Oakland, Urban Violence, And The Politicization Of Crime By The Rich

I know this may shock you, but Oakland has had a crime problem my entire life. And if you were born any time after the mid-sixties, your entire life, too. To be entirely, and brutally honest, politicians don’t prevent urban crime. If someone really wants to kill you, they can. America has guns. A lot of guns. Or, as we say in the East Bay – hella guns.

If someone wants to kill you or anyone else with one of those many, many guns, it doesn’t matter if you voted for supposedly “soft on crime” Democrats or “tough on crime” Republicans. You’re probably gonna get killed, or shot, or at the very least, shot at. That’s unfortunately life in America.

Right wing policies don’t prevent violence, it just gives the state a monopoly on violence. Left wing policies, as proven in nearby Richmond, work. Richmond gave people financial incentives not to murder each other and found out that the majority of the city’s homicides were only committed by a handful of people. Yes, only a handful of very busy homicidal maniacs committed the majority of murders in a city with a population north of 100k.

I’m not just saying crime is down. We have the data to prove it. In 1992, crime was at its highest level in recorded American history. This is when America was balls deep in a 21-year-long drug war that started in 1971 under Richard Nixon. The Drug War of the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s didn’t work. Despite cops having a ton of resources to essentially go to war with communities of color and the poor, the violence increased right along with the funding, and it spiraled even further with the introduction of crack cocaine.

Now, because I’m a bit of a sociology nerd, let’s dig into the fuckin’ numbers. 

Richmond suffered 62 homicides in 1992 with a population of 87,000. In comparison, Richmond only had 8 homicides with a population of 114,000 in 2023. This isn’t limited to Richmond. East Palo Alto in fucking Silicon Valley of all places still holds the highest homicide rate ever recorded by the FBI. In 1992, East Palo Alto, a city of only 23,000 had a staggering 42 homicides. That’s almost 2 homicide victims for every 1,000 residents. In 2023, they recorded 0. Literally no one was killed in East Palo Alto, and their population is now 28,000. 

To put things mildly, things are a lot fucking better in terms of violent crime, not only in the Bay Area, but in the country. So when wealthy donors try to oust elected officials because of “out of control” crime rates, like they did with Chesa Boudin, or how they’re attempting to do with Sheng Thao and Pamela Price, tell these rich assholes to read a fucking book. 

That’s not to say crime in Oakland isn’t bad. Shit does happen here, but it used to happen more with a smaller population. Let’s go back to Oakland in 1992, or as Rappin’ 4-Tay called it ‘the Biggity, Biggity O.” Oakland recorded 175 murders in ‘92 with a population of 372,000. In 2023, Oakland had 126 with a population of 436,000. Still very high, but a lot lower than it used to be.

Don’t be fooled by right wingers trying to use their money to subvert the will of voters. Things are a lot better than they used to be when it comes to violence in America. The real threat American cities currently face is the rise of billionaires using their money to uproot local democracy. Because unlike violent crime, that is actually on the rise. 

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