Discrimination against African Americans is very prominent in America through stereotypes. James Miles, the Director of the Fresh Ed at the Urban Arts Partnership and writer of the “They Don’t Care About Us”, stated that our current system arranges black to be deemed as violent, uneducated, and unworthy (Miles 121). These weight-bearing stereotypes have caused great damage by showing how deeply flawed the system is and the limited opportunities they have to succeed. Similar to Miles, Chana would agree that these stereotypes affect how law enforcement agencies such as police officers treat African Americans. Although they have similar viewpoints, Chana and Miles focus on two different aspects of black discrimination. Miles focused on personal experiences whereas, Chana focuses on a legal standpoint such as mass incarceration of African Americans (Chana 204). Michelle Alexander, the author of the book, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, defines mass incarceration as a “racial caste system”. This caste system follows the same pattern as Jim Crow Laws and slavery (Alexander 261). These stereotypes of being violent and uneducated have led to unjust hatred, communities crumbling, and innocent lives in prison from mass incarceration. This speaks volumes of how complex stereotypes play in black discrimination. 

After discussing the environment and stereotypes African Americans are surrounded by, we can assume that these stereotypes can have a personal toll on someone’s mental health. African Americans are increasingly having more mental health problems due to socioeconomic disparities, provider bias and inequality of care. Shameka Y. Neely-Fairbanks, a research manager from Maryland National Capital Parks who conducted a study called Mental Illness Knowledge, Stigma, Help-seeking Behavior, Spirituality, and the African American Church” which discusses the health, media, social justice issues of blacks and how blacks have the highest rate of current depression in America (Fairbanks, et al. 162). Fairbanks’ statement can be explained by Jameta Barlow, a professor from George Washington University who studies African Americans, stated that the trauma blacks faced are often viewed as pathologically and socially accepted as the “living while Black in America” when growing up (Barlow 897). With this socially accepted “living while in Black in America” experience, Kevin Cokley, Director of the Institute for Urban Policy Research and Analysis at the University of Texas, has conducted a study of mental health among minorities and discussed the effects of living in this “normalized black experience”. He established that due to constant discrimination and racial profiling, blacks are more likely to deem racial discrimination as stressful and a “personal weakness” (Cokley et al. 247). These burdens and trauma can cause disastrous effects in communities, and it is important to bring light to their daily struggles. If not, it will bring many black down to a dark place.

The daily struggles African Americans face is the discriminatory behaviors of police officers. Recently there is a strained relationship between police officers and blacks due to racial discrimination and unjust bias. Due to the required training, police officers have a preconceived notion towards blacks. According to James Price and Erica Payton, both American academic who researched about the health and public disparities at the University of Toledo, wrote a research paper, “Implicit Racial Bias and Police Use of Lethal Force: Justifiable Homicide or Potential Discrimination?, stated that “a widely used measure of assessment of implicit attitude toward African Americans is the Implicit Association Test (IAT)” (Price and Payton 679). The IAT requires officers to distinguish “African American faces in a screen from white faces on the screen by pressing a button on the left of a computer key for one of the races and another key on the right for the other race” (Price and Payton 679). This emphasizes that police officers’ brains are wired automatically to separate blacks from others. The training officers learned would be shown on duty.

  Specific training practices, such as the IAT, play a significant role in the way officers behave toward African Americans, especially if it is in a predominantly black neighborhood. Roger G. Dunham, associate professor at the Department of Sociology at University of Miami, and Alpert, professor at the College of Criminal Justice at USC, wrote a research paper called, “Neighborhood differences in attitudes toward policing: Evidence for a mixed strategy model of policing in a multi-ethnic setting,” even though it was published in 1988 it still discusses the relevant issue of police mishandling towards blacks. Similar to Price and Payton viewpoints’, Dunham and Alpert would also agree that racial profiling and training practices attribute to police officers’ mentality of discriminating against blacks. However, Price and Payton’s viewpoints differ from Dunham and Apert’ viewpoints. Price and Payton believed that police officers with IAT training increased the racial bias towards black. Whereas, Durham and Alpert believed that for blacks to trust officers, they need to start treating them equally and respectfully. If this trust is not established, it can cause friction between blacks and officers such as innocent deaths caused by gun violence (Durham and Alpert 504). From Price and Payton’s analysis, 37 citizens died from gun violence, 81% were blacks. Moreover, they showed that blacks’ socioeconomic status and neighborhood increased the risk of firearm use by officers (Price and Payton 680). This is completely unfair towards blacks because officers often associate them with criminals and drug dealers. Therefore, officers with IAT training can affect how blacks are treated in society and their neighborhoods.

It has been evident that African Americans have played a significant role in American history. In general, the cycle of discrimination often stems from stereotyping where one group is considered “superior” and the other “inferior”. Officers are stereotyping African Americans the same way whites saw them during the Jim Crow Laws and slavery. Although African Americans have overcome some of the struggles of this cycle of discrimination, other struggles arise. It is vital to bestow trust between African Americans and officers by creating community reform groups in black-dominated communities. Doing this can bring awareness to the traumatic experiences blacks face in their communities such as police brutality and racial stereotypes. However, these community groups do not give legal protection to African Americans against discrimination. This cycle of discrimination must cease or else African Americans are continually going to struggle with discrimination in America. 

Alexander, Michelle. New Jim Crow;Mass Incarceration In The Age Of Colorblindness. New Press, 2010.

Barlow, Jameta Nicole. “Restoring Optimal Black Mental Health and Reversing 

Intergenerational Trauma in an Era of Black Lives Matter.” Biography: An 

Interdisciplinary Quarterly, vol. 41, no. 4, Fall 2018, p. 895. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1353/bio.2018.0084.

Carbado, Devon W., and L.Song Richardson. “The Black Police: Policing Our Own.” Harvard 

Law Review, vol. 131, no. 7, May 2018, p. 1979. EBSCOhost,  search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aqh&AN=129599747&site=ehost-live.

Chaiet, Lisa. “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.” Berkeley 

Journal of Employment & Labor Law, vol. 36, no. 1, Jan. 2015, p. 261. EBSCOhost, 

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aqh&AN=102963678&site=ehost-live.

Chama, Brian. “The Black Lives Matter Movement, Crime and Police Brutality: Comparative 

Study of the New York Post and New York Daily News.” European Journal of American 

Culture, vol. 38, no.3, Sept. 2019, p. 201. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1386/ejac_00002_1.

Cokley, Kevin, et al. “Ethnic Minority-Majority Status and Mental Health: The Mediating Role 

of Perceived Discrimination.” Journal of Mental Health Counseling, vol. 33, no. 3, July 

2011, p. 243. EBSCOhost, doi:10.17744/mehc.33.3.u1n011t020783086.

Dunham, Roger G., and Geoffrey P. Alpert. “Neighborhood Differences in Attitudes toward 

Policing: Evidence for a Mixed-Strategy Model of Policing in a Multi-Ethnic Setting.”

Journal of Criminal  Law & Criminology, vol. 79, no. 2, Summer 1988, p. 504.

EBSCOhost, doi:10.2307/1143473.

Miles, James. “They Don’t Really Care About Us.” Teaching Artist Journal, vol. 14, no. 2, Apr. 2016, p. 120. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1080/15411796.2016.1188526.

Price, James, and Erica Payton. “Implicit Racial Bias and Police Use of Lethal Force: Justifiable 

Homicide or Potential Discrimination?” Journal of African American Studies, vol. 21, no. 4, Dec. 2017, p. 674. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1007/s12111-017-9383-3.

Seigel, Micol. “The Dilemma of ‘Racial Profiling’: An Abolitionist Police History.” 

Contemporary Justice Review, vol. 20, no. 4, Dec. 2017, p. 474. EBSCOhost, 

doi:10.1080/10282580.2017.1383773.