Unnecessary Racial Profiling

"The police of New York have arrested a demonstrator during a March held for 16-year-old Kimani Gray. He was shot to death on a Brooklyn street by plainclothes police officers."

According to America's Traffic Laws Give Police Way too Much Power,  “There are roughly 20 million traffic stops every year, many for petty infractions.” But how many of these traffic stops involve racial profiling? Throughout the United States, traffic stops are conducted to stop and investigate a possible crime or violation of the law. Sometimes, the intentions behind the traffic stop are not always justifiable which is talked about in the Exploring the Influence of Race Relations and Public Safety Concerns on Public Support for Racial Profiling during Traffic Stops; many argue that they were racially profiled because of their race or ethnicity. When those two things get involved, no one is absolutely happy in any way. The intentions of racial profiling shine a dark light on the topic because it goes against two amendments: the Fourth and Fourteenth. The fourth amendment states that it protects people from unreasonable search seizures from the government, and the fourteenth amendment states “No state shall make or enforce any law which denies to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” Both amendments are violated effortlessly when race and ethnicity appear on the road.

Racial Profiling is a problematic in the United States because of its baleful intentions. When blacks and Hispanics are behind the wheel, they are presumably the target of racial profiling; they are automatically suspected of a crime or violating the law. These quick assumptions anger many people on the road and put them in distress when thrown into situations they did not ask for in the first place. Racial Profiling is deliberately used incorrectly and innocent citizens are getting stopped for the accusation of handling illegal substances and committing illegal acts.

Anyone is capable of smuggling drugs in their vehicles, but certain races are picked on when it comes to these situations. When black and Hispanics are on the road, they are more likely to be pulled over because they are presumed to have possible illegal drugs. The involvement of illegal substances in dire circumstances like traffic stops means no good. No one wants to be caught and pulled over with what can be weed or heroin in the back trunk because anyone in the vehicle will be held responsible, arrested, and charged with possessing illegal drugs. Being accused of handling drugs in the first place when not being involved with them in the car is humiliating. Many people probably ask,  “Why am I getting pulled over when I did not even violate the law in any way?” This is where Racial Profiling comes in. You are being treated unequally and using your race and ethnicity against you to assume you have illegal substances in the car. Significant findings from Kelsey Shoub and her colleagues’ analysis of the North Carolina data set included in the Racial Disparities Revealed in Massive Traffic Stop Dataset article “ Blacks were 63 percent more likely to be stopped even though, as a whole, they drive 16 percent less. Taking into account less time on the road, blacks were about 95 percent more likely to be stopped.” 

When talking about racial profiling, there was a percentage of people who supported the idea. Many thought it was justified and the proper way to deal with traffic stops. Though profiling was useful to catch criminals because it aided them during hard times, racial profiling was the number one tactic. A former police captain from Miami, Marshall Herald said in the article Racial Profiling: Past, Present, and Future? “Label me a racist if you wish, but the cold fact is that African Americans comprise [sic] 12 percent of the nation’s population, but occupy nearly half the state and federal prison cells. African Americans account for 2,165 inmates per 100,000 population, versus 307 for non-Hispanic whites and 823 for Hispanics.” He argued that most African Americans commit serious crimes and that police should continue to use profiling.

However, the tactic of racial profiling had supportive reasonings on why it was inefficient. On the American Bar Association, it was said that “In jurisdictions using racial targeting in their stops and searches, police hit more often when they stopped and searched whites than when they searched either blacks or Latinos.” With the valid facts, Marshall Drnak’s statement was overridden and dismissed. His evidence, along with others assumed targeting the right people who were racial minorities was the best idea, but turns out hit rates got worse. 

It’s wrong to assume and racially profile people because of their race or ethnicity. Traffic stops are used to conduct searches of potential criminals or violations of the law. The intentions behind these stops are not always justifiable; many argued they were racially profiled because of their race and ethnicity. While these issues expand throughout America, the Fourth and Fourteenth amendment gets violated because of inequality. Racial Profiling is used incorrectly and innocent people are getting pulled over for accusations of handling illegal substances and committing possible illegal acts. No one wants to be in a situation where they are pulled over because their race and ethnicity was the key factor to a cop’s reasoning behind it. With many supportive facts behind Racial Profiling being unjustifiable, you are safe to say statements targeted to induce profiling have hit an end. Sadly, in today’s modern-day society, we still issue lots of reports of profiling races and ethnicity; therefore, we need more people to get educated on problems that affect our nation.