And, Sadly, 90% of the time that police engage in activity that one thinks is "OMFG RACIST PROFILING" they are ACTUALLY doing it because some scared racist white person in his nice 3/4 million dollar home called 911 to have the Police check on "duh black man" walking around his neighborhood.
The problem is that for many folks, actual cases of racism didn't happen. Far too often someone blames their race on an encounter with the police instead of looking at other factors. Its an excuse for many. And its far too often speculative. Could some of these incidents actually be racially based? Yes. But for many situations, racial discrimination is a factor that cannot be proven, and thus is very speculative. I don't agree with any instance of the race card being tossed out without specific details behind why a person believes that their race was the motivating factor, ESPECIALLY when the officer has a valid reason for a stop. Far too often I hear someone say, "I was stopped for Driving While Black." "He said he stopped me because my tail light was out." ... "Well, was your tail light out?" ... "Yeah, but I didn't know it was out. An' he wouldn't have done it if I was white." ...... That is an example of an unsubstantiated claim to the Driving While Black excuse. There could be many factors why such a stop was conducted. Often times police are directed to increase activity in an area that has been subject to a high level of crime, as a way of suppressing criminal activity in the area because criminals will see that police are out and active in said area. This can include stopping cars for whatever legal reason possible. Not only does it give us a tool to investigate furthur into who is in the area during the target times, but it also gives us an edge in that the actual perpetrators of said crimes will see an increase in police activity and either move on to a different area, or give up for the day.
And, unfortunately, we still have to treat everyone as a suspect when we deal with them. Both for safety reasons (see The Officer Down Memorial Page, Inc. (ODMP) for details), and because we aren't doing our job if we are just letting people go without a minimal investigation. However this can still be accomplished without talking down to someone, or even making it feel like they are being suspected of something outside of what we either already know they have been (ie. Traffic stop for Tail light out in an area with recent criminal activity) or outside of whatever information we were given by citizen complaint to stop them for.
The point Im trying to get you to conceed is that someone saying, "I just know." isn't good enough to be considered an "actual instance" of racism. Example, Rodney King. Not a real instance of racist cops... IS a real instance of excessive force, however.
