Negative Effects Of Police Brutality

Humans have an inborn and fundamental need for affiliation, and belonging to an ingroup is one way to fulfill this need. Naturally with this attainment we develop and us versus them mentality. An Ingroups (us) is a social group that one is linked to and identifies with, while and outgroup (them) is a group we’re unable to identify with. Race, gender, occupation, schooling, even sharing the same home town are all examples of groups for which a person can classify themselves into. Throughout this paper I’m going to discuss the negative effects of ingroup and outgroup relationships and the role they play in increasing prejudice and discrimination throughout the country. Specifically examining the issue of police brutality toward minorities. …show more content…
In certain settings theses automatic feelings can influence people to act in explicit racism even if it’s not their intention. African Americans, but black men specifically have a large-scale of unfavorable stereotypes, including: gangsters, lazy, poor, feels less pain, jailbirds, etc. It’s common for black men to be followed in stores, imagine walking into a jewelry store just to have the owner lock the glasses at your presence. Now let’s look at the stereotypes of police officers specifically Native Americans. While an officer role in society is to protect and serve its people, in too many minority communities, people are experiencing the opposite. The days when officers were viewed in a positive light has declined and now they’re viewed of as trouble and a threat. Here lies the conflict, African Americans feel threatened by the people who are in some ways responsible for their protection, while the police feel as though African Americans are the threat towards society in some ways. Because officers jobs are significant in that their actions could be the cause of someone living or dying, and that on a daily basis, they could interact with people of different races they need to be able separate the stereotypical thoughts they have at work. As I stated earlier sometimes this happens implicitly. An officer may be overly aggressive with a black man because in his head he’s thinking black men are aggressive and tend to not listen to authority so I have to be more forceful. This could cause a chain reaction ending in the African American behaving in ways he usually wouldn’t because of the extra forcefulness the officer showed. The officer may have never intended for it to go that far, but the implicit racism he behaved in causing him to act that