Blog #4 – It is not history, it is now.

Initially, this portion of the blog was to examine past injustices carried out by “civilized societies” in recent history of the last few centuries.  The topics could have included the fate of the American Indian, treatment of immigrants here in the United States, genocide in the Eastern Europe, and of course Nazi Germany.  All these are instances where human suffering and death were carried out right in front the public of the day, not hidden, due to the power of dehumanization within a society.  Sadly, recent events present examples that allow the debate to be focused on current events, and not pulled from the history books.  The shooting deaths of Philando Castile, Alton Sterling, and the five Dallas police officers are examples of dehumanization at work within today’s society.  This blog is an examination of a single element of these events, not judgement of these events.

When a police officer shoots a citizen it is easy to dismiss such incidents as the actions of a “bad apple.”  Dr. Philip Zimbardo discusses that such incidents don’t require a bad person, but it requires a bad situation, a bad choice, based on bad influences.  Good people do bad things to others because they have been able to detach themselves from a human connection to them.  Part of the role of a police officer is being able to identify dangers to the general public, this means police officers look at generalities not always people.  This dehumanization process is often found in racial profiling in which an officer attempts to identify criminals based on criminal profile.  Writer Janet Chan in her article for the Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice wrote the following about racial profiling;

“…three mechanisms through which racial disparities in police treatment can happen: through prejudice, through cognitive bias and stereotyping, and through race-based deployment. While prejudice involves conscious intent, cognitive bias and stereotyping can be unconscious biases based on false assumptions about the criminality of ethic groups, while race-based deployment is an organizational or local practice that may or may not involve individual intent and consciousness.”

The language a police officer uses, both internally and verbally, when profiling dehumanizes the suspect.  Police officers in these situations don’t see person, but instead see a “perp”, “suspect”, or even more simply “the bad guy.”  By dehumanizing the person, the police officer becomes morally capable of behavior and actions they would never consider against another person.  The flaw is in the system that teaches and re-enforces this type of language and thinking, not in a few “bad apples” as society later views these police officers.  This video demonstrates how changing they system keeps the good apples from going bad, by seeing the people of the community not the stereotypes.

Word Count : 457

Works Cited

Chan, Janet. "Racial Profiling and Police Subculture." Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice, vol. 53, University of Toronto Press, 2011..doi:10.3138/cjccj.53.1.75.

TEDxTalks. "The Importance of Mindset in Policing | Chip Huth | TEDxTacoma." YouTube. YouTube, 2015. Web. 13 July 2016.