You’re not surprised, right? I mean, what isn’t racist in America in the eyes of the left? This raises an interesting thought. If everything is racist, then nothing is racist. Think about it.
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So yeah, an Illinois Democrat state legislator is calling for an investigation into why residents on Chicago’s South Side, which is predominantly black, receive 2.5 times the number of traffic citations than residents on the North Side, which is predominantly white. Not that Rep. La Shawn Ford has raced to a conclusion, mind you — wait, of course he has — but as he sees it, traffic light cameras are “racist,” even though he dances around the issue without using the term.
We’ll get to the idiocy in a bit.
As first reported by The Center Square, data analyzed by the Illinois Policy Institute, as the result of a yearlong study, found that of the 614,498 tickets that were issued across the city — accounting for $61.4 million in fines through September — traffic signal cameras on the South Side issued an average of 9,132 tickets, or 5,521 more than each North Side camera.
And, of course, in the eyes of Ford and everyone who thinks as he does, the above data is clear proof that traffic cameras are indeed racist. That, of course, is insane, if not race-hustling to the max.
Ford, a Chicago Democrat, told The Center Square:
It’s clearly a money grab and it’s not fair. The question is are the people on the South Side of Chicago driving to that degree that they deserve to be disproportionately impacted by a system, or is the system flawed? I would urge the city to do some type of investigation.
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Hang on.
Ford contradicted himself, right off the bat. Questioning whether South Siders are driving to the degree that they deserve to be disproportionally impacted is oxymoronic. It’s one way or the other. Either “they’re driving to the degree” or “they’re disproportionally impacted.” Both can’t be true.
Ford wonders how much longer many of those who are among the most vulnerable can survive the onslaught (emphasis, mine).
The tickets are one problem, but the impact that these tickets have on families is devastating. If I get multiple tickets and I’m placed on a boot list, then my car gets towed and I lose my car. Then I have these tickets and I have to file bankruptcy to eliminate the debt. Government should not be in the business of driving people into poverty. We know that this regressive tax hits people in poverty more and drives people deeper into poverty.
Hold the bus.
If I get multiple tickets, whose fault is that? And if I get so many tickets that I lose my car, whose fault is that? And if I get enough tickets that I’m driven into bankruptcy and ultimately poverty, then whose fault is that? The only answer to every one of these questions is “mine.”
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Ford previously called for an investigation into “CameraGate” (my term, not his).
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There should be a deep dive investigation to explain because we know that when you compare the traffic stops by human beings, we learned that there was a reason behind it. People were racially profiled. We have to ask ourselves how are the residents in the South Side of Chicago receiving three times the number of tickets. I think the public deserves transparency and explanation as to whether there are more chances for this population to be ticketed.
And there it is.
Racial profiling is to blame for the residents of the South Side getting more tickets from cameras than residents on the North Side. Therefore, the cameras are racist. Or they’re programmed by white people to issue more traffic violations to black people?
Dunno, but I do know that Rep. Ford’s argument tracks with multiple other arguments that various inanimate objects — firearms come to mind — are guilty of crime.
And dare I say “racist”? Stranger things have happened on the left.