"Don't give me your BS idealistic answer . Tell the TRUTH. You KNOW the answer. Don't you fucking tell me you don't hold your belongings just a little closer when you see a black man walking towards you at night."
But is the real problem here the black man walking down the street, or you/my/our response upon seeing him? Even if the statistics are all true, and not biased themselves by the attitudes of police officers, judges and we jurors (the same attitudes you describe, ironically, creating a self-perpetuating cycle of justification), isn't the real problem here that no matter how many black men commit crimes, we are not justified in being prejudiced against that particular black man on our street, who is an individual, and not beholden to behave according to the biased stereotypes we created for him and for black men in general?
Just because we wrote a play, it doesn't mean that he has to become an actor in it, dutifully performing the part we wrote for him and his kind.
He isn't the problem. We (or more specifically, our biased attitudes that make us hold our belongings closer) are.
(And I say this as a guy who does sometimes tense up when I see certain folks dressed or behaving in certain ways...)
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Posted (& subsequently deleted, along with everything else at that post) 03/28/12 08:11 PM
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