black people weren't calling for this, we were calling for help and resources and better funded schools, jobs, access to health care and other things we needed to improve our quality of life and thus curb the allure of illegal activity. these law makers took it upon themselves to structure a bill and laws that would hyper-penalize "black crime" as opposed to crimes of others.
how one can defend this then turn around and look at the response to crime/drug use in today's white community - billions being spent to fund treatment and rehab of opioid addiction, addicts being looked at with compassion, sellers completely absolved as the government spends billions suing the drug companies who produced the opioids as opposed to the lowlifes selling them on the black market...fukk up outta here with this "we needed something"...that crime bill was the denouement of reagan era tough on crime/welfare queen rhetoric and policy. devastated the black community and wiped out the socio-economic gains we made in the late 60's-early 80's....set us back decades once again
I just want to be clear, I’m not supporting the bill. I’m just giving context to how the bill was passed and the support it had in the black community.
People were calling for more police and tougher sentencing for drug gangs that were tearing the black community apart with violence.
I don’t know how old you are, but Im in my 40s and trust when I tell you those times were legit scary and dangerous. There were a lot of sociopaths and psychopaths victimizing the black community and they needed to be taken off the street. Look up some of the more famous criminals like Preacher, Monster Kody, Wayne Perry, Alpo etc. These were not good guys and it was to the benefit of the black community to have them off the street.
Now, the comparison with opioids is true but only to a certain extent. Opioid epidemic doesn’t have my where close to the violence of the crack epidemic.
My solution would have been to decriminalize drugs and avoid “the war on drugs” completely.
