Recent studies carried out on the aspect of racial profiling reveal that on average, unarmed African Americans are 3.49 times more likely to be shot by police compared to unarmed white citizens. Such statistics strike fear into the hearts of African Americans living in the U.S since it dawns on them that the people who are supposed to protect them in a society filled with crime and chaos are the same individuals who are likely to be their end. Racial profiling is an extremely negative aspect of any society. In America, racial profiling exists in a myriad of ways and is mostly directed at the minority communities in the country. Racial profiling is based on stereotypical assumptions due to a person’s color, race, and ethnicity. Stereotyping is a huge problem since individuals act on their stereotypical views in a manner that impacts others. This then leads to profiling, which mostly affects radicalized individuals. Normally, profiling is perpetrated by people in authority and can occur in various areas of society like security, safety, and public protection. Therefore, racial profiling has devastating effects on the minority groups since it does not solve crimes, leads to discrimination among members of society. Although racial profiling has negative impacts on radicalized individuals, it can be death with through policy and oversight, technology and social media, community policing as well as Training and education.
Racial profiling offers unequal opportunities to individuals in a country. In the United States, the majority groups are the whites, while the minorities include Hispanics, African Americans, and Asians among others. The article, "Black Lives Matter," highlights the problems endured by blacks in their daily lives. In fact, it includes an illustration of racial profiling, whereby a white policeman, George Zimmerman, was not found guilty by the courts for killing a black person Trayvon Martin. Consequently, the minority groups are judged based on their skin color, thus, hindering them from being free from discrimination. In Paul Davis's article, he depicts the racial discrimination that happened in Starbucks, whereby, two blacks were arrested for not ordering food after they arrived by a white manager. The two African Americans had done no crime in the restaurant, but their skin color betrayed them, which promoted the manager to call the police. Evidently, racial profiling is rampant in America, which means that minority groups continue enduring challenges including false arrests, shooting, and racial discrimination. Martin's illustration was among the cases that proved that racial profiling was present in law enforcement, meaning that the nation's justice system is biased. Therefore, racial profiling is a problem that deserves immediate solutions since minority groups will not have many opportunities in the country. Instead, they will continue suffering from racial profiling from the majority group, that is the citizens and law enforcement, thus lacking chances to exploit their potential.
Problem Explanation Point 2 (Topic Sentence): Consequently, racial profiling cannot solve crimes effectively. When the authority concentrates on racial profiling to address criminal acts, the possibilities are they are unlikely to catch the perpetrator. Elahe Izadi demonstrates that the authorities use racial profiling to identify the criminal responsible for the Boston Marathon bombing, but unfortunately, the profile they created did not coincide with the real terrorist. The author shows that "CNN's John King quoted a law enforcement source as saying they had a suspect who was "dark-skinned"…But the actual bombing suspects, Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, are ethnic Chechens who have lived in the United States for a decade "(2). Alternatively, racial profiling prompts the policemen to assume that one's skin color depicts violence, leading to unnecessary shootings. Brown is a perfect example because he was killed by a police officer, despite being unarmed. Furthermore, the text indicates "release of mobile phone footage of a New York City police officer using excessive force on Eric Garner, another unarmed African American" ("Black Lives Matter" 3). The authorities should not use racial profiling because it favors one race over the others, leading to undesired deaths and violence. From the Boston Marathon bombing, he detectives concentrated on a racial profile they created, that did not help catch the actual terrorist. In a country where different races live, everyone should be guilty until proven innocent since they can catch an innocent victim believing to be a criminal, while it is not. With this in mind, racial profiling is not a strategic way of capturing criminals because it is biased and does not depend on substantial evidence.
Racial profiling violates human rights as recorded in the constitution. According to the Fourteenth Amendment, all citizens, including those who became through naturalization, are supposed to be protected by the law. The Black Lives Matter is an activist group that seeks to remind the public that any negative activity, including racial profiling targeted towards blacks is illegal. The text showcases that the meaning of Black Lives Matter, "it is intended to draw attention to how society does not ascribe the same value to black lives as it does to the lives of others" ("Black Lives Matter" 6). Consequently, the people in authority do not care about the minorities since they racial profile them, hence failing to protect them as the Fourteenth Amendment states. The Black Lives Matter continues to encounter challenges in its activities because the authorities have branded it as a violent group. The article depicts that the proponents of the Black Lives Matter group consider the authorities as racists, and discriminative, meaning that the police do not consider their main activities, that is liberating the African Americans from challenges such as racial profiling ("Black Lives Matter 6). Therefore, racial profiling ignores the laws recorded in the constitution because the laws illustrate that every American citizen should be protected from negative vices and activities.
Although racial profiling is a difficult problem to overcome, the use of technology and society can ensure that the issue is solved to a certain degree. According to Munmun De Choudhury et al.’s article titled "Social Media Participation in an Activist Movement For Racial Equality," "social media has been instrumental in driving and supporting socio-political movements throughout the world… social media in enabling collective action around this different movement and how social media platforms may help understand perceptions on a socially contested and sensitive issue like race…” (93). Over the years, social ills have managed to continue undetected by the public. As a result, it was extremely hard for these social ills like racial profiling to be dealt with since victims had no evidence or no way of proving what they had undergone. However, in the modern day, the presence and emergence of technology like the smartphones, cameras, computers, tablets and the internet have been extremely crucial in the fight against racial profiling. This is because people can record the perpetrators and expose them online. Furthermore, due to the presence of social media, individuals have managed to mobilize others to protest against this ill-treatment of the minority races. Consequently, technology and social media are an integral part of the fight against racial profiling since they create awareness on the issue and can be utilized to stage protests through mobilization of people.
Another important solution for racial profiling is policy oversight to ensure the safety of all members of society. According to Barbara Attard’s article titled “Oversight of Law Enforcement is Beneficial and Needed—Both Inside and Out”, “The civilian oversight of law enforcement movement in the United States is expanding and evolving…oversight organizations work to ensure that community members’ civil rights are respected, probing issues of disparate treatment, racial profiling, and excessive use of force in the law enforcement agencies they oversee” (2). As mentioned previously in this text racial profiling is highly prevalent among people with authority and power over others. Subsequently, people with power and authority end up using their power to discriminate against a certain race due to their prejudice towards the people from that race. One such group with power and authority is the police who in recent years have been at the center of many racial profiling incidences that have occurred in the U.S. most of these racial profiling cases involving the police have needed up with the death of black people. Since there is a common stereotype of African Americans being involved in crime, most police officers do not wait to interrogate a suspect as they result to firing their weapons at them first since they assume that they are all armed and dangerous. As a result, many young innocent lives have been lost in this manner where the police end up shooting at innocent people believing that they are criminals. However, with policy oversight in the policing docket, police can be held accountable for choosing to trust racists stereotypes over their training and good judgment. Oversight in the U.S has become common since it is a good strategy of getting the police to be accountable for the choices they make and defending the African American civilians who have become afraid of the police despite the fact that they should be happy they exist. With this in mind, it is evident that policy oversight is extremely important in the fight against racial profiling since it ensures that police and other members of society who use their power and authority to intimidate the minority can be held accountable for their actions.
Racial profiling is a complicated problem that continues to develop in the United States. The issue has promoted the deaths and arrests of innocent civilians because the authorities use it to catch criminals; instead of looking for the real perpetrators. Besides, the vice fails to offer races with similar opportunities because the minority groups encounter many difficulties in their daily activities compared to their counterparts. America’ constitution clearly states that all citizens should be protected from bad laws, but clearly, racial profiling overlooks this. Nonetheless, different solutions can help reduce the activity. For instance, monitoring the authority can help determine those using racial profiling in their work and determine whether to arrest them or not. Moreover, in the current era, people can use technology and social media to record any activities related to racial profiling to arrest the people involved. In this regard, racial profiling deserves to end since it is affecting the minority groups and denying them an opportunity to be free in their country.
Works Cited
Attard, Barbara. "Oversight of Law Enforcement is Beneficial and Needed-both Inside and Out." Pace L. Rev. 30 (2009): 1548.
"Black Lives Matter." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2018. Opposing Viewpoints In Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/RMBGVS336742654/OVIC?u=avlr"sid=OVIC" xid=96e1470b. Accessed 5 Nov. 2018.
Davis, Paul. "Political Correctness Is Turning the Starbucks Incident into a Racial Matter." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2018. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/DLGGNM658294732/OVIC?u=avlr"sid=OVIC"xid=d037ab3f. Accessed 6 Nov. 2018. Originally published as "Trouble brewing over Starbucks arrests," Washington Times, 24 Apr. 2018.
De Choudhury, Munmun, et al. "Social Media Participation in an Activist Movement for Racial Equality." ICWSM. 2016.
Izadi, Elahe. "Racial Profiling Is Ineffective in Catching Terrorists." Racial Profiling, edited by Noël Merino, Greenhaven Press, 2015. Current Controversies. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/EJ3010929214/OVIC?u=avlr"sid=OVIC"xid=e95a8ee0. Accessed 7 Nov. 2018. Originally published as "Boston Bombing Case Upends Assumptions About Racial Profiling," National Journal, 19 Apr. 2013.
Sojo, Victor, and Melissa A. Wheeler. "Why Short ‘Unconscious Bias’ Programs aren’t Enough to End Racial Harassment and Discrimination." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2018. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/MGEACS844223276/OVIC?u=avl_susc"sid=OVIC"xid=1b74af44. Accessed 31 Oct. 2018. Originally published as "Why short ‘unconscious bias’ programs aren’t enough to end racial harassment and discrimination," The Conversation, 24 Apr. 2018
