To repair racial wounds in criminal justice, start with language

Robert W. Kahle, Ph.D. is an independent sociologist who has studied crime in Michigan for decades. He currently resides in Charleston, S.C.

Sometimes insults are direct and overt. Other times, they’re delivered with nuance and apparent absence of malice, articulated by a system, embedded in a culture, rather than coming from the tongue of any single person. The other N word, “non-white,” is just that.

In recent months, tension between law enforcement and racial minorities, especially African-Americans has increased and become more public. From Ferguson to New York, Los Angeles to North Charleston, police shootings of unarmed men, especially black men, and the associated videos that in some cases appear to contradict the officers’ accounts, reinforce a long-held perception that blacks and whites are not treated equally by law enforcement officials.

Some argue that this is true, not only at the point of arrest, but also in terms of sentencing, incarceration, probation and parole. One notable book, Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness” argues that even though Jim Crow rules have been removed from formal laws, the mass incarceration of African-Americans over the last 30 years is simply a redesigned approach to systemic discrimination by race.

In Michigan, the perceived bias is especially relevant because the state’s largest and most important city, Detroit, is the largest one with an African-American majority in the country. In the state as a whole, according to the 2010 Census, 14.2 percent of Michigan residents self-identify as Black or African-American alone. (Another 2.3 percent self-identify as multi-racial in the 2015 census update). In Gov. Rick Snyder’s 2012 address on crime he focused on four Michigan cities, Detroit (82.7 percent African-American), Flint (56.6 percent), Pontiac (52.1 percent) and Saginaw (46.1 percent). Is it coincidental that these cities were targeted in Snyder’s 2013 special message on criminal justice?

Today, when looking for evidence of discrimination and fairness in the Michigan Department of Corrections, the most recent and only data available about race of incarcerated offenders is categorized as “white” and “non-white.”

In Department of Corrections reports in recent years, inmates in Michigan’s prison are categorized as white and “non-white.” If you are non-white, you are more than twice as likely to be incarcerated in Michigan than if you are white.

Until the legislature and governor openly and directly address racial inequities in the criminal justice system, we will not have comprehensive, meaningful criminal justice reform in Michigan.

Exploring data by race on factors like length of sentence, time served prior to parole, type of offense, etc. would help shine a bright light on the role of race in Michigan’s criminal justice system.

At another level, while some Michigan police departments and law enforcement agencies have diverse forces that reflect community composition by race, quite simply, the Michigan State Police do not.

The Free Press reported earlier this year that its 59 African-American troopers, in a force of 1,134, represent less than half the number it had when a federal consent decree was lifted in 1993. During that time, the percentage of black troopers fell from 12.5 percent to 5.2 percent.

Stated another way, for the Michigan State Police to reflect the state’s population by race today, it would need to immediately recruit and add more than 100 new African-American officers, replacing white troopers.

If the state legislature, as it looks for cost savings through criminal justice reform, wants to send a message to the citizenry that they “get it,” they should require that the Department of Corrections no longer categorize its population of offenders as “white” and “non-white,” but rather use the generally accepted Census Bureau definitions of race. Defining people or groups of people by who they are not is inherently insulting and a pernicious method of oppression by the powerful over the less powerful.

Michigan Department of Corrections own vision statement says:

“We conduct all of our duties and responsibilities with the highest degree of integrity, expectations for excellence and respect for the value and dignity of human life.”

How can African Americans be valued, respected and treated with integrity when they are categorized by who they are not and incarcerated at grossly disproportionate rates? To some, it may be just symbolic, but showing an entire race basic respect by identifying them by who they are is central to the paradigm shift required for the criminal justice system to work effectively for all in Michigan.