Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, David Simon (1991; Picador, 2006). The following is an email exchange between Jane Psmith and Charles Lehman of the Manhattan Institute and The Causal Fallacy, edited slightly for clarity. Jane: In late 1987, Baltimore Police Commissioner Edward J. Tilghman — who was, at the time, dying of a brain tumor — agreed to permit
Ghettoside and Homicide are both great books but for totally different reasons. You have a perverse situation where intuitive you know human life is not being treated with dignity. Ghettoside is about the pain of this perversity and the frustration of trying to find even a sliver of justice. Homicide is about the joy of trying to impose standards on it with full knowledge of the insanity in doing so. Liberals would probably prefer we think mainly about the pain, but someone like Zizek would be much more interested in the joy.
The cycle of retribution doesn't end just because a victim is dead rather than injured. The existence of gangs should make that obvious.
Ghettoside and Homicide are both great books but for totally different reasons. You have a perverse situation where intuitive you know human life is not being treated with dignity. Ghettoside is about the pain of this perversity and the frustration of trying to find even a sliver of justice. Homicide is about the joy of trying to impose standards on it with full knowledge of the insanity in doing so. Liberals would probably prefer we think mainly about the pain, but someone like Zizek would be much more interested in the joy.