Argument Against Racial Profiling

There are a number of different groups within the overall population in the jurisdiction that you will be serving as a criminal justice professional. The criminal justice professional will need to be aware of the needs of the various groups in order to serve them in the best way possible. You will have to learn about their culture as well as their customs. If these populations within your jurisdiction have a negative perception of your agency you as a professional will be required to change their perception. Each population within your jurisdiction will have needs that each of the groups expects you to take care of. For example, the homeless population will need you to protect them from unjust harassment from the rest of the population. …show more content…
The issue has been the extent to which police officers use their discretionary power to stop, detain, search or arrest in ways that disadvantage persons of color. It is well established that persons of color are stopped by police at much higher rates than white citizens. The debate has focused on the motives of the police, whether racial bias causes the disproportionate effect or whether the effect can be explained otherwise. Most of the recent argument on profiling has focused on the narrow issue of whether the police should be required to keep statistics to assist in understanding the scope of the problem. Lost in this debate about whether to study the problem further is the reality that racial profiling has a devastating impact on persons of color. Also lost in the current debate is the extent to which judicial decisions may have contributed to the problem. (Judicial Toleration of Racial Bias – Tolerating Racial and Cultural Stereotypes in the Justice system, William E. Martin and Peter N. Thompson, …show more content…
You can start by looking past the color of one’s skin or past the language barrier that there might be. Look at the person as just a person. Someone that is part of your population/group. Treat everyone the same whether they are black, brown, yellow, or green. This all falls back on your personal bias. How you were raised is a huge influence on how you look at different groups other than your own. Another stereotype that society has with the criminal justice profession is we are above the law. We follow our own set of rules. One way we can begin to remove that negative stereotype is to not break the law. Whether on duty or off, we need to ensure that we obey the laws that we have. How can you expect the average citizen within your jurisdiction to obey the law when you break them and are never punished? Another way to help remove this stereotype is to punish those in the criminal justice profession when they do break the law. The public needs to know that we can be punished just like they can and with the same severity. These negative stereotypes are the cause for how society perceives us in such a negative way. With social media and the constant negative news coverage each and every criminal justice professional should always do the right thing. You have to take the hard left instead of the easy

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