In this book, you will gain more than just biased complaints about racism. In fact, this book is exciting because it is fact-based and provides a deeper look at both the roots of the American racial division as well as the medical and psychological reasons that peril the black community. Whether you are conservative or liberal, after reading this book in its entirety, you will gain a more complete picture of the factors that hinder the rebuilding of the African American community. In order to fully understand the situation beyond a shallow emotional perspective, a deeper examination of the history, roots, and other contributing factors are required. Read with an open mind and you will gain a full perspective of the plight facing the African American community.
The barriers to the rebuilding of the black community are genuine. They cannot be politically manipulated, rationalized, or downplayed. Dozens upon dozens of sociological and scientific studies have placed a spotlight on the symptons of a ←7 | 8→much deeper root to the problem. The barriers are heavier than just the social media’s accentuation of racism and slavery. Continue reading and you will discover what they truly are as well as some suggested solutions. A study conducted just a few years ago published in the Child Trends journal regarding childhood trauma broken down by race and state reported that “disturbingly, black and Hispanic children and youth in almost all divisions of the United States are more likely to experience ACEs than their white and Asian peers. To some extent, these racial disparities reflect the lasting effects of inequitable policies, practices, and social norms. Discriminatory housing and employment policies, bias in law enforcement and sentencing decisions, and immigration policies have concentrated on disadvantaged black and Hispanic children, in particular, and leave them disproportionally vulnerable to traumatic experience like ACEs (4).”
References
1. Feagin, J., & Bennefield, Z. (2014). Systemic racism and US health care. Social Science & Medicine, 103, 7–14.
2. Hoerner, E., & Tulsky, R. (2019). Cops around the country are posting racist and violent comments on Facebook. InJusticeWatch.com. Retrieved from https://www.injusticewatch.org/interactives/cops-troubling-facebook-posts-revealed/
3. Prout, H. T., & Fedewa, A. (2015). Counseling and psychotherapy with children and adolescents: Theory and practice for school and clinical settings. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
4. Sacks, V., & Murphey, D. (2018). The prevalence of adverse childhood experiences, nationally, by state, and by race or ethnicity. Child Trends. Retrieved from https://ncvc.dspacedirect.org/handle/20.500.11990/1142
5. United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. (May 4, 2015). Investigation of The Fergusson Police Department. Retrieved from https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/opa/press-releases/attachments/2015/03/04/ferguson_police_department_report.pdf
6. Wade, R., Jr., Cronholm, P. F., Fein, J. A., Forke, C. M., Davis, M. B., Harkins-Schwarz, M., & Bair-Merritt, M. H. (2016). Household and community-level adverse childhood experiences and adult health outcomes in a diverse urban population. Child Abuse & Neglect, 52, 135–145.
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In times past, there was often a fervent and compelling reason for the escalating use of force by law enforcement personnel. In the 1990s, gang violence was at an all-time high throughout the United States, especially in cities with high rates of poverty and unemployment. Federal, state, and local government agencies made committed attempts to suppress gang-related violence and its subsequent criminal behavior. Increased police patrols, more frequent arrests, and harsher punishments were some of the common methods used to suppress violence.
As a result, the United States of America has the highest rate of incarceration in the world, amounting to a total of approximately 6.8 million people living in correctional facilities at one point in 2014. According to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), “in 2014, African Americans constituted 2.3 million, or 34% of the total 6.8 million correctional population. African Americans are incarcerated at more than five times the rate of whites and the imprisonment rate for African American women is twice that of white women. Nationwide, African American children represent 32% of children who are arrested, 42% of children who are detained, and 52% of children whose cases are judicially waived to criminal court (7).”
However, despite the escalation of police presence in urban communities, stricter enforcement of local laws, particularly those related to the possession and ←9 | 10→use of illegal drugs, and higher rates of incarceration, there were relatively few police killings of unarmed suspects in the 1990s compared with this past decade. In recent times, the proliferation of fatalities as a result of officer-involved shootings of unarmed African American suspects is staggering. The Washington Post conducted a two-year-long study on the relevance of race in police shootings. The following is an excerpt of the findings of that study, published on December 26, 2015.
“Race remains the most volatile flash point in any accounting of police shootings. Although black men make up only 6 percent of the U.S. population, they account for 40 percent of the unarmed men shot to death by police this year, the Post’s database shows. In the majority of cases in which police shot and killed a person who had attacked someone with a weapon or brandished a gun, the person who was shot was white. But a hugely disproportionate number, 3 in 5 of those killed after exhibiting less threatening behavior were black or Hispanic (10).”
The results of the study should be sobering, if not downright appalling. Both the investigation by the United States Justice Department and the study by The Washington Post found evidence to support claims of unlawful racial targeting by multiple police departments throughout the country. In addition to these reports, there are numerous additional on-going investigations of police officers, police departments, and other law enforcement agencies for similar practices.
Predatory police practices and the killings of unarmed African Americans have likely persisted for over a century with an inkling of impunity. The difference maker today is due to essentially two key reasons, the advent of the body camera and civilian video tapings with their camera phones. People are now able to capture footage of these violent altercations and bring them to the public view, which is precisely what occurred in the Rodney King police brutality case. On March 3, 1991, while Mr. King, an African American taxi driver, was being violently beaten by Los Angeles Police Department officers, a civilian, George Holliday, filmed the incident from his nearby balcony and sent the footage to the local news station. This event sparked a historic wildfire series of riots and civil unrest.
One of the leading explanations for unarmed killings of African Americans as proposed by critics and analysts, both within and outside of law enforcement, is the lack of training of police officers on how to de-escalate situations at potential crime scenes and during arrests. This argument points