Racial profiling is cultivated from an institutionalized system made to keep minorities as underprivileged citizens. The root cause of the problem can be the criteria to get a loan for a home, health benefits, or even what zip code one lives in compared to their white counterparts.
In the past, Tim Wise stated that it took the average Black citizen an income of $60,000 a year, compared to the average white citizen having an income of $14,000 to be approved for a FHA or VA home loan. That now has changed a bit due to new lending guidelines. What this meant was that the black person had to work five times as hard as the white person to be considered equal.
However, the best example for racial profiling is when Tim Wise had walked into a police academy and asked the group “When you see a young black man driving a luxury car, what is the first thing you think?” only to receive a united response of “Drug dealer”. When asking the same question about a young white man, they unanimously responded, rich parents.
People of success of color are racially profiled to earn their money in unethical ways.
However, the institutionalized response to such examples reaches even further than that. Statistics have shown that (note to self: add in year here from research) millions of minorities have died to the inability to have access to the same health care as their white counterparts, which causes epidemics. Yet, epidemics caused by institutionalized racial profiling are usually swiped up under a rug and never brought to the light, except in data reports and analytics.
In comparison, racism is an individualized hate for a member of a minority race. This can be seen as something as minor as moving seats on a bus because you’re uncomfortable or scared that the person next to you is a thief or terrorist. It can also be as major as a group of white men in Texas tying up a black man to the back of their truck and dragging them down the street. Individualized racism gets the attention of the headlines and news articles.
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Originally posted on Quora.
Leonard Kim consults startups and writes books like The Etiquette of Social Media: How to Connect and Respond to Others in the World of Social Media
So, why doesn’t racial profiling not get the same amount of media coverage? Because the way I see it, it is more harmful than individual racial acts???
As a black Caribbean woman, I don’t see colour in America.. only because I am not from a country where it’s black and white. However, this article right here, just gave me chills. Especially the part about home ownership and young men driving fancy cars. It’s very true, once you start really thinking about it. Great article.