Bad black young man gangster

The synonymy of Blackness with criminality is not a new phenomenon in America. Documented historical accounts have shown how myths, stereotypes, and racist ideologies led to discriminatory policies and court rulings that fueled racial violence in a post-Reconstruction era and has culminated in the exponential increase of Black male incarceration today. Despite the connection between disproportionate criminality and Black masculinity, little research has been done on how unarmed Black male victims, particularly but not exclusively at the hands of law enforcement, have been posthumously criminalized. This paper investigates the historical criminalization of Black males and its connection to contemporary unarmed victims of law enforcement.

The criminal stereotype of African Americans in the United States is an ethnic stereotype according to which African American males in particular are stereotyped to be dangerous criminals. Scholars such as public defender James Williams and sociologist Becky Petitt have commented that the treatment of African Americans by law enforcement agencies is "the most pervasive blight on the criminal justice system today" and that African American progress is a myth, as it does not take into consideration the African American men who are incarcerated. Patrick Sharkey and Micheal Friedson estimated that the decline in homicides led to a 0. As of , one in fourteen adult black males was incarcerated in prison or jail on any given day, representing a doubling of this rate from

Young black men in London are being murdered at a rate unlike anywhere else in the UK, as gang wars rage on in the capital. Sky News has spent months speaking with London's fiercest gangs as part of an investigation into this year's increase in gang-related violence. This is a stark contrast to everywhere else in the UK, where the racial and age profile of murder victims and suspects reflects the demographic in those areas. In our Line 18 special report, gang members from in Brixton and the Woolwich Boys in southeast London warn Sky News they will continue their street war - and they don't see an end to violence in the capital. One gang member told Sky News: "This is the only life we know, we just have to keep doing it - there's nothing else for us to do.

Can we talk about the Black Elephant in the Room? All of the rhetoric about racism, white privilege, systemic bigotry and such may be missing the point. Do police really treat young black men differently than other young men, and if so, why? Is there malice involved or experiential logic? Is the argument literally as basic as black and white?