Racial Biases Research Paper

Words: 769
Pages: 4

Racial Bias and the Decision to Shoot

In recent years, there have existed countless police cases that raise questions about racial biases. An example of this was the case of Amadou Diallo. In the winter of 1999, four police officers were searching for a rape suspect in Bronx, New York. They came across Diallo, a 22-year-old African man, standing by his apartment building. The police stated in their testimony that Diallo looked similar to the rape suspect, so they had ordered him to stand still. Diallo put his hand into the pocket of his pants, and the officers wrongly assumed he was reaching for a gun; Diallo did not have a gun on him. The police officers proceeded to shoot the innocent man, and after a total of 41 shots, they indeed killed Diallo. All officers involved were released of any crime.
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Additional factors like the darkness of the night and Diallo’s suspicious movement had surely contributed to the police’s heightened precaution. But there lies a deeper question in this case; this is the uncomfortable yet pressing question of race. What if Diallo were white? Would the police have reacted in a different manner, possibly in a less harsh way? Unfortunately, these inquiries remain unanswered, and this has had pivotal effects on instances in areas across the nation, from Martin Luther King Jr.’s day to modern day cases of Eric Garner in Staten Island, New York and Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The issue deserves inspection. It is essential to comprehend whether or not racial biases have a role in these life-or-death decisions, and if they do, what this issue entails. Many social psychologists have held an interest in the concept that schemata, including expectations about ethnic background for example, guide the analysis of ambivalent data. Essentially, a stereotype can act as a schema to help define or authenticate an otherwise confusing