In the piece we read this week, Staples discusses how black people are treated differently and seen as more dangerous and violent. While I agree this stereotype is real, I know it is false and I do not feel that way at all in public.
The only judgments that make sense are ones that the person can control-clothes, what he's carrying, etc. Skin color gives absolutely no insight to what a person is like or what his purpose is.
No matter what the color of skin, if anyone approaches me I tense up.
Day or night, paranoia consumes me when I'm alone and see someone. A
shadow alone is enough to speed up my heartbeat, and I assume many
others feel this way.
This being said, I feel that if I was a boy, I would not be as scared. Girls are seen as week so they are taken advantage of and have a much greater chance of being victims of things such as rape. According to RAINN, 9/10 of rape victims are women, and 1/6 women in the United States have faced either attempted rape or completed rape. With these statistics, how can you trust anyone, of any age or any race?
Although the stereotype itself is completely false and racist, I feel that for those who believe it simply do because it has been wrongly imprinted into their brains and coincides with a survival instinct. For them, it is a means of self-defense because people are not willing to risk their lives for anything, and no one knows whom to trust. In my opinion, race does not matter whatsoever; it is much more a matter of not trusting anyone at all.
I like how you described people's fears as "survival instinct" rather than prejudices. I too become afraid whenever a stranger approaches me no matter the ethnicity of that person.
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