Is Racial Profiling Fact or Fiction

Our nation took a massive step forward last November when Barrack Obama became the first African-American to be voted into the White House. There was doubt and skepticism from many parts of the nation whether the racial schism that had long divided our country could be put aside and what the man stood for could be counted on. There was hope that perhaps with the election of President Obama, perhaps now the country had finally stopped being as racially divided as it had been for many years. But following the recent arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, the question has come up to the public again; is racial profiling really happening or is it just people jumping on the racism 'bandwagon'.

For those unfamiliar with the case, Professor Gates had returned to his Cambridge, Massachusetts home after a trip back from China. Unable to get the door to his home open he enlisted the aid of his limo driver to get the door open. A neighbor, seeing two black men attempting to force the door open, immediately called the police. Now here is where stories tend to vary depending on who you ask. The gist of the story is that police and Gates had a confrontation and despite showing proof that the home in question was his, police arrested Gates. Now many in the Cambridge area have accused police of racial profiling in the past. A recent case comes to mind where a black man was arrested on campus for 'attempting to steal a bicycle'. The individual was attempting to use tools to break the lock on his bike as he couldn't find the key.

Perhaps these are individual incidents with no real connection to racially motivated targeting but isn't it a little odd that incidents like this do occur? Perhaps the police came into the situation with Gates with uncertainty but what could have prompted such a response from them? According to the officer who made the arrest, he will not apologize for his actions and stated as much on television. The tension over this incident has gone up to even the level of the President who made comments on the incident during his primetime broadcast Wednesday night. He indicated that he was disturbed by what had happened and verbally chastised the police in Cambridge for their actions. In the wake of that announcement there were already complaints and compliments over the fact that the President took notice of this issue.

Some people are of the opinion that 'just because' it was a black man involved in this incident (and that too of some stature as a well respected scholar) that was the reason the incident got any attention at all. Some accuse the President of making comments only because it was a black man and that had this been someone else he probably wouldn't have said anything. That may be the case but what about what had happened with actor Shia LaBeouf earlier this year? The star of "Transformers" and the latest "Indiana Jones" film was arrested for also being beligerent with officers (as was the accusation made against Gates) but he was arrested as well. This wasn't racial profiling in the traditional sense and it's safe to say that his arrest was also uncalled for in the eyes of many but despite his fame as an actor, he was arrested due to his conduct.

I'm not saying that what the police in Cambridge did was right but I also don't think that racial profiling and bias is limited against any one race. Don't believe me? Well what particular reason would someone of my complexion have for getting pulled aside for 'random screenings' every time I have flown? Or what reason would there be for people to complain about traditional Muslim headware being the reason to refuse to wait on customers at banks? The same reason that most anything happens, racial bias and assumptions. By calling racism something euphemistic like 'racial profiling' gives it an almost 'official' connotation when it really isn't. It's an inborn human condition.

No one is immune to it and for the most part, all of us, somehow somewhere have some racial bias built into us. Whether it is a product of the environment in which we're raised one thing remains clear; we are not getting rid of this problem as quickly as we'd like. As far forward as we appear to be moving, we take an equal number of steps back. We are headed in the wrong direction when we keep going back. We've seen where we've come from; I for one would rather see where we could go if only we could put this type of problem behind us for good.