In the area of civil law enforcement, Racial profiling is the consideration of race as a variable or indicator when making an assessment of the likelihood that someone has committed a crime or has made some kind of infringement. Racial profiling results in an increased level of surveillance and inquisition of people which are deemed to fall into the category of being more likely to offend.
A similar study was conducted in Maryland with the same results. In both cases,‘In New Jersey, the data showed that only 15 % of all driver on the New Jersey Turnpike were racial minorities, yet 43 % of all stops and 73 % of all arrests were of black minorities – despite the fact that blacks and whites violated traffic laws at almost exactly the same rate.’There was a also a study in Florida with the same results, and one in Illinois, and one in California. The practice of focussing on non-white drivers was called the‘whites were actually more likely than people of color to be carrying illegal drugs on contraband in their vehicles.’by an ex New Jersey attorney general.‘circular logic of racial profilling’
In New York City in 2007 the NYPD made 508 540 pedestrian stops,.‘the vast majority of which were non white and more than half were African American.’If you find it outrageous to have your x-ray taken and your shoes removed on the odd occasion you have to travel through an airport, imagine how you would feel being subjected to random frisks and searches in daily life by zealous officers, whose decision to give you attention was influenced by the colour of your skin.In 2008, ’80 % of the people stopped were African American.’
The humiliation and injustice of racial profiling creates a toxic divide in the society that endures it. For the victims, a sense of resentment, hopelessness and anger is guaranteed to manifest, the results of which are only likely to cause their livelihoods to spiral further downward. The mind-boggling incarceration rate of African Americans is in no small part due to racial profiling practices. The destruction within families, the impoverishment and hopelessness, caused by this mass imprisonment is a stain on the American State, and racial profiling under the umbrella of the war on drugs exacerbates it tremendously. The resentment also maintains a pressure base that has the potential to violently rupture, in the event of some kind of trigger, which will then only be used to further denigrate and victimise the minorities in question
If racial profiling can be brought to an end, the benefits to American society could not be over estimated. But, how can racial profiling be stopped? I think the people perpetrating it need to be educated on the consequences of their actions, and de-mystified of their deluded justifications. It may also help if they could live a week in the shoes of their quarry. Given the war on drugs underlies much of the (false) justification for racial profiling, an end to the war on drugs also needs to be demanded.
The quotes in this post are from the excellent book, The New Jim Crow, by Michelle Alexander (The New York Press). To learn more, about how racial profiling is used to select neighborhoods to target for drug operations, for example, I suggest you buy a copy of the book.