Just curious if anyone else has had this experience with the police: I moved to a new town and about a week or so later I was walking home from work through my neighbourhood when I am stopped by the police. They are asking me all kinds of questions, like where I live, where I am coming from, can we see your ID, etc. They said I looked like someone they were looking for. At the time I accepted that reason, but looking back, and given the timing of it, it seems like they were checking me out.
Has anyone else had this experience? Do white men go through this? Just wondering.
What’s the racial makeup and class level of this neighborhood?
Guess this experience dismantles “Robert Lindsay”‘s assumption of you being a “white, pro-black cheerleader”.
I wonder if he and his brothers in internet ignorance can say that they’d had a similar experience to you. You know, since racism isn’t a real issue anymore and blacks just point an unneccessary finger at white America.
LikeLike
White men will experience it if they are in a predominately black or latin or asian area. Especially if its a known drug area that is populated predomintely by minorities.
A white man or women in a non white neighborhood would be stopped.
It actually happened to me. My husband was a cop working federal HUD. I was bringing him dinner. A City Cop stopped me and asked why I ws there etc etc. Said car matched description of someone they were looking for. truth is, white women dont come to that area much unless looking to buy drugs (or bring their husbands dinner). Its profiling.
It is based on neighborhood stereo types.
Cops know the neighborhood, and know the typical people who live there. Profiling works…because its based on stopping people who dont fit in the norm surroundings. and mayb 60% of the time the cop stops a bad guy. 40 % they meet someone who belongs and then hopefulyl adjust that neighborhoods demographic in their heads. Even black cops profile on a neighborhood. My bro in law knows that if he wants over time – he can go down to a certain street in the city, a few minutes before his shift end, and randomly grab any person on that street and they will have warrants out for them. and he is a black cop, operating in a black and latin neighborhood. He know a white kid on the street is looking to buy. My sister works the mission, vice. She knows a white male in his 40, in her area is looking for a prostitute (or is lost).
Of course racism is a cause of why our neighborhoods lack diversity. Also, peoples desire to live around people who share their culture. That cop who stopped you may be a racist SOB or he may just have been profiling based on his knowledge of your neighborhood.
LikeLike
To Abagond:
“Just curious if anyone else has had this experience with the police.”
I’d say I have had my id check by police officers (aside from traffic violations..) a little more than a dozen times. In two separate instances I had a gun drawn on me. Almost every occurrence happened in my teens to my late twenties with one exception in my 40s. I suspect it’s because I often used to travel on foot and had problems in the past with insomnia so they thought it unusual that I was walking around at 1:00 am in areas where there weren’t bars, clubs, or other late night venues.
Not really the same thing but I have had my luggage, cameras, and computer searched many times by customs. (I travel frequently to overseas destinations..) Between 2000 and 2007 I was searched probably 75% of the time I travelled. I was joking with a friend of mine that I should get a t-shirt that said “No bombs,guns, knives, kiddie porn, or drugs on board”.
LikeLike
I am a WASPy-looking white guy in my mid-40s and I’ve almost always lived in middle- to upper-middle class areas. Apart from getting pulled over when I was speeding, I have never been stopped or questioned by the police in my entire life.
What happened to you really sounded like racist BS to me until I read what Davida wrote. So maybe there’s a profiling aspect that can cut either way …but I think it’s fair to say that people who look like me get treated a lot better than minorities do.
LikeLike
truth is, they were looking to shoot you. white men are so insecure and jealous of black men they cant even see straight. they just wanted to harrass you.
LikeLike
All this time I assumed you were white. I feel dumb. I never hear of this happening to white guys except when there’s a specific bad guy in the area being sought after, (who is also white). Just my observation.
LikeLike
“truth is, they were looking to shoot you. white men are so insecure and jealous of black men they cant even see straight. they just wanted to harrass you.”
What an incredibly racist thing to say.
LikeLike
asked my bro in law who is a cop and a black male and he agrees with me that its about neighborhood profiling. White guy in black neighborhood gets stopped. Black guy in white neighborhood will also get stopped. He says unless you are in a community that is very diverse you will have this issue because a cop opporrates on his knowledge on the community and what doesnt fit.
LikeLike
Aba, I’ve never been stopped by the police by myself. However, on one occasion my boyfriend and I were stopped and he was searched. The police claimed that he fit the description of someone they were looking for. And we were in a predominantly black neighborhood. I’ve also witnessed many times in predominantly black neighborhoods, black males being stopped by the police. I think it all boils down to racial profiling/racism.
LikeLike
I’m white, and I’ve been stopped by the police several times. Once, I was stopped for driving too slow (45 in a 55, I had just gotten out of a speed trap and didn’t see the sign), got frisked, got my car searched, all for no apparent reason.
I guess the difference is, because I’m white, and the officer was white, I didn’t blame it on racism or get all offended and self-righteous about it. I simply saw it as an overzealous cop trying a little too hard.
After all, since I had nothing to hide, there was really nothing for me to worry about. If I’d had drugs or an unlicensed gun in the car, then I would have deserved whatever I got for breaking the law.
When you consider that blacks are disproportionately victimized by crime, it’s sad to hear black people demanding that cops walk on eggshells. What’s more important to you, protecting the lives of your loved ones or a 10 minute inconvenience?
LikeLike
Forgot to mention – my bro in law also said, 9 times out of 10 he will get a call of a black male, in all black clothes with a gun…or a black male, all black clothes fighting or selling drugs or… whatever.
He shows up to scene – he finds 8 BMs in black clothes…he has to check them all because they all fit description. soo – yes – they were stopped because they were a BM ….wearing black clothes, because thats all the caller gave. If they had a better description then could be more pinpointed in who they stop.
LikeLike
This took place in a quiet, mixed, middle-class neighbourhood, though one end of it, where I was, is much whiter (80%) than the other end, where I lived (33%). It is one of those neighbourhoods where the children are almost all black and the old people are almost all white.
LikeLike
I’ve never been hassled by cops while on foot. I have been stopped while driving for obviously pretextual reasons, once in Southfield, Michigan (a suburb of Detroit) and once in San Francisco. I’ve also been ticketed for seemingly minor infractions — not coming to a complete stop while turning right on red, for example, or going 62 in a 55 zone (with many vehicles going much faster than me), or stopping at a light in a way that obstructs a crosswalk. I’m a WM, by the way.
During her single 20’s and early 30’s, my wife, a pretty BF, drove sports cars, and she drove fast, frequently well in excess of the speed limit. She was pulled over multiple times but never once ticketed. In almost every instance the cop was a male.
LikeLike
My brother, a white working class male, has gotten stopped before for being out late as he walked home from a bar or from work. I suppose that his appearance, in jeans, work boots, and a leather jacket, with long hair, suggests counterculture and potential criminal intent or history to certain officers. He noted that he got a lot less attention when he cut his hair short and got a different jacket.
Unfortunately, part of what security officers look for is someone who “doesn’t fit” there. But “doesn’t fit” can be anything from skin color to percieved socioeconomic status to how one is dressed to mannerisms that stand out. It is sad but I suppose as long as we have a society here in which we have enclaves of one ethnicity or the other that someone who looks different, and can’t help that, will “not fit” to the officer on patrol.
LikeLike
Yes, I’ve had that type of an experience. Just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I lived in a edgy neighborhood at that time. I’m a white guy (Scottish actually). I was not at all surprised, since my part of town was often under the search lights of police helicopters and such.
LikeLike
@ Blanc 2
Same thing with my wife. She is a BF (Afro Brazilian) and she always got of tickets in Missouri. (one exception was when she was doing 25 miles an hour over the speed limit in a 40mph zone!!!)
Me? I get ticketed for anything! ! ! Ironically, living in Miami, the wife got pulled over and slammed with a couple of tickets by a BF cop! Thank goodness!!! It toned down my wifes “bad” driving. (Doh, the pocket book!!!)
LikeLike
I notice in the town I’m in, only black males get stopped for things such as mufflers and little petty things. I know this young black male that was stopped and had never been in any trouble. The policeman asked him what was he doing and where he was going. The young man told the officer that he was on his way too school and he was attending college and he didn’t want to be late because he had a very important test. The officer looked at him and said ” You go too school?” The officer proceeds to laugh as if it were a joke. Things like this anger me! I think white men become policeman just so they can legally harass our black males, and in some cases our females also.
LikeLike
Oops, I meant to say my wife gets “out” of tickets.
LikeLike
I am so sick and tired of black people pulling the race card. Get a life. White men are not jealous of black men, trust me. we have nothing to be jealous about. jasmine are you black? Its individuals like you who make white people hate blacks.
LikeLike
tom, you guys always hated blacks not matter what blacks did so its definitely not black peoples fault that you are racist and hate blacks. you guys never stopped being racist and just hate that we don’t like to be complacent about your guys’ racism.
LikeLike
*no matter
LikeLike
as for the post…missouri isn’t the best example since the police around here are very greedy to the point they will pull people over for anything and everything. our police go around killing white people for no reason, so you know they do very bad things to blacks.
LikeLike
I am so sick and tired of black people pulling the race card. Get a life. White men are not jealous of black men, trust me. we have nothing to be jealous about. jasmine are you black? Its individuals like you who make white people hate blacks.
Who gives a rat’s a$$! You are just looking for a pretext for hating blacks. You don’t even have the testicular fortitude to plainly state that you just don’t like blacks. No-one can make you hate anyone, only you can. Clown!
LikeLike
Tom needs to grow up and take his superiority complex foot out of his mouth.
LikeLike
That’s just it. They feel inferior, not superior, else why look down on others?
LikeLike
I’m getting ready to go shopping see you all later. There’s a big sale downtown!
LikeLike
@Herneith:
You’re absolutely right! People like this have a need to continually prove they’re superior when in fact, they’re not.
LikeLike
Well I am a black female and I never get out of tickets and ALL of my tickets have been written by white males. I just received a ticket yesterday for going 20 mph in a 40 mph zone ( you’ve read that correctly ) on St. Charles Rock Road in Bridgeton, MO. by an Officer C. Drews. It was around 7:30pm on a Saturday and there was no traffic around. Just me and him behind me-which I had no idea he was behind me until he put on his flashing lights and noise makers. . I explained to him that I didn’t know that I was breaking a law and was looking for a particular business/store. He didn’t seem to give a shit so I asked him repeatedly what the minimum speed limit was. He wouldn’t tell me, and just said Ma’am I am not going to argue with you and told me if I kept it up I would be going to jail. Seriously I was doing nothing to go to jail, I guess with him I was not supposed to open my mouth and ask questions. It is like I have no rights.
I called Bridgeton PD and they told me that there was no minimum on the street and I would have to fight the ticket in court. I say to the officer that I have heard of this law on a highway but not a street and he says, ” This is a highway “. Keep in mind that I have never thought of St. Charles Rock Road as a highway. I mean and its not like it’s Lindbergh/hwy67 or HWY370 or something like that. I truly believe I did not deserve a ticket. Since I have received my CDL, I have tried to do everything in my power to not get a speeding ticket. Like I said maybe I am just unlucky, huh
NOW TO ME THIS FELT LIKE RACISM. He could have easily given me a warning, I mean I wasn’t on the highway, there wasn’t much traffic where I was, and I have a CDL for goodness sake. I am quite certain that if I was white, he would not have given me this silly ticket. Or maybe I am just an unlucky person.I have never had good experiences with white police officers, no matter how polite I was. It also seems, the more polite I am the worst the police officers act. It’s almost as if they can’t stand the fact I am NOT angry.
Anyhow he asked me to sign the ticket, I refused, then he said in a much louder tone, ” Good, the judge prefers that “.
Overzealous or Racist? LOL!
Now I have also received tickets for going 10 miles over the limit when there were people in front of me and behind me doing the same thing. But you know, I get stopped and of course ticketed. I call myself keeping up with the flow of traffic. So damned if I do, damned if I don’t. I guess with white people, I MUST walk on eggshells and do EXACTLY the speed limit.
This is just one reason why I hate white people and believe that this world is ran by satan..their god.
LikeLike
I was stopped by coppers about once a week in Paris, especially in the métro during my twenties (in the 1980s). It was during the period when there were a lot of bomb threats by islamist terrorists. I’m ‘only’ 1/4 black and I look more like an arabe/maghrébin. My eldest brother has about the same features as me. What my father used to tell us two when we were teenagers and starting to look more like young males – You guys have won the “jackpot”. You need to get used to certain people seeing in you the “bougnoule”. You might get checked out by cops. You might get looked down upon more than your siblings or us parents. Just be yourself and keep your cool. You can’t change yourself and neither can you change other people’s prejudice right there and then when it happens. Just show them your ID when they ask and they’ll have to let you go. If they give you grief although you keep your cool, memorise their faces and names and tell me.
(Admittedly it worked well most of the time but you know how young males can be sometimes. Especially when you grow up in an environment that doesn’t fear verbal confrontation ;))
Now that I’m older, cops ignore me most of the time.
My other brother looks more West African, dark skin, frizzy hair. He hardly ever got stopped in Paris for no reason. But then he’s got this sweet innocent look – yeah right 😉 My sisters always knew how to get out of everything, even when they really DID something. Never understood how they do it…
Btw in American airports at immigration I always got triple checked.
I was stopped by cops in the streets once when I worked in Houston. The reason was because I was walking. No joke. That is, in casual clothes, denim, shirt, leather shoes. Not a jogging outfit. They asked me where my car was. I said at home. Has it broken down? No. Why are you walking then? Where are you going? I like walking. I walk every day several miles in my home country. I’m sitting all day you know. Do you have your driver’s licence? Well, I’m just walking. I didn’t know I need my driver’s licence for that.
That tipped them over. Hands on the car top, legs spread and a really rough body search. I didn’t say a word and pretended to be intimidated (although I felt the urge to give him a kick in the bollox). You can’t win with those people. After making “their point” they let me go. Frustrated overzealous idiots.
LikeLike
Femi,
I thought you were female this entire time.
LikeLike
A similar experience, seems to have an Western flavour.
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/670484
LikeLike
@FG
😀 Female? Why’s that?
LikeLike
I think it is because Femi is an unfamiliar name (to Americans) that ends in a vowel.
It is not a rule or anything, but if you look at, say, the top 20 boy and girl names for those born in America in 2010, only one boy name ends in a vowel (Joshua), while 11 girl names do (Emma, Isabella, Ava, Olivia, Sophia, Chloe, Samantha, Natalie, Mia, Alyssa and Ella).
LikeLike
I see. It’s a fairly common Yoruba name, short for Olufemi.
(I’m not Yoruba though)
LikeLike
Femi, I thought you were female a while back as well, but I figured out a month or so ago that you were male. I think it was because all the Femis I know are female (and Yoruba), even though I know it’s a unisex name, I always tend to associate it with women.
LikeLike
What? Femi is male? All this time I thought Femi was a woman. Go figure. 😉
LikeLike
@Natasha & leigh 🙂
(Olu)Femi is actually very majority male. Kemi is mostly female for instance. People tend to confuse the two.
LikeLike
Sorry Femi, I thought you were female too *makes mental note* 🙂
LikeLike
Femi, for a while I also thought you were a woman. I think some of the the confusion comes from associating the name “Femi” with the word “feminine”.
LikeLike
I’m white and live in a white area but have been in black areas too and tihs has never happened to me. You were probably profiled.
LikeLike
white here, yeah i’ve been lighted up a hundred times, usually due to driving a shitbox car in a drug area or a nice neighborhood. i’ve been told i ‘stick out like a sore thumb’ by a cop before, drug area of course. i mean the nypd is announcing today they are going to shoot down airplanes — and that should go over well in manhattan i would imagine — the power is the power not just a white thing any more… they share the wealth. then again i’m considered a not so mainstream person.
LikeLike
I agree with the commenters that suggest that the police pull you over if they suspect that you look like you don’t *belong* in the neighborhood.
I was pulled over by the police and frisked in Anacostia, DC when I was showing a friend, a visitor from out of town, where I lived as a child. They asked me those questions.
LikeLike