How the War on Drugs was Created to Target Minorities Essay Example
How the War on Drugs was Created to Target Minorities Essay Example

How the War on Drugs was Created to Target Minorities Essay Example

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  • Pages: 3 (740 words)
  • Published: November 1, 2021
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How the War on Drugs was Created to Target Minorities

Generally, use of drugs is illegal in most countries and it should not be allowed since its effects are unbearable. Addicted drug users live miserable lives and to safe guard them; laws have been put in place to regulate the use of drugs. However, from the drug offenders population, the African-American takes 62 percent of those sent to state prisons, and yet they only occupy 12 percent of the total population in U.S, from the statistics, it is clear that the Black are the Minority.

If one takes a close comparison between the Black and White men sent to state prison on drug charges, Black men are 14 times the rate of White men. According to Fagin (2-6), police easily target drug transactions among the Black because they happen to carry the operations in pub

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lic unlike transactions between the Whites. According to Human Rights Watch, the Black men are sent to federal prison for drug charges at an alarming rate of 57 times greater than White people (LoBianco). Since 1980, 25.4 million inhabitants have faced arrest on drug charges, and one-third of them are Black.

The Black populations in prisons are not proportionate. In the minority category, the Latinos group is not much reflected on the increased prevalence of drugs activities. “We believe that the mass criminalization of people of color, particularly young African American men, is as profound a system of racial control as the Jim Crow laws were in this country until the mid-1960s” (LoBianco).

The fight against the Black minority can be traced from way back during Richard Nixon who was elected the 37th President of

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the United States (1969-1974) after serving as a U.S. Representative and a Senator from California (Watkins). One of Richard Nixon's top advisers was quoted saying “the war on drugs was created as a political tool to fight blacks”.

On the same matter, a former domestic policy chief John Ehrlichman went on record when he argued that "The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people, we knew we could not make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities," Ehrlichman said. "We could arrest their leaders. Raid their homes, break up their meetings and vilify them night after night on the evening news." Ehrlichman's comment plainly shows that war on drugs was meant to fight the Black (Fagin 18-31).
The opponents to these views are the White men, since the law enforcers favored them, they strongly believed that Black men are misusing the drugs and the charges pressed on them are proportional to their involvement in drug. On the other hand they are considered to be intruders to the native, whereby they should go where they belong. Some of the natives also view that the vice is accelerated by the Black men who escaped their countries for different reasons.

However, one need not to be believes these, because it is misleading. Facts put it straight that the Blacks are the major target in war against the drugs. From the comments of the American leaders, it is clear that Black

man is the main target group by the users of the White man. White man is doing all that he is capable of doing to ensure Black man is enslaved.

In conclusion, this global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and communities around the globe. Since the majority held over drug charges are Blacks, then the war is not on drugs but it a war against the Black man. From the content of this article, it brings us close to Martin Luther Jnr’s famous quote that, “one day we shall be judged by the content of our character but not the color of our skin” It’s time to end the war, not just draw down the troops.

Works Cited

  • Fagin, James A. Cj2013. Pearson, 2014.
  • LoBianco, Tom. "Report: Nixon Aide Says War on Drugs Targeted Blacks, Hippies Politics.com." CNN, CNN POLITICS, 24 Mar. 2014, edition.cnn.com/2016/03/23/politics/john-ehrlichman-richard-nixon-drug-war-blacks-hippie/. Accessed 30 Nov. 2016.
  • Watkins, Boyce. "Forbes Welcome." Forbes Welcome, Forbes, 28 June 2011, www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/06/28/the-war-on-drugs-is-a-war-on-minorities-and-the-poor/#359c90f034b6. Accessed 30 Nov. 2016.
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