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A Nation of Profilers
· Thursday, May 13, 2010
Profiling is considered among the worst of American sins.
Not long ago, Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates was arrested by the Cambridge, Mass., police for trying to enter his own locked home after misplacing his key. Almost immediately, President Obama rushed to condemn what he thought was racial profiling. The police were acting "stupidly," Obama concluded. He added: "There's a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately."
Here is where the argument about an individual and the group turns nasty: Is using statistics on collective behavior a reasonable tool of law enforcement to anticipate the greater likelihood of a crime, or is it gratuitously stereotyping the innocent? Or sometimes both, depending on how it's done?
Take the Arizona anti-illegal-immigration law. It gives police the right to ask for identification papers if they have reasonable cause to suspect that those questioned on a separate matter may be in the country illegally. In heated reaction to this new state law, we now hear everything from calls for a boycott of Arizona to allegations of Gestapo-like tactics.
But is Arizona doing anything that much different from what most Americans do all the time -- namely, using all sorts of generalized criteria to make what they think are play-by-the-odds judgments that may or may not be proven wrong by exceptions? The president himself did just that when he said his own grandmother sometimes acted as a "typical white person." And he once stereotyped rural Pennsylvania voters as xenophobes clinging to their guns and religion.
More than 60 percent of voters nationwide either support the Arizona law or find it still too lax, according to polls. They apparently believe that a police officer can, in fact, make reasonable requests for identification. For example, if a trooper near the border pulls over a car for a missing tail light, finds that there are younger Hispanic males in the car and that none can understand English, can he then conjecture that there is a greater likelihood some might be Mexican nationals? The trooper, after all, is working within a landscape in which one in 10 Arizonans is an illegal alien from Latin America, and the state shares a 300-mile-long border with nearby Mexico.
Otherwise, would it be presently OK for the border patrol to try to detain suspicious Hispanic males for possible immigration violations at or near the border, but not OK for police to ask for ID from the same person should he make it a few miles past the border?
Or imagine the reaction if nearly a million mostly poor, white French-Canadians were trying to cross into Vermont and New York from Canada each year. If those states felt such an influx were both contrary to federal statutes and a burden on their social service industries, could police rightly ask for ID from any French-speaking white males pulled over for traffic infractions -- or do so only at or near the northern border? Would these French-speaking suspects likelier be illegal aliens than, say, Hispanic, English-speaking American citizens of Albany or Burlington?
On a recent international flight, I noticed the cabin crew was far more attentive to a group of Arabic-speaking, Middle Eastern males than it was to a group of Chinese nationals. Had the attendants collated the number of terrorist incidents since 9/11, concluded that the vast majority of them were attempted by Middle Eastern males, and so tried to give more attention to politely watching one group than another? And should they have, given that the vast majority of Middle Eastern males reject terrorism?
When Justice Sonia Sotomayor was nominated to the Supreme Court, the media unabashedly wrote that President Obama was focusing on naming the court's first Hispanic justice. Sotomayor herself had often used the term "wise Latina" to suggest that her gender and ethnic profile in some cases made her a better judge than stereotypical white males.
When we weigh racial and gender stereotypes for what we deem are noble purposes, we call it "diversity," but when considering criteria other than one's individuality for matters of public safety, it devolves into "profiling"?
So what are we to make of the Arizona law?
First, rightly or wrongly, most Americans have long accepted some forms of both private and government profiling that draws on greater statistical likelihood. Second, should Arizona police start gratuitously pulling over U.S. citizens statewide and questioning them without cause, the law should -- and will -- be overturned. Third, far more illegal aliens will be detained than before the law was passed.
And fourth, the third likelihood accounts for much of the angry reaction to the Arizona law.
(C) 2010 TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
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Marcus
It's good to see at least one state showing some chutzpah. I think anyone who hasn't been living under a rock recognizes that in the bizzaro world of Washington DC that is wrong for white people to profile and stereotype, but everyone else no problem. Make fun of white dads, white cops, white families, etc. and that's OK.
the government has tried to legislate for a long time now against the human/animal instinct of association with like kind. What level of arrogance does that require? What of an admission by these legislators of the obvious bad results?
I would love to see some of these do gooders walk alone, unarmed, at night through some the city sections that we aren't supposed to profile against.
Arrogant hypocrites they are and again I am glad to see people starting to stand up for what's really going on in the world.
Let's keep the momemtum going of that movement that Arizona in their bravery has started.
Posted May 13, 2010 at 9:10:19 AM
Smitty
On behalf of the 9 Norwegians who are here in the U.S. illegally (since U.S. citizens are disinclined to make ludafisk), we have no problem with AZ's law and support your arguments Mr. Hanson.
Seriously, when any business advertises in both English AND Spanish, aren't they "profiling" that a certain percentage of thier customer base may have difficulty with English? And what about campaign polls that speak to voting trends by any race (or gender for that matter)?
Can't have it both ways. So let's support law enforcement.
Posted May 13, 2010 at 9:34:14 AM
Marcus
It's good to see at least one state showing some chutzpah. I think anyone who hasn't been living under a rock recognizes that in the bizzaro world of Washington DC that is wrong for white people to profile and stereotype, but everyone else no problem. Make fun of white dads, white cops, white families, etc. and that's OK.
the government has tried to legislate for a long time now against the human/animal instinct of association with like kind. What level of arrogance does that require? What of an admission by these legislators of the obvious bad results?
I would love to see some of these do gooders walk alone, unarmed, at night through some the city sections that we aren't supposed to profile against.
Arrogant hypocrites they are and again I am glad to see people starting to stand up for what's really going on in the world.
Let's keep the momemtum going of that movement that Arizona in their bravery has started.
Posted May 13, 2010 at 9:54:04 AM
Bob W
Get the word out to all!
Boycott Los Angeles and San Diego and other states and businesses that boycott Arizona.
The Open Border Socialist Liberals are pulling out all stops to pressure on and influence Arizona’s new Illegal Alien law.
Send you support to Arizona Law Makers and the Governor by sending your business and travel pleasures to Arizona! It is time we Conservative Americans make a stand against this Socialist Liberal push and hold our ground.
Posted May 13, 2010 at 10:12:30 AM
Duke of Earl
Marcus,
Are you profiling by using the word "chutzpah???" I thought that word was reserved for the "chicken soup" crowd.
In any event, Arizona has done what the Federal Government has failed to do; that is, provide some effort for their own border security. I applaud Arizona and I agree; boycott California, New York and every other locale that advises boycotting Arizona.
Smitty is also correct in his statement about the advertising. When one to three languages are used on the exterior of a package, the manufacturer is profiling the marketplace by assuming that some of the public cannot read or understand English.
Statistics have a funny habit of being truthful and showing patterns. When 'X' happens 'Y' number of times in given area 'A'; then people in 'A' will begin to look out for the 'X' occurrence. And, when 'X' happens primarily to 'B' in area 'A'; the other groups in that area react accordingly. This interpretation can gone on indefinitely; but the fact is that profiling to one extent or another happens every day to everyone.
The next time you change some information on a favorite website or banking website, etc. look at the information you are changing. IT IS YOUR PROFILE.
Duke
Posted May 13, 2010 at 1:26:29 PM
Howard Last
What is wrong with profiling? Say the police receive word of a robbery commited by two tall thin black males in their 20's. Will they stop 70 year old white women going to a garden club meeting or 4 ft midgets? The Israel airline gives arab looking males a more thorough look see. Maybe the TSA (Thousands Standing Around) should do the same.
Posted May 13, 2010 at 6:28:18 PM
bRUCE
Smitty - anyone who dares to introduce ludafisk to the US deserves to be shot, then deported! Vile ... substance.
Anyway ... Re Zero's comment about cops profiling blacks and Hispanics ... perhaps if those peoples were not the vast majority of those committing crime (witness the jail populations as proof) they would not find themselves being stopped all the time. As a retired cop, I can tell you that a few other commentors statements are entirely correct - if we get a radio broadcast to BOLO for a black male wearing a purple shirt and baggy jeans - you can bet I'd not be putting a white male wearing a suit and tie on the wall. This is not profiling - it's a direct response to an IDENTIFICATION of a criminal.
Posted May 16, 2010 at 5:11:37 PM