Analysis Of Beverly Tatum 's ' Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together '

Analysis of Why are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria by Beverly Daniel Tatum

Did you know that unarmed black men are seven times more likely to die than white men? Racism is as old as human society itself. As long as human beings have been around, people have always seemed to have hated or feared people with a different skin color. Racism is just a part of the human nature. Trayvon Benjamin Martin was just 17 when he was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch captain, in Sanford, Florida on February 2012. The murder of Trayvon Martin affected many people. The death of Martin was just the first of several deaths where a white person killed a black innocent person. Since the deaths weren’t stopping the #BlackLivesMatter movement began.

Racism is a serious issue in today's society. Racial terms can be considered verbal and sometimes physical abuse towards a certain gender, color, or race. Something that John Mcwhorter wrote in his article about racism was "An opinion that certain people are inferior because of their race" (Mcwhorter, John). Some jobs are so racist that they won't even give blacks, hispanics, asians, native americans, lesbians, gays, and the disabled. Racism is so bad in some parts of the world that it is considered racial harassment (Racial Discrimination). Some people might discriminate different races from playing

Racism is a concept that has been around for centuries of human history: The act of a privileged party oppressing, demeaning, and committing genocide of another race. However, scientifically, humanity is only made up of a single species: homosapiens. The idea of race as it is known (groups based on skin pigment and cultural descent) is a social construct created and ingrained into society. Just because race is socially constructed does not mean racism is not real. Social constructs are not physical entities, but are certainly “real” to humans of a society. One concept that has been created along with the idea of race is the inequality of said races. Caucasian people in many societies (including North American and European) have become the “norm”, meaning they are the standard and expected. Because of this, Caucasian people receive benefits, often known as white privilege, which is “A collective, implicit acceptance of whiteness as virtuous, normal, unremarkable, and expected.” (Jeffries, 2013). Because race is socially constructed in culture, it has created white privilege and white normativity. This privilege can be seen in the media created and consumed by North Americans, and in the justice system and law upheld in North American countries.

All across the nation, in the news the black community has been making their voice heard, in regards to white police brutality, and murder against the unarmed black community. Many of these brutal attacks and flat out murders of unarmed black people haven’t been largely prosecuted, some officers have even been acquitted of any wrong doing or murder. This has led to outrage in the African American community at large. The shooting of an unarmed black teen named Michael Brown caused the racial strain in this country to break.

White privilege is a unique form of racism given its fascinating characteristic of not involving hostility. Therefore, it cannot be directly blamed on someone (Pludo, 2015). The lack of blame does not cause any discomfort on the white persons enjoying the privileges.

All across the nation, in the news the black community has been making their voice heard, in regards to white police brutality, and murder against the unarmed black community. Many of these brutal attacks and flat out murders of unarmed black people haven’t been largely prosecuted, some officers have even been acquitted of any wrong doing or murder. This has led to outrage in the African American community at large. The shooting of an unarmed black teen named Michael Brown caused the racial strain in this country to break.

Police brutality has been in the headlines for years. Reports continually stream in, exhibiting the needless force displayed by police. However, the people don’t always have all the information. The media shows the aftereffects itself, not the reasons why the victim was targeted. Perhaps it was a justified arrest. Maybe it was simply because the target of the attack wasn’t white. Police are constantly put on trial for their crimes, but the community may never know the whole truth. The pain and misery caused by racial profiling greatly outweighs the positive aspects.

African American groups, such as Black Lives Matter, have created a false narrative that African Americans in our society are victimized by law enforcement. The media has presented police officers to be murderers, and have created trends and discussions that encourage Americans to turn their backs on the ones that protect them. Police Brutality has become an ongoing conversation as black citizens experience law enforcement related deaths. Although society is blaming the killings of African Americans on white cops specifically, they fail to realize that black and hispanic police officers are more likely to fire a gun at African Americans than white officers. This is according to a Department of Justice report in 2015 about the Philadelphia

In today society, police brutality is seen in many news media. You cannot go on social media or television without seeing a police officer shooting an unarmed African American male for very little reason. Recently twenty-three years old Stephon Clark was shot by Sacramento office officers in the back for allegedly resisting arrest for breaking windows. When comes to police brutality, African Americans is the fore front of this topic. This topic called police brutality goes back to the slave patrol when the patrollers will monitor the slaves and the slave owners to make sure that the slaves will get the punishment for staying out of order. As Black America knows, this problem has been embedded in our community and in America for over 200 years, while white America is till hearing about it. However, that not one of the biggest problem with this issue. The issue is when African American women like myself or male will stop seeing cops getting away for murder or assault. When I am going to stop seeing my people rioting and show the criminal justice how angry we are with this racial systematic practice.

Police brutality has been a major issue since slavery. In slavery people, mainly whites, were able to do anything to black people without having to deal without dealing with the consequences. Families were destroyed, people died, babies were killed, and many unknown factors still to this day that will never be known. When slavery was abolished, it did not end right away. It took several years and still is not abolished if you look at in a political way. People of power, mainly white, were not happy that a black person could be seen as equals. This is the main reason why they feel it is okay to lash out at black people. There are several major issues that are causing and epidemic in The United States. However, the main issue that seems to be the most discussed is about police brutality in the black community. “Police brutality is the use of excessive and/or unnecessary force by police when dealing with civilians. “Excessive use of force” means a force well beyond what would be necessary in order to handle a situation. Police brutality can be present in a number of ways. The most obvious form of police brutality is a physical form. Police officers can use nerve gas, batons, pepper spray, and guns in order to physically intimidate or even intentionally hurt civilians. Police brutality can also take the form of false arrests, verbal abuse, psychological intimidation, sexual abuse, police corruption, racial profiling, political repression and the improper use of Tasers”

In the world we live in today, racism and police brutality are raising concerns that society needs to be aware of. Beginning from the mid 1900s and on, racism was an ongoing problem that many individuals acted on from day to day. Whether it was mainly whites who hated blacks or vice versa, there never seemed as if a solution would ever come about. Based on this article about racism and police brutality, it talks a lot about how brutality following the Rodney King incident has change and is more exposed due to updated technology. Racism is not a thing of the past, it exist in this day and happens everyday in front of our eyes. Another point from this article is how the media portrays black as intimidating and scary which often times is the reason why police officers act the way they do when they are encountering a black male. Today’s society is taught to be afraid of black men because they are dangerous and unpredictable. The media account is a short video of how police brutality is caught on camera and how the police are portrayed because of these videos. Because of the new technology officers are no longer able to get away with brutality and not having to answer for there actions. This media account is more of an awareness video of how if someone sees the police physically abusing someone, they should take there phones out and record everything that is going on. Today’s camera phone as said to be the police’s kryptonite because they capture everything that is done by the

Our society shows how racism and police officers are a focal point within our country. In the United States, many police officers demonstrate racist qualities. Research states that many police officers are only patrolling around predominately African American neighborhoods. People agree that police officers are just sitting in areas where African Americans live instead of just sitting anywhere and waiting for any crimes. (Martin, Trayvon. Racial Profiling). Polices are just waiting for African Americans to make a mistake. Most Police Officers haven’t changed their ways on racism. “Diallo was gunned down by NYPD officers while trying to enter his apartment building. The officers had mistaken Diallo for a suspected rapist—who was also black’’ (Martin, Trayvon. Racial Profiling). NYPD killed an innocent man because he was African American and he looked like the guy they were looking for. Therefore, this just proves police officers have not changed their racist

Last year, blacks were killed very often and in bad demeanors by cops. Alton Sterling was pinned to the ground, hands up unarmed, was shot twice in the chest and died. Nothing happened to those cops because they say it was self-defense. Another incident where a black male was pulled over his hands clearly shown on his steering wheel, was shot dead with his wife and son in the car. Trayvon Martin was shot and killed in his own neighborhood just because of his appearance, the man was set

Racism is an ideology that is based on the principle that human beings can be subdivided and ranked into categories as being inferior or superior. It’s worth mentioning that in recent years the concept or notion of racism has changed. Racism in the post-racial twenty-first century is now marked by subtlety that discriminates against individuals through unnoticeable or seemingly passive methods. Although overt racism has decreased since the 1960s, it has been supplemented by what is called colorblind racism,” which refers to “contemporary racial inequality as the outcome of nonracial dynamics” (p. 455-456).