hallucinogenic drugs such as LSD.

Most of the group members were young women from middle-class backgrounds, many of whom were radicalized by Manson's teachings and drawn by hippie culture and communal living.

Manson was released from prison for petty crimes in 1967, and the Family moved to San Francisco and later to a deserted ranch in the San Fernando Valley.

According to group member Susan Atkins, the Family believed that Manson was a manifestation of Jesus and that his prophecies were reliable concerning an imminent, apocalyptic race war.

They gained international attention after the murder of actress Sharon Tate and four others on August 9, 1969. The murders were committed by Tex Watson, Susan Atkins, and Patricia Krenwinkel. Linda Kasabian was also present but did not take part. Group members were also responsible for a number of other murders, assaults, petty crimes, and thefts.

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O. J. Simpson Pictured below: ‘Trial of the century’ legacy: How O.J. Simpson case changed US
​Orenthal James Simpson (born July 9, 1947), nicknamed "the Juice", is an American former football running back, broadcaster, actor, advertising spokesman, and convicted felon.

Once a popular figure with the U.S. public, he is best known for being tried for the murders of his former wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ron Goldman. Simpson was acquitted of the murders in criminal court, but was later found responsible for both deaths in a civil trial.

Simpson attended the University of Southern California (USC), where he played football for the USC Trojans and won the Heisman Trophy in 1968.

Simpson played professionally as a running back in the National Football League (NFL) for 11 seasons, primarily with the Buffalo Bills from 1969 to 1977. He also played for the San Francisco 49ers from 1978 to 1979.

In 1973, Simpson became the first NFL player to rush for more than 2,000 yards in a season. He holds the record for the single season yards-per-game average, which stands at 143.1. He was the only player to ever rush for over 2,000 yards in the 14-game regular season NFL format.

Simpson was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1983 and the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1985. After retiring from football, he began new careers in acting and football broadcasting.

In 1994, Simpson was arrested and charged with the murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ron Goldman. He was acquitted by a jury after a lengthy and internationally publicized trial. The families of the victims subsequently filed a civil suit against him. A civil court awarded a $33.5 million judgment against him in 1997 for the victims' wrongful deaths. In 2000, he moved to Florida to avoid paying any more of the liability judgment and settled in Miami.

In 2007, Simpson was arrested in Las Vegas, Nevada and charged with the felonies of armed robbery and kidnapping. In 2008, he was convicted and sentenced to 33 years' imprisonment, with a minimum of nine years without parole. He served his sentence at the Lovelock Correctional Center near Lovelock, Nevada.

Simpson was granted parole on July 20, 2017. He was eligible for release from prison on October 1, 2017, and was released on that date.

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​Hate Crimes in the United States, including a List of Hate Groups along with Fighting Discrimination Pictured below:
TOP: A majority of Americans believe hate crimes have happened more frequently within the last year (YouGov 2/18/2019)
BOTTOM: Among racial groups, blacks experience the most hate crime. (Washington Post 6/18/2015)
 A hate crime (also known as a bias-motivated crime or bias crime) is a prejudice-motivated crime which occurs when a perpetrator targets a victim because of their membership (or perceived membership) in a certain social group or race.

Examples of such groups can include, and are almost exclusively limited to: 
Non-criminal actions that are motivated by these reasons are often called "bias incidents".

"Hate crime" generally refers to criminal acts which are seen to have been motivated by bias against one or more of the social groups listed above, or by bias against their derivatives. Incidents may involve physical assault, damage to property, bullying, harassment, verbal abuse or insults, mate crime or offensive graffiti or letters (hate mail).

A hate crime law is a law intended to deter bias-motivated violence. Hate crime laws are distinct from laws against hate speech: hate crime laws enhance the penalties associated with conduct which is already criminal under other laws, while hate speech laws criminalize a category of speech.

Hate speech laws exist in many countries. In the United States, hate crime laws have been upheld by both the Supreme Court and lower courts, especially in the case of 'fighting' words and other violent speech, but they are thought by some people to be in conflict with the First Amendment right to freedom of speech, but hate crimes are only regulated through threats of injury or death.

Psychological Effects:

​Hate crimes can have significant and wide-ranging psychological consequences, not only for their direct victims but for others as well. A 1999 U.S. study of lesbian and gay victims of violent hate crimes documented that they experienced higher levels of psychological distress, including symptoms of depression and anxiety, than lesbian and gay victims of comparable crimes which were not motivated by anti-gay bias. 

A manual issued by the Attorney-General of the Province of Ontario in Canada lists the following consequences:

Impact on the individual victim: psychological and affective disturbances; repercussions on the victim's identity and self-esteem; both reinforced by a specific hate crime's degree of violence, which is usually stronger than that of a common crime.

Effect on the targeted group: generalized terror in the group to which the victim belongs, inspiring feelings of vulnerability among its other members, who could be the next hate crime victims.

Effect on other vulnerable groups: ominous effects on minority groups or on groups that identify themselves with the targeted group, especially when the referred hate is based on an ideology or a doctrine that preaches simultaneously against several groups.

Effect on the community as a whole: divisions and factionalism arising in response to hate crimes are particularly damaging to multicultural societies. Hate crime victims can also develop depression and psychological trauma.

A review of European and American research indicates that terrorist bombings cause Islamophobia and hate crimes to flare up but, in calmer times, they subside again, although to a relatively high level.

Terrorist's most persuasive message is that of fear and fear, a primary and strong emotion, increases risk estimates and has distortive effects on the perception of ordinary Muslims. Widespread Islamophobic prejudice seems to contribute to anti-Muslim hate crimes, but indirectly: terrorist attacks and intensified Islamophobic prejudice serve as a window of opportunity for extremist groups and networks.

Motivation:

The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation conducted a study into the motives for hate crimes and found four motives:
  • Thrill-seeking - perpetrators engage in hate crimes for excitement and drama. There is often no greater purpose behind the crimes, with victims being vulnerable because they have an ethnic, religious, sexual or gender background that differs from their attackers. While the actual animosity present in such a crime can be quite low, thrill-seeking crimes were determined to often be dangerous, with 70% of thrill-seeking hate crimes studied involving physical attacks.
  • Defensive - perpetrators engage in hate crimes out of a belief they are protecting their communities. These are often triggered by a certain background event. Perpetrators believe society supports their actions but is too afraid to act and thus they believe they have communal assent in their actions.
  • Retaliatory - perpetrators engage in hate crimes out of a desire for revenge. This can be in response to personal slights, other hate crimes or terrorism. The "avengers" target members of a group whom they believe committed the original crime, even if the victims had nothing to do with it. These kinds of hate crimes are a common occurrence after terrorist attacks.
  • Mission offenders - perpetrators engage in hate crimes out of ideological reasons. They consider themselves to be crusaders, often for a religious or racial cause. They will often write complex explanations for their views and target symbolically important sites while trying to maximize damage. They believe that there is no other way to accomplish their goals, which they consider to be justification for excessive violence against innocents. This kind of hate crime often overlaps with terrorism and was considered by the FBI to be both the rarest and deadliest form of hate crime.

The categories of hate crimes can often overlap and it can be unclear which category a particular offence should fit in to.

Laws:

Hate crime laws generally fall into one of several categories:
  1. laws defining specific bias-motivated acts as distinct crimes;
  2. criminal penalty-enhancement laws;
  3. laws creating a distinct civil cause of action for hate crimes; and
  4. laws requiring administrative agencies to collect hate crime statistics. Sometimes (as in Bosnia and Herzegovina), the laws focus on war crimes, genocide, and crimes against humanity with the prohibition against discriminatory action limited to public officials.

United States:
Main article: Hate crime laws in the United States

​Hate crime laws have a long history in the United States. The first hate crime laws were passed after the American Civil War, beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1871, to combat the growing number of racially motivated crimes being committed by the Reconstruction era Ku Klux Klan.

The modern era of hate-crime legislation began in 1968 with the passage of federal statute, 18 U.S. 245, part of the Civil Rights Act which made it illegal to "by force or by threat of force, injure, intimidate, or interfere with anyone who is engaged in six specified protected activities, by reason of their race, color, religion, or national origin." However, "The prosecution of such crimes must be certified by the U.S. attorney general.".

The first state hate-crime statute, California's Section 190.2, was passed in 1978 and provided for penalty enhancement in cases where murder was motivated by prejudice against four "protected status" categories: race, religion, color, and national origin.

Washington included ancestry in a statute passed in 1981. Alaska included creed and sex in 1982 and later disability, sexual orientation, and ethnicity. In the 1990s some state laws began to include age, marital status, membership in the armed forces, and membership in civil rights organizations.

Criminal acts which could be considered hate crimes in various states included: 
Defined in the 1999 National Crime Victim Survey, "A hate crime is a criminal offence. In the United States, federal prosecution is possible for hate crimes committed on the basis of a person's race, religion, or nation origin when engaging in a federally protected activity."

In 2009, the Matthew Shepard Act added actual or perceived gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, and disability to the federal definition, and dropped the prerequisite that the victim be engaging in a federally protected activity.

Forty-five states and the District of Columbia have statutes criminalizing various types of hate crimes. Thirty-one states and the District of Columbia have statutes creating a civil cause of action in addition to the criminal penalty for similar acts. Twenty-seven states and the District of Columbia have statutes requiring the state to collect hate crime statistics.

According to the FBI Hate Crime Statistics report for 2006, hate crimes increased nearly 8% nationwide, with a total of 7,722 incidents and 9,080 offences reported by participating law enforcement agencies. Of the 5,449 crimes against persons, 46% were classified as intimidation and 32% as simple assaults. 81% of the 3,593 crimes against property were acts of vandalism or destruction.

However, according to the FBI Hate Crime Statistics for 2007, the number of hate crimes decreased to 7,624 incidents reported by participating law enforcement agencies. These incidents included 9 murders and 2 rapes(out of the almost 17,000 murders and 90,000 forcible rapes committed in the U.S. in 2007).

Attorney General Eric Holder said in June 2009 that recent killings show the need for a tougher U.S. hate crimes law to stop "violence masquerading as political activism".

The 2011 hate crime statistics show 46.9% were motivated by race and 20.8% by sexual orientation.

In 2015, the Hate Crimes Statistics report identified 5,818 single-bias incidents involving 6,837 offenses, 7,121 victims, and 5,475 known offenders

In 2017, the FBI released new data showing a 17% increase in hate crimes between 2016 and 2017.

Prosecutions of hate crimes have been difficult in the United States. Recently, state governments have attempted to re-investigate and re-try past hate crimes.

One notable example was Mississippi's decision in 1990 to retry Byron De La Beckwith for the murder of Medgar Evers, a prominent figure in the NAACP. This was the first time in U.S. history that an unresolved civil rights case was re-opened. De La Beckwith, a member of the Ku Klux Klan, was tried for the murder on two previous occasions, resulting in hung juries. A mixed race jury found Beckwith guilty of murder. He was sentenced to life in prison in 1994.

According to a November 2016 report issued by the FBI hate crime statistics are on the rise in the United States. The number of hate crimes increased from 5,850 in 2015, to 6,121 hate crime incidents in 2016, an increase of 4.6 percent.

Khalid Jabara-Heather Heyer National Opposition to Hate, Assault, and Threats to Equality Act (NO HATE), which was first introduced in 2017, was reintroduced in June 2019 as a response to anti-LGBTQ, anti-Muslim and anti-Semitic attacks to improve hate crime reporting and expand support for victims. The bill will fund state hate crime hotlines, support expansion of reporting and training programs in law enforcement agencies.

Victims in the United States:

One of the largest waves of hate crimes in the United States took place during the civil rights movement in the 1960s. Both violence and threats of violence were common against African Americans, and hundreds of lives were lost due to such acts.

Members of this social class faced violence from groups such as the Ku Klux Klan as well as violence from individuals who were committed to maintaining segregation. At the time, civil rights leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr. and their supporters fought hard for the right of African Americans to vote as well as for equality in their everyday lives.

African Americans have been the target of hate crimes since the Civil War, and the humiliation of this social class was also desired by many Anti-black individuals. Other frequently reported bias motivations were bias against a religion, bias against a particular sexual orientation, and bias against a particular ethnicity/national origin. At times, these bias motivations overlapped, because violence can be both anti-gay and anti-black, for example.

Analysts have compared groups in terms of the per capita rate of hate crimes committed against them, to allow for differing populations. Overall, the total number of hate crimes committed since the first hate crime bill was passed in 1997 is 86,582. David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act

Contentious Case:

​On 29 January 2019, Chicago police announced that they were investigating a suspected racist and homophobic attack on actor Jussie Smollett. However, on 20 February 2019, Jessie Smollett had been "classified as a suspect in a criminal investigation by #ChicagoPolice for filling a false police report (Class 4 felony). 

This charges he faced were cleared on the 26th of March however after spurring much debate about the validity and impact of alleged attack. Notably, "Chicago Police and the city's mayor stand by their case against Jussie Smollet." 

​Support for and opposition to hate crime laws:

Support:
​
Justifications for harsher punishments for hate crimes focus on the notion that hate crimes cause greater individual and societal harm. It is said that, when the core of a person's identity is attacked, the degradation and dehumanization is especially severe, and additional emotional and physiological problems are likely to result.

Society then, in turn, can suffer from the disempowerment of a group of people.

Furthermore, it is asserted that the chances for retaliatory crimes are greater when a hate crime has been committed. The riots in Los Angeles, California that followed the beating of Rodney King, a Black motorist, by a group of White police officers are cited as support for this argument. The beating of white truck driver Reginald Denny by black rioters during the same riot is also an example that supports this argument.

In Wisconsin v. Mitchell, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously found that penalty-enhancement hate crime statutes do not conflict with free speech rights, because they do not punish an individual for exercising freedom of expression; rather, they allow courts to consider motive when sentencing a criminal for conduct which is not protected by the First Amendment. 

Whilst in the case of Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire the court defined "fighting words" as "those which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace."

Opposition:

The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously found the St. Paul Bias-Motivated Crime Ordinance amounted to viewpoint-based discrimination in conflict with rights of free speech, because it selectively criminalized bias-motivated speech or symbolic speech for disfavored topics while permitting such speech for other topics.

Many critics further assert that it conflicts with an even more fundamental right: free thought. The claim is that hate-crime legislation effectively makes certain ideas or beliefs, including religious ones, illegal, in other words, thought crimes.

Heidi Hurd argues that hate crimes criminalize certain dispositions yet do not show why hate is a morally worse disposition for a crime than one motivated by jealousy, greed, sadism or vengeance or why hatred and bias are uniquely responsive to criminal sanction compared to other motivations.

Hurd argues that whether or not a disposition is worse than another is case sensitive and thus it is difficult to argue that some motivations are categorically worse than others.
In their book Hate Crimes: Criminal Law and Identity Politics, James B. Jacobs and Kimberly Potter criticize hate crime legislation for exacerbating conflicts between groups.

They assert that by defining crimes as being committed by one group against another, rather than as being committed by individuals against their society, the labeling of crimes as "hate crimes" causes groups to feel persecuted by one another, and that this impression of persecution can incite a backlash and thus lead to an actual increase in crime.

Jacobs and Potter also argued that hate crime legislation can end up only covering the victimization of some groups rather than all, which is a form of discrimination itself and that attempts to remedy this by making all identifiable groups covered by hate crime protection thus make hate crimes co-terminus with generic criminal law.

The authors also suggest that arguments which attempt to portray hate crimes as worse than normal crimes because they spread fear in a community are unsatisfactory, as normal criminal acts can also spread fear yet only hate crimes are singled out. Indeed it has been argued that victims have varied reactions to hate crimes, so it is not necessarily true that hate crimes are regarded as more harmful than other crimes.

Heidi Hurd argues that hate crime represents an effort by the state to encourage a certain moral character in its citizen and thus represents the view that the instillation of virtue and the elimination of vice are legitimate state goals, which she argues is a contradiction of the principles of liberalism.

Hurd also argues that increasing punishment for an offence because the perpetrator was motivated by hate compared to some other motivation means that the justice systems is treating the same crime differently, even though treating like cases alike is a cornerstone of criminal justice.

Some have argued hate crime laws bring the law into disrepute and further divide society, as groups apply to have their critics silenced. American forensic psychologist Karen Franklin said that the term hate crime is somewhat misleading since it assumes there is a hateful motivation which is not present in many occasions; in her view, laws to punish people who commit hate crimes may not be the best remedy for preventing them because the threat of future punishment does not usually deter such criminal acts.

​Some on the political left have been critical of hate crime laws for expanding the criminal justice system and dealing with violence against minority groups through punitive measures.

See also: ___________________________________________________________________________

​List of organizations designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as hate groups

​The following is a list of U.S.-based organizations that are classified as hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). The SPLC is an American nonprofit legal advocacy organization specializing in civil rights and public interest litigation.

The SPLC defines a hate group as "an organization that — based on its official statements or principles, the statements of its leaders, or its activities — has beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristic."

The SPLC states that "Hate group activities can include criminal acts, marches, rallies, speeches, meetings, leafleting or publishing" and adds that inclusion on its hate-group list "does not imply that a group advocates or engages in violence or other criminal activity."

Since 1981, the SPLC's Intelligence Project has published a quarterly Intelligence Report, which monitors hate groups and extremist organizations in the United States. The SPLC began an annual census of hate groups in 1990. The SPLC listed 1,020 hate groups and hate-group chapters on its 2018 list—an all-time high fueled primarily by an increase in radical right groups.

The Intelligence Report provides information regarding the organizational efforts and tactics of these groups, and it is cited by a number of scholars as a reliable and comprehensive source on U.S. hate groups. The SPLC also publishes the HateWatch Weekly newsletter, which documents racism and extremism, and the Hatewatch blog.

Pundits, politicians, and some of the designated groups have objected to the SPLC's list. For example, the Family Research Council disputed its designation in 2010, and the Center for Immigration Studies disputed the SPLC anti-immigrant designation in 2016.

The SPLC's hate group listings have also been criticized by some political observers and prominent Republicans. Critics include Ken Silverstein, Laird Wilcox, Dana Milbank, John Boehner and Michele Bachmann.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about "List of organizations designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as hate groups": ___________________________________________________________________________

Fighting Discrimination:

The Fighting Discrimination Program of Human Rights First focuses on the violence known as hate crimes or bias crimes. Because equality is a cornerstone of human rights protection, discrimination in all its forms is a violation of human rights.

Discrimination can take the form of violence generated by prejudice and hatred founded upon a person's race, ethnicity, religious belief, sexual orientation, gender, disability, age or other such factors.

Through the Fighting Discrimination Program, Human Rights First seeks to combat discrimination by reversing the tide of antisemitic, anti-immigrant, and anti-Muslim violence and reducing other bias crime in North America, Europe, and the Russian Federation.

In this effort, the Program looks at both the reality of violence driven by discrimination in each country and at two principal ways in which this violence can best be confronted.

The first is through hate crimes legislation and effective and equitable enforcement of criminal law to protect often vulnerable minorities. The Program's premise is that hate crimes should be treated as the exceptional crimes that they are and prosecuted as such, including with enhanced penalties.

Second, the fight against discrimination requires the monitoring and statistical reporting of incidents and crimes in which bias is an element – in order to provide analytical tools for policy makers and effective action to confront violence. Official anti-discrimination bodies can play a pivotal role in ensuring that monitoring occurs and effective anti-discrimination policies are then implemented.

​Advocacy efforts:

In pursuing policy changes, the Fighting Discrimination Program works in cooperation with nongovernmental organizations throughout Europe and North America and advocates directly with the governments concerned and through intergovernmental organizations, such as the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), the United Nations (UN), the Council of Europe (CoE), and the European Parliament (Europarl).

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe: the OSCE provides the main stage for the Fighting Discrimination Program's advocacy on the intergovernmental level. Human Rights First is well-established and respected within this important organization that brings together 56 countries in North America, Europe, and Central Asia.

OSCE has been very receptive and supportive of the program's activities during the past years. Human Rights First has consistently maintained a vocal presence at the annual Human

Dimension Implementation Meetings (HDIMs) and was invited to participate in various roundtables and events hosted by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR).

The United Nations: the Fighting Discrimination Program was initiated in the aftermath of the 2001 Durban UN World Conference Against Racism (WCAR), which was attended by senior staff of Human Rights First. Hence, the UN is an important stage for the Program's initiatives.

Apart from engaging in various advocacy opportunities at the UN, Fighting Discrimination has also played a role in moving the venue for the Durban Review Conference from South Africa to the Geneva, Switzerland. Human Rights First representatives took part in several Preparatory Committee Meetings and will be present at the Durban Review in 2009.

Over the years, the Fighting Discrimination Program has also been in direct contact with important government officials who deal with the issues of discrimination, hate crime, national minorities, antisemitism, and others.

Human Rights First has established good rapport with the offices of the: 
  • Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights,
  • the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities,
  • the Chair of the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia,
  • the United States Special Envoy for Monitoring and Combating Antisemitism,
  • and the OSCE Personal Representatives of the Chairman-in-Office on Combating Intolerance and Discrimination (Combating Racism, Xenophobia and Discrimination, Combating Antisemitism, and Combating Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims), and the Russian Ombudsman for Human Rights.

The Fighting Discrimination often collaborates with other nongovernmental nonprofit organizations based in different countries. Combined advocacy efforts are known to have deeper impact and wider public reach.

Some of the FD Program's NGO partners include: 
Reports and publications:

Since 2001, the Fighting Discrimination produced several groundbreaking comprehensive reports on hate crime, which were hailed by NGOs, the media, and representatives of governments and intergovernmental organizations.

All publications are available for free on the Fighting Discrimination website. Starting in 2007, the program began producing the Annual Hate Crime Survey, supplemented with an online-based Hate Crime Report Card.

Hate Crime Survey:

The 2008 Hate Crime Survey by Human Rights First provides the most comprehensive and up-to-date overview of hate crime in the 56 countries comprising the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

The Survey includes sections examining six facets of violent hate crime:
  1. Violence Based on Racism and Xenophobia,
  2. Antisemitic Violence,
  3. Violence Against Muslims, 
  4. Violence Based on Religious Intolerance, 
  5. Violence Against Romani, 
  6. and Violence Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Bias.

The Survey also examines government responses to violent hate crimes in sections on Systems of Monitoring and Reporting and The Framework of Criminal Law and includes a Ten-Point Plan for governments to strengthen their responses.

The Survey includes an in-depth look at the Russian Federation, Ukraine, and the United States and contains a Country Panorama section that profiles individual hate crime cases from more than 30 countries within the OSCE.

The Survey's unique and progressive presentation style allows separate chapters to be used as stand-alone reports. Thus, each section can be presented as a report on a particular dimension of bias-motivated violence.

​Hate Crime Report Card:The Report Card — updated annually — is a useful web-based resource produced by Human Rights First to monitor government response to bias-motivated violence. Hate crimes have occurred at alarmingly high levels throughout much of Europe and North America.

The first Human Rights First Hate Crime Survey documents dozens of hate crime cases, analyzes trends, and discusses the causes and consequences of hate crime violence.

The Report Card is an innovative tool that examines hate crime laws and monitoring and reporting systems in the states that comprise the OSCE, regrettably finding that a majority of European governments get a poor grade in their efforts to tackle hate crimes. All 56 countries that comprise the OSCE are rated in the Report Card.

​Country Focus:

The 2008 Hate Crime Survey also takes an in-depth look at the Russian Federation, Ukraine, the United States, and contains a Country Panorama section that profiles individual hate crime cases from more than 30 countries within the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

​Recommendations:

The Fighting Discrimination Program's "Ten-Point Plan" for Combating Hate Crime was prepared to reference and guide the 56 participating states of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. The Ten-Point Plan call the governments to:
  • Acknowledge and condemn violent hate crimes whenever they occur. ... 
  • Enact laws that expressly address hate crimes. ...
  • Strengthen enforcement and prosecute offenders. ...
  • Provide adequate instructions and resources to law enforcement bodies. ... 
  • Undertake parliamentary, inter-agency or other special inquiries into the problem of hate crimes. ...
  • Monitor and report on hate crimes. ...
  • Create and strengthen antidiscrimination bodies. ...
  • Reach out to community groups. ...
  • Speak out against official intolerance and bigotry. ...
  • Encourage international cooperation on hate crimes.

A full version of the Ten-Point Plan and specific recommendations to governments are available at the Program's Website.

See also:







​Domestic Terrorism in the United StatesPictured below: Help for Crime Victims -- Domestic Terrorism and Mass Violence
Domestic terrorism in the United States consists of incidents confirmed as terrorist acts. These attacks are considered domestic because they were carried out by U.S. citizens or U.S. permanent residents.

The statutory definition of domestic terrorism in the United States has changed many times over the years; also, it can be argued that acts of domestic terrorism have been occurring since long before any legal definition was set forth.

Under current United States law, set forth in the USA PATRIOT Act, acts of domestic terrorism are those which:
  • "(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State;
  • (B) appear to be intended – (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping;
  • and (C) occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States."

The above definition is made for the purposes of authorizing law enforcement investigations. While international terrorism ("acts of terrorism transcending national boundaries") is a defined crime in federal law, no federal criminal offense exists which is referred to as "domestic terrorism". Acts of domestic terrorism are charged under specific laws, such as killing federal agents or "attempting to use explosives to destroy a building in interstate commerce".

​Anti-abortion violence:
Main article: Anti-abortion violence

Anti-abortion violence, considered a form of terrorism, is often committed in the United States against individuals and organizations that provide abortions or abortion counseling.

Incidents have included crimes against people, such as murder, assault, kidnapping, and stalking; crimes affecting both people and property, such as arson or bombing; and property crimes such as vandalism.

Perpetrators may defend their actions as necessary to protect fetuses, and are often motivated by their Christian beliefs, leading to anti-abortion violence's identification as Christian terrorism; it is also associated with antifeminism.

Notable incidents of anti-abortion violence include the murders of a number of doctors and clinic staff in the 1990s.
  • In 1993, Michael F. Griffin shot Dr. David Gunn to death during a protest.
  • In 1994, Paul Jennings Hill shot Dr. John Britton and clinic escort James Barrett to death, also wounding Barrett's wife June; John Salvi shot and killed two receptionists, Shannon Lowney and Lee Ann Nichols. Paul Hill would yell at the clinic "God hates murderers".
  • Eric Robert Rudolph bombed the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta in protest of abortion, killing one person and wounding 111, and bombed several abortion clinics in 1997 and 1998, killing a security guard and critically injuring a nurse.
  • In 1998, James Kopp shot a number of abortion providers, killing one, Dr. Barnett Slepian.
  • In 2009, Scott Roeder shot and killed Dr. George Tiller. Tiller served as an usher at church; he had previously been a target in 1993, when he was shot by Shelley Shannon. The Army of God, an underground terrorist organization, has been responsible for a substantial amount of anti-abortion violence, including a number of the above murders.
  • In 2015, Robert Lewis Dear, a 57 years-old Kentucky born, moved from South Carolina to North Carolina to Colorado where he opened fire on a Planned Parenthood facility, killing two civilians and a police officer. After a five-hour standoff Dear told the police "no more baby parts." Robert Lewis Dear has been found to be mentally incompetent to stand trial.

Eco-terrorism:
Main article: Eco-terrorism

According to the FBI in June 2008, eco-terrorists and extreme animal rights activists represent "one of the most serious domestic terrorism threats in the U.S. today". They committed over 2,000 crimes and caused over $110 million in damages since 1979, against targets including lumber companies, animal testing facilities and genetic research firms. However, no human casualties have been reported.

Terrorist organizations:

Alpha 66 and Omega 7:

Alpha 66 (still existent) and Omega 7 (now defunct) were two affiliated Cuban exile action groups who have carried out many bombings and acts of sabotage.

While many of these attacks have historically been directed at Cuba and the Castro government, many of them occurred domestically, especially during the period of Cuba-US diplomacy and negotiations in the 1970s known as "el Diálogo" (the dialogue) when powerful anti-Castro figures in Miami attempted to terrorize those in their community who favored a more moderate approach.

Luciano Nieves, for instance, was killed for advocating peaceful coexistence with Cuba. WQBA-AM news director Emilio Milian lost his legs in a car bomb after he publicly condemned Cuban exile violence.

These cases of terrorism were documented extensively in the book Miami by Joan Didion. Human Rights Watch released a report in 1992 in which it claimed that the more extreme exiles have created a political environment in Miami where "moderation can be a dangerous position."

Animal Liberation Front:
Main article: Animal Liberation Front

Animal Liberation Front (ALF) is a name used internationally by activists who engage in direct action against persons and/or organizations which the activists perceive are harming animals. This includes removing animals from laboratories and fur farms, and sabotaging facilities involved in animal testing and other animal-based industries. According to ALF statements, any act that furthers the cause of animal liberation, where all reasonable precautions are taken not to endanger life, may be claimed as an ALF action.

Army of God:
Main article: Army of God (United States)

The Army of God (AOG) is a loose network of individuals and groups connected by ideological affinity and the determination to use force to end abortion in the United States.

Acts of anti-abortion violence increased in the mid-1990s culminating in a series of bombings by Eric Robert Rudolph, whose targets included two abortion clinics, a gay and lesbian night club, and the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. Letters sent to newspapers claim responsibility for the bombing of the abortion clinics in the name of the Army of God.

Aryan Nations:
Main article: Aryan Nations

Aryan Nations (AN) is a white nationalist neo-Nazi organization founded in the 1970s by Richard Girnt Butler as an arm of the Christian Identity group known as the Church of Jesus Christ-Christian. As of December 2007 there were two main factions that claimed descent from Butler's group. The Aryan Nations has been called a "terrorist threat" by the FBI, and the RAND Corporation has called it the "first truly nationwide terrorist network" in the United States.

Atomwaffen Division:
Main article: Atomwaffen Division

The Atomwaffen Division (AWD) or simply Atomwaffen is a neo-Nazi organization based in Florida that promotes former American Nazi Party member, founder of the defunct National Socialist Liberation Front (NSLF) convict James Mason's Siege and "Universal Order" ideology as well as race war against minorities, Jews, and LGBT people including ties to Satanism.

The group has about 24 and 36 to about 80 active members and 20 cells across 23 states in America. The organization also has a United Kingdom branch called the Sonnenkrieg Division (SKD), a presence in Canada by a group called Northern Order and one located in Germany. The organization has been responsible for the deaths of five people most notably the Murder of Blaze Bernstein a gay Jewish California student and the killings of Jeremy Himmelman and Andrew Oneschuk.

Black Liberation Army:
Main article: Black Liberation Army

A splinter group made up of the more radical members of the Black Panther Party, the Black Liberation Army (BLA) sought to overthrow the US government in the name of racial separatism and Marxist ideals. The Fraternal Order of Police blames the BLA for the murders of 13 police officers. According to a Justice Department report on BLA activity, the group was suspected of involvement in over 60 incidents of violence between 1970 and 1980.

The Covenant, The Sword, and the Arm of the Lord:
Main article: The Covenant, The Sword, and the Arm of the Lord

The Covenant, The Sword, and the Arm of the Lord (CSA) was a radical Christian Identity organization formed in 1971 in the small community of Elijah in southern Missouri, United States. One of its members, Richard Wayne Snell was responsible for the murder of a pawnshop owner and a Missouri state trooper. The CSA collapsed following an FBI and ATF siege in 1985.

Earth Liberation Front:
Main article: Earth Liberation Front

The Earth Liberation Front has been classified as a top "domestic terror" threat in the United States by the Federal Bureau of Investigation since March 2001.

Jewish Defense League:
Main article: Jewish Defense League

The Jewish Defense League (JDL) was founded in 1968 by Rabbi Meir Kahane in New York City. FBI statistics show that from 1980 to 1985, 15 terrorist attacks were attempted in the U.S. by JDL members. The FBI’s Mary Doran described the JDL in 2004 Congressional testimony as "a proscribed terrorist group".

The National Consortium for the Study of Terror and Responses to Terrorism states that during the JDL's first two decades of activity it was an "active terrorist organization." Kahane later founded the far right Israeli political party Kach.

Ku Klux Klan (KKK):
Main article: Ku Klux Klan

During reconstruction at the end of the Civil War the original KKK used domestic terrorism against the federal government and against freed slaves. During the 20th century, leading up to the Civil Rights Movement, unrelated Ku Klux Klan (KKK) groups used threats, violence, arson, and murder to further their anti-Black, anti-Catholic, anti-Communist, anti-immigrant, anti-Semitic, homophobic and white-supremacist agenda.

Other groups with agendas similar to the Ku Klux Klan include neo-Nazis, white power skinheads, and other far-right movements.

May 19 Communist Organization:
Main article: May 19 Communist Organization

The May 19 Coalition (also variously referred to as the May 19 Communist Coalition, May 19 Communist Organization, and various alternatives of M19CO), was a U.S.-based, self-described revolutionary organization formed by members of the Weather Underground Organization.

The group was originally known as the New York chapter of the Prairie Fire Organizing Committee (PFOC), an organization devoted to legally promoting the causes of the Weather Underground. This was part of Prairie Fire Manifesto change in Weather Underground Organization strategy, which demanded both aboveground mass and clandestine organizations.

The role of the clandestine organization would be to build the "consciousness of action" and prepare the way for the development of a people's militia. Concurrently, the role of the mass movement (i.e., above ground Prairie Fire Collective) would include support for, and encouragement of, armed action. Such an alliance would, according to Weather, "help create the 'sea' for the guerrillas to swim in."

The Order:
Main article: The Order (white supremacist group)

The Order, also known as the Brüder Schweigen or Silent Brotherhood, was a white nationalist revolutionary group active in the United States between 1983 and 1984. It is probably best known for the 1984 murder of radio talk show host Alan Berg. The group also carried out several bank and car robberies, three murders, and money counterfeiting until its leader, Robert Jay Mathews, was killed in a shootout with FBI agents on Whidbey Island, Washington, in December 1984.

Phineas Priesthood:
Main article: Phineas Priesthood

The Phineas Priesthood (Phineas Priests) is a Christian Identity movement that opposes interracial sex, the mixing of races, homosexuality, and abortion. It is also marked by anti-Semitism, anti-multiculturalism, and opposition to taxation. It is not considered an organization because it is not led by a governing body, there are no gatherings, and there is no membership process.

One becomes a Phineas Priest by simply adopting the beliefs of the Priesthood and acting upon those beliefs. Members of the Priesthood are often called terrorists for, among other things, planning to blow up FBI buildings, abortion clinic bombings, and bank robberies.

Symbionese Liberation Army:
Main article: Symbionese Liberation Army

The Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) was an American self-styled, far left "urban guerrilla warfare group" that considered itself a revolutionary vanguard army. The group committed bank robberies, two murders, and other acts of violence between 1973 and 1975.

Among their most notorious acts was the kidnapping of the newspaper heiress Patty Hearst.

United Freedom Front:
Main article: United Freedom Front

The United Freedom Front (UFF) was a small American Marxist organization active in the 1970s and 1980s. It was originally called the Sam Melville/Jonathan Jackson Unit, and its members became known as the Ohio 7 when they were brought to trial.

Between 1975 and 1984 the UFF carried out at least 20 bombings and nine bank robberies in the northeastern United States, targeting corporate buildings, courthouses, and military facilities. Brent L. Smith describes them as "undoubtedly the most successful of the leftist terrorists of the 1970s and 1980s."

The group's members were eventually apprehended and convicted of conspiracy, murder, attempted murder, and other charges. Two, Tom Manning and Jaan Laaman, remain incarcerated today.

Weathermen:
Main article: Weather Underground Organization

The Weather Underground Organization was a far left organization active from 1969 to 1975. It originated in 1969 as a faction of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) composed for the most part of the national office leadership of SDS and their supporters. The group collapsed shortly after the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam in 1975.

Notable domestic terrorist attacks:
See also: List of domestic terrorist attacks in the United States

The Mountain Meadows Massacre (1857):
Main article: Mountain Meadows massacre

The Mountain Meadows massacre was a series of attacks on the Baker–Fancher emigrant wagon train, at Mountain Meadows in southern Utah. The attacks began on September 7 and culminated on September 11, 1857, resulting in the mass slaughter of the emigrant party by members of the Utah Territorial Militia from the Iron County district, a Mormon group, together with some Paiute Native Americans.

Intending to leave no witnesses and thus prevent reprisals, the perpetrators killed all the adults and older children – about 120 men, women, and children in total. Seventeen children, all younger than seven, were spared.

Milwaukee Police Department bombing (1917):
Main article: Milwaukee Police Department bombing

The Milwaukee Police Department bombing was a November 24, 1917, bomb attack that killed ten people including nine members of local law enforcement. The perpetrators were never caught but are suspected to be an anarchist terrorist cell operating in the United States in the early 20th century. The target was initially an evangelical church in the Third Ward and only killed the police members when the bomb was brought to the police station by a concerned member of the public.

Wall Street bombing (1920):
Main article: Wall Street bombing

The Wall Street bombing was a terrorist incident on September 16, 1920, in the Financial District of New York City. A horse-drawn wagon filled with 100 pounds (45 kg) of dynamite was stationed across the street from the headquarters of the J.P. Morgan Inc. bank. The explosion killed 38 and injured 400. Even though no one was found guilty, it is believed that the act was carried out by followers of Luigi Galleani.

Burning of Black Wall Street (1921):
Main article: Tulsa race riot

On May 31 and June 1, 1921, a white mob started the Tulsa race riot, attacking residents and businesses of the African-American community of Greenwood in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in what is considered one of the worst incidents of racial violence in United States History. The attack, carried out on the ground and by air, destroyed more than 35 blocks of the district, did $30 million (2017 dollars) in damages, left 10,000 people homeless and up to 300 dead in a town considered the wealthiest black community in the nation.

16th Street Baptist Church bombing (1963):
Main article: 16th Street Baptist Church bombing

On Sunday, September 15, 1963, members of the United Klans of America set a bomb consisting of a timing device and fifteen sticks of dynamite to explode at a historically-black church in Birmingham, Alabama, that was a local focus of the Civil Rights struggle. The explosion killed four girls between the ages of 11 and 14 and did much other local damage.

Three perpetrators were eventually caught years later and sentenced to life imprisonment for their roles. There had been other bombings in Birmingham, then grimly known as "Bombingham" for such attacks.

Unabomber attacks (1978–1995):
Main article: Theodore Kaczynski

From 1978 to 1995, Harvard University graduate and former mathematics professor Theodore "Ted" Kaczynski – known by the codename "UNABOM" until his identification and arrest by the FBI – carried out a campaign of sending letterbombs to academics and various individuals particularly associated with modern technology. In 1996, his manifesto was published in The New York Times and The Washington Post, under the threat of more attacks. The bomb campaign ended with his capture.

Attacks by the Jewish Defense League (1980–1985):
Main article: Terrorism by the Jewish Defense League

In a 2004 congressional testimony, John S. Pistole, Executive Assistant Director for Counterterrorism and Counterintelligence for the Federal Bureau of Investigation described the JDL as "a known violent extremist Jewish Organization." FBI statistics show that, from 1980 through 1985, there were 18 terrorist attacks in the U.S. committed by Jews; 15 of those by members of the JDL.

Mary Doran, an FBI agent, described the JDL in a 2004 Congressional testimony as "a proscribed terrorist group". Most recently, then-JDL Chairman Irv Rubin was jailed while awaiting trial on charges of conspiracy in planning bomb attacks against the King Fahd Mosque in Culver City, California, and on the office of Arab-American Congressman Darrell Issa. In its report, Terrorism 2000/2001, the FBI referred to the JDL as a "violent extremist Jewish organization" and stated that the FBI was responsible for thwarting at least one of its terrorist acts.

Oklahoma City bombing (1995):
Main article: Oklahoma City bombing

This truck bomb attack by Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols killed 168 people on April 19, 1995 – the deadliest domestic-based terrorist attack in the history of the United States since the era of mass lynchings and race riots. It inspired improvements to United States federal building security.

Centennial Olympic Park bombing (1996):
Main article: Centennial Olympic Park bombing

The Centennial Olympic Park bombing was a terrorist bombing on July 27, 1996, in Atlanta, Georgia, during the 1996 Summer Olympics, the first of four committed by Eric Robert Rudolph, former explosives expert for the United States Army. Two people died, and 111 were injured.

Wisconsin Sikh temple shooting (2012):
Main article: Wisconsin Sikh temple shooting

On August 5, 2012, Wade Michael Page fatally shot six people (including himself) and wounded four others in a mass shooting at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. Page was an American white supremacist and a United States Army veteran from Cudahy, Wisconsin, who was a member of the neo-Nazi skinhead Hammerskin Nation. All of the dead were members of the Sikh faith.

Boston Marathon bombing (2013):
Main article: Boston Marathon bombing

On April 15, 2013, two homemade bombs detonated 12 seconds and 210 yards apart at 2:49 p.m., near the finish line of the annual Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring several hundred others, including 16 who lost limbs. Kyrgyz-American brothers Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were apprehended and claimed to have been motivated by radical Islamist beliefs.

Charleston church shooting (2015):
Main article: Charleston church shooting

On June 17, 2015, Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old white supremacist, went into the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and shot and killed nine people including South Carolina senator Clementa C. Pinckney. Roof was known to be a white supremacist who admired Apartheid South Africa and Rhodesia and owned a website with a manifesto both called The Last Rhodesian in which he outlined his views toward blacks, among other peoples.

San Bernardino shooting (2015):
Main article: 2015 San Bernardino attack

On December 2, 2015, 14 people were killed and 24 injured in a mass shooting at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, California, United States. Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik targeted a San Bernardino County Department of Public Health training event and holiday party of about 80 employees in a rented banquet room.

Farook was an American-born citizen of Pakistani descent, while his wife was a Pakistani-born legal resident of the U.S. He had attended the event as an employee before the shooting.

Both had become radicalized through jihadist material on the internet, and stockpiled supplies in their home.

Orlando nightclub shooting (2016):
Main article: 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting

In the early hours of June 12, 2016, 49 people were killed and 53 were injured in a mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida. The perpetrator, 29-year-old Omar Mateen, was a security guard and person of interest to the FBI in 2013 and 2014. At the time, this event was the deadliest mass shooting in United States history by a single gunman, later eclipsed by the 2017 Las Vegas shooting on October 1, 2017.

Additionally, it was the deadliest confirmed terrorist attack on U.S. soil since the 9/11 attacks and the deadliest attack against LGBT people in U.S. history.

​Congressional baseball shooting (2017):
Main article: 2017 Congressional baseball shooting

While the annual Congressional Baseball Game for Charity was going on, James Thomas Hodgkinson opened fire on Republican Congressmen and Congresswomen on the field such as U.S. House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, U.S. Capitol Police Officer Crystal Giner, congressional aide Zack Barth and lobbyist Matt Mika, resulting in 6 getting injured (4 critically) and the perpetrator getting killed.

James Thomas Hodgkinson prior to the shooting was a supporter of Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and had liked various left-wing/liberal and anti-Donald Trump/anti-Republican Facebook pages.

Charlottesville car attack (2017):
Main article: Charlottesville car attack

During the Charlottesville riots/Unite the Right rally on August 11-12, 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia, by neo-Nazis, neo-fascists, white nationalists, alt-righters, Southern nationalists and Ku Klux Klansmen, Vanguard America (VA) member James Alex Fields drove his car into counter-protesters, killing 1 named Heather Heyer and injuring 28 others.

Pittsburgh synagogue shooting (2018):
Main article: Pittsburgh synagogue shooting

On October 27, 2018, 11 people died and 6 more were injured at the Tree of Life - Or L'Simcha Congregation in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania by Robert Bowers a user of Gab. The attack was motivated by anti-Semitism and a belief in the white genocide conspiracy theory.

Escondido mosque fire and Poway synagogue shooting (2019):
Main articles: Escondido mosque fire and Poway synagogue shooting

On March 24, 2019, a mosque in Escondido, California, was set on fire; no one was injured and the fire was contained without major damage. The following month, on April 27, 2019, an elderly Jewish woman named Lori Gilbert-Kaye was killed and three others (including Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein) were injured at the Chabad of Poway synagogue in Poway, California.

The accused shooter, John T. Earnest, blamed Jews for "white genocide" and other ills in an anti-Semitic and racist open letter on 8chan confessing to the mosque arson and citing inspiration from the Christchurch mosque shooter Brenton Harrison Tarrant and Pittsburgh synagogue shooting perpetrator Robert Bowers.

El Paso Walmart shooting (2019):
Main article: 2019 El Paso shooting

On August 3, 2019, a domestic terrorist attack/mass shooting occurred at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, killing 22 people and injuring 24 others.

The attack was carried out by Patrick Crusius, who wrote a manifesto titled The Inconvenient Truth and posted it on 8chan where he cited a supposed "Hispanic invasion of Texas" and "simply trying to defend my country from ethnic and cultural replacement brought on by an invasion" as motivations as well as praising the perpetrator of the Christchurch, New Zealand, mosque shootings and read his manifesto The Great Replacement.

See also:
​






​Hate Groups in the United States, including a List Pictured below: US hate incidents rise sharply after Trump win: civil rights group
Click here for a List of organizations designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as hate groups

A hate group is a social group that advocates and practices hatred, hostility, or violence towards members of a race, ethnicity, nation, religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation or any other designated sector of society.

According to the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), a hate group's "primary purpose is to promote animosity, hostility, and malice against persons belonging to a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity/national origin which differs from that of the members of the organization."

Monitoring:
​
In the US, The FBI does not publish a list of hate groups, and it also says that "investigations are only conducted when a threat or advocacy of force is made; when the group has the apparent ability to carry out the proclaimed act; and when the act would constitute a potential violation of federal law". The FBI maintains statistics on hate crimes.

Two private American non-profit organizations that monitor intolerance and hate groups are the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). They maintain lists of what they deem to be hate groups, supremacist groups and anti-Semitic, anti-government or extremist groups that have committed hate crimes.

The SPLC's definition of a "hate group" includes any group with beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people—particularly when the characteristics being maligned are immutable. However, at least for the SPLC, inclusion of a group in the list "does not imply a group advocates or engages in violence or other criminal activity."

According to USA Today, their list ranges from "white supremacists to black nationalists, neo-Nazis to neo-Confederates."

According to the SPLC, from 2000 to 2008, hate group activity saw a 50 percent increase in the US, with a total of 926 active groups. In 2019, the organization's report showed a total of 1,020 hate groups, the highest number in 20 years, and a 7% increase from 2017 to 2018. The previous high was 1,018 in 2011, and the recent low point was 2014, when the list included 784 groups. A rise in white nationalist groups from 100 in 2017 to 148 in 2018 was the most significant increase in the 2019 report.

Since 2010 the term alt-right, short for "alternative right," has come into usage. This broad term includes a range of people who reject mainstream conservatism in favor of forms of conservatism that may embrace implicit or explicit racism or white supremacy. The alt-right is described as being "a weird mix of old-school neo-Nazis, conspiracy theorists, anti-globalists, and young right-wing internet trolls—all united in the belief that white male identity is under attack by multicultural, "politically correct" forces."

Violence and  Hate Crimes:
​Further information: Hate crime

Four categories associated with hate groups' propensity for violence are:
  1. organizational capacity,
  2. organizational constituency,
  3. strategic connectivity,
  4. and structural arrangement.

The larger an extremist group is and the longer it has existed, the more prone the group is to engage in violence. Regionally, hate groups based in the West and Northeast are more likely to engage in violence than those based in the South.

If a group has a charismatic leader, it is more likely to be violent. Groups that share a conflict-based relationship with another group are more likely to engage in extreme violence. The amount of ideological literature a group publishes is linked to significant decreases in a group's violent behavior, with more literature linked to lower levels of violence.

Violent hate groups tend to commit "downward crimes," which involve the persecution of a minority group by a more powerful majority. By contrast, acts of terrorism are typically "upward crimes," with a low-power minority perpetrator targeting a more prominent majority group.

The California Association for Human Relations Organizations (CAHRO) asserts that hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and White Aryan Resistance (WAR) preach violence against racial, religious, sexual and other minorities in the United States.

Joseph E. Agne argues that hate-motivated violence is a result of the successes of the civil rights movement, and he asserts that the KKK has resurfaced and that new hate groups have formed. Agne argues that it is a mistake to underestimate the strength of the hate-violence movement, its apologists and its silent partners.

In the US, crimes that "manifest evidence of prejudice based on race, religion, sexual orientation, or ethnicity, including the crimes of murder and nonnegligent manslaughter; forcible rape; robbery; aggravated assault; burglary; larceny-theft; motor vehicle theft; arson; simple assault; intimidation; and destruction, damage or vandalism of property", directed at the government, an individual, a business, or institution, involving hate groups and hate crimes, may be investigated as acts of domestic terrorism.

Hate speech:
Main article: Hate speech

Counter-terrorism expert Ehud Sprinzak argues that verbal violence is "the use of extreme language against an individual or a group that either implies a direct threat that physical force will be used against them, or is seen as an indirect call for others to use it."

Sprinzak argues that verbal violence is often a substitute for real violence, and that the verbalization of hate has the potential to incite people who are incapable of distinguishing between real and verbal violence to engage in actual violence.

People tend to judge the offensiveness of hate speech on a gradient depending on how public the speech is and what group it targets. Although people's opinions of hate speech are complex, they typically consider public speech targeting ethnic minorities to be the most offensive.

Historian Daniel Goldhagen, discussing antisemitic hate groups, argues that we should view verbal violence as "an assault in its own right, having been intended to produce profound damage—emotional, psychological, and social—to the dignity and honor of the Jews. The wounds that people suffer by ... such vituperation ... can be as bad as ... [a] beating."

In the mid-1990s, the popularity of the Internet brought new international exposure to many organizations, including groups with beliefs such as: 
Several white supremacist groups have founded websites dedicated to attacking their perceived enemies. In 1996, the Simon Wiesenthal Center of Los Angeles asked Internet access providers to adopt a code of ethics that would prevent extremists from publishing their ideas online.

In 1996, the European Commission formed the Consultative Commission on Racism and Xenophobia (CRAX), a pan-European group which was tasked to "investigate and, using legal means, stamp out the current wave of racism on the Internet."

Religious hate groups:
See also: List of organizations designated by the SPLC as anti-LGBT hate groups

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has designated several Christian groups as hate groups, including:
Some conservatives have criticized the SPLC for its inclusion of certain Christian groups, such as the Family Research Council, on its list.

The SPLC classifies the Nation of Islam (NOI) as a hate group under the black separatist category. The NOI preaches that a black scientist named Yakub created the white race, a "race of devils", on the Greek island of Patmos. The NOI, unlike traditional Muslim groups, does not accept white members and it is not regarded as a legitimate branch of Islam by mainstream Muslims.

The white supremacist Creativity Movement (formerly the World Church of the Creator), led by Matthew F. Hale, is associated with violence and bigotry. Aryan Nations is another religiously-based white supremacist hate group.

Westboro Baptist Church is considered a hate group because of its provocative stance against homosexuality and the United States, and it has been condemned by many mainstream gay rights opponents as well as by gay rights supporters.

Internet hate groups:

Traditionally, hate groups recruited members and spread extremist messages by word of mouth, or through the distribution of flyers and pamphlets. In contrast, the Internet allows hate group members from all over the world to engage in real-time conversations.

The Internet has been a boon for hate groups in terms of promotion, recruitment and expansion of their base to include younger audiences. An Internet hate group does not have to be part of a traditional faction such as the Ku Klux Klan.

While many hate sites are explicitly antagonistic or violent, others may appear patriotic or benign, and this façade may contribute to the appeal of the groups. Hate group websites work towards the following goals: to educate group members and the public, to encourage participation, to claim a divine calling and privilege, and to accuse out-groups (e.g. the government or the media).

Groups that work effectively towards these goals via an online presence tend to strengthen their sense of identity, decrease the threat levels from out-groups, and recruit more new members.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC), in its 2009 iReport, identified more than 10,000 problematic hate and terrorist websites and other Internet postings. The report includes hate websites, social networks, blogs, newsgroups, YouTube and other video sites.

The findings illustrate that as the Internet continues to grow, extremists find new ways to seek validation of their hateful agendas and recruit members.

Creators of hate pages and groups on Facebook choose their target, set up their page or group, and then recruit members. Anyone can create a Facebook group and invite followers to post comments, add pictures and participate in discussion boards.

A Facebook page is similar, with the exception that one must "like" the page in order to become a member. Because of the ease of creating and joining such groups, many so-called hate groups exist only in cyberspace. United Patriots Front, an internet-based Australian far-right anti-immigration and neo-nazi organisation formed in 2015 has been described as a hate group.

See also: Filter bubble, Echo chamber (media), Deviancy amplification spiral, and Terrorism and social media

Psychology of hate groups:

Hateful intergroup conflict may be motivated by "in-group love," a desire to positively contribute to the group to which one belongs, or "out-group hate," a desire to injure a foreign group. Both individuals and groups are more motivated by "in-group love" than "out-group hate," even though both motivations might advance a group's status.

This preference is especially salient when a group is not situated in a competitive position against another. This partiality towards cooperative behavior suggests that intergroup conflict might decline if group members devoted more energy to positive in-group improvements than to out-group competition.

Groups formed around a set of moral codes are more likely than non-morality-based groups to exhibit "out-group hate" as a response to their especially strong sense of "in-group love."

Intergroup threat occurs when one group's interests threaten another group's goals and well-being. Intergroup threat theories provide a framework for intergroup biases and aggression.

One type of intergroup threat theory, realistic group conflict theory, addresses competition between groups by positing that when two groups are competing for limited resources, one group's potential success is at odds with the other's interests, which leads to negative out-group attitudes.

If groups have the same goal, their interactions will be positive, but opposing goals will worsen intergroup relations. Intergroup conflict may increase in-group unity, leading to a larger disparity and more conflict between groups.

Symbolic threat theory proposes that intergroup bias and conflict result from conflicting ideals, not from perceived competition or opposing goals. Biases based on symbolic threat tend to be stronger predictors of practical behavior towards out-groups than biases based on realistic threat.

Realistic group conflict theory and symbolic threat theory are, in some cases, compatible. Integrated-threat theory recognizes that conflict can arise from a combination of intergroup dynamics and classifies threats into four types: realistic threat, symbolic threat, intergroup anxiety, and negative stereotypes.

Intergroup threat theories provide a framework for intergroup biases and aggression. Intergroup anxiety refers to a felt uneasiness around members of other groups, which is predictive of biased attitudes and behaviors. Negative stereotypes are also correlated with these behaviors, causing threat based on negative expectations about an out-group.

According to the 7-stage hate model, a hate group, if unimpeded, passes through seven successive stages. In the first four stages, hate groups vocalize their beliefs and in the last three stages, they act on their beliefs.

Factors that contribute to a group's likelihood to act include the vulnerability of its members as well as its reliance on symbols and mythologies. This model points to a transition period that exists between verbal violence and acting out that violence, separating hardcore haters from rhetorical haters. Thus, hate speech is seen as a prerequisite of hate crimes, and as a condition of their possibility.

Hate group intervention is most possible if a group has not yet passed from the speech to the action stage, and interventions on immature hate groups are more effective than those that are firmly established. Intervention and rehabilitation is most effective when the one investigating a hate group can identify and deconstruct personal insecurities of group members, which in turn contribute to the weakness of the group.

​Perhaps most critical to combating group hate is to prevent the recruitment of new members by supporting those who are most susceptible, especially children and youth, in developing a positive self-esteem and a humanized understanding of out-groups.

See also:






​
Racism in the United States  including Racial Profiling Pictured: Members of The Ku Klux Klan
Racism in the United States against non-whites is widespread and has been since the colonial era. Socially sanctioned privileges and rights continue to be given to white Americans but denied to all other races, while explicit legal discrimination endured into the 1960s.

In the view of the United Nations and the U.S. Human Rights Network, "discrimination in the United States permeates all aspects of life and extends to all communities of color."

European Americans (particularly the affluent white Anglo-Saxon Protestants) were granted exclusive privileges in matters of education, immigration, voting rights, citizenship, land acquisition, and criminal procedure over periods of time extending from the 17th century to the 1960s.

In addition, Middle Eastern American groups like Jews and Arabs have faced continuous discrimination in the United States, and as a result, some people belonging to these groups do not identify as white. East and South Asians have similarly faced racism in America. Non-Protestant immigrants from Europe; particularly Irish people, Poles, and Italians, often suffered xenophobic exclusion and other forms of ethnicity-based discrimination in American society until the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Major racially and ethnically structured institutions include slavery, segregation, the American Indian Wars, Native American reservations, Native American boarding schools, immigration and naturalization law, and internment camps. Formal racial discrimination was largely banned in the mid-20th century and came to be perceived by some Americans as socially and morally unacceptable.

Racism remains a widespread and major phenomenon, continuing to be reflected in socioeconomic inequality. Racial stratification continues to occur in employment, housing, education, lending, and government.

​Some Americans saw the presidential candidacy of Barack Obama, and his election in 2008 as the first black president of the United States, as a sign that the nation had, in fact, become post-racial. The populist radio host Lou Dobbs claimed in November 2009, "We are now in a 21st-century post-partisan, post-racial society." Two months later, Chris Matthews, an MSNBC host, said of President Obama, "He is post-racial by all appearances. You know, I forgot he was black tonight for an hour."

The election of President Donald Trump is seen as a racist backlash against the election of Barack Obama.

While the nature of the views held by average Americans have changed much over the past several decades, surveys by organizations such as ABC News have found that, even in modern America, large sections of Americans self-admit to holding discriminatory viewpoints.

For example, a 2007 article by ABC stated that about one in ten admitted to holding prejudices against Hispanic and Latino Americans and about one in four did so regarding Arab-Americans. A 2018 YouGov/Economist poll found that 17% of Americans oppose interracial marriage; with 19% of "other" ethnic groups, 18% of blacks, 17% of whites, and 15% of Hispanics opposing.
​
During the 2010s, the country has seen continued high levels of racism and bigotry. America has seen the rise of the "alt-right" movement: a white nationalist coalition that seeks the explusion and/or subjection of sexual and racial minorities from the United States.

In August 2017, these groups attended a rally that meant to unify various white nationalist factions. During the rally, a white supremacist killed a demonstrator ramming a car into Heather Heyer, a protester against the rally. 

Since the mid-2010s, the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation now consider white supremacist violence the leading threat of domestic terrorism in the United States.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Racism in the United States: ___________________________________________________________________________

Racial profiling is the act of suspecting or targeting a person of a certain race based on a stereotype about their race, rather than on individual suspicion. 
More commonly in the United States., racial profiling is thought of in the sense of the law enforcement at the local, state, and federal levels and the racial discrimination of people in the Black, Arab, Latino, Asian, and American Indian communities.

Racial Profiling in the United States:

​See also: Airport racial profiling in the United States

​According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU):

'Racial profiling' refers to the practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual's race, ethnicity, religion or national origin. Criminal profiling, generally, as practiced by police, is the reliance on a group of characteristics they believe to be associated with crime.

Examples of racial profiling are the use of race to determine which drivers to stop for minor traffic violations (commonly referred to as 'driving while black or brown'), or the use of race to determine which pedestrians to search for illegal contraband.

Besides such disproportionate searching of African Americans, and members of other minority groups, other examples of racial profiling by law enforcement in the U.S. include the targeting of Hispanic and Latino Americans in the investigation of illegal immigration; and the focus on Middle Eastern and South Asians present in the country in screenings for ties to Islamic terrorism. 

These suspicions are typically on the basis of racist, and/or derogatory beliefs about the group of target, and assumes the criminal ideologies of one individual from a specific racial group is a trait held by all members of that racial group.

According to Minnesota House of Representatives analyst Jim Cleary, "there appear to be at least two clearly distinguishable definitions of the term 'racial profiling': a narrow definition and a broad definition... Under the narrow definition, racial profiling occurs when a police officer stops and/or searches someone solely on the basis of the person's race or ethnicity... Under the broader definition, racial profiling occurs whenever police routinely use race as a factor that, along with an accumulation of other factors, causes an officer to react with suspicion and take action."

A study conducted by Domestic Human Rights Program of Amnesty International USA found that racial profiling has increased since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and that state laws cannot provide sufficient and consistent protections against racial profiling.

History:

Sociologist Robert Staples emphasizes that racial profiling in the U.S. is "not merely a collection of individual offenses" but, rather, a systemic phenomenon across American society, dating back to the era of slavery, and, until the 1950s, was, in some instances, "codified into law". Enshrinement of racial profiling ideals in United States law can be exemplified by several major periods in U.S. history.

In 1693, Philadelphia's court officials gave police legal authority to stop and detain any Negro (freed or enslaved) seen wandering about. Starting around the mid 18th century, slave patrols were used to stop slaves at any location in order to ensure they were being lawful.

In the mid 19th century, the Black Codes (United States), a set of statutes, laws and rules, were enacted in the South in order to regain control over freed and former slaves and relegate

African Americans to a lower social status. Similar discriminatory practices continued through the Jim Crow era.

Prior to the U.S. immigration restriction following September 11, 2001, Japanese immigrants were rejected U.S. citizenship during WWII, for fear of disloyalty following the attacks on Pearl Harbor. What resulted was the government's preemptive internment of more than 100,000 Japanese immigrants and Japanese American citizens during the Second World War, as a measure against potential Japanese espionage, also constituted a form of racial profiling.

In the late 1990s racial profiling became politicized, when police and other law enforcement fell under scrutiny for the disproportionate traffic stops of minority motorists. Researchers from the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) provided evidence of widespread racial profiling, one study showed that while blacks only made up 42 percent of New Jersey's driving population they accounted for 79 percent of motorists stopped in the state.

Supreme Court cases Terry v. Ohio was the first challenge to racial profiling in the United States in 1968. This case was about African American people who were thought to be stealing. The police officer arrested the three men and searched them and found a gun on two of the three men, and Terry (one of the three men searched) was convicted and sentenced to jail. 

Terry challenged the arrest on the grounds that it violated the search and seizure clause of the Fourth Amendment, however, in an 8-1 ruling, the Supreme Court decided that the police officer acted in a reasonable manner, and with reasonable suspicion, under the Fourth Amendment. The decision in this case allowed for greater police discretion in identifying suspicious or illegal activities.

In 1973, U.S. v. Brignoni- Ponce was decided. Felix Humberto Brignoni-Ponce was traveling in his vehicle and was stopped by border patrol agents because he appeared to be Mexican. The agents questioned Ponce and the other passengers in the car and discovered that the passengers were illegal immigrants, and the border agents subsequently arrested all occupants of the vehicle. 

​The Court determined that the testimonies that led to the arrests in this case were not valid, as they were obtained in the absence of reasonable suspicion and the vehicle was stopped without probable cause, as required under the Fourth Amendment.

In 1996, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in U.S. v. Armstrong that disparity in conviction rates is not unconstitutional in the absence of data that "similarly situated" defendants of another race were disparately prosecuted, overturning a 9th Circuit Court ruling that was based on "the presumption that people of all races commit all types of crimes – not with the premise that any type of crime is the exclusive province of any particular racial or ethnic group", waving away challenges based on the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution which guarantees the right to be safe from search and seizure without a warrant (which is to be issued "upon probable cause"), and the Fourteenth Amendment which requires that all citizens be treated equally under the law.

To date there have been no known cases in which any U.S. court dismissed a criminal prosecution because the defendant was targeted based on race. This Supreme Court decision doesn't prohibit government agencies from enacting policies prohibiting it in the field by agents and employees.

The Court also decided the case of Whren v. United States in 1996. Whren was arrested on felony drug charges after officers observed his truck sitting at an intersection for a long period of time before it failed to use its turn signal to drive away, and the police officers stopped his vehicle for the traffic violation.

Upon approaching the vehicle the officers observed that Whren was in possession of crack-cocaine. The Court determined the officers did not violate the Fourth Amendment through an unreasonable search and seizure and that the officers were permitted to stop the vehicle after it committed a traffic violation and the subsequent search of the vehicle was permitted regardless of the pretext of the officers.

In June 2001 the Bureau of Justice Assistance, a component of the Office of Justice Programs of the United States Department of Justice, awarded a Northeastern research team a grant to create the web-based Racial Profiling Data Collection Resource Center.

It now maintains a website designed to be a central clearinghouse for police agencies, legislators, community leaders, social scientists, legal researchers, and journalists to access information about current data collection efforts, legislation and model policies, police-community initiatives, and methodological tools that can be used to collect and analyze racial profiling data.

The website contains information on the background of data collection, jurisdictions currently collecting data, community groups, legislation that is pending and enacted in states across the country, and has information on planning and implementing data collection procedures, training officers in to implement these systems, and analyzing and reporting the data and results.

Statutory law:

In April 2010, Arizona enacted SB 1070, a law that would require law-enforcement officers to verify the citizenship of individuals they stop if they have reasonable suspicion that they may be in the United States illegally.

The law states that "Any person who is arrested shall have the person's immigration status determined before the person is released". United States federal law requires that all illegal immigrants who remain in the United States for more than 30 days are to register with the U.S. government and to have all registration documents with them at all times. Arizona made it a misdemeanor crime for an illegal immigrant 14 years of age and older to be found without carrying these documents at all times.

According to SB 1070, law-enforcement officials may not consider "race, color, or national origin" in the enforcement of the law, except under the circumstances allowed under the United States and Arizona constitutions. In June 2012, the majority of SB 1070 was struck down by the United States Supreme Court, while the provision allowing for an immigration check on detained persons was upheld.

Some states contain "stop and identify" laws that allow officers to detain suspected persons and ask for identification, and if there is failure to provide identification punitive measures can be taken by the officer. There are currently 24 states that have "stop and identify" statues, however, the criminal punishments and need to produce identification vary from state-to-state.

Utah HB 497 requires residents to carry relevant identification at all times in order to prove resident status or immigration status, even so, police may still dismiss provided documents under suspicion of falsification and arrest or detain suspects.
​
In early 2001, a bill was introduced to Congress named "End Racial Profiling Act of 2001" but lost support in the wake of the September 11th attacks. The bill was re-introduced to Congress in 2010 but also failed to gain the support it needed.

Several U.S. states now have reporting requirements for incidents of racial profiling. Texas, for example requires all agencies to provide annual reports to its Law Enforcement Commission. The requirement began on September 1, 2001, when the State of Texas passed a law to require all law enforcement agencies in the State to begin collecting certain data in connection to traffic or pedestrian stops beginning on January 1, 2002.

Based on that data, the law mandated law enforcement agencies to submit a report to the law enforcement agencies' governing body beginning March 1, 2003 and each year thereafter no later than March 1. The law is found in the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure beginning with Article 2.131.

Additionally, on January 1, 2011, all law enforcement agencies began submitting annual reports to the Texas State Law Enforcement Officers Standards and Education Commission.

The submitted reports can be accessed on the Commission's website for public review. In June 2003 the Department of Justice issued its Guidance Regarding the Use of Race by Federal Law Enforcement Agencies forbidding racial profiling by federal law enforcement officials.

Support:
​
Supporters defend the practice of racial profiling by emphasizing the crime control model. They claim that the practice is both efficient and ideal due to utilizing the laws of probability in order to determine one's criminality. 

This system focuses on controlling crime with swift judgment, bestowing full discretion on police to handle what they perceive as a threat to society. The use and support of racial profiling has surged in recent years, namely in North America due to heightened tension and awareness following the events of 9/11. As a result, the issue of profiling has created a debate that centers on the values of equality and self-defense. Supporters uphold the stance that sacrifices must be made in order to maintain national safety, even if it warrants differential treatment.

According to a 2011 survey by Rasmussen Reports, a majority of Americans support profiling as necessary "in today's society".

In December 2010, Fernando Mateo, then president of the New York State Federation of Taxi Drivers, made some pro-racial profiling remarks in the case of gun-shot taxi-cab driver: "You know sometimes it's good that we are racially profiled because the God's-honest truth is that 99 percent of the people that are robbing, stealing, killing these drivers are blacks and Hispanics." "Clearly everyone knows I'm not racist. I'm Hispanic and my father is black. ... My father is blacker than Al Sharpton."

When confronted with accusations of racial profiling the police claim that they do not participate in it. They emphasize that numerous factors (such as race, interactions, and dress) are used to determine if a person is involved in criminal activity and that race is not a sole factor in the decision to detain or question an individual. They further claim that the job of policing is far more imperative than to concerns of minorities or interest groups claiming unfair targeting.

Proponents of racial profiling believe that inner city residents of Hispanic communities are subjected to racial profiling because of theories such as the "gang suppression model". The "gang suppression model" is believed by some to be the basis for increased policing, the theory being based on the idea that Latinos are violent and out of control and are therefore "in need of suppression". Based on research, the criminalization of people can lead to abuses of power on behalf of law enforcement.

Criticism:

Critics of racial profiling argue that the individual rights of a suspect are violated if race is used as a factor in that suspicion. Notably, civil liberties organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) have labeled racial profiling as a form of discrimination, stating, "Discrimination based on race, ethnicity, religion, nationality or on any other particular identity undermines the basic human rights and freedoms to which every person is entitled."

Conversely, those in opposition of the police tactic employ the teachings of the due process model, arguing that minorities are not granted equal rights and are thus subject to unjust treatment. 

In addition, some argue that the singling out of individuals based on their ethnicity comes in violation of the Rule of Law, having voided all instance of neutrality. Those in opposition also make note of the role that the news media plays within the conflict.

The general public internalizes much of its knowledge from the media, relying on sources to convey information of events that transpire outside of their immediate domain. In conjunction with this power, media outlets are aware of the public's intrigue with controversy and have been known to construct headlines that entail moral panic and negativity.

In the case of racial profiling drivers, the ethnic backgrounds of drivers stopped by traffic police in the US suggests the possibility of biased policing against non-white drivers. Black drivers felt that they were being pulled over by law enforcement officers simply because of their skin color.

However, some argue in favor of the "veil of darkness" hypothesis, which states that police are less likely to know the race of a driver before they make a stop at nighttime as opposed to in the daytime. Referring to the veil of darkness hypothesis, it is suggested that if the race distribution of drivers stopped during the day differs from that of drivers stopped at night, officers are engaging in racial profiling.

For example, in one study done by Jeffrey Grogger and Greg Ridgeway, the veil of darkness hypothesis was used to determine whether or not racial profiling in traffic stops occurs in Oakland, California. The conductors found that there was little evidence of racial profiling in traffic stops made in Oakland.

Research through random sampling in the South Tucson, Arizona area has established that immigration authorities sometimes target the residents of barrios with the use of possibly discriminatory policing based on racial profiling. 

Author Mary Romero writes that immigration raids are often carried out at places of gathering and cultural expression such as grocery stores based on the fluency of language of a person (e.g. being bilingual especially in Spanish) and skin color of a person. She goes on to state that immigration raids are often conducted with a disregard for due process, and that these raids lead people from these communities to distrust law enforcement.

In a recent journal comparing the 1990s to the present, studies have established that when the community criticized police for targeting the black community during traffic stops it received more media coverage and toned down racial profiling.

However, whenever there was a significant lack of media coverage or concern with racial profiling, the amount of arrests and traffic stops for the African-American community would significantly rise again.

NYPD Demographics Unit:

Between 2003 and 2014, the New York City Police Department (NYPD) operated the Demographics Unit (later renamed Zone Assessment Unit) which mapped communities of 28 "ancestries of interest", including those of Muslims, Arabs, and Albanians. Plain-clothed detectives were sent to public places such as coffee shops, mosques and parks to observe and record the public sentiment, as well as map locations where potential terrorists could "blend in".

In its 11 years of operation, however, the unit did not generate any information leading to a criminal charge. A series of publications by the Associated Press during 2011–12 gave rise to public pressure to close the unit, and it was finally disbanded in 2014.

Racial profiling not only occurs on the streets but also in many institutions. Much like the book Famous all over Town where the author Danny Santiago mentions this type of racism throughout the novel. According to Jesper Ryberg's 2011 article "Racial Profiling And Criminal Justice" in the Journal of Ethics, "It is argued that, given the assumption that criminals are currently being punished too severely in Western countries, the apprehension of more criminals may not constitute a reason in favor of racial profiling at all."

It has been stated in a scholarly journal that for over 30 years the use of racial and/or demographic profiling by local authorities and higher level law enforcement's continue to proceed. NYPD Street cops use racial profiling more often, due to the widespread patterns.

They first frisk them to check whether they have enough evidence to be even arrested for the relevant crime. "As a practical matter, the stops display a measurable racial disparity: black and Hispanic people generally represent more than 85 percent of those stopped by the police, though their combined populations make up a small share of the city's racial composition." 

The New York Police Department has been subject to much criticism for its "stop and frisk" tactics. According to statistics on the NYPD's stop and frisk policies, collected by the Center for Constitutional Rights, 51% of the people stopped by the police were Black, 33% were Latino, and 9% were White, and only 2% of all stops resulted in contraband findings.

Starting in 2013, use of racial profiling by the New York Police Department was drastically curtailed, as New York Mayor Bill de Blasio was campaigning for the office, and this policy has continued into his term.

​Dealing with terrorism:
See also: Islamophobia

The September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon have led to targeting of some Muslims and Middle Easterners as potential terrorists and, according to some, are targeted by the national government through preventive measures similar to those practiced by local law enforcement. 

The national government has passed laws, such as the Patriot Act of 2001, to increase surveillance of potential threats to national threat as a result of the events that occurred during 9/11.

It is argued that the passage of these laws and provisions by the national government leads to justification of preventative methods, such as racial profiling, that has been controversial for racial profiling and leads to further minority distrust in the national government. 

One of the techniques used by the FBI to target Muslims was monitoring 100 mosques and business in Washington DC and threatened to deport Muslims who did not agree to serve as informers. The FBI denied to be taking part in blanket profiling and argued that they were trying to build trust within the Muslim community.

On September 14, 2001 three days after the September 11th attacks, an Indian American motorist and three family members were pulled over and ticketed by a Maryland state trooper because their car had broken taillights.

The trooper interrogated the family, questioned them about their nationality, and asked for proof of citizenship. When the motorist said that their passports were at home, the officer allegedly stated, "You are lying. You are Arabs involved in terrorism." He ordered them out of the car, had them put their hands on the hood, and searched the car. When he discovered a knife in a toolbox, the officer handcuffed the driver and later reported that the driver "wore and carried a butcher knife, a dangerous, deadly weapon, concealed upon and about his person." The driver was detained for several hours but eventually released.
​
In December 2001, an American citizen of Middle Eastern descent named Assem Bayaa cleared all the security checks at Los Angeles airport and attempted to board a flight to New York City. Upon boarding, he was told that he made the passengers uncomfortable by being on board the plane and was asked to leave.

Once off the plane, he wasn't searched or questioned any further and the only consolation he was given was a boarding pass for the next flight. He filed a lawsuit on the basis of discrimination against United Airlines. United Airlines filed a counter motion which was dismissed by a district judge on October 11, 2002. In June 2005, the ACLU announced a settlement between Bayaa and United Airlines who still disputed Bayaa's allegations, but noted that the settlement "was in the best interest of all".

The events of 9/11 also led to restrictions in immigration laws. The U.S. government imposed stricter immigration quotas to maintain national security at their national borders.

In 2002, men over sixteen years old who entered the country from twenty-five Middle Eastern countries and North Korea were required to be photographed, fingerprinted, interviewed and have their financial information copied, and had to register again before leaving the country under the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System. No charges of terrorism resulted from the program, and it was deactivated in April 2011.

In 2006, 18 young men from the GTA were charged with conspiring to carry out a series of bombings and beheadings, resulting in a swell of media coverage. Two media narratives stood out with the former claiming that a militant subculture was forming within the Islamic community while the latter attributed the case to a bunch of deviant youth who had too much testosterone brewing.

Eventually, it was shown that government officials had been tracking the group for some time, having supplied the youth with the necessary compounds to create explosives, prompting critics to discern whether the whole situation was a set-up.

Throughout the case, many factors were put into question but none more than the Muslim community who faced much scrutiny and vitriol due to the build-up of negative headlines stemming from the media.

Studies:

Statistical data demonstrates that although policing practices and policies vary widely across the United States, a large disparity between racial groups in regards to traffic stops and searches exists. However, whether this is due to racial profiling or the fact that different races are involved in crime in different rates, is still highly debated. Based on academic search, various studies have been conducted regarding the existence of racial profiling in traffic and pedestrian stops.

For motor vehicle searches academic research showed that the probability of a successful search is very similar across races. This suggests that police officers are not motivated by racial preferences but by the desire to maximize the probability of a successful search.

Similar evidence has been found for pedestrian stops, with identical ratios of stops to arrests for different races.

The studies have been published in various Academic Journals aimed towards Academic professionals as well practitioners such as law enforcers. Some of these journals include, Police Quarterly and the Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, so that both sides of the argument are present and evaluated. Of those gathered the most noted study refuting racial profiling was the conducted using the veil of darkness hypothesis stating that it will be difficult, if not impossible, for officers to discern race in the twilight hours. The results of this study concluded that the ratio of different races stopped by New York cops is about the same for all races tested.

Some of the most referenced organizations, who offer evidence on the existence of racial profiling, are The American Civil Liberties Union, which conducted studies in various major U.S. cities, and RAND. In a study conducted in Cincinnati, Ohio, it was concluded that "Blacks were between three and five times more likely to (a) be asked if they were carrying drugs or weapons, (b) be asked to leave the vehicle, (c) be searched, (d) have a passenger searched, and (e) have the vehicle physically searched in a study conducted. This conclusion was based on the analysis of 313, randomly selected, traffic stop police tapes gathered from 2003 to 2004."

A 2001 study analyzing data from the Richmond, Virginia Police Department found that African Americans were disproportionately stopped compared to their proportion in the general population, but that they were not searched more often than Whites. The same study found that Whites were more likely than African Americans to be "the subjects of consent searches", and that Whites were more likely to be ticketed or arrested than minorities, while minorities were more likely to be warned.

A 2002 study found that African Americans were more likely to be watched and stopped by police when driving through white areas, despite the fact that African Americans' "hit rates" were lower in such areas.

A 2004 study analyzing traffic stop data from suburban police department found that although minorities were disproportionately stopped, there is only a "very weak" relationship between race and police decisions to stop. 

Another 2004 study found that young black and Hispanic men were more likely to be issued citations, arrested, and to have force used against them by police, even after controlling for numerous other factors.

A 2005 study found that the percent of speeding drivers who were black (as identified by other drivers) on the New Jersey Turnpike was very similar to the percent of people pulled over for speeding who were black.

A 2004 study looking at motor vehicle searches in Missouri found that unbiased policing did not explain the racial disparity in such searches.

In contrast, a 2006 study examining data from Kansas concluded that its results were "consistent with the notion that police in Wichita choose their search strategies to maximize successful searches," and a 2009 study found that racial disparities in people being searched by the Washington state patrol was "likely not the result of intentional or purposeful discrimination." 

Another 2009 study found that police in Boston were more likely to search if their race was different from that of the suspect, in contrast to what would be expected if discrimination was occurring (which would be that police search decisions are independent of officer race).[64]

A 2010 study found that black drivers were more likely to be searched at traffic stops in white neighborhoods, whereas white drivers were more likely to be searched by white officers at stops in black neighborhoods.

A 2013 study found that police were more likely to issue warnings and citations, but not arrests, to young black men.

A 2014 study analyzing data from Rhode Island found that blacks were more likely than whites to be frisked and, to a lesser extent, searched while driving; the study concluded that "Biased policing is largely the product of implicit stereotypes that are activated in contexts in which Black drivers appear out of place and in police actions that require quick decisions providing little time to monitor cognitions."

As a response to the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9, 2014, the Department of Justice recruited in September a team of criminal justice researchers to study racial bias in law enforcement in five cities and to subsequently devise strategic recommendations. In its March 2015 report on the Ferguson Police Department, the Department of Justice found that although only 67% of the population of Ferguson was black, 85% of people pulled over by police in Ferguson were black, as were 93 percent of those arrested and 90 percent of those given citations by the police.

Public opinion:

Perceptions of race and safety:

In a particular study, Higgins, Gabbidon, and Vito studied the relationship between public opinion on racial profiling in conjunction with their viewpoint of race relations and their perceived awareness of safety. It was found that race relations had a statistical correlation with the legitimacy of racial profiling.

Specifically, results showed that those who believed that racial profiling was widespread and that racial tension would never be fixed were more likely to be opposed to racial profiling than those who did not believe racial profiling was as widespread or that racial tensions would be fixed eventually.

On the other hand, in reference to perception of safety, the research concluded that one's perception of safety had no influence on public opinion of racial profiling. Higgins, Gabbidon, and Vito acknowledge that this may not have been the case immediately after 9/11, but state that any support of racial profiling based on safety was "short-lived".

Influence of religious affiliation:

One particular study focused on individuals who self-identified as religiously affiliated and their relationship with racial profiling. By using national survey data from October 2001, researcher Phillip H. Kim studied which individuals were more likely to support racial profiling.

The research concludes that individuals that identified themselves as either Jewish, Catholic, or Protestant showed higher statistical numbers that illustrated support for racial profiling in comparison to individuals who identified themselves as non-religious.

Contexts of terrorism and crime:

After the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, according to Johnson, a new debate concerning the appropriateness of racial profiling in the context of terrorism took place. According to Johnson, prior to the September 11, 2001 attacks the debate on racial profiling within the public targeted primarily African-Americans and Latino Americans with enforced policing on crime and drugs.

​The attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon changed the focus of the racial profiling debate from street crime to terrorism. According to a June 4–5, 2002 FOX News/Opinion Dynamics Poll, 54% of Americans approved of using "racial profiling to screen Arab male airline passengers."

A 2002 survey by Public Agenda tracked the attitudes toward the racial profiling of Blacks and people of Middle Eastern descent. In this survey, 52% of Americans said there was "no excuse" for law enforcement to look at African Americans with greater suspicion and scrutiny because they believe they are more likely to commit crimes, but only 21% said there was "no excuse" for extra scrutiny of Middle Eastern people.

However, using data from an internet survey based experiment performed in 2006 on a random sample of 574 adult university students, a study was conducted that examined public approval for the use of racial profiling to prevent crime and terrorism.

It was found that approximately one third of students approved the use of racial profiling in general. Furthermore, it was found that students were equally likely to approve of the use of racial profiling to prevent crime as to prevent terrorism-33% and 35.8% respectively.

The survey also asked respondents whether they would approve of racial profiling across different investigative contexts. It was found that 23.8% of people approved of law enforcement using racial profiling as a means to stop and question someone in a terrorism context while 29.9% of people approved of racial profiling in a crime context for the same situation.

It was found that 25.3% of people approved of law enforcement using racial profiling as a means to search someone's bags or packages in a terrorism context while 33.5% of people approved of racial profiling in a crime context for the same situation. It was also found that 16.3% of people approved of law enforcement wire tapping a person's phone based upon racial profiling in the context of terrorism while 21.4% of people approved of racial profiling in a crime context for the same situation.

It was also found that 14.6% of people approved of law enforcement searching someone's home based upon racial profiling in a terrorism context while 18.2% of people approved of racial profiling in a crime context for the same situation.

The study also found that white students were more likely to approve of racial profiling to prevent terrorism than nonwhite students. However, it was found that white students and nonwhite students held the same views about racial profiling in the context of crime. It was also found that foreign born students were less likely to approve of racial profiling to prevent terrorism than non-foreign born students while both groups shared similar views on racial profiling in the context of crime.

See Also:






​
​Mass racial violence in the United States including the Murder of George Floyd Pictured below: George Floyd being Choked to Death by the Police
​Mass racial violence in the United States, also called race riots, can include such disparate events as:
Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Mass Racial Violence in the United States: ___________________________________________________________________________

Death of George Floyd

​The death of George Floyd, an African-American man, occurred in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020, when Derek Chauvin, a white Minneapolis police officer, knelt on Floyd's neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds, with 2 minutes and 53 seconds of that occurring after Floyd was unresponsive, according to the criminal complaint filed against Chauvin. Floyd was handcuffed and lying face down on the road, while Chauvin had his knee on his neck. 

The three other arresting officers were identified as Thomas K. Lane, Tou Thao, and J. Alexander Kueng. Officer Kueng held Floyd’s back while Lane held his legs, and Thoa stood nearby and looked on.

The four officers were fired the next day.

The incident occurred during Floyd's arrest in Powderhorn, a neighborhood south of downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota, and was recorded on smartphones of bystanders. The arrest was conducted after Floyd allegedly attempted to use a $20 bill in a deli, which an employee identified as counterfeit.

Police alleged that Floyd "physically resisted" after being ordered to exit his vehicle before the video was filmed. Surveillance footage from a nearby restaurant however doesn't support the claim, with Floyd shown falling twice while being escorted by the officers.

Video recording by bystanders, showing the arrested Floyd repeatedly saying "I can't breathe", were widely circulated on social media platforms and broadcast by the media.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is conducting a federal civil rights investigation into the incident at the request of the Minneapolis Police Department. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) is also investigating possible violations of Minnesota statutes.

On May 29, Chauvin was arrested and charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter for Floyd's death, with Hennepin County attorney Michael O. Freeman saying he anticipated charges to be brought against the other three officers at the scene of Floyd's death.

After Floyd's death, demonstrations and protests in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul area were initially peaceful on May 26, but later that day evolved into riots as windows were smashed at a police precinct, two stores were set on fire, and many stores were looted and damaged.

Some demonstrators skirmished with police, who fired tear gas and rubber bullets. A preliminary autopsy found no indication that Floyd died of strangulation or traumatic asphyxia, but that the combined effects of being restrained, underlying health conditions, including coronary artery disease and hypertensive heart disease, and any potential intoxicants in his system likely contributed to his death. Attorneys for Floyd's family announced that they have requested an independent autopsy.

Floyd's death has been compared to the 2014 death of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man who also repeated "I can't breathe" eleven times after being placed in a choke hold by a New York police officer during an arrest.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the murder of George Floyd:






​
Domestic violence in the United States Pictured below: Victims of domestic violence
Domestic violence in United States is a form of violence that occurs within a domestic relationship.

Although domestic violence often occurs between partners in the context of an intimate relationship, it may also describe other household violence, such as violence against a child, by a child against a parent or violence between siblings in the same household.

It is recognized as an important social problem by governmental and non-governmental agencies, and various Violence Against Women Acts have been passed by the US Congress in an attempt to stem this tide.

Victimization from domestic violence transcends the boundaries of gender and sexual orientation. Women are more often the victims of domestic violence, and are more likely than men to suffer injuries or health consequences as a result of the incidents, but men are also subject to domestic violence in significant numbers, including in incidents of physical partner violence.

Significant percentages of LGBT couples also face domestic violence issues. Social and economically disadvantaged groups in the U.S. regularly face worse rates of domestic violence than other groups. For example, about 60% of Native American women are physically assaulted in their lifetime by a partner or spouse.
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Many scholarly studies of the problem have stated that domestic violence is often part of a dynamic of control and oppression in relationships, regularly involving multiple forms of physical and non-physical abuse taking place concurrently. Intimate terrorism is an ongoing, complicated use of control, power and abuse in which one person tries to assert systematic control over another psychologically. 

Homeless shelters exist in many states as well as special hotlines for people to call for immediate assistance, with non-profit agencies trying to fight the stigma that people both face in reporting these issues.

Definitions:

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary definition, domestic violence is: "the inflicting of physical injury by one family or household member on another; also: a repeated or habitual pattern of such behavior."

The following definition applies for the purposes of subchapter III of chapter 136 of title 42 of the US Code: "The term 'domestic violence' includes felony or misdemeanor crimes of violence committed by a current or former spouse of the victim, by a person with whom the victim shares a child in common, by a person who is cohabitating with or has cohabitated with the victim as a spouse, by a person similarly situated to a spouse of the victim under the domestic or family violence laws of the jurisdiction receiving grant monies, or by any other person against an adult or youth victim who is protected from that person’s acts under the domestic or family violence laws of the jurisdiction."

It was inserted into the Violence Against Women Act of 1994 by section 3(a) of the Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005.

It also applies for the purposes of section 7275 of subpart 17 of Part D of subchapter V of chapter 70 of title 20, section 1437F of subchapter I of chapter 8 of title 42, and subchapter XII-H of chapter 46 of title 42 of the US Code.

It is also the definition used by the US Office on Violence Against Women (OVW)

Globally:

Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations, declared in a 2006 report posted on the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) website that:
Violence against women and girls is a problem of pandemic proportions. At least one out of every three women around the world has been beaten, coerced into sex, or otherwise abused in her lifetime with the abuser usually someone known to her.

​Forms:
Main article: Domestic violence

Domestic violence may include verbal, emotional, economic, physical and sexual abuse. All forms of domestic abuse have one purpose: to gain and maintain control over the victim. Abusers use many tactics to exert power over their spouse or partner: dominance, humiliation, isolation, threats, intimidation, denial and blame.

The dynamics between the couple may include:
  • Situational couple violence, which arises out of conflicts that escalate to arguments and then to violence, is not connected to a general pattern of control, generally infrequent, and likely the most common type of intimate partner violence. Women are as likely as men to be abusers, however, women are somewhat more likely to be physically injured, but are also more likely to successfully find police intervention.
  • Intimate terrorism (IT), involves a pattern of ongoing control using emotional, physical and other forms of domestic violence and is what generally leads victims. It is what was traditionally the definition of domestic violence and is generally illustrated with the "Power and Control Wheel" to illustrate the different and inter-related forms of abuse.
  • Violent resistance (VR), or "self-defense", is violence perpetrated by victims against their abusive partners.
  • Common couple violence, where both partners are engaged in domestic violence actions.
  • Mutual violent control (MVC) is a rare type of intimate partner violence that occurs when both partners act in a violent manner, battling for control,

Incidence:

Between 960,000 and 3,000,000 incidents of domestic violence are reported each year, while many other incidents go unreported. It is estimated that more than ten million people experience domestic violence in the U.S. each year.

The ten states with the highest rate of females murdered by males were, as of 2010, 
  • Nevada, 
    South Carolina, 
    Tennessee, 
    Louisiana, 
    Virginia, 
    Texas, 
    New Mexico
    , Hawaii, 
    Arizona, 
    Georgia.

In 2009, for homicides in which the victim to offender relationship could be identified, 93% of female victims were murdered by a male they knew, 63% of them in the context of an intimate relationship.

Several studies in the U.S. have found that domestic violence is more common in the families of police officers than in the general population. Early studies found that between 24% and 40% of participating families of police officers reported incidents of domestic violence. 

Subsequent studies suggested possible rates of officer-involved domestic violence that ranged from 4.8% to 28%, meaning the rate could be the same as that of the general public. The prevalence of domestic violence in law enforcement is important, as police attitudes toward domestic violence affect the quality of police intervention in domestic violence situations.

Gender aspects of abuse:
See also: Domestic violence § Gender differences

​In the United States, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics in 1995 women reported a six times greater rate of intimate partner violence than men. 

The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) indicates that in 1998 about 876,340 violent crimes were committed in the U.S. against women by their current or former spouses, or boyfriends.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in the United States 4.8 million women suffer intimate partner related physical assaults and rapes and 2.9 million men are victims of physical assault from their partners.

Research reviews have concluded that the majority of women's physical violence against men is in response to being abused by those men. A 2010 systematic review of the literature on women's perpetration of IPV found that anger, self-defense and retaliation were common motivations but that distinguishing between self-defense and retaliation was difficult.

With regard to similar rates and a difference in methods, a study compiled by Martin S. Fiebert, suggested that women are as likely to be violent to men, but that men are less likely to be hurt. He, however, stated that men are seriously injured in 38 percent of the cases in which "extreme aggression" is used. Fiebert additionally stated that his work was not meant to minimize the serious effects of men who abuse women.

A 2011 review by researcher Chan Ko Ling from the University of Hong Kong found that perpetration of minor partner violence was equal for both men and women but more severe partner violence was far likelier to be perpetrated by men. His analysis found that men were more likely to beat up, choke or strangle their partners while women were more likely to throw objects, slap, kick, bite, punch, or hit with an object.

The Bureau of Justice Statistics also reported that women are far more likely to use objects. The National Institute of Justice contends that national surveys supported by NIJ, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Bureau of Justice Statistics that examine more serious assaults do not support the conclusion of similar rates of male and female spousal assaults. These surveys are conducted within a safety or crime context and find more partner abuse by men against women.

Straus and Gelles found that in couples reporting spousal violence, 27 percent of the time the man struck the first blow; in 24 percent of cases, the woman initiated the violence. The rest of the time, the violence was mutual, with both partners brawling. The results were the same even when the most severe episodes of violence were analyzed. In order to counteract claims that the reporting data was skewed, female-only surveys were conducted, asking females to self-report, and the data was the same.

The simple tally of physical acts is typically found to be similar in those studies that examine both directions, but studies show that male violence is more serious. Male violence does more damage than female violence; women are more likely to be injured and/or hospitalized.

Women are more likely to be killed by an intimate than the reverse (according to the Department of Justice, the rate is 63.7% to 36.3%), and women in general are more likely to be killed by their spouses than by all other types of assailants combined.
Studies have found that men are much less likely to report victimization in these situations.

According to some studies, less than 1% of domestic violence cases are reported to the police. In the United States 10–35% of the population will be physically aggressive towards a partner at some point in their lives. As abuse becomes more severe women become increasingly overrepresented as victims. The National Violence Against Women Survey for 2000 reported that 25% of women and 7.6% of men reported being victims of intimate partner violence at some point in their lives.

The rate of intimate partner violence in the U. S. has declined since 1993.

In a 2006 Amnesty International report, The Maze of Injustice: The Failure to Protect Indigenous Women From Sexual Violence in the USA, the data for Native women indicates high levels of sexual violence. Statistics gathered by the U.S. government reveal that Native American and Alaska Native women are more than 2.5 times more likely to be sexual assaulted than women in the United States in general; more than one in three Native women will be raped in their lifetime.

Statistics Over a year:
  • 1% of all women (age > 18) who participated in a UN national study in 1995–96, who may or may not have been married or partnered, were victims of domestic abuse within the previous 12-month period. Since this population included women who had never been partnered, the prevalence of domestic violence may have been greater.
  • A report by the United States Department of Justice in 2000 found that 1.3% of women and 0.9% of men reported experiencing domestic violence in the past year.
  • About 2.3 million people are raped or physically assaulted each year by a current or former intimate partner or spouse.
  • Physically assaulted women receive an average of 6.9 physical assaults by the same partner per year.

During pregnancy:
Main article: Domestic violence and pregnancy

The United States was one of the countries identified by a United Nations study with a high rate of domestic violence resulting in death during pregnancy.

During one's lifetime:
  • According to The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and The National Institute of Justice, nearly 25% of women experience at least one physical assault during adulthood by a partner.
  • 22% of the women had been subject to domestic violence during some period of their life, according to a United Nations study. Since this population included women who had never been married or partnered, the prevalence of domestic violence may have been greater.ccording to a report by the United States Department of Justice in 2000, a survey of 16,000 Americans showed 22.1 percent of women and 7.4 percent of men reported being physically assaulted by a current or former spouse, cohabiting partner, boyfriend or girlfriend, or date in their lifetime.
  • 60% of American Indian and Alaska Native women will be physically assaulted in their lifetime.
  • A 2013 report by the American Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that 26% of male homosexuals and 44% of lesbians surveyed reported experiencing intimate partner violence. The study evaluated 2010 data from the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, which involved over 16,000 U.S. adults.

​Injury:

In 1992, domestic violence was the leading cause of injury for women between 15 and 44; more than rapes, muggings, and car accidents combined. The levels of domestic injury against men have not been investigated to the same extent.

Rape:
Main article: Rape
  • 1 in 71 men and 1 in 5 women have experienced an attempted or completed rape committed by a partner. More than one in three American Indian and Alaska Native women will be raped in their lifetimes.
  • A 2013 CDC study stated that 28% of straight women who had been raped experienced their first rape as a child, with the crime taking place between the ages of 11 and 17.
​
Murder:

​Women are more likely than men to be murdered by an intimate partner. Of those killed by an intimate partner, about three quarters are female and about a quarter are male. In 1999 in the United States, 1,218 women and 424 men were killed by an intimate partner, and 1,181 females and 329 males were killed by their intimate partners in 2005. In 2007, 2,340 deaths were caused by intimate partner violence—making up 14% of all homicides. 70% of these deaths were females and 30% were males.

Dating violence:
Main articles: Dating abuse and Teen dating violence

Dating violence is often a precursor to domestic violence. 22% of high school girls and 32% of college women experienced dating violence in a 2000 study. 20.6% of women experienced two or more types of dating violence and 8.3% of women experienced rape, stalking or physical aggression while dating. The levels of dating violence against men has not been investigated to the same extent.

Stalking:

According to the Centers for Disease Control National Intimate Partner Violence Survey results of 2010, 1 in 6 women (15.2%) have been stalked during their lifetime, compared to 1 in 19 men (5.7%).

Additionally, 1 in 3 bisexual women (37%) and 1 in 6 heterosexual women (16%) have experienced stalking victimization in their lifetime during which they felt very fearful or believed that they or someone close to them would be harmed or killed.

Socio-economic impacts:

While domestic violence crosses all socio-economic classes, Intimate Terrorism (IT) is more prevalent among poor people. When evaluating situational couple violence, poor people, subject to greater strains, have the highest percentage of situational couple violence, which does not necessarily involve serious violence.

Regarding ethnicity, socio-economic standing and other factors often have more to do with rates of domestic violence. When comparing the African American population to European Americans by socio-economic class, the rates of domestic violence are roughly the same. Since there are more poor African Americans, though, there is a higher incidence of domestic violence overall. It is not possible to evaluate the rate of domestic violence by ethnicity alone, because of the variability of cultural, economic and historical influences and the forms of domestic violence (situational couple violence, intimate terrorism) affecting each population of people.

Effects on children:

Up to 10 to 20% children in the United States witness abuse of a parent or caregiver annually. As a result, they are more likely to experience neglect or abuse, less likely to succeed at school, have poor problem-solving skills, subject to higher incidence of emotional and behavioral problems, and more likely to tolerate violence in their adult relationships.

Complicating this already bleak picture, parental psychopathology in the wake of domestic violence can further compromise the quality of parenting, and in turn increase the risk for the child's developing emotional and behavioral difficulties if mental health care is not sought.

Homelessness:
Main article: Homeless women in the United States

According to the authors of "Housing Problems and Domestic Violence," 38% of domestic violence victims will become homeless in their lifetime. Domestic violence is the direct cause of homelessness for over half of all homeless women in the United States. According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, domestic violence is the third leading cause of homelessness among families.

Economic impacts:

Economic abuse can occur across all socio-economic levels.

The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence in the United States reports that:
  • 25% - 50% of victims of abuse from a partner have lost their job due to domestic violence.
  • 35% - 56% of victims of domestic violence are harassed at work by their partners.
  • More than 1.75 million workdays are lost each year to domestic violence. Lost productivity due to missed workdays and decreased productivity, with increased health and safety costs, results in a loss of $3 to $5 billion each year.

The Centers for Disease Control has released that the medical care, mental health services, and lost productivity cost of intimate partner violence was an estimated $8.3 billion in 2003 dollars for women alone.

Religion:
Main articles: Christianity and domestic violence and Islam and domestic violence

One 2004 study by William Bradford Wilcox examined the relationship between religious affiliation, church attendance, and domestic violence, using data on wives' reports of spousal violence from three national United States surveys conducted between 1992 and 1994.

The study found that the lowest reported rates of domestic violence occurred among active conservative Protestants (2.8% of husbands committed domestic violence), followed by those who were religiously unaffiliated (3.2%), nominal mainline Protestants (3.9%), active mainline Protestants (5.4%), and nominal conservative Protestants (7.2%).

Overall (including both nominal and active members), the rates among conservative Protestants and mainline Protestants were 4.8% and 4.3%, respectively.

Examining Wilcox's study, Van Leewen finds that the parenting style of conservative Protestant fathers is characterized by features which have been linked to positive outcomes among children and adolescents,  that there is no evidence that gender-traditionalist ideology of the "soft patriarchal" kind is a strong predictor of domestic physical abuse, and that "gender hierarchicalist males" who are frequent and active church members function positively in the domestic environment. 

​Another 2007 study by Christopher G. Ellison suggested that "religious involvement, specifically church attendance, protects against domestic violence, and this protective effect is stronger for African American men and women and for Hispanic men, groups that, for a variety of reasons, experience elevated risk for this type of violence."

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about domestic violence in the United States:​






​
​Racial Bias on Criminal News in the United States Pictured below: See First YouTube above
Racial biases are a form of implicit bias, which refers to the attitudes or stereotypes that affect an individual's understanding, actions, and decisions in an unconscious manner. These biases, which encompass unfavorable assessments, are often activated involuntarily and without the awareness or intentional control of the individual.

Residing deep in the subconscious, these biases are different from known biases that individuals may choose to conceal for the purposes of social and/or political correctness.

Police officers come from all walks of life and they too have implicit bias, regardless of their ethnicity. Racial bias in criminal news reporting in the United States is a manifestation of this bias.

​Racial bias in U.S. criminal news:

Racial bias has been recorded in criminal news reporting from the United States, particularly with regard to African American individuals, and a perceived fear of African Americans among European and White Americans.

Racial bias against African Americans:

Historical racism towards African Americans consists of beliefs about African American intelligence, ambition, honesty and other stereotyped characteristics, as well as support for segregation and support for acts of open discrimination.

Dana Mastro's research on racial bias in the United States reveals persistent racial prejudice among Caucasians, characterizing African Americans as violent and aggressive. These beliefs have been found to manifest in a heightened fear among Caucasians of victimization at the hands of racial minorities, specifically African American males.

Both theory and empirical evidence indicate that media exposure contributes to the construction and perpetuation of these perceptions by disproportionately depicting racial/ethnic minorities as criminal suspects and Caucasians as victims in television news.

Further consuming these messages has been shown to provoke prejudicial responses among Caucasian viewers.

Robert Entman suggests that today's media environment suggests that old-fashioned racial images are socially undesirable and stereotyping is now subtler and stereotyped thinking is reinforced at levels likely to remain below conscious awareness.

Rather than grossly demeaning distortions of yesterday's stereotyping now there is a grey area allowing for denial of the racial component. The phrase "threatening black male" allows for a negative attribute rather than an attack on racial identity.

Twitter, one of the more widely used forms of social media, with over 271 million active users, is the choice of the Millennial generation to get breaking news. Using hashtags, such as #michaelbrown, when they post allows for individuals to find information in a simpler manner.

The study conducted in the article Race and Punishment states that current crime coverage strategies aim to increase in the importance of a crime, thus distorting the public sense of who commits crimes, and leads to biased reactions. By over-representing Caucasians as victims of crimes perpetrated by people of color it exaggerates crimes committed by African Americans and downplays victimization of African Americans.

For example, the majority of US homicides are intra-racial, but media accounts often portray a world in which African American male offenders are overrepresented.

African American suspects presentation in news:

A study by the Sentencing Project reports that African American crime suspects were presented in more threatening contexts than Caucasians; to specify, African American suspects were more often left unnamed and were more likely to be shown as threatening by being depicted in physical custody of the police.

Analyses of television news consistently indicate that African American males are overrepresented as perpetrators and underrepresented as victims, compared to both their Caucasian male counterparts on TV as well as real-world Department of Justice arrest reports.

In these news stories, African American suspects are more likely than Caucasians to be portrayed as nameless, menacing, and in the grasp of the police. Some evidence also suggests that audiences know the news they watch misrepresents the reality of race and crime in the United States, and that news executives know their broadcasts scare their audiences.

Dana Mastro reports that African Americans are nearly four times more likely to be represented as criminals than police officers on television news—a proportion inconsistent with U.S. Department of Labor statistics. Alongside their over-representation as criminals in the news, African Americans also are underrepresented as victims compared with their on-air counterparts.

Another study by Dixon and Williams had also concluded that is still the case in cable news channels with one difference. African American homicide victims being may be more likely shown on cable networks than on television networks when national stories like the Trayvon Martin Fatal Shooting receive constant coverage on news cycles, thus receiving more airtime on cable owned twenty four hour run programming. This particular study also came to the conclusion that when studying this bias they would need to include a larger population of programs with more "polarizing on-air" personality, and across different parts of the country with different age groups.

Further, the text of crime-related news stories also has been found to vary depending on the race of the perpetrator. For example, Dixon and Linz's research reveals that statements containing prejudicial information about criminal suspects, such as prior arrests, were significantly more likely to be associated with African Americans as opposed to Caucasians defendants, particularly in cases involving Caucasian victims. Exposure to biased messages has consequences.

When the public consistently consumes the persistent over-representation of African American males in crime-related news stories it strengthens their cognitive association between Blacks and criminality in their mind such as the connection "Blacks and crime" and thus becomes chronically accessible for use in race-related evaluations such as: higher support for the death penalty because crime is more associated as a black problem that people need protection from and; that laziness is the only road black to success for people of color..

Notably, as the research on media priming illustrates, even a single exposure to these unfavorable characterizations can produce stereotype-based responses:
Journalistic practices:

Studies conducted by The Sentencing Project found that journalists gravitated towards cases where Caucasians were the victims and cases where the assailant was African American.

Studies drew the conclusion that newsworthiness is not a product of how representative or novel a crime is, but rather how well it can be "scripted using stereotypes grounded in racism and fear of African American crime."

Robert Entman believes it is crucial to understand that journalists may not support modern racism. The news personnel shape reports in accordance with professional norms and conventions rather than their own perspective. Furthermore, journalistic practices yield to dialogue that fit audience stereotypes.

For example, select sound bites for a story about African American political activity will often choose those that convey trauma and conflict. Entman suggests that African American leaders produced ample supply of such quotes because the structure of social political power often maximizes them.

The following table done by Robert Entman in his article Blacks in the News: Television, Modern Racism and Cultural Change shows that 11% of the stories about African Americans accused of crimes compared with 29% of Caucasians allowed them or their defenders to present information in their own voices. This suggests that African Americans are treated less humanely and in a less individualistic way than Caucasians:
​A smaller study delved a bit deeper into the tendency of journalistic racial bias by moving from data, to analyzing reporters. 

An article written by Emily Drew In Critical Studies in Media Communication journal published in 2011 reviewed data from the interviews of 31 reporters from 28 major newspapers across the U.S.  Each major newspaper had at one time published a series of articles covering race relations lasting from one month to a year. Through out the different series a common theme kept emerging, they questioned why “race relations appeared to be worsening – and racial disparities increasing”.

During the interviews, the journalists analyze why the media did not help in race relations when they held the power to do so “ just by choosing which stories to cover”.  They started to investigate their own bias. They realized that two of the reasons bias most often happens in journalism is because privilege is not recognized and is due to a lack of diversity either on staff or in the city that they live and work.

The journalists interviewed also recognized that this bias does not end with white reporters.

One journalist was quoted, “Black folks are not immune to it either. If you get writing for a white newspaper for long enough, you start to write and even think in a white voice.”. Some short lived efforts of this study included programs aimed at hiring more people of color to staff these papers and for reporters to start becoming a part of the actual communities they were covering.

Media outlets and racial bias against African Americans:

Fox News:

Media Matters for America, a "progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media" is an outspoken critic of Fox News, frequently accusing the channel of including racial overtones in news coverage.

Furthermore, an MMFA article claims that a shooting of an Australian teen was labelled a racial hate crime by Fox News. MMFA was particularly outraged over an incident where Fox News' show On The Record With Greta Van Susteren, guest Pat Buchanan claimed that "racial hate crimes [are] 40 times more prevalent in the black community than the white community."

Media Matters for America also asserted that an edition of Fox & Friends, regarding the case of the Ferguson shootings, reporter Peter Doocy described the DOJ's finding of racial bias, emphasizing that Attorney General Eric Holder "floated the possibility" of dissolving the Ferguson police department as a result, while co-host Steve Doocy linked the DOJ report and Holder's response to the shooting of two police officers in Ferguson. Holder, at a press conference stated it was revenue rather than law enforcement that drove officers to target African-Americans in the community.

Doocy described the shooting, saying, "a new wave of violence comes one week after Attorney General Eric Holder vowed to dismantle that city's police department", and questioned whether it was "what he wanted."

ABC News:

ABC News has been seen to falter within the topic of journalism and to have a certain bias that has been painted by third parties that swayed their viewpoint. In the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal, a Philadelphia journalist and activist who was convicted and sentenced to death in 1981 for the murder of a police officer, ABC News formed a specific argument for their audience to see.

Tom Gardner, a professor at Westfield State University, decided to look deeper into this case and saw many valuations within the trial that needed to be reassessed. The Media Education Foundation took this case under their wings and decided to tell the story of this controversial case with Gardner and asked "important questions about the responsibility that journalists have when it comes to issues of life and death."

The documentary Framing an Execution: The Media & Mumia Abu-Jamal looks at the way Sam Donaldson from the ABC program 20/20 covered the case. Many scholars believe that Abu-Jamal is a political prisoner and is only in jail because of his specific views and criticisms of how police have dealt with the black community. This case only got recognition after people continued to dispute that Abu-Jamal's trial was fair or lawful, to the extent that it reached national and international attention. 20/20 told this case as an emotional story, minimalizing its importance.

Sam Donaldson began his interviews with the widow, Maureen Faulkner. She was portrayed as a damsel in distress, making her a more sympathetic figure. From the beginning the specific angle of ABC News and the direction of Sam Donaldson's bias could be seen. ABC stated in their letter sent to the Pennsylvania prison authorities when trying to get an interview with Abu-Jamal that they were "currently working in conjunction with Maureen Faulkner and the Philadelphia Fraternal Order of the Police."

Framing has a couple of meanings; to the filmmakers, the one that best described the behavior of 20/20 is "to falsely set someone up to look as though they are guilty." Because of the unfairness of the trial proceedings, many have argued that it is impossible for anyone to know if Abu-Jamal is guilty or not, but the way the media has framed his trial says otherwise.

Mike Farrell believes that it is important to look at "the political context, the tone of the time in Philadelphia, at that period before and after to understand the context of this trial." When Mike Farrell and Ed Asner were interviewed on 20/20 by Donaldson, he had to portray them as "know-nothing dupe celebrities" once they started to sound knowledgeable.

Donaldson believed that the trial wasn't unfair but that Mumia was unfair to the trial. He continues to put down Abu-Jamal and those standing up for him by negatively accusing them of taking on the behavior of a religious cult.

Thomas Gardner opined that the 20/20 program "was never really journalism to start with. It was an exercise in persuasion, in rhetoric, really unadulterated propaganda masquerading as journalism." 

Amnesty International stated that "numerous aspects of this case clearly failed to meet minimum international standards safeguarding the fairness of legal proceedings", and "believes that the interest of the justice would best be served by the granting of a new trial of Mumia Abu Jamal." 

Angela Davis, an activist, scholar, and author believes that the media purposely prevented people from understanding the case of Abu-Jamal, and that they wanted to keep the public unaware to make sure there would not be large numbers of people supporting his campaign.

Search engines and racial bias against African Americans:

Professor Latanya Sweeney from Harvard University identified "significant discrimination" in Google search terms that included names typically associated with black people, and were more likely to yield results relating to criminal activities, which according to Prof. Sweeney, may expose "racial bias in society".

Police bias:
See also: Institutional racism

The United States Department of Justice concluded that the police department of Ferguson, Missouri has been racially biased against African Americans by removing all variables other than race: the police have routinely violated the constitutional rights of African Americans in Ferguson due to the out of control violent crime problems that the community protects from policing, following a civil rights investigation investigating the shooting of Michael Brown by the department, which sparked protests and riots in the area.

Other reports indicate protests were held all around the United States as a result of Michael Browns death in Ferguson, Missouri. Police shootings have been studied by researchers in regards to whether ethnicity plays a role in an officers decision to use excessive force.

The Department of Justice has determined black suspects are more often killed by police officers than other races. Although three-quarters of the city's population is African American, the police department is almost entirely white. This city, like many other major cities has begun making changes in the past year to try to better its racial fairness.

See also:







​Discrimination in America Today Pictured below: National poll finds discrimination prevalent in the United States
Discrimination is the act of someone being prejudiced towards another. This term is used to highlight the difference in treatment between members of different groups when one group is intentionally singled out and treated worse, or not given the same opportunities.

Attitudes toward minorities have been marked by discrimination historically in the United States. Many forms of discrimination have come to be recognized in U.S. society, on the basis of national origin, race, gender, and sexuality in particular.

History:
​
Racism:
Main articles: Racism in the United States and Racial inequality in the United States
​
​Skin of Color  is a form of racially-based discrimination where people are treated unequally due to skin color. It initially came about in America during slavery. Lighter skinned slaves tend to work indoors, while dark skinned worked outdoors.

In 1865, during the Reconstruction period after the Civil War, the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was passed and it abolished slavery. This was soon followed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution that granted citizenship to all persons "born or naturalized in the United States", and the Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution that protected the rights to vote for everyone.

These Amendments passed during the Reconstruction period extended protection to the newly emancipated slaves. However, in the 1870s Jim Crow laws were introduced in the Southeastern United States. These laws promoted the idea of "Separate but equal" which was first brought about from the Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, meaning that all races were equal, but they had to have separate public facilities.

The mixing of races was illegal in most places such as public schools, public transportation and restaurants. These laws increased discrimination and segregation in the United States.

Often times, the products and sections designated for the "Colored" were inferior and not as nice for the "White Only". Water fountains, bathrooms, and park benches were just a few of the areas segregated by Caucasians due to Jim Crow laws. Furthermore, the Jim Crow laws systematically made life harder for African-Americans and people of color. It made voting harder to accomplish, due to the fact that African-Americans had to do literacy tests and go through other obstacles before getting the chance to vote.

​In the modern United States, gay black men are extremely likely to experience intersectional discrimination. In the United States, the children of gay African-American men have a poverty rate of 52 percent, the highest in the country. Gay African-American men in partnerships are also six times more likely to live in poverty than gay white male couples.

​Fighting back:

Major figures such as Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Rosa Parks were involved in the fight against the race-based discrimination of the Civil Rights Movement. Rosa Parks's refusal to give up her bus seat in 1955 sparked the Montgomery bus boycott—a large movement in Montgomery, Alabama that was an integral period at the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement.

The Bus Boycott lasted a total of 381 days before the Supreme Court deemed that segregated seating is unconstitutional. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a peaceful activist and pastor, led many such protests, advocating for the improvement of African-Americans in American's society. His role in the Montgomery Bus Boycott helped to launch his role in the Civil Rights Movement. King organized many protests attended not only by African-American, but also Caucasians.

While King organized peaceful protests, Malcolm X went a different route. His main supporters, The Nation of Islam, and him stressed the idea of black power, and black pride.

Although Malcolm X's actions were radical, especially when they contradicted that of Dr. King, but he is still considered one of the pioneers in fighting back against racial discrimination in daily life and not just from a political standpoint. His ideas of black nationalism and the use of violence to fight back helped to spark the political group in the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, which later became known as the Black Panther Party.

Formed by Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton, the organization was created in October of 1966 in Oakland, California. Usually seen in all black and armed, as a group, the Black Panthers first started off patrolling police activity in Oakland, but soon grew to widespread support in cities like Los Angeles, and Chicago. Although they were seen as a violent gang and a danger to society, the Black Panthers brought numerous social programs such as free breakfast for school children and free clinics across numerous cities.

What the Black Panthers were fighting for was outlined in their Ten Point Program. They were ultimately taken down by the FBI, led by J. Edgar Hoover, in the early 1970s. Other factors such as internal tensions, and financial struggles also played into the demise of the Black Panther Party and by 1982 they were completely gone.

In the education system, the Civil Rights Movement further became huge after the ruling of Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. Oliver Brown challenged the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas when his daughter was not allowed to enroll in any of the all white schools claiming that "separate but equal" violates the protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. 

Ruby Bridges, along with the Little Rock Nine, dealt with discrimination from Caucasian peers, their parents, and the community in general during the desegregation of schools. The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine African-American students who volunteered to attend school at the Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. They continuously had problems with the public and faced harsh treatment from other students, parents, and even the Little Rock National Guard.

However, a change occurred when President Dwight D. Eisenhower intervened by sending federal troops to escort the students. For Ruby Bridges, she joined the Civil Rights Movement in the November 14, 1960 when she became enrolled in William Frantz Elementary School.

Due to many parents not allowing their children in her class, Bridges was in class by herself, which was taught by Barbara Henry, and often times ate alone and had recess alone. Ruby, along with her family, did face a lot of backlash throughout Louisiana from the desegregation; however, they did receive support from numerous people in the North and Bridges was able to finish the year.

​Contemporary society:

Gender discrimination:
Further information: 
Gender discrimination is another form of discrimination. Women are often seen as an expense to their employers because they take days off for children, need time off for maternity leave and are stereotyped as "more emotional". The theory that goes hand in hand with this is known as the glass escalator or the glass ceiling, which holds that while women are being held down in male-dominated professions, men often rise quickly to positions of authority in certain fields.

Men are pushed forward into management, even surpassing women who have been at the job longer and have more experience in the field.

Men's rights deals with discrimination against men in the areas of family law, such as divorce and child custody, labor such as paternity leave, paternity fraud, health, education, conscription, and other areas of the law such as domestic violence, genital integrity, and allegations of rape.

Discrimination against immigrants:

Immigrants to the United States are affected by a totally separate type of discrimination. Some people feel as though the large numbers of people being allowed into the country are cause for alarm, therefore discriminate against them.

Arizona recently passed a law that forces people to carry documents with them at all times to prove their citizenship. This is only one controversy over immigrants in the United States, another is the claim that immigrants are stealing "true Americans'" jobs.

Immigration restrictions are among the biggest government interventions in the economy. They prevent millions of people from taking jobs, renting homes, and pursuing a wide range of opportunities that they could otherwise have.

Violent hate crimes have increased drastically. Recent social psychological research suggests that this form of prejudice against migrants may be partly explained by some fairly basic cognitive processes.

According to Soylu, some argue that immigrants constantly face being discriminated against because of the color of their skin, the sound of their voice, the way they look and their beliefs. Many immigrants are well educated, some argue that they are often blamed and persecuted for the ills in society such as overcrowding of schools, disease and unwanted changes in the host country's culture due to the beliefs of this "unwelcomed" group of people.

According to Soylu, there was an open immigration policy up until 1924 in America until the National Origins Act came into effect. According to the Immigration Act of 1924 which is a United States federal law, it limited the annual number of immigrants who could be admitted from any country to 2% of the number of people from that country who were already living in the United States in 1890, down from the 3% cap set by the Immigration Restriction Act of 1921, according to the Census of 1890.

It superseded the 1921 Emergency Quota Act. The law was primarily aimed at further restricting immigration of Southern Europeans and Eastern Europeans. According to Buchanan, later in the 1930s with the advent of opinion polling, immigration policy analysis was carried out by collecting public thoughts and opinions on the issue. These factors encouraged a heated debate on immigration policy.

These debates continued even into the 2000s, and were intensified by George W. Bush's immigration proposal. Some argue that the 9/11 terrorist attacks left the country in a state of paranoia and fear that strengthened the views in favor of having closed borders.

Discrimination in the workplace:

Immigration to the United States can be difficult due to immigrants' lack of access to legal documents and the expensive nature of immigration. The United States has historically been a major target destination for people seeking work and continues to be so today.

As Graciela, a 47-year-old married woman who had lived in the US for 4 years, stated, “My husband,…he lost his job. Things were beginning to get tough…We came with the need to find work and better life possibilities.” Worldwide, the workforce has become increasingly pluralistic and ethnically diverse as more and more people migrate across nations.

Although race- or ethnicity-based discriminatory employment practices are prohibited in most developed countries, according to feminist scholar Mary Harcourt, actual discrimination is still widespread. Sahagian Jacqueline, an author, argues that one example of this act of discrimination occurred at Macy's a department store.

According to the U.S. Justice Department, Macy's used unfair documentation practices against legal immigrant employees who had proper work authorizations. During an eligibility re-verification process, Macy's broke immigration law that prohibits employers from discriminating against immigrant employees during re-verification by asking for more or different documents than other employees are required to submit based on a worker's immigration status or national origin.

Some of the affected employees lost seniority, were suspended, or even let go due to the illegal re-verification. While their opinions are controversial, researchers Moran, Tyler and Daranee argue that with immigrants' growing numbers and their expanding economic role in U.S. society, addressing challenges and creating opportunities for immigrants to succeed in the labor force are critical prerequisites to improve the economic security for all low-wage working families and ensure the future vitality of our economy.

Discrimination based on sexual orientation:

Another type of discrimination is that against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals. For personal reasons such as religious beliefs, employers sometimes choose to not hire these people. LGBT rights have been protested against for various reasons; for example, one topic of controversy related to LGBT people is marriage, which was legalized in all states in June 2015 following the Supreme Court case Obergefell v. Hodges.

See also:







White Supremacy, including the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) Pictured below: "Should the U.S. designate racial violence as terrorism?" (PBS 7-11-2020)
White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of white power and privilege.

White supremacy has roots in the now-discredited doctrine of scientific racism, and was a key justification for colonialism. It underlies a spectrum of contemporary movements including neo-Confederates, neo-Nazism and Christian Identity.

Different forms of white supremacy put forth different conceptions of who is considered white (though the exemplar is generally light-skinned, blond-haired, and blue-eyed, or 'Aryan' traits most common in northern Europe), and groups of white supremacists identify various racial and ethnic enemies, most commonly those of African ancestry, Indigenous peoples of the Americas and Australia, and Jews.

As a political ideology, it imposes and maintains social, political, historical, or institutional domination by white people. This ideology has been put into effect through socioeconomic and legal structures such as the Atlantic slave trade, Jim Crow laws in the United States, the White Australia policies from the 1890s to the mid-1970s, and apartheid in South Africa. 

​In addition, this ideology is embodied in the "White power" social movement. Since the early 1980s, the White power movement has been committed to overthrowing the United States government and establishing a white homeland using paramilitary tactics.

In academic usage, particularly in critical race theory or intersectionality, "white supremacy" can also refer to a social system in which white people enjoy structural advantages (privilege) over other ethnic groups, on both a collective and individual level, despite formal legal equality.

​History:

White supremacy has ideological foundations that date back to 17th-century scientific racism, the predominant paradigm of human variation that helped shape international relations and racial policy from the latter part of the Age of Enlightenment until the late 20th century (marked by decolonization and the abolition of apartheid in South Africa in 1991, followed by that country's first multiracial elections in 1994).

​United States:
Main category: White supremacy in the United States
See also: Racism in the United States

White supremacy was dominant in the United States both before and after the American Civil War, and it also persisted for decades after the Reconstruction Era. In the antebellum South, this included the holding of African Americans in chattel slavery, in which four million of them were denied freedom. 

The outbreak of the Civil War saw the desire to uphold white supremacy being cited as a cause for state secession and the formation of the Confederate States of America. In an editorial about Native Americans and the American Indian Wars in 1890, author L. Frank Baum wrote: "The Whites, by law of conquest, by justice of civilization, are masters of the American continent, and the best safety of the frontier settlements will be secured by the total annihilation of the few remaining Indians."

The Naturalization Act of 1790 limited U.S. citizenship to whites only. In some parts of the United States, many people who were considered non-white were disenfranchised, barred from government office, and prevented from holding most government jobs well into the second half of the 20th century.

Professor Leland T. Saito of the University of Southern California writes: "Throughout the history of the United States, race has been used by whites for legitimizing and creating difference and social, economic and political exclusion."

The denial of social and political freedom to minorities continued into the mid-20th century, resulting in the civil rights movement. Sociologist Stephen Klineberg has stated that U.S. immigration laws prior to 1965 clearly declared "that Northern Europeans are a superior subspecies of the white race". 

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 opened entry to the U.S. to non Germanic groups, and significantly altered the demographic mix in the U.S. as a result. 16 U.S. states banned interracial marriage through anti-miscegenation laws until 1967, when these laws were invalidated by the Supreme Court of the United States' decision in Loving v. Virginia. 

These mid-century gains had a major impact on white Americans' political views; segregation and white racial superiority, which had been publicly endorsed in the 1940s, became minority views within the white community by the mid-1970s, and continued to decline into 1990s polls to a single-digit percentage. For sociologist Howard Winant, these shifts marked the end of "monolithic white supremacy" in the United States.

After the mid-1960s, white supremacy remained an important ideology to the American far-right. According to Kathleen Belew, a historian of race and racism in the United States, white militancy shifted after the Vietnam War from supporting the existing racial order to a more radical position—self-described as "white power" or "white nationalism"—committed to overthrowing the United States government and establishing a white homeland.

Such anti-government militia organizations are one of three major strands of violent right-wing movements in the United States, with white supremacist groups (such as the Ku Klux Klan (next topic below, neo-Nazi organizations, and racist skinheads) and a religious fundamentalist movement (such as Christian Identity) being the other two. 

Howard Winant writes that, "On the far right the cornerstone of white identity is belief in an ineluctable, unalterable racialized difference between whites and nonwhites." In the view of philosopher Jason Stanley, white supremacy in the United States is an example of the fascist politics of hierarchy, in that it "demands and implies a perpetual hierarchy" in which whites dominate and control non-whites.

In a 2020 article in The New York Times titled How White Women Use Themselves as Instruments of Terror, black columnist Charles M. Blow wrote that the expression of white supremacy “is just as likely to wear heels as a hood. Untold numbers of lynchings were executed because white women had claimed that a black man raped, assaulted, talked to or glanced at them.

The Tulsa race massacre, the destruction of Black Wall Street, was spurred by an incident between a white female elevator operator and a black man. As the Oklahoma Historical Society points out, the most common explanation is that he stepped on her toe. As many as 300 people were killed because of it. The torture and murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till in 1955, a lynching actually, occurred because a white woman said that he “grabbed her and was menacing and sexually crude toward her.”

This exercise in racial extremism has been dragged into the modern era through the weaponizing of 9-1-1, often by white women, to invoke the power and force of the police who they are fully aware are hostile to black men. This was again evident when a white woman in New York’s Central Park told a black man, a bird-watcher, that she was going to call the police and tell them that he was threatening her life.“

Some academics argue that outcomes from the 2016 United States Presidential Election reflect ongoing challenges with white supremacy. Psychologist Janet Helms suggested that the normalizing behaviors of social institutions of education, government, and healthcare are organized around the "birthright of...the power to control society's resources and determine the rules for [those resources]". 

Educators, literary theorists, and other political experts have raised similar questions, connecting the scapegoating of disenfranchised populations to white superiority. As of 2018, there are over 600 white supremacy organizations recorded in the U.S.

On July 23, 2019, Christopher A. Wray, the head of the FBI, said at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing that the agency had made around 100 domestic terrorism arrests since October 1, 2018, and that the majority of them were connected in some way with white supremacy.

Wray said that the Bureau was "aggressively pursuing [domestic terrorism] using both counterterrorism resources and criminal investigative resources and partnering closely with our state and local partners," but said that it was focused on the violence itself and not on its ideological basis. A similar number of arrests had been made for instances of international terrorism. In the past, Wray has said that white supremacy was a significant and "pervasive" threat to the U.S.

On September 20, 2019, the acting Secretary of Homeland Security, Kevin McAleenan, announced his department's revised strategy for counter-terrorism, which included a new emphasis on the dangers inherent in the white supremacy movement. McAleenan called white supremacy one of the most "potent ideologies" behind domestic terrorism-related violent acts.

In a speech at the Brookings Institution, McAleenan cited a series of high-profile shooting incidents, and said "In our modern age, the continued menace of racially based violent extremism, particularly white supremacist extremism, is an abhorrent affront to the nation, the struggle and unity of its diverse population."

The new strategy will include better tracking and analysis of threats, sharing information with local officials, training local law enforcement on how to deal with shooting events, discouraging the hosting of hate sites online, and encouraging counter-messages.

School curriculum:
Main article: White supremacy in U.S. school curriculum

White supremacy has also played a part in U.S. school curriculum. Over the course of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, material across the spectrum of academic disciplines has been taught with an overemphasis on White culture, contributions, and experiences, and a corresponding underrepresentation of non-White groups' perspectives and accomplishments. 

In the 19th century, Geography lessons contained teachings on a fixed racial hierarchy, which white people topped. Mills (1994) writes that history as it is taught is really the history of White people, and it is taught in a way that favors White Americans and White people in general. He states that the language used to tell history minimizes the violent acts committed by White people over the centuries, citing the use of the words "discovery," "colonization," and "New World" when describing what was ultimately a European conquest of the western hemisphere and its indigenous peoples as examples. 

Swartz (1992) seconds this reading of modern history narratives when it comes to the experiences, resistances, and accomplishments of Black Americans throughout the Middle Passage, slavery, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the Civil Rights Movement.

In an analysis of American history textbooks, she highlights word choices that repetitively "normalize" slavery and the inhumane treatment of Black people (p. ). She also notes the frequent showcasing of White abolitionists and actual exclusion of Black abolitionists, as well as the fact that Black Americans had been mobilizing for abolition for centuries before the major White American push for abolition in the 19th century.

She ultimately asserts the presence of a masternarrative that centers Europe and its associated peoples (White people) in school curriculum, particularly as it pertains to history She writes that this master narrative condenses history into only history that is relevant to, and to some extent beneficial for, White Americans.

Elson (1964) provides detailed information about the historic dissemination of simplistic and negative ideas about non-White races. Native Americans, who were subjected to attempts of cultural genocide by the U.S. government through the use of American Indian boarding schools, were characterized as homogenously "cruel," a violent menace toward White Americans, and lacking civilization or societal complexity (p. 74). 

For example, In the 19th century, Black Americans were consistently portrayed as lazy, immature, and intellectually and morally inferior to white Americans, and in many ways not deserving of equal participation in U.S. society. For example, a math problem in a 19th century textbook read, "If 5 white men can do as much work as 7 negroes..." implying that white men are more industrious and competent than black men (p. 99). 

In addition, little to none was taught about Black Americans' contributions, or their histories before being brought to U.S. soil as slaves. According to Wayne (1972), this approach was taken especially much after the Civil War in order to maintain Whites' hegemony over emancipated Black Americans. 

Other racial groups have received oppressive treatment, including Mexican Americans, who were temporarily prevented from learning the same curriculum as White Americans because they were supposedly intellectually inferior, and Asian Americans, some of whom were prevented from learning much about their ancestral lands because they were deemed a threat to "American" culture, i.e. White culture, at the turn of the 20th century.

Effect of the media:

White supremacy has been depicted in music videos, feature films, documentaries, journal entries, and on social media. The 1915 silent drama film The Birth of a Nation followed the rising racial, economic, political, and geographic tensions leading up to the Emancipation Proclamation and the Southern Reconstruction era that was the genesis of the Ku Klux Klan.

David Duke, a former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, believed that the Internet was going to create a "chain reaction of racial enlightenment that will shake the world." Jessie Daniels, of CUNY-Hunter College, also said that racist groups see the Internet as a way to spread their ideologies, influence others and gain supporters. 

Legal scholar Richard Hasen describes a "dark side" of social media: "There certainly were hate groups before the Internet and social media. [But with social media] it just becomes easier to organize, to spread the word, for people to know where to go. It could be to raise money, or it could be to engage in attacks on social media. Some of the activity is virtual. Some of it is in a physical place.

Social media has lowered the collective-action problems that individuals who might want to be in a hate group would face. You can see that there are people out there like you. That's the dark side of social media.

With the emergence of Twitter in 2006, and platforms such as Stormfront which was launched in 1996, an alt-right portal for white supremacists with similar beliefs, both adults and children, was provided in which they were given a way to connect. Daniels discussed the emergence of other social media outlets such as 4chan and Reddit, which meant that the "spread of white nationalist symbols and ideas could be accelerated and amplified."

Sociologist Kathleen Blee notes that the anonymity which the Internet provides can make it difficult to track the extent of white supremacist activity in the country, but nevertheless she and other experts see an increase in the amount of hate crimes and white supremacist violence.

In the latest wave of white supremacy, in the age of the Internet, Blee sees the movement as having primarily become a virtual one, in which divisions between groups become blurred: "[A]ll these various groups that get jumbled together as the alt-right and people who have come in from the more traditional neo-Nazi world. We're in a very different world now."

A series on YouTube hosted by the grandson of Thomas Robb, the national director of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, "presents the Klan's ideology in a format aimed at kids — more specifically, white kids." The short episodes inveigh against race-mixing, and extol other white supremacist ideologies.

A short documentary published by TRT describes Imran Garda's experience, a journalist of Indian descent, who met with Thomas Robb and a traditional KKK group. A sign that greets people who enter the town states "Diversity is a code for white genocide."

The KKK group interviewed in the documentary summarizes its ideals, principles, and beliefs, which are emblematic of white supremacists in the United States. The comic book super hero Captain America was used for dog whistle politics by the alt-right in college campus recruitment in 2017, an ironic co-optation because Captain America battled against Nazis in the comics, and was created by Jewish cartoonists.

​Academic use of the term:

The term white supremacy is used in some academic studies of racial power to denote a system of structural or societal racism which privileges white people over others, regardless of the presence or the absence of racial hatred. White racial advantages occur at both a collective and an individual level (ceteris paribus, i. e., when individuals are compared that do not relevantly differ except in ethnicity).

Legal scholar Frances Lee Ansley explains this definition as follows: "By "white supremacy" I do not mean to allude only to the self-conscious racism of white supremacist hate groups. I refer instead to a political, economic and cultural system in which whites overwhelmingly control power and material resources, conscious and unconscious ideas of white superiority and entitlement are widespread, and relations of white dominance and non-white subordination are daily reenacted across a broad array of institutions and social settings."

This and similar definitions have been adopted or proposed by the following:
These are widely used in critical race theory and intersectional feminism. Some anti-racist educators, such as Betita Martinez and the Challenging White Supremacy workshop, also use the term in this way.

The term expresses historic continuities between a pre–civil rights movement era of open white supremacy and the current racial power structure of the United States. It also expresses the visceral impact of structural racism through "provocative and brutal" language that characterizes racism as "nefarious, global, systemic, and constant". 

Academic users of the term sometimes prefer it to racism because it allows for a distinction to be drawn between racist feelings and white racial advantage or privilege. John McWhorter, a specialist in language and race relations, explains the gradual replacement of "racism" by "white supremacy" by the fact that "potent terms need refreshment, especially when heavily used", drawing a parallel with the replacement of "chauvinist" by "sexist".

Some have characterized the term's recent rise in popularity among leftist activists as counterproductive. John McWhorter has described the use of "white supremacy" as straying from its commonly accepted meaning to encompass less extreme issues, thereby cheapening the term and potentially derailing productive discussion. 

​Political columnist Kevin Drum attributes the term's growing popularity to frequent use by Ta-Nehisi Coates, describing it as a "terrible fad" which fails to convey nuance. He claims that the term should be reserved for those who are trying to promote the idea that whites are inherently superior to blacks and not used to characterize less blatantly racist beliefs or actions. 

The use of the academic definition of white supremacy has been criticized by Conor Friedersdorf for the confusion it creates for the general public inasmuch as it differs from the more common dictionary definition; he argues that it is likely to alienate those it hopes to convince.

Ideologies and movements:

Supporters of Nordicism consider the "Nordic peoples" to be a superior race. By the early 19th century, white supremacy was attached to emerging theories of racial hierarchy.

The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer attributed cultural primacy to the white race: "The highest civilization and culture, apart from the ancient Hindus and Egyptians, are found exclusively among the white races; and even with many dark peoples, the ruling caste or race is fairer in colour than the rest and has, therefore, evidently immigrated, for example, the Brahmans, the Incas, and the rulers of the South Sea Islands.

All this is due to the fact that necessity is the mother of invention because those tribes that emigrated early to the north, and there gradually became white, had to develop all their intellectual powers and invent and perfect all the arts in their struggle with need, want and misery, which in their many forms were brought about by the climate."

The eugenicist Madison Grant argued in his 1916 book, The Passing of the Great Race, that the Nordic race had been responsible for most of humanity's great achievements, and that admixture was "race suicide". In this book, Europeans who are not of Germanic origin but have Nordic characteristics such as blonde/red hair and blue/green/gray eyes, were considered to be a Nordic admixture and suitable for Aryanization.

​In the United States, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK: see next topic below) is the group most associated with the white supremacist movement. Many white supremacist groups are based on the concept of preserving genetic purity, and do not focus solely on discrimination based on skin color. 

The KKK's reasons for supporting racial segregation are not primarily based on religious ideals, but some Klan groups are openly Protestant. The KKK and other white supremacist groups like Aryan Nations, The Order and the White Patriot Party are considered antisemitic.

Nazi Germany promulgated white supremacy based on the belief that the Aryan race, or the Germans, were the master race. It was combined with a eugenics program that aimed for racial hygiene through compulsory sterilization of sick individuals and extermination of Untermenschen ("sub-humans"): Slavs, Jews and Romani, which eventually culminated in the Holocaust.

Christian Identity is another movement closely tied to white supremacy. Some white supremacists identify themselves as Odinists, although many Odinists reject white supremacy. Some white supremacist groups, such as the South African Boeremag, conflate elements of Christianity and Odinism. Creativity (formerly known as "The World Church of the Creator") is atheistic and it denounces Christianity and other theistic religions.

Aside from this, its ideology is similar to that of many Christian Identity groups because it believes in the antisemitic conspiracy theory that there is a "Jewish conspiracy" in control of governments, the banking industry and the media. Matthew F. Hale, founder of the World Church of the Creator, has published articles stating that all races other than white are "mud races", which is what the group's religion teaches.

The white supremacist ideology has become associated with a racist faction of the skinhead subculture, despite the fact that when the skinhead culture first developed in the United Kingdom in the late 1960s, it was heavily influenced by black fashions and music, especially Jamaican reggae and ska, and African American soul music.

White supremacist recruitment activities are primarily conducted at a grassroots level as well as on the Internet. Widespread access to the Internet has led to a dramatic increase in white supremacist websites. The Internet provides a venue to openly express white supremacist ideas at little social cost, because people who post the information are able to remain anonymous.

White separatism:

White separatism is a political and social movement that seeks the separation of white people from people of other races and ethnicities, the establishment of a white ethnostate by removing non-whites from existing communities or by forming new communities elsewhere.

Most modern researchers do not view white separatism as distinct from white supremacist beliefs. The Anti-Defamation League defines white separatism as "a form of white supremacy"; the Southern Poverty Law Center defines both white nationalism and white separatism as "ideologies based on white supremacy." 

Facebook has banned content that is openly white nationalist or white separatist because "white nationalism and white separatism cannot be meaningfully separated from white supremacy and organized hate groups".

Use of the term to self-identify has been criticized as a dishonest rhetorical ploy. The Anti-Defamation League argues that white supremacists use the phrase because they believe it has fewer negative connotations than the term white supremacist.

Dobratz & Shanks-Meile reported that adherents usually reject marriage "outside the white race". They argued the existence of "a distinction between the white supremacist's desire to dominate (as in apartheid, slavery, or segregation) and complete separation by race".

They argued that this is a matter of pragmatism, that while many white supremacists are also white separatists, contemporary white separatists reject the view that returning to a system of segregation is possible or desirable in the United States.
Political violence:

The Tuskegee Institute has estimated that 3,446 blacks were the victims of lynchings in the United States between 1882 and 1968, with the peak occurring in the 1890s at a time of economic stress in the South and increasing political suppression of blacks.

If 1,297 whites were also lynched during this period, blacks were disproportionally targeted, representing 72.7% of all people lynched. According to scholar Amy L. Wood, "lynching photographs constructed and perpetuated white supremacist ideology by creating permanent images of a controlled white citizenry juxtaposed to images of helpless and powerless black men."

See also: ___________________________________________________________________________

​The Ku Klux Klan,  commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist terrorist hate group whose primary targets are African Americans as well as Jews, immigrants, leftists, homosexuals, Catholics, and Muslims. 

The Klan has existed in three distinct eras at different points in time during the history of the United States. Each has advocated extremist reactionary positions such as white nationalism, anti-immigration and – especially in later iterations – ​
Historically, the first Klan used terrorism – both physical assault and murder – against politically active blacks and their allies in the Southern United States in the late 1860s. All three movements have called for the "purification" of American society and all are considered "right-wing extremist" organizations. 

In each era, membership was secret and estimates of the total were highly exaggerated by both friends and enemies.

The first Klan was established in the wake of the Civil War and was a defining organization of the Reconstruction era. Organized entirely in the Southern United States, it was suppressed through federal intervention in the early 1870s. It sought to overthrow the Republican state governments in the South, especially by using voter intimidation and targeted violence against African-American leaders.

Each chapter was autonomous and highly secret as to membership and plans. Its numerous chapters across the South were suppressed around 1871, through federal law enforcement.

Members made their own, often colorful, costumes: robes, masks and conical hats, designed to be terrifying and to hide their identities.

The second Klan started small in Georgia in 1915. It grew after 1920 and flourished nationwide in the early and mid-1920s, including urban areas of the Midwest and West.

Taking inspiration from D. W. Griffith's 1915 silent film The Birth of a Nation, which mythologized the founding of the first Klan, it employed marketing techniques and a popular fraternal organization structure.

Rooted in local Protestant communities, it sought to maintain white supremacy, often took a pro-Prohibition stance, and it opposed Catholics and Jews, while also stressing its opposition to the alleged political power of the pope and the Catholic Church.

This second Klan flourished both in the south and northern states; it was funded by initiation fees and selling its members a standard white costume. The chapters did not have dues. It used K-words which were similar to those used by the first Klan, while adding cross burnings and mass parades to intimidate others. It rapidly declined in the later half of the 1920s.

The third and current manifestation of the KKK emerged after 1950, in the form of localized and isolated groups that use the KKK name. They have focused on opposition to the civil rights movement, often using violence and murder to suppress activists. It is classified as a hate group by the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center. As of 2016, the Anti-Defamation League puts total KKK membership nationwide at around 3,000, while the Southern Poverty Law Center puts it at 6,000 members total.

​The second and third incarnations of the Ku Klux Klan made frequent references to America's "Anglo-Saxon" blood, hearkening back to 19th-century nativism. Although members of the KKK swear to uphold Christian morality, the group is widely denounced by Christian denominations.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more  about the Ku Klux Klan: ​
​Official websites:

Because there are multiple Ku Klux Klan organizations, there are multiple official websites. To find a website, try entering the full name of a particular organization into a search engine.

Following are third-party lists of such organizations: Other links:




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​
Purdue Pharma Held Responsible for the Opioid Crisis killing Users Pictured below: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy as part of settlement
Purdue Pharma L.P. is a privately held pharmaceutical company founded by John Purdue Gray. It is (or respectively was) owned principally by members of the Sackler family as descendants of Mortimer and Raymond Sackler. In 2007, it paid out one of the largest fines ever levied against a pharmaceutical firm for mislabeling of its product OxyContin, and three executives were found guilty of criminal charges.

Although the company shifted its focus to abuse-deterrent formulations, Purdue continued to market and sell opioids as late as 2019 and continued to be involved in lawsuits around the opioid epidemic in the United States. Purdue filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on September 15, 2019 in New York.

On October 21, 2020, it was reported that Purdue had reached a settlement potentially worth $8.3 billion, admitting that it "knowingly and intentionally conspired and agreed with others to aid and abet" doctors dispensing medication "without a legitimate medical purpose." Members of the Sackler family will additionally pay $225 million and the company will close.

Controversy:

Purdue Pharma makes pain medicines such as hydromorphone, oxycodone, fentanyl, codeine, and hydrocodone. It is widely known for the production of drugs such as MS Contin, OxyContin, and Ryzolt.

In 1972, Contin (a controlled drug-release system) was developed. In 1984, its extended-release formulation of morphine, MS Contin was released. In 1996, its extended-release formulation of oxycodone, OxyContin was released.

The controversy behind the company emerged as a result of the drugs that they made and how they carried high potential for addiction. The most commonly abused medications that the company produces are MS Contin and OxyContin. Both can be abused by crushing, chewing, snorting, or injecting the dissolved product.

These ingestion methods create a significant risk to the abuser; they can result in overdose and death. Drug-seeking tactics that addicts undergo to obtain the medication include "doctor shopping", which is visiting a number of different physicians to obtain additional prescriptions and refusal to follow up with appropriate examinations.

Along with the high potential for abuse among people without prescriptions, there is also a risk for physical dependency and reduced reaction or drug desensitization for patients that are prescribed them. Nevertheless, strong analgesic drugs remain indispensable to patients suffering from severe acute and cancer pain.

OxyContin, introduced in 1995, was Purdue Pharma's breakthrough palliative for chronic
pain. Under a marketing strategy that Arthur Sackler had pioneered decades earlier, the company aggressively pressed doctors to prescribe the drug, wooing them with free trips to pain-management seminars and paid speaking engagements. Sales soared. 

The drug was marketed as "smooth and sustained pain control all day and all night" when taken on a 12-hour schedule and as having lower abuse potential than immediate-release oxycodone because of its time-release properties, even though there was no scientific evidence backing that conclusion and the addictive nature of opiates had been known for thousands of years. 

In these early years, Purdue Pharma was aware of OxyContin abuse, including "reports that the pills were being crushed and snorted; stolen from pharmacies; and that some doctors were being charged with selling prescriptions," according to The New York Times, based on a confidential Justice Department report that was revealed in May 2018. Over a hundred internal company memos between 1997 and 1999 included the words "street value," "crush," or "snort."

At the start of 2000, widespread reports of OxyContin abuse surfaced. The results obtained from a proactive abuse surveillance program called Researched Abused, Diversion, and Addiction-Related Surveillance (RADARS) sponsored by Purdue Pharma L.P. pronounced Oxycontin and hydrocodone the most commonly abused pain medications.

In 2012, New England Journal of Medicine published a study that found that "76 percent of those seeking help for heroin addiction began by abusing pharmaceutical narcotics, primarily OxyContin" and drew a direct line between Purdue's marketing of OxyContin and the subsequent heroin epidemic in the U.S.

In 2003, the Drug Enforcement Administration found that Purdue's "aggressive methods" had "very much exacerbated OxyContin's widespread abuse."

A 2016, the Los Angeles Times investigation reported that in many people OxyContin's 12-hour schedule does not adequately control pain, resulting in withdrawal symptoms including intense craving for the drug. The journalists suggested that this problem gives "new insight into why so many people have become addicted."

Using Purdue documents and other records, they claim that Purdue was aware of this problem even before the drug went to market but "held fast to the claim of 12-hour relief, in part to protect its revenue [because] OxyContin's market dominance and its high price—up to hundreds of dollars per bottle—hinge on its 12-hour duration."

OxyContin became a blockbuster drug. "Between 1995 and 2001, OxyContin brought in $2.8 billion in revenue for Purdue Pharma." Cumulative revenues had increased to US$31 billion by 2016 and US$35 billion by 2017. 

According to a 2017 article in The New Yorker, Purdue Pharma is "owned by one of America's richest families, with a collective net worth of thirteen billion dollars". Many US states allege the family is worth more than $13 billion. In response to this and other journalism, photographer Nan Goldin launched the organization P.A.I.N., to pressure museums and other cultural institutions to divest from Sackler Family philanthropy.

In 2018, Purdue Pharma patented a new form of buprenorphine which controls cravings and is used to treat addiction to opioids such as OxyContin.

​Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Purdue Pharma:







Tulsa Race Massacre (1921)Pictured below:   Tulsa Race Massacre survivors are fighting for reparations, 100 years later
The Tulsa race massacre took place on May 31 and June 1, 1921, when mobs of White residents, some of them deputized and given weapons by city officials, attacked Black residents and destroyed homes and businesses of the Greenwood District in Tulsa, Oklahoma, US.

Alternatively known as the Tulsa race riot or the Black Wall Street massacre, the event is considered one of "the single worst incident[s] of racial violence in American history". The attacks burned and destroyed more than 35 square blocks of the neighborhood – at the time one of the wealthiest Black communities in the United States, known as "Black Wall Street".

More than 800 people were admitted to hospitals, and as many as 6,000 Black residents of Tulsa were interned in large facilities, many of them were interned for several days The Oklahoma Bureau of Vital Statistics officially recorded 36 dead. A 2001 state commission examination of events was able to confirm 39 dead, 26 Black and 13 White, based on contemporary autopsy reports, death certificates, and other records. The commission gave several estimates ranging from 75 to 300 dead.

The massacre began during the Memorial Day weekend after 19-year-old Dick Rowland, a Black shoeshiner, was accused of assaulting Sarah Page, the 17-year-old White elevator operator in the nearby Drexel Building. He was taken into custody. After Rowland was arrested, rumors that stated that he was going to be lynched were spread throughout the city, which had seen a White man named Roy Belton lynched the previous year.

Upon hearing reports that a mob of hundreds of White men had gathered around the jail where Rowland was being held, a group of 75 Black men, some of whom were armed, arrived at the jail in order to ensure that Rowland would not be lynched. The sheriff persuaded the group to leave the jail, assuring them that he had the situation under control.

An old White man approached O.B. Mann, a Black man, and demanded that he hand over his pistol. Mann refused, and the old man attempted to disarm him. Mann shot him, and then, according to the sheriff's reports, "all hell broke loose." At the end of the exchange of gunfire, 12 people were dead, 10 White and two Black.

Subsequently the militants fled back into Greenwood shooting as they went. As news of the violence spread throughout the city, mob violence exploded. White rioters invaded Greenwood that night and the next morning, killing men and burning and looting stores and homes. Around noon on June 1, the Oklahoma National Guard imposed martial law, ending the massacre.

About 10,000 Black people were left homeless, and property damage amounted to more than $1.5 million in real estate and $750,000 in personal property (equivalent to $32.65 million in 2020).

Many survivors left Tulsa, while Black and White residents who stayed in the city largely kept silent about the terror, violence, and resulting losses for decades. The massacre was largely omitted from local, state, and national histories.

In 1996, 75 years after the massacre, a bipartisan group in the state legislature authorized the formation of the Oklahoma Commission to Study the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. The commission's final report, published in 2001, states that the city had conspired with the mob of White citizens against Black citizens; it recommended a program of reparations to survivors and their descendants. 

The state passed legislation to establish scholarships for the descendants of survivors, encourage the economic development of Greenwood, and develop a park in memory of the victims of the massacre in Tulsa. The park was dedicated in 2010.

Schools in Oklahoma have been required to teach students about the massacre since 2002, but in 2020, the massacre officially became a part of the Oklahoma school curriculum.

​Further information: History of Oklahoma

In 1921, Oklahoma had a racially, socially, and politically tense atmosphere. The territory of northern Oklahoma had been established for the resettlement of Native Americans from the southeast, some of whom had owned slaves. Other areas had received many settlers from the South whose families had been slaveholders before the Civil War. Oklahoma was admitted as a state on November 16, 1907.

The newly created state legislature passed racial segregation laws, commonly known as Jim Crow laws, as its first order of business. The 1907 Oklahoma Constitution did not call for strict segregation; delegates feared that, should they include such restrictions, U.S.

President Theodore Roosevelt would veto the document. Still, the first law passed by the new legislature segregated all rail travel, and voter registration rules effectively disenfranchised most Black Americans. This meant that they were also barred from either serving on juries or serving in local public offices. These laws were enforced until they were ruled unconstitutional after the passage of the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965. Major cities passed laws that imposed additional restrictions.

On August 4, 1916, Tulsa passed an ordinance that mandated residential segregation by forbidding either Black or White people from residing on any block where three-fourths or more of the residents were members of the other race.

Although the United States Supreme Court declared such an ordinance unconstitutional the following year, Tulsa and many other cities continued to establish and enforce segregation for the next three decades.

Many servicemen returned to Tulsa following the end of the First World War in 1918, and as they tried to re-enter the labor force, social tensions and anti-Black sentiment both increased in cities where job competition was fierce. Northeastern Oklahoma was in an economic slump which increased the level of unemployment.

The American Civil War, which ended in 1865, was still in living memory; civil rights for African Americans were lacking, and the Ku Klux Klan was resurgent (primarily through the influence of the wildly popular 1915 film The Birth of a Nation). 

Since 1915, the Ku Klux Klan had been growing in urban chapters across the country. Its first significant appearance in Oklahoma occurred on August 12, 1921. By the end of 1921, 3,200 of Tulsa's 72,000 residents were Klan members according to one estimate. 

In the early 20th century, lynchings were common in Oklahoma as part of a continuing effort to assert and maintain white supremacy. By 1921, at least 31 people, mostly men and boys, had been lynched in the newly formed state; 26 were Black.

At the same time, Black veterans pushed to have their civil rights enforced, believing that they had earned full citizenship as the result of their military service. In what became known as the "Red Summer" of 1919, industrial cities across the Midwest and Northeast experienced severe race riots in which Whites attacked Black communities, sometimes with the assistance of local authorities. In Chicago and some other cities,

Blacks defended themselves with force for the first time but they were often outnumbered.

As a booming oil city, Tulsa also supported a large number of affluent, educated and professional African-American people. Greenwood was a district in Tulsa that was organized in 1906 following Booker T. Washington's 1905 tour of Arkansas, Indian Territory and Oklahoma. It was a namesake of the Greenwood District which Washington had established as his own district in Tuskegee, Alabama, five years earlier. Greenwood became so prosperous that it came to be known as "the Negro Wall Street" (now commonly referred to as "the Black Wall Street"). 

Most Black people lived together in the district. Black Americans had created their own businesses and services in this enclave, including several grocers, two newspapers, two movie theaters, nightclubs, and numerous churches. Black professionals, including doctors, dentists, lawyers, and clergy, served their peers. During his trip to Tulsa in 1905, Washington encouraged the co-operation, economic independence and excellence being demonstrated there.

Greenwood residents selected their own leaders and raised capital there to support economic growth. In the surrounding areas of northeastern Oklahoma, they also enjoyed relative prosperity and participated in the oil boom.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the Tulsa Race Massacre:







​2020–21 United States election protests 
including the January 6, 2021 Storming of the United States National Capitol Building
Other Videos: See end of last section re:  January 6, 2021 Storming of the United States Capitol Building

​Pictured below and Clockwise from top:
  • Protesters gathering outside the Capitol
  • President Trump speaking to supporters at the "Save America" rally
  • A gallows erected outside the building
  • Crowd retreating from tear gas
  • Tear gas being deployed
  • Crowd pressing into the Capitol's Eastern entrance
2020–21 United States election protests:

​​The 2020–21 United States election protests are an ongoing series of protests across multiple cities in the United States following the 2020 United States presidential election between incumbent President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger former Vice President Joe Biden.

The election was held on November 3, 2020. Biden won the election, receiving 81.3 million votes (51.3%) to Trump's 74.2 million (46.9%) and winning the Electoral College by 306 to 232. Biden's victory became clear on November 7, after the ballots (including mail-in ballots) had been tabulated. The Electoral College voted on December 14, in accordance with the law, formalizing Biden's victory.

Before and after the election, Trump, his presidential campaign, and his allies challenged the legitimacy of the election and baselessly claimed widespread electoral fraud. Trump and his allies filed dozens of legal challenges to the results, which were rejected by at least 86 judges from across the political spectrum, in both the state and federal courts, including by federal judges appointed by Trump himself.

The courts found that his claims had no factual or legal basis. His unsubstantiated allegations of widespread voting fraud were also refuted by state election officials.

Pro-Trump protesters, including groups such as the Proud Boys, which some Canadian politicians regard as a terrorist organization, engaged in multiple demonstrations in Washington, D.C., state capitals, and other locations nationwide decrying the election results and echoing Trump's claims of election fraud. 

In November and December 2020, there were nighttime clashes and street scuffles in Washington, D.C. between Trump supporters who refused to accept the president's defeat, including the Proud Boys, and counter-protesters.

On January 6—the day when Congress formally counts the electoral votes—Trump supporters gathered for the "Save America" rally where attendees heard speeches from Trump and Rudy Giuliani.

Before the speeches were over, a mob of protesters marched on Congress and stormed the capitol building. Congress was in session at the time, certifying the Electoral College vote count. Several buildings in the U.S. Capitol complex were evacuated, and protesters broke past security to enter the U.S. Capitol building, including National Statuary Hall. 

All buildings in the Capitol complex were subsequently locked down. There was reportedly an armed standoff at the doors to the House chambers, one person was shot within the Capitol building, and one Capitol Police officer died after being beaten with a fire extinguisher. 

At least two improvised explosive devices were found.

In the aftermath of the storming of the U.S. Capitol, at least 36 House Democrats called for Trump's immediate impeachment and removal by Congress. State-level officials including Maryland Lieutenant Governor Boyd Rutherford supported impeachment, and representatives called on Vice President Mike Pence to remove Trump via the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. 

Trump continued to face backlash in the days following and, due to his use of social media to encourage his supporters' protests and violence, was eventually restricted or banned from most online platforms including YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and his preferred Twitter platform.

Armed supporters of Trump have continued protesting in the aftermath of the storming of the US Capitol. As of January 10, armed protests were being planned at the state capitols of most states. Thousands of troops poured into the capital, and by the inauguration ceremony for Biden, up to 25,000 troops were deployed to guard against further threats to security. Protests have continued in some U.S. cities after Biden became president.

Causes:

In remarks from the White House on the early hours of November 4, President Trump attacked the vote counting efforts without evidence, calling it "fraud". The president remarked, "We will win this. As far as I'm concerned, we already have won." Major networks provided fact checks and variously interrupted the speech or carried it in full.

Furthermore, former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon suggested violence against Dr. Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Christopher A. Wray could serve as "a warning to federal bureaucrats" to begin a second term for President Trump.

Observers had been suggesting for months about the possibility of a premature Trump victory claim and then a contested election. This was expected based on the likelihood that the initial votes counted by Election Night would skew heavily Republican and mail-in ballots would skew heavily Democratic, a blue shift that became more favorable to Biden as more votes are counted and could be misrepresented as fraudulent.

Pro-Trump protests:
See also: Demonstrations in support of Donald Trump

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the 2020-21 United States Election Protests:
___________________________________________________________________________

​2021 storming of the United States Capitol:

​The storming of the United States Capitol was a riot and violent attack against the 117th United States Congress at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Part of the 2020–21 U.S. election protests, it was carried out by a mob of supporters of Donald Trump, the 45th U.S. president, in a failed attempt to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election. (See above) 

The Capitol was placed under lockdown while lawmakers were evacuated. Five people died and more than 140 were injured.

Called to action by Trump, thousands of his supporters had gathered in Washington, D.C., on January 5 and 6 in support of his false claims​ that the 2020 election had been "stolen" from him, and to demand that Vice President Mike Pence and Congress reject Joe Biden's victory. 

On the morning of January 6, at a "Save America" rally on the Ellipse, Trump repeated false claims of election irregularities and said, "if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore". At his encouragement, thousands of protesters then walked to the Capitol, where a joint session of Congress was beginning the Electoral College vote count to formalize Biden's victory.

Many in the crowd at the Capitol breached police perimeters and stormed the building, occupying, vandalizing, and looting for several hours, assaulting Capitol Police officers and reporters, erecting a gallows on the Capitol grounds, and attempting to locate lawmakers to take hostage and harm. They chanted "Hang Mike Pence", blaming him for not rejecting the Electoral College votes, although he lacked the constitutional authority to do so 

The rioters targeted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D–CA), vandalizing and looting her offices, as well as those of other members of Congress.

Upon security being breached, Capitol Police evacuated the Senate and House of Representatives chambers. Several buildings in the Capitol complex were evacuated, and all were locked down. Rioters occupied and ransacked the empty Senate chamber while federal law enforcement officers drew handguns to defend the evacuated House floor.

Pipe bombs were found at the offices of the Democratic National Committee and the Republican National Committee, and Molotov cocktails were discovered in a vehicle near the Capitol.

Trump resisted sending the D.C. National Guard to quell the mob. In a Twitter video, he called the rioters "very special" and told them to "go home in peace" while repeating his false election claims.

The Capitol was cleared of rioters by mid-evening, and the counting of the electoral votes resumed and was completed in the early morning hours of January 7.

Pence declared President-elect Biden and Vice-President-elect Kamala Harris victors, and affirmed that they would assume office on January 20. Pressured by his administration, the threat of removal, and numerous resignations, Trump later committed to an orderly transition of power in a televised statement.

The assault on the Capitol was widely condemned by political leaders and organizations in the United States and internationally. Mitch McConnell (R–KY), then–Senate Majority Leader, called the storming of the Capitol a "failed insurrection" and said that the Senate "will not bow to lawlessness or intimidation".

Several social media and technology companies suspended or banned Trump's accounts from their platforms, and many business organizations cut ties with him.

A week after the riot, the House of Representatives impeached Trump for incitement of insurrection, making him the only U.S. president to have been impeached twice. Speaker Pelosi announced an independent commission modelled after the 9/11 Commission to investigate the attack.

Opinion polls showed that a large majority of Americans disapproved of the storming of the Capitol and of Trump's actions leading up to and following it, although many