Racial Bias and the Death Penalty

A North Carolina judge has overturned a death penalty conviction after concluding from statistical research that the prosecution focused on removing African Americans from the pool of potential jurors. The New York Times reports on this important decision here: http://nyti.ms/HSQZNC

One of the many reasons for opposing the death penalty is racial bias in its implementation. From the research on this issue, the most pervasive form of racial bias appears to involve the race of the victim. Simply put, when whites are victims of homicides, prosecutors are more likely to seek the death penalty, and jurors are more likely to decide on a sentence of death, then when African Americans are victims. In effect, prosecutors and jurors are placing more importance on the life of a white person than on the life of a black person.

When hearing about this type of evidence, students sometimes wonder whether prosecutors and jurors are deliberately making their decisions on the basis of the victim’s race. We may never know the answer to this question, but much research shows that people often take someone’s race into account when making decisions without necessarily being aware of their racial biases.  Scholars refer to this bias as “implicit racism” or “unconscious racism.” Thus even though prosecutors and jurors may feel they are acting without racial bias, their racial prejudices may be unwittingly affecting their decisions in capital cases. The bottom line remains: the imposition of the death penalty is often racially discriminatory.

Sociology and Medical School Admissions

Today’s New York Times has an article on the importance of social science knowledge for medical students. http://nyti.ms/HLd5E2 

The medical school admissions test will now have several questions related to the social and behavioral sciences, apparently especially anthropology, psychology, and sociology. More premed students are predicted to take introductory courses in these areas. This new emphasis on the social and behavioral sciences recognizes that health and medicine are not just scientific issues and that sociology and the other social sciences are very relevant for attempts to improve the health our nation and the practice of medicine.

As a sociologist, I’ve long thought that health professionals would benefit from an understanding of some of the emphases of sociology: racial, gender, and social class inequality; social interaction; social institutions; and so forth. I’ve also thought that issues of health and health care reflect and illustrate these emphases, and that students who take sociology classes benefit sociologically from learning about health and health care issues.

The introduction to sociology text I’ve authored for Flat World Knowledge has a chapter on health and health care, as does the social problems text I am now finishing up for Flat World. These are among my favorite chapters in these books because issues of poverty, racial and ethnic inequality, and gender inequality manifest themselves so often and so clearly in the study of health and health care. By reading about health and health care in these books, then, students will learn a lot about larger problems in American society. And by knowing more about these problems, they will be in a better position someday to perhaps help to resolve them. 

Obama's Wrong Decision on LGBT Job Discrimination

The White House indicated on Wednesday that President Obama would not be issuing an executive order banning discrimination by federal contractors against gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender employees. This decision received rather minimal attention in the national press (only on p. A17 of the New York Times and p. A4 of the Washington Post), and that is a shame. LGBT activists are angry with the White House, and rightly so.

It is perfectly legal under federal law for employers to refuse to hire or to fire employees who are openly LGBT or who are perceived as being LGBT. Less than half the states have laws that prohibit job discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Although the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) has been proposed in Congress to end such discrimination, it is not close to passing.

Election-year politics almost certainly explain the White House’s failure to issue the executive order. That may be so, but the fact remains that the public in national surveys overwhelmingly agrees that gays and lesbians should have the same job opportunities as heterosexuals. The fact also remains that about 90% of the Fortune 500 prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation, and that about half prohibit discrimination based on gender identity. The issue of job discrimination against the LGBT community may be less volatile than the White House fears. It is also a matter of right versus wrong, and on this issue the White House is wrong.

Ann Romney, Working Women, and Wealth or Lack of It

There’s an uproar in the news today over a comment by a Democratic strategist that Ann Romney, the wife of Mitt Romney, has “never worked a day in her life.” This wording was clumsy, to say the least. When the contemporary women’s movement began in the late 1960s, one of its key emphases was that women should have the choice as well as the opportunity to live their lives as they want to. If they want to work outside the home, fine; if they want to stay at home and raise kids, fine also. Back then women did not have the opportunity to work outside the home, especially in the jobs that were male-dominated, that they do today. If Ann Romney chose to stay at home and raise her five sons, that was her choice, and no one should think worse of her for it.

But the larger message that the strategist was attempting to make has gotten lost in the uproar. And this message is that women who can afford to stay at home because of their family’s wealth—in this case, great wealth—do not begin to face the everyday problems of time, money (actually lack of money), and energy that the average (i.e., non-wealthy) woman faces, whether or not she works outside the home. And they do not begin to experience the stress and worry that the average woman faces, again whether or not she works outside the home. Ann Romney no doubt is a fine person who has accomplished a lot in her life and who is now facing a debilitating disease. But during her adult life she has not suffered for a lack of money, and she has never had to wonder how she will be able to find the money to pay her family’s medical bills, feed and clothe her children, repair a car, and any number of things that the average woman would have trouble paying.