Racial Profiling: a Struggle for Justice and Equality

Imagine being a parent of a Black or Latino child having to explain to them that not all police officers have their best interest at heart. Or having to worry and pray that the said child makes it to their destinations safely without being pulled over in the fears of them being arrested or worst killed. What about the innocent children who have been profiled just for walking in a crowd or being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Or simply playing at the playground. To have to wonder and worry every time a child leaves the house if they are going to return is something no parent should every have to go through. Sadly, this is the reality of most families. Male children of color have it the hardest for example a fifteen-year-old boy can be viewed as a grown man to a rookie who is unsure of their role or place yet. Or a prejudice police officer that has slipped under the radar. This is racial profiling

Imagine being a Black man in a nice car driving home from a long day on the job. The only thing on his mind is getting home to relax with family. A police officer pulls up behind him just as he pulls up to the gated community in which he lives and signals for him to pull over. The police officer goes up to his window and asks what he was doing in the neighborhood and whose car is he driving. The driver asks the officer what he did wrong and the police officer repeats his questions then asks him to step out of the car. This is racial profiling.

Imagine being a person of color who has turned to the police for help only to have it backfire on them. For example, A person calls the police because they believe they have been wronged only to be the one integrated and place in handcuffs due to the color of their skins. Or what could be worst ignored by the police all together. This is racial profiling.

Imagine a being a young black man or women wishing they were a white woman/ man just so they can get though the day being left alone. Or can drive a nice car in a nice neighborhood, go for a walk in the park, or walking into to a store without being stopped or questioned. This is racial profiling.

Racial Profiling is defined as the practice of targeting people because of their ethnic background and or race, it is illegal but continues to occur especially when it comes to the policing of communities and or cities. To judge someone simply by the color of their skin based on no real evidence is a serious problem not to mention a civil rights violation. It is one thing to be racially profiled by citizens is one thing but to be profiled by the police is a whole different ball game. Police officers are set in place to protect and serve not harass and arrest. Studies have shown that racial profiling is the leading cause of police stops and arrests. The entire process of racial profiling is unjust but, not surprisingly, it is applied against those in society most vulnerable to attack and the least likely to effectuate any political or social pressure to prevent its enforcement. Racial profiling is another way to blame or associate deviant behaviors with a certain group. While police culture may be cited by officers to justify their profiling practices, culture is not, in itself, always static, homogeneous, insulated from its environment and unaffected by the agency of police actors (Chan 1997; Chan, Devery, and Doran 2003)

Numerous studies, in any case, have demonstrated that innocent drivers have become targets of such law enforcement practices, particularly amid the stops, some of which have perhaps prompted police to look for drugs and other things after the subjects of inquiry have just been educated that they have been halted something else, for different causes and pretentions, for example, broken tail light, worn tires, dark tint, and wrongly displayed car tags or other minor petty criminal offenses, for example, the non-use of seat belts. The suspicion that more minority youth are committing crimes gives the police the justification to automatically target them for traffic stops, searches, ticketing and sometimes arrests. (Kamalu,2016).

Racial profiling is and will continue to be a longstanding and profoundly disturbing national issue despite cases that the United States has entered a ‘post-racial period.’ It happens each day, in urban areas and towns the nationwide, when law implementation and private security target non-white individuals for awkward and frequently alarming confinements, cross examinations, and searches without proof of criminal association and dependent on race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion. it is thought that the police are set in place to protect citizens from harm while promoting fairness and justice in our communities when this is not happening there is now a problem. The problem is that citizens of communities are now living in fear with the possibility of being stopped, questioned, and or arrested simply because of what they look like, where they come from, or what religion they adhere to. Racial profiling should be seen as the foundational, and lived experiences of people of color being controlled and punished by the police in a criminal justice system that uses bias and predisposition, among a greater part white public that excuses and defends this treatment (Staples,2011).

Contrary to popular belief racial profiling is not just a black or white issue. The federal government’s support of unprecedented attacks on immigrant communities and workplaces by neighborhood law enforcement in support with federal organizations has focused on Latino communities specifically. These strategies have unjustly extended the purview of and undermined primary trust in nearby law enforcement, distanced immigrant communities, and made an environment of fear. As well as a drastic increase in hate crimes against Latinos. Also, while Black, Latinos and their families endure these unfair practices resulting from the over-policing of their neighborhoods, relatively few whites are impacted by crimes Latinos and blacks commit(Staples,2011). According to an analysis done by the NYCLU on New Yorkers in 2017 which showed New Yorkers were stopped by the police “10,861 times. Out of that 7,301 were totally innocent (67 percent), 6,277 were black (58 percent), 3,427 were Latino (32 percent), and 947 were white (9 percent)”.

This study does not include the innocent people killed by the police. Sadly, in 2017 the police killed 1,129 people. “There were only 14 days in 2017 when no one was killed by the police (D’Onofrio,2018).” Numerous whites pleasingly observe the police who are mostly white, similar to their cutting edge of barrier in keeping misconduct confined to the ghettos Subsequently, the police remain the primary source of racial tension in the United States. It has been argued that the reasoning for racial profiling by the police is that Blacks and Latinos commit crimes at a higher rate than any other race. This has since been proven to be a false statement.

Racial profiling by the police has placed a huge stigma on law enforcement. If people are now more scared of the police then the problems they have on hand. Then what? It has been said that “people of color fear what could happen if police came rushing into a group of people who, by virtue of our skin color, might be mistaken for suspects(Hannah,2018)” People are not offenders just because they black. Nor are they in some way or another the main individuals in America who prefer not to live in safe neighborhoods.

Racial profiling can be a very difficult issue to prove while prejudice involves conscious intent, cognitive bias and stereotyping can be unconscious biases based on false assumptions about the criminality of ethnic groups, while race-based deployment is an organizational or local practice that may or may not involve individual intent and consciousness. (Chan,1997). It is rare that a police officer is charged with racial profiling even when death is involved. Because profiling is not something that is expressed openly it can be hard to hold the police accountable for their actions. “Part of the reason that so little is done about racial profiling is that the burden of proof falls on the victims, something that’s nearly impossible to do in situations of one-on-one harassment, where third party witnesses or material evidence are often lacking(Goyette,2010)”.In the rare cases that a person has been able to prove that they have been profiled by the police it is their civil right to sue all involved the officer, department, and/or the municipality for violating his civil rights.

There are many factors that can contribute as to why racial profiling is happening amongst police officers and or any other form of law enforcement. It is a sad thing to admit but one factor can be the profiling is a learned behavior passed down by generations of the officers’ family. “The biases come from unconscious or unintentional beliefs. ‘A large proportion of white Americans have these [implicit] biases, and it’s hard to expect police officers to be any different(Weir,2016)”.

Just because they have taking an oath to protect and serve doesn’t mean that they must abide by it. A second factor can be something as them being a rookie cop who has either been trained by some older officers that have pushed their views upon them or maybe they are just scared and it is easier to arrest or shoot. Even though there are multiple hands on trainings and polices in place to prevent these types of things of things from happening they still do and more than likely will continue to happen well into the future. This is almost a guarantee since twenty states have no law against the profiling by police officers. Who is going to police the police?

The effects that racial profiling by police officers can cause on a person of color can be a wide range of things. Things such as but not limited to stress, loss of wages due an arrest/court fees, and a feeling of being unsafe. To be discriminated against almost every day of one’s life can cause serious turmoil.

Contrary to popular belief Whites can be racially profiled as well by police officers. Many times, if Whites are spotted in a so called Black or Latinos neighborhoods then they are stopped by police offers and questioned to see if they are in the area to buy or sell drugs because they look as if they do not belong in that type of neighborhood. While it is true that Whites are profiled they are more likely than any other race to be let go with a only a warning. According to The Leadership Council “Relative to stopped Whites, stopped Blacks in LA were 127% more likely to be frisked and Hispanics were 43% more likely to be frisked. Blacks were also 76% more likely to be searched compared to Whites”.

Racial profiling is not only done to the opposite race it can be done to same race as well. For example, a Black cop and picks on a Black person and a White cop can pick on a White person. Even though police officers are trained to patrol without bias and treat everyone they interact with respect and all their suspicious should be based on probable cause and not skins color. They are also forbidden from engaging in or ignoring policing with bias, using harassing or derogatory manners. This is not always the case. There are some officers whose egos inflate every time they put that uniform on almost like it gives them a sense of power. If this is the case These are the people then need to be removed from the force.

Considering the current events going on in the world today with the help of media outlets, cell phones and social media everything is being recording nowadays. So, there is no denying that racial profiling by the police is a real thing. Racial profiling whether it is at the hands of the police or citizens voicing their opinions and beliefs towards other citizens based on the color of their skin is morally wrong and should be dealt with accordingly. Not only should they be laws in place to prevent the police from profiling there should be some in place for citizens as well.

In conclusion, there is no denying that racial profiling by the police or any other forms of law enforcement rather it can be seen or felt is very much alive. No matter how many polices and procedures that are in place it will continue. One can only hope that the police who are in the wrong will take a step back and look at themselves and the image they are portraying to realize that racial profiling is not only wrong it is dehumanizing and for people of color, everyday racial profiling is one indignity piled atop another. It can leave anyone involved rather they be Black, Latino, or White feeling frightened, humiliated, annoyed, unjustly treated, and angry. St the end of the day the million dollar question is and will continues to be if a person cannot turn to the police who can they turn to? 

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