Police Brutality Myth

Has the news influenced people to think a certain way about police officers? In the past two years news headlines talk about a topic called police brutality. People nowadays see police more of a threat than help. This is because many police officers have been charged with assault and murder, which is what is known as police brutality. When people think of police brutality they think of a officers attacking a civilian for no reason. However most of the time people misinterpret this. People who are resisting arrest have to be dealt with in a rougher manner. Also this has to do with the life of the officer. At the end of the day that man or woman officer want’s to go home to their family. Each day these officer are poised with danger, and shouldn’t all be judged for one officers

This however isn’t true at all. The race that people think is mainly targeted is the African-American race. Statistics show another story to this myth. The Washington Post has conducted a series of research to track police fatal shootings. The Washington Post has said, “As of Sunday, 1502 people have been shot and killed by on-duty police officers since Jan.1.2015. Of them, 732 were white and 381 were black(and 382 were of another unknown race).” This is a lot of people killed in this, but this shows how its very diverse and just isn’t one race being targeted. In the book Police Brutality, written by Sheila Fitzgerald, Officers are interviewed and are asked on their opinion on racial profiling. Their responses were, “ If you're stopped, they said, it’s because you fit a description or you’ve done something to raise an officer’s suspicion, such as hitch up your waistband in a way that suggests a hidden gun”(Fitzgerald 66). Officers only act on suspicion and not race. An officer is just trying to stay alive, and isn’t going to take a risk. Race has nothing to do with police brutality, but instead is based on