Exam 5: Racial Oppression Today: Everyday Practice

Because of racial and associated class bias in many court decisions, since the early 2000s several states have abolished the death penalty, and the number of death sentences nationally has dropped.

Explain how discrimination within the criminal justice system leads to a disproportionate number of African Americans being on death row and executed.

Recall the research by Joe Feagin and Leslie Picca that involved gathering brief semester journals from 626 white students at various colleges and universities. These student journals indicate that even whites who make extremely racist comments or engage in highly racist actions are frequently viewed by other whites as doing something relatively harmless.

Why are some anti-death-penalty advocates wary when it comes to giving attention to issues of racial bias?

One expert's analysis of stop-and-frisk reports indicated that 95,000 of the reports by officers involved "reasonable, articulable suspicion," and thus was NOT a violation of the Fourth Amendment.

Similar to the United States, Canada and most European countries do not significantly restrict hate-based speech.

In spite of improvements in policing practices in some cities, discriminatory police harassment and violence continues to oppress African Americans and their communities today.

During the years 1920-1932 substantially more than half of all African Americans killed by whites were killed by white officers.

The number of black elected officials has increased from a few dozen in the 1960s to several thousand today.

Discuss how white police officers have historically played, and many still often play, a major role in the subordination of black Americans, including those who seek to protest. Be sure to include the chilling data on police violence in U.S. history.

Judging from housing audit studies, roughly ____ of all whites are inclined to discriminate in some fashion, subtly or blatantly, in situations where they have housing to rent or sell to black individuals or black families.

Even if most people are not active participants in far-right groups and social movements, we in the U.S. are living in a white supremacist society. Explain how in any supremacist environment, "equality" and "diversity of opinions" in the public sphere effortlessly become empty ideas.

Your classmate insists that the Confederate battle flag reflects Southern pride and is not linked to racist views. Explain to her what social scientists have recently concluded about Confederate symbols upon surveying whites nationally and in the South. Also, explain to your classmate why the Confederate battle flag is quite problematical as a contemporary symbol for "Southern pride" or "white pride."

Half or more of African Americans say that they have been personally discriminated against when interacting with police because they are black.

In recent elections voter-restriction programs have involved:

Explain how voter caging works.

All but one of the following statements is true about African Americans, who are approximately 13 percent of the U.S. population.

Statistical and other analysis of bail-related variables found:

Describe recent "noose incidents" and "burning cross incidents" in terms of the white racial frame, by drawing on any one of the following: i. beliefs aspect (racial stereotypes and ideologies) ii. integrating cognitive elements (racial interpretations and narratives) iii. visual and auditory elements (racialized images and language accents) iv. "feelings" aspect (racialized emotions) v. inclination to action (to discriminate) vi. strong positive orientation to whites and whiteness (the pro-white subframe) vii. the strong negative orientation to racial "others" who are exploited and oppressed (anti-others subframes)

You and your friend are discussing the legacy of President Barack Obama. Your friend argues that more than a century and a half since African Americans officially gained access to the political process through the post-Civil War amendments to the Constitution, historic promises of truly representative political participation have now been achieved. Explain to her that the election of an African American president did not change most of that political pattern.