Racial Profiing Discussion the Events From 2001 Essay

Racial Profiing Discussion

The events from 2001 marked a crucial point in the history of the United States from the perspective of the casualties and human loss they produce but at the same time from the perspective of the changes these events marked in the American society. Nowadays, the security measures are increased to such an extend that there have been wide debates on the potential abuses that may take place in terms of human rights, privacy issues, as well as personal security.

One of the security measures enforced since September 2001 is the extended control measures and techniques used to prevent any terrorist attacks from taking place on American soil. At the same time though, despite the fact that increased security measures are justified, they also allow controversies over potential abuses. One of the arguments protesting against increased security measures as they are enforced today points out the role of racial profiling. According to the Department of Justice, racial profiling "rests on the erroneous assumption that any particular individual of one race or ethnicity is more likely to engage in misconduct than any particular individual of other races or ethnicities" (Dept. Of Justice, 2003). More precisely, there have been cases for instance that included two suspects to a crime.Depending on the nature of the crime, the black suspect (as in most rape cases) was labeled as primary suspect, whereas in serial killing crimes the white suspect was identified as primary lead (Cloud, 2001). These assumptions are suggested to be determined by a constant trail case which includes a larger number of rape offenders among African-Americans and a larger number of serial killers among the white population.

The definition in itself fails to provide the exact magnitude of the problem. In fact, racial profiling has become an ever more increasing problem largely since the 9/11 events. However, until that moment, racial profiling had been a common practice, especially in big cities around the United States with particular aim towards black people. More precisely, Time Magazine noted "Most often we use the latter term (racial profiling) to describe the police practice of stopping people for "driving while black," but there are myriad permutations. Actor Danny Glover held a press conference in 1999 because cabdrivers weren't stopping for him in New York City; some called this "hailing while black." (Cloud, 2001). This aspect comes to point out that in fact….....