Segregation Fuels Dangerous Stereotypes

April 25, 2012

The tragic death of Trayvon Martin has generated a lot of "talk" about race and racism, some of which has done little beyond provoking anger. A conversation about implicit racial bias, however, is worth having.

The April 14, 2012 New York Times op-ed "Young, Black, Male and Stalked by Bias" addressed this point by explaining:

"Very few Americans make a conscious decision to subscribe to racist views. But the toxic connotations that the culture has associated with blackness have been embedded in thought, language and social convention for hundreds of years. This makes it easy for people to see the world through a profoundly bigoted lens without being aware that they are doing so. Over the last three decades, a growing body of research has shown that racial stereotypes play a powerful role in judgments made by ostensibly fair-minded people."

I'm not drawing a conclusion about whether George Zimmerman, the man who shot Trayvon, is fair-minded or not. I am suggesting, however, that racial stereotypes are learned and internalized by every person in this country regardless of their own race or convictions, and we are frequently unaware when our behaviors are being influenced by myths and stereotypes. Therefore, it is irrelevant that Mr. Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer who shot the unarmed, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, is identified as a Latino.

In a recent Huffington Post article, I cited seven studies that prove an implicit bias against African Americans. Furthermore, according to 2010 data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, blacks are the target of the highest number of hate crimes in the United States, higher by a wide margin than any other group of Americans by race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or disability. Blacks make up 12.6% of the country's population; however, blacks were 70 % of the victims of racial hate crimes.

Or course, we could write volumes about the "Stand Your Ground Law" under which the police saw no reason to arrest an individual who shot dead an unarmed teenager until more than 6 weeks after the shooting under mounting criticism from across the country. Given that numerous African American, law-abiding men have been arrested for no reason whatsoever, it is not hard to speculate that if a black man shoots and kills a white man, he would be immediately arrested, even if he claimed self-defense.

Here on Long Island, as in many other parts of the nation, residential segregation contributes to the dangerous acceptance of racial stereotypes and perpetuates racial disparities and discrimination. In other words, living in racially isolated communities contributes to dangerous belief in racial stereotypes that we often unconsciously learn, teach and act upon.

After the recent fatal shootings in Tulsa, Oklahoma, of five African Americans that left 3 dead and 2 wounded, a brother of one of the victims said of the two white shooters, "We didn't know them. Maybe if they would have known us, it wouldn't have happened."

For 11 years, ERASE Racism has advocated for the creation of integrated communities. These two tragic incidents remind us that real changes towards that goal are more urgent now than ever before.