If Black People Said Stuff White People Say: Stereotypes

Stereotypes are born from fear and ignorance. They are used to wrongly judge an individual or group. Brent Staples, a black man, is no stranger to this. “Black Men and Public Space,” written by Staples, he discusses his experiences as a black man; often being mistaken as a criminal because of his appearance. Most people see his universal identity and not who he really is. Living in the city of Chicago as a black man, he is frequently categorized as a thug or aggressor. The purpose of his essay is to inform the readers about how it feels to be the one who is stereotyped, as well as to express his discontent of being type casted. As a result of the negative stereotypes involving black men, Staples has the capacity to negatively alter the space he is in by causing others to fear him. Equivalently, many people also fear cops because of the stigma they have. Because of this, the police negatively impact the space they are in. In the article, “What Happens When Black People Learn They Should Fear the Police”, Jesse Singal discusses how police brutality has affected the black community’s trust in the police.

Through out history society has created many stereotypes and assumptions based on race and nationality to confine us into categories. The reality is not every individual fits a specific category because we are unique even within the same ethnicity group. In “On Being Told I Don’t Speak Like a Black Person” Allison Joseph illustrates some speech stereotypes that come hand in hand with her racial background and how even people from the same racial background and house hold don’t all sound a like. The author portrays that race and linguistic has a huge impact on our daily life and how society sees her different to others. Also, her own identity is being put in to question base on a linguistic stereotype. Furthermore, base on ones racial orientation society already have a certain expectation of what they assume the person is capable of and an expectation of how one acts like. When we put stereotypes on individuals we discrediting the individuals identity, we are making those people part of a group base on a assumption and stereotypes can not be used to describe a who group because not everyone fits into a certain category.

Over the years, our generations’ stereotypical views over the issue on young black males being viewed as dangerous has grown significantly. There are different reasons why these stereotypes occur in our society. People feel on edge when running into them in dark passageways, whenever it’s late at night. Also, while they’re sitting at red lights and notice someone walking towards their cars, they instantly initiate down the door locks. People think stereotyping black men this way keeps them safer because they assume the worst. However; other people disagree with instantly judging who they see around them, it hurts more people as well as themselves by viewing black men this way. Brent Staples, the author of “Black Men and Public Spaces,” claims that he’s considered a stereotypical black criminal. In his essay, Staples succeeds because he successfully appeals to people’s emotions, is an expert on human behavior, creates common ground and offers a logical solution.

Men and women alike are often afraid to venture out into the streets at the dark hours of the day. It could be argued that this is a byproduct of the ever-increasing US crime rate, yet it may also be due to the natural fear that accompanies walking alone in public spaces, familiar or not. Although any shifty figures lurking on the sidewalk can be the source of this fear, it is no doubt that the gross misrepresentation of black people as perpetrators of violent crimes has given them “the ability to alter public space in ugly ways,” as so proficiently stated in “Black Men and Public Space” by Brent Staples (205). Through this short essay, Staples uses a variety of rhetorical devices, namely anecdotes, in order to present the fact that these preconceived racial notions can make certain individuals increasingly susceptible to societal scrutiny. This forces many individuals to make concentrated efforts to present themselves as less threatening because “where fear and weapons meet -- [as] they often do in urban America -- there is always the possibility of death” (206).

The image of the man being discriminated by the police and the teacher is connected to the real world in how black people are being victimized by the police even when a person has not committed a crime. This image portrays how the police assume a black person has done something wrong and choose to pick on them. This image also shows different scenarios where an innocent black man is being victimized to portray the fact that police brutality happens often and can happen in any situation and has happened in numerous situations. The police use the false stereotype that all black people are “trouble- making” and this picture shows the mistreatment by the police by arresting them or pulling them aside when no crime has been committed. In addition,

During my time in Mr. Arts room, I observed an interaction where race words were silenced between two students. A Hispanic female students says, “can I use someone’s white crayon.?” Bobby an African American student says, “did you just call me white man?” The female student says, “no I said can I use someone’s white crayon.”. Bobby replies, “yes you called me white man.”

There will always be negative stereotypes of low-income African Americans, but white police officers and officers of color tend to have slightly different views on the “ghetto.” Caucasian police officers often tend to think that black communities are entirely atrocious, but African American officers can see that there are both good and bad elements to this group of people. African American officers seem to moralize the class struggle between African American workers who are much like themselves, they do not let the negative views define them as a person. They have risen above their poor community and refuse to let it own them. Thus, African American officers often think that they are solely protecting the good people of the ghetto from the

White vs Black contexts may represent different cultures, subcultures, or both and may influence language acquisition in noticeable ways. Nonverbal cues such as facial expression and contextual cues, such as shared experience have different communicative roles in different cultures (Kaiser & Rasminsky, 2003). While in some cultural groups it's okay to speak formally others are not only encouraged but expected to initiate the use of slang and failing to do so means that you aren’t assimilating to the culture and therefore shouldn't be a part of the cultural circle. The relationship between language and culture is a complex one due largely in part to the great difficulty in understanding people’s cognitive processes when they communicate.

"When someone fabricates a crime and blames it on another person because of his race OR when an actual crime has been committed and the perpetrator falsely blames someone because of his race." (Russel 70) The negative image of African-Americans has become so bad that "imaginary" Black people are invented as criminals. In some cases Black individuals were even chosen out of a line

When being around white people, members of the black race were always to act tacitly in a form of admission of inferiority.

The black male has often been depicted as a thug, hoodlum, a gangster, and as a man with an itchy trigger finger. This is obviously why many young people have grown to be subtly racist their toward fellow Americans, while others have grown such hatred that they form radical organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan, Neo Nazis, and skinheads. Hate crimes are still evident and not as uncommon as many people

Another common negative stereotype, establishes the African American male as intellectually inferior. Studies directed by psychologist Claude Stale, indicate that African American teenagers are aware that they are stigmatized as being intellectually inferior and the go to school bearing what psychologist Claude has called a “burden of suspicion” Such burden can affect their attitudes and achievements. These shadows hang over stigmatized people no matter their status or accomplishments. These stigmas have the potential to roll them of their individually and debilitate their attempts to break out of the stereotypical roles. Blacks are the repository for the American fear of crime. Ask anyone, of any race, to picture a criminal and the image will have a black face. The linked between blackness and criminality it’s routinized by terms such a “black-on-black crimes” or “black crimes”.

Eduardo Bonilla-Silva is a professor of sociology. He has written multiple books about color racism. The linguistics of color blind racism: how to talk nasty about blacks without sounding “racist” is one of the works that incudes color racism that I will be discussing. This title describes how other races that are racists are trying to hide so they find ways to speak about the blacks trying to not sound racist. I am in agreement with Silva’s work because I have witnessed instances where semantic moves, diminutives and projection have occurred.

My first response was to immediately tell her not to use that word because it was simply racist. Looking back at the conversation, the underlying discrimination beneath those terms further influences the social identities that have been accumulating in our societies for centuries. We define others by their physical appearances and separate them by their ethnic

Stereotypes and discrimination have been in our society since this country’s founding. In our current society, many of these stereotypes are projected through movies. In the article “Whistling Vivaldi” Steele makes frequent comments about the differences between black and whites stating if you are any color other than white you are in fact less intelligent (2). This is the core problem, in our day to day lives, stereotypes get thrown around like they are facts, without any questions involved. Wither you are white, Black, or Hispanic, we all function the same on the inside.