Overrepresentation Of African-American Men

Although society is responsible for accepting the historical master narratives that connect African Americans to criminality, more individuals are beginning to realize the issue that internal racism causes. Documentaries, like 13th, are increasing in popularity, causing vast audiences to notice that many of the historical master narratives regarding race and criminality are imprecise. This specific documentary exposes how the media inaccurately depicts African Americans as criminals, and therefore, society should not always trust the media’s representation of individuals. By portraying how African Americans are criminalized, this documentary also offers solutions as to how the problem of mass incarceration can be solved; through not only educating police officials and training them to approach situations in a colorblind manner, but also adjusting structural components, such as laws that require extremely long sentences for committing petty crimes, the amount of minorities jailed for committing petty crimes will decrease drastically, thus allowing federal and state spending to be directed toward more important

Crime and justice provides a substantial portion of the media’s raw material; crime stories are good ‘products’ for the media; public perception’s are influenced by the media; and crime policies are created, endorsed, or abandoned based in part on media coverage and public reaction (Guastaferro,2008). With the recent killings of unarmed black men and boys broadcasted throughout today’s media, in addition to the backlash that they receive by society as being involved in any type of Criminal activity or being depicted as a threat to public safety to justify the injuries,

The criminal justice system in the United States is evident of several deep flaws relating to the treatment of black men and women accused of committing criminal offenses. It is logical to believe that due to the U.S.’s rather dark past surrounding the treatment of black Americans, systematic racism is included under the guise of the criminal justice system. The U.S. is historically infamous for it’s open racial discrimination against black Americans, up until systematic racism became one of the more dominant forms of discrimination in the most recent years. Systematic racism has been shrouded under societal ignorance and regulated particularly by social and political groups in order to keep the human rights of black Americans frigid and

In today’s society mass media has major influences on the beliefs/perceptions one may have on certain ethnicities or controversial topics. Media outlets have the power to shape certain situations and place people in an image that may not always be accurate. As stated in an article by Narissra M. Punyanunt-Carter, Communication research and theory suggest that the mass media is an important source of information about African Americans and media portrayals contribute to public perceptions of African Americans(2008). Further, it was mentioned that media outlets such as television may cause viewers to conceive, alter, or even reinforce their beliefs and opinions about African Americans ( Punyanunt- Carter, 2008). For Instance, in the Netflix documentary called “13th” Media outlets consistently used the word “Super predators” when describing the numerous African American men who were being arrested in the 80’s during the war on drugs era. The constant use of the word super predator can persuade viewers to believe that ALL African American men are super predators when that is not the case! Just because there are a few African Americans who are seen on Media outlets committing heinous crimes does not mean that all African Americans are criminals. As stated in a scholarly article by Tony Weaver, Media outlets create a narrative that portrays African Americans as lazy, violent individuals, who are prone to crime. The Misrepresentation of African Americans in media has

There are large racial disparities in incarceration and related detainments for African Americans. They are more likely to be under the supervision of the Department of Corrections than any other racial or ethnic group (H.West, Sabol, & Greenman, 2010). Institutional racism is believed to be the reason why African Americans, especially males, are disproportionately represented in the criminal justice system. On balance, the public believes that discrimination against black people is based on the prejudice of the individual person, correlates to the discrimination built into the nation’s laws and institutions (Pew’s Research Center, 2017). This belief is actually supported through several experimental studies that provide evidence that African Americans are to be seen as more criminal and threatening than others thus more likely to be arrested or even shot (Greenwald, Oakes, & Hoffman, 2003). Racism within the criminal justice system very much exists and is still relevant.

The people of a minority group who are at a greater risk of being subjected to the criminal justice system are the African Americans and Hispanics. It is not surprising these two groups are more prone, yet throughout the remainder of this paper, certain concepts/themes will be further analyzed from a chosen film to portray the reality minorities face with and in the criminal justice system and society.

Starting off, this will show a comparison between white and black crimes, based on facts from the website for the Federal Bureau of Investigations. All statistics throughout this research paper, are from 2012, and have been collected from the Federal Bureau of Investigations, Department of Justice, and multiple news organizations. The data collected from these different agencies has been analyzed and put into it’s best format to fit what is being asked in this topic. All sources have been checked out, and found that they are not biased toward any of the races discussed in the article. Some crimes are committed by whites at a higher rate than other races, although these results that have been gathered to complete this paper could show that African

The racial stereotyping of minority groups is a prevalent problem within the United State’s criminal justice system. It is a regrettable issue which permeates American society. The young Black male, in particular, is often portrayed as a criminal based on incorrect assumptions regarding who perpetrates crime. There are several components contributing to the criminal stigma of Blacks. The way crime is conveyed by American culture is possibly as important as how crime actually functions. The widespread belief that Black males commit the majority of crime skews the view society’s perception of Blacks. Typifications of Black males include a violent, threatening, thug-like character. The connection between race and crime is so deeply seeded in

Many legal statements and documents show that black people are prevalent to various criminal cases compared to the white people. These claims have been based on allegations that the police force is bias and they suspect every black person by taking them in even on minor offenses. The black community is also faced with the problem of misrepresentation of their cases leading to them filling most of the United States prisons. However, there are substantial pieces of evidence that clearly show that the black people are actively involved in many crimes in the United States. There is no tangible evidence to articulate and form an inference between the relationship of race and criminal activity.

The incarceration rate for African Americans is higher than that of Caucasians and has been that way for years. The Blumstein study conducted in 1982, found a disproportion between black and white incarceration rates of seven-to-one (Hawkins & Hardy, 1989). The inequality of incarceration rates within criminal justice lingered. Authors of State and County Incarceration Rates: The Direct and Indirect Effects of Race and Inequality, Thomas Arvanites and Martin Asher, stated that the white majority feels threatened by nonwhite minorities because they believe they are more involved in crime. Blacks were seven times more likely to be incarcerated than whites in 1993. Due to these facts, “cultural conflict theorists argue that law enforcement

In Steve Chapman’s article “Are Blacks to Blame for Cops Actions?” the author addresses the most important controversial problem we had for centuries. Does racial profiling exists? If so, what is the problem with it? Many say that law enforcement are only targeting the minority, to be specific mainly African Americans. This is because they are the only ones to blame and that if they were not committing so much crime, they wouldn 't get so much attention from police(502). The author points out that blaming the black community for violent crime by blacks we fail to notice the truth of today’s real crime. I strongly believe with the author, we fail to notice the real crimes that are society has. Are we so distracted by what the media

The media, in particular broadcasting news, has catered to stereotypes of non-whites by over-representing minorities as the assailants in violent crime. These types of practices are clearly detrimental to the advancement of those who have been handicapped by the ignorance of the past. In the first part of the paper we examine the effects of the rise of local news, charting specific studies

In the television show The First 48, which is promoted as being an authentic form of reality television, the depiction of blacks as criminals is evident. In most cases, it is a black person who is suspected, accused and arrested for a crime; although, one might argue the show does its job to follow along with the calls received and crimes reported, the overrepresentation of blacks relative to the population numbers is evident. Ardis C. Martin, in an Academic Psychiatry Journal, writes, “People develop conceptions about the world as a result of repeated exposure to consistent and repetitive images in the media.” In watching The First 48, it is no surprise why a white consumer would come to the realization that all blacks are deviant criminals, while a black consumer would be susceptible to being a criminal because of a media that has already defined him or her by the color of his or her skin.

Within media and society there are seemingly different representations of race and crime. They are different in how they are constructed for their perceived audience in the majority and the opinion that is supposed to be evoked by the event. Within the public perception of crime in reality there is abundant racism that has been socially constructed over many generations. Whereas media crime is gentrified and critiqued in such a way as to support fears and intrigue into crime through violence from what could rarely happen to the viewer. When both of these are combined the social construction of race is reinforced. Through crime television shows the allure of feeling a crime through draws an audience.

The author, Travis L. Dixon, sought to address the association of criminal behavior and race based on news programs portrayals of crime, specifically to blacks and whites. Thus, blacks are classified as the perpetrators, whereas whites are classified as the victims, creating an ideology of whites are most likely to be victimized by people of color. Published on October 1st, 2008, Dixon assets the validity of this by addressing main points such as taking a psychological approach on social cognition, priming process and interracial victimization. As a result, a study was conducted to “test whether the race of perpetrators, race of victims, and level of stereotype endorsement have an impact on participants perception of the featured perpetrator