And...
Report: States With Stand Your Ground Laws Have More Homicides
If you’re interested in reducing violent crime, homicides, or racial
bias, you should repeal Stand Your Ground laws, according to new
recommendations from an American Bar Association Task Force. In a
diplomatic fashion, the
62-page preliminary report
hedges from calling for the outright repeal of the controversial “shoot
first” provisions, but instead suggests that the laws are a “solution
searching for a problem,” that they are associated with increased
homicide rates and reinforce racial bias, and that any state concerned
with these problems should probably do something about it.
Disaster Sociologists Study How Hurricane Sandy Changed Life In New York
Hurricane Sandy has ushered in big changes all over the New York metropolitan region, from
seawalls to
city ordinances. It may have also changed things in the Ivory Tower.
Supported by New York University and its
Institute for Public Knowledge, a young cadre of social scientists calling themselves the
Superstorm Research Lab is quietly rethinking business as usual in academia. Though their work fits squarely in the established field of
disaster sociology, the Research Lab is deeply invested in pushing the boundaries between scholarly research and efforts to make real change.
Read the
white paper: A Tale of Two Sandys
Sex Offender Laws Have Gone Too Far
"Our draconian policies about sex offenses reflect our ignorance of them."
"Is the American approach to sex registration working? Who goes on the
registries, for how long, and for what kinds of crimes? Do the answers
suggest that they are helping to keep kids safe—or sweeping in too many
people and stoking irrational fears?"
Author of "Broken Windows" Policing Defends His Theory
In 1982, after another year of record lawlessness in New York City, two
college professors advanced — or, more accurately, rekindled — a
plausibly uncomplicated theory that would revolutionize law enforcement
in the city: Maintaining public order also helps prevent crime.
European Court Finds CIA Interrogation Techniques "Amounted To Torture"
The European Court of Human Rights concludes that so-called enhanced
interrogation techniques - specifically approved by John Yoo and Jay
Bybee for use by the CIA on Abu Zubaydah at a Polish black site -
amounted to torture.
The Draw Of the Undertow: Extremity, Otherness And Emergent Harm In Gaming And Pornography
"My own interest in the cultural and social impact of video games probably
began with morally conflicted feelings while playing Grand Theft Auto
III for the first time. I remember experiencing a real sense of surprise
at the possibility of running over pedestrians and perhaps more so, a
sense of worry at what other, younger, players might take from the game.
The game felt like an incredibly violent space, a bleak vision of a
city without moral codes or goodness, a space most of all where we were
being goaded to bring out our more callous side, running over the
homeless in tunnels, sniping at the unsuspecting or beating and stabbing
to advance, or just for the sheer hell of it."
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