Prop 21 Essay, Research Paper

Prop 21

Education is the best part of life. Education can evolve you into a better person. Education can prevent you from committing crimes and will lead you to a prosperous life. Proposition 21; The Gang Violence and Juvenile Crime Prevention Act aims to incarcerate disturbed youth rather then educate them. Proposition 21 creates tougher laws that are aimed toward minority teen males. Therefore Proposition 21is a careless solution to reduce crime and is aimed toward youth and minorities.

Minority men are a problem to society. No wonder the majority of imprisoned males are minorities. Racial profiling is the cause of this, and it is a big problem in our society. Proposition 21 will increase racial profiling by giving authorities more freedom to categorize people as a menace to society or a gangster . Racial profiling is illegal yet it will be used as a form of judgment. Authorities will take the liberty to judge you by your appearance and label you as a gangster or not. If you were in a group of four people or more, you would be hassled, and brought down to the police station. Your picture and fingerprint will be taken. This is a big problem in society, considering how many corrupted police officers we have out there. Policemen will abuse their power, and base their opinion on what color skin you have and how you look or dress. Proposition 21 tries to get rid of or reduce crimes, but all it does is create more problems.

Everybody wants to feel safe. People would lust at the ideal life style of walking down the street and feeling safe with your family. Proposition 21 increases low level vandalism into a felony. Four hundred dollars worth of damage will be considered a felony. Four hundred dollars would be a scratch on a window of a bus. Sure everyone wants to be safe, and walk down the streets with their family. But imagine walking down the street knowing your only son went to jail for graffiti damage. Proposition 21 hides societal problems rather then try to fix them.

Proposition 21 may seem like a good idea. Hiding problems may not be so bad. Besides problems that are out of sight are out of mind. Yet Proposition 21 aims to take away school funding, and build more prisons. California already has the most prisons, and is ranked one of the lowest states in education. Prison building will increase your tax money and crimes. If children are not educated, they will make wrong choices in life, and will resort to drugs and crime. This will give the prison industry more money, because people will have to fill these new prisons that are being built. Your tax dollars will increase dramatically, and criminals will be imprisoned more often knowing that there is a lot more room for these new criminals. Proposition 21 gives prisons more money from out tax dollars to incarcerate out youth.

Proposition 21 will create new problems as well. As a result of your children going to adult prison, they would also have to attend adult court. This rule is blown way over proportion. True in some cases, youth criminals are murderers or rapists that are very disturbed. In those cases, they should be trailed as an adult and be treated as an adult. Not the innocent victims of our societal problems. Youth criminals that commit accidents that are not intentional, or crimes that are not life threatening should still be considered as an adolescent. Adolescents make mistakes and should be forgiven, not taken to a serious matter where they have to attend adult prisons and adult court. Clearly those people that fall under Proposition 21 and is not a large menace to our society should not be punished to the same extent as an adult. Proposition 21 is aims to put minorities, and teen males in adult prisons. No one under the age of fourteen attend adult prisons, especially if the crime was an accident. The Gang Violence And Youth Crime Prevention Act is a desperate attempt to get rid of minority youths, put them in adult prisons and give the prison industry more money.

In conclusion Proposition 21 is an attempt to reduce crime, yet all is does is hide society s flaws, by incarcerating our teens instead of educating them.