27 October 2008

Racial Profiling




Recent studies have shown that African Americans are far more likely to be stopped and searched while driving their motor vehicle. Other statistics show that a higher percentage of crime is perpetrated by African Americans. Are African Americans really committing more crimes or are they just caught more often because they are racially profiled thus skewing the statistics?

13 comments:

theBaraness said...

I believe that African Americans are said to commit more crimes because they are caught more due to racial profiling. If white people were watched just as much as African Americans, the same amount of white Americans would also be caught. The more a certain race is searched and sought out, the more they will be caught doing illegal activity. The statistics are definately being skewed with racial profiling. These statistics leaning towards African Americans and crime get skewed more because more action will be taken in using racial profiling to stop and find criminals. This increase of racial profiling action will be due to the increase of the wrong and incredibly skewed statistics.

wow that's confusing.

Melissa A. said...
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tophocity said...

In my personal opinion I do believe that African Americans do get caught committing crimes more than Caucasians do because of racial profiling. Some cops might pull over a white man driving down the road in a busted up old Buick. But there are better chances that a cop would pull over a black man driving in that same Buick down that same road just for being black. Because the color of his skin is different, apparently it makes it more likely for him to be committing a crime at the moment, and that is just straight up ridiculous. No one should be picked out of a crowd for the color of their skin.

A Holzhauer said...

Although I do agree with the comments posted prior to this, i do have some discrepancies with them. First of all I do think that blacks get racially profiled more that whites and yes they might get pulled over faster than a white person if they are both driving the same busted old Buik. But if your a cop and you have the choice of pulling over a black person who according to statistics will have a higher chance of lets say for example, having a warrant out for his arrest or a traffic violation or any sort of violation, rather than a white person who according to stats. probably wont have any of those, of course the cop is going to pull over the black person driving the car. It sad to say but why would the police take a chance and start to pull over white people and find nothing when they could be pulling over black people and according to statistics finding something wrong. It is a vicious cycle that is going to be very hard to get away from.

Tim McDonald said...

I think that Aferican Americans are not commiting more crimes but are being caught more due to racial profiling. Since they get pulled over more than other people, they are more likely to get caught for a crime they committed. I Aferican Americas were being pulled over the same amount as other people then I think that the statistics would be more even in the percent caught. Racial profiling skews the statistics.

Derek Giansanti said...
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Carl Fleming said...

I believe that racial profiling plays a huge role in the statistics behind it. The statistics are skewed. African Americans are sought out for by authorities and are profiled. More often than not authorities take notice of a african american that may look suspicious than a white american that may look equally as suspicious. Racial profiling is practiced in law enforcement and skew stats

Derek Giansanti said...

i belive that the recent studies are this way because of racial profialing.i belive this because everyone makes mistakes and everyone breaks the law.so if the whites were watched just as much as the african americans then the percentages would be just about the same.plus if some one gets pulled over then the police sometimes lets them go on a warning but from what i have heard the police doesn't let african americans go as much as they let whites go. i have acutaly experienced this in one case or another and thats why i belive this.

amanda bollacker said...

I do agree that African Americans and other races are stereotyped which makes people believe that they commit more crimes. It works the same way with any stereotype; since it is addressed now the people begin to look for it. Police expect Blacks, not Whites, to commit crimes so that is who they'll stop. Population probably also plays a role as well as where these people live. You can't say that all Blacks commit crimes. You can't say all Whites commit crimes. If you live in a place where crime is common and acceptable it makes it more likely for that crime to occur, black or white. And since living conditions are another stereotype--the police look for crimes in poor, black communities or ethnic communities rather than arrest the rich white guy who's embezzling money in the skyscraper next door.

Natalia said...
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Natalia said...

In my opinion African Americans are racially profiled. I don't believe that this is the right thing to do, although it happens on a daily basis. It's not only that African Americans are stopped and searched while driving, this happens in most public places as well. As statistics show, there is a high percentage of crime perpetuated by African Americans. I don't think that these statistics are necessarily true. Statistics aren't accurate due to the fact that there are more African Americans being stopped, than Caucasians, in other words, if both groups were racially profiled, then the percentage would equal out.

mohawk man said...

I think that african americans are caught more because they are looked at more closly. And in turn looked at even more closely. I think that originaly they were looked at so closely because of racial profiling. But now they are looked at more closely because of the statistics. But the statistics are skewed because they were racialy profiled before. Now it's a vicious cycle that can't be stopped. It sucks. And thats the real truth.

Anonymous said...

I think that African Americans may not be necesserly committing more crimes but they are probably caught more often because of racial profilig. I think that the concept behind racial profiling is sad and it is hard to believe that police would act in such a way. In my opinion, they should be they should be the ones to look up to and learn from, but things such as racial profiling does not make people want to look up to the police who should be following the laws and doing their job in a fair manner. If more white were stopped by the police then the percentage would probably go up and there wouldn't be as much of a difference. But if racial profiling exists, the results will probably be what they are now.