Racial Stereotypes Against African Americans

For the past couple of centuries, racial stereotypes have been a problem that many have faced, and are still facing, throughout the world. Many people question what stereotyping is and how it affects people. Racial stereotyping is when a person judges another person based on their race’s fixed characteristics (Pickrell). To this day, racial stereotypes have gotten out of hand and continue to cause not only racism, but also segregation. People today use negative assumptions against African Americans, Latinos and other races. Various races tend to face negative stereotypes which divides today’s community and make the people of the world more distant from each other (Robinson and Harris). African Americans, for example, get labeled by White Americans

Just because African Americans have a different skin color doesn't mean they should be treated different. Today, people have predispositions and presumptions about black people which causes unfair treatment (Robinson and Harris). Due to African American semblance, white people don't acknowledge their advantage of their skin color. In, How to Make Love to a Negro without Getting Tired, Laferriere describe how white people hate to live in the same apartment complex as black people because of their smell. Judging African Americans as a whole by their smell is nonsense. It shows how ignorant people can be. Laferriere describes it by stating “In his journal (Le Retour du Tchad), Gide writes that what struck him most in Africa was the smell. A smell of strong spices. A smell of leaves. The Negro is of the vegetable kingdom. Whites forget that they have a smell too” (Laferriere, 21). Laferriere mentions how people judge African Americans but don't look at themselves and realize that African Americans can be judging them too. One person's smell does not determine the smell of the whole race. Laferriere tries to explain that not all African Americans are the same and decriminalizing isn't