Racial Profiling Pros And Cons Essay

Playing it safe or just being blatantly racist The United States of America is a melting pot for an abundant amount of cultures. The U.S is actually a country that was founded by entirely immigrants. This fact of the matter has seemed to have been forgotten after the events of 9/11 in which “Al Qaeda terrorists aboard three hijacked passenger planes carried out coordinated suicide attacks against the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., killing everyone on board the planes and nearly 3,000 people on the ground. A fourth plane crashed into a Pennsylvania field, killing all on board, after passengers and crew attempted to wrest control from the hijackers.”
(9/11: Timeline of Events) After this attack the term “racial profiling” was given popularity within the U.S as it became an often
used phrase. Racial Profiling means to use race or ethnicity as a means to suspect an individual of being a criminal or having criminal intent. It’s a negative term that has been justified amongst the public as being a necessary extra precaution to ensure the safety of U.S citizens. Although racial profiling is a form of racial institution it has been responsible for many positive outcomes in the U.S.
First off as stated in an article on Occupytherapy.com, “Racial profiling can help law enforcement find a possible suspect based on racial cues. Statistically certain ethnicities are more likely to commit certain types of crimes.”(Profiling Pros and Cons List) This fact has helped many police officers and investigators to locate the guilty suspect and put them to justice for their crimes. Another pro of racial profiling is that it in a way delivers a sense of belonging to one's own ethnic group. For example as a result of racial profiling African American’s have a sense of understanding of one another's struggle of “being black in America”. Although this fact is sad to say the least, many African Americans can share that when they are around police officers they feel a sense of panic and the urge to “act normal”, no matter what they’re doing, whether it’d be walking their dog or driving to the local convenience store. These pro’s of racial profiling are contradictory because in reality their are no pros to racial
profiling. Racial profiling has a plethora of cons such as causing innocent people to be targeted and mistreated, being a direct violation of the 14th amendment which states that no U.S citizen should face unequal treatment, and causing a major disruption amongst communities by pitting neighbors against each other. Racial profiling is speculated to be the key reason as to why certain minorities groups don’t get along with law enforcement and have hard times within airports. For example recently a famous youtube star who happens to be muslim was kicked off of his flight simply because he spoke in his native tongue “arabic”. He let out a statement shortly after stating,“I speak to my mom on the phone every flight,” Saleh told CBSN shortly after the video he posted on Twitter showing his removal went viral. “She only speaks Arabic.” Another passenger by the name of Chris Ashford who saw the incident unfold also stated in an interview with cbs, “I think the guy was giving a bit of a prayer, just before take off, which is not unusual. Somebody heard him speaking in Arabic and I think reported him.”(YouTube star Adam Saleh speaks out after being kicked off Delta flight) This is a prime example of the major social disconnection that racial profiling has caused within the U.S. Racial profiling, all in all, is extremely unethical. Many would like to argue that it is a necessary practice to ensure the safety of our citizens, and although it may be a lazy way to boost security morales, it simply still is wrong. Racial profiling in the U.S has ultimately managed to create an nervous and fearful environment across the entire U.S nation. It has also managed to take away a major right of the people away from them, the right for equal treatment amongst each others. In the end the con’s heavily outweigh the pros and calling racial profiling “playing it safe” rather than Blatant racism would be calling it out of it’s name.