The Stereotyping of a Whole Race On September 14th, 2015, a high school freshman named Ahmed Mohamed brought a clock he built himself to his school to exhibit his technical prowess. His teacher confiscated the clock, believing it resembled a bomb, and Ahmed was taken into the principal’s office. He was questioned for about an hour and a half before he was arrested and sent to a juvenile detention facility. According to Ahmed, he wasn’t allowed to contact his family throughout the whole process. He was then released and suspended for three days for bringing a “hoax bomb,” even though the local police came to the conclusion that he had no malicious intent. This story went viral and sparked debates on racial profiling all over the internet.
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This is shown in the movie “Straight Outta Compton”, where there is a scene in the movie in which officers put the five rappers in NWA in submission for no observable reason other than standing outside their studio. Their manager, a white male named Jerry Heller, came out and exclaimed “you can’t arrest them just because they’re black!” This moment in the movie was one of many ways “Straight Outta Compton” portrayed racial profiling against African Americans, and how the media can influence negative stereotypes regarding …show more content…
The NYPD dubbed this program stop-and-frisk because they essentially stop and question a pedestrian and after this they “frisk” them in search of weapons or other contraband according to wikipedia.org. There’s been controversy over this program as it allows police officers to detain anyone who looks suspicious of criminal activity. The efficiency of this program has also been questioned. According to an article called “Injustices of Stop and Frisk,” around 700,000 New Yorkers have been stopped by police, almost completely innocent of any crime. Evidently, the article states that only 6 percent of stops actually lead to an arrest. Statistics show that hispanic men were being stopped in disproportionate numbers when compared to whites. Also, according to this article, police are “significantly more likely to use force when when they stop Blacks and Hispanics than when they stop whites.” All of these are reasons as to why racial profiling is an issue here in the US, and how little racial profiling actually does to help stop crime. There are many things that can contribute to racial profiling. Stereotypes, media coverage, and stigmas are just a few examples of this. By complicating the lives of those affected with a single story, the belief that thinking about races stereotypically becomes a more and more acceptable idea in society. However,
This is shown in the movie “Straight Outta Compton”, where there is a scene in the movie in which officers put the five rappers in NWA in submission for no observable reason other than standing outside their studio. Their manager, a white male named Jerry Heller, came out and exclaimed “you can’t arrest them just because they’re black!” This moment in the movie was one of many ways “Straight Outta Compton” portrayed racial profiling against African Americans, and how the media can influence negative stereotypes regarding …show more content…
The NYPD dubbed this program stop-and-frisk because they essentially stop and question a pedestrian and after this they “frisk” them in search of weapons or other contraband according to wikipedia.org. There’s been controversy over this program as it allows police officers to detain anyone who looks suspicious of criminal activity. The efficiency of this program has also been questioned. According to an article called “Injustices of Stop and Frisk,” around 700,000 New Yorkers have been stopped by police, almost completely innocent of any crime. Evidently, the article states that only 6 percent of stops actually lead to an arrest. Statistics show that hispanic men were being stopped in disproportionate numbers when compared to whites. Also, according to this article, police are “significantly more likely to use force when when they stop Blacks and Hispanics than when they stop whites.” All of these are reasons as to why racial profiling is an issue here in the US, and how little racial profiling actually does to help stop crime. There are many things that can contribute to racial profiling. Stereotypes, media coverage, and stigmas are just a few examples of this. By complicating the lives of those affected with a single story, the belief that thinking about races stereotypically becomes a more and more acceptable idea in society. However,