> It's also well established that the black community was for the harsh laws of the crack epidemic
What does 'black community' mean here? Is there such a thing as a representative body that speaks for all blacks and this is what they were asking for? Or did people go out and ask a few black people who were felt to be community leaders, or was it done by a survey?
Yep. Acting as if there was one monolithic black community position is extremely problematic.
> The debate leading up to passage of the laws in 1973 was fierce, exposing rifts within the community. Some black lawmakers dismissed Gov. Nelson Rockefeller's black allies as "palace pets." Others, like Brooklyn’s Vander L. Beatty, one of the top black legislators at the time, said the Rockefeller laws didn’t go far enough. He wanted the death penalty.[1]
It's also problematic to equate wanting tougher laws for dealers with wanting tougher laws for simple possession, or the heroin epidemic with the crack epidemic, or New York with America. There is a point to be made that we sometimes have too simplistic a narrative in our heads, but the solution isn't to replace it with another overly simplistic narrative.
Leaders of prominent groups that promote / lobby for African-American issues, one would assume.
To be frank, your response reads like a "No True Scotsman" - could I not just write off Black Lives Matter as "Not representative of the black community" then? Who are those activists to say what the real problems are?
What does 'black community' mean here? Is there such a thing as a representative body that speaks for all blacks and this is what they were asking for? Or did people go out and ask a few black people who were felt to be community leaders, or was it done by a survey?