Jose Aquino

Jose Aquino
Mrs. Cottrell
English 3-4
13 January 2015
Racism In America Every 28 hours a black man is killed by a police officer and only two percent are indicted. These statistics are showing that the lives of black men and minorities are not important. Our beloved nation was founded on the belief that we were all created equal. That we have the unalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Yet the sad reality of all this, is that after years of civil rights movements, protests, and non stop effort to raise awareness of the issue, in the U.S. racism is still very much alive. Sure we have gone a very long way to back in the days of Martin Luther King J.r., Blacks/Minorities are not so bluntly discriminated but now in days its as if this new form of subliminally resentful actions are being brought to this day and age. Examples like the recent tragedies regarding Mike Brown and Erick Gardner make my argument even more clear to understand and to prove. Of course there are a few people who believe that the actions the police officers took were necessary. Perhaps they might say, “They asked for it,” “They Resisted arrest,” they had it coming. I say to them that events such as the police killings are a nexus where white racial resentment and white supremacy are made to confront black/ minority pain, reasonable hurt, and the righteous anger. Why is it that the media has always showed the “gang member” as a Black or Hispanic male? These are subjects we should be asking ourselves and realize how that can be crucial to some ones perception about a group of people and think about the repercussions all this can have to future generations. Just recently released to the public was data that disappointingly proves the Boston Police department has used racially biased policing. Researchers concluded that police targeted Blacks in 63.3% of encounters, while Blacks make up less than a quarter of Boston’s population. This racial disparity cannot be explained. They also found that Blacks were more likely than whites to be subjected to repeat police/civilian encounters and to be frisked or searched. The bottom line is that race was a significant factor driving the BPD’s stop and frisk practices. Those on the opposing side would become speechless to this information. These people who were randomly targeted were minding there business and going about there day. But because of this current view that society has emplaced they were boxed in to this stereotypical box, leading to them being victimized. How do we put an end to all of this? First we need to know our own conscious and unconscious feelings. Perhaps think about what stereotypes we may have and ways we might eliminate these believes or figure out why these ideas have been introduced and of course find the ROOT of this. But perhaps the most important but most difficult is to educate ourselves well enough to change the way people think and work within the system so that new ideas and change can be accomplished. The simple fact is that racism both personal, institutional, and structural remains a force in American life. It impacts the lives of everyone, whites included because the result of tension , and shapes the broad material circumstances of minorities in countless negative ways. Yes, there are many ways in which we’ve made progress, and we should celebrate them. But just because we don’t face the racism of the past doesn’t mean we’ve solved the problem. We haven’t.