Good Social Control Mechanisms Essay Example

The United States of America boasts of practicing equality and mutual respect amongst groups in the society for one another’s culture. However, a closer look at it shows that, it is still grappling with sociological perspectives on race and ethnicity. Although the U.S also boasts of having the ideal society, that is not the reality. Rampant cases of racial profiling and white privilege dismiss this notion of an ideal society.
Racial profiling is a form of discrimination by which the authorities use a person’s race or cultural background as the main reason to suspect that the individual has broken the law. Racial profiling has been institutionalized to the extent that institutional reform cannot be overlooked in efforts to address the problem. The institutionalization mainly occurs by stereotyping. Racial profiling based on one’s religious background is a crucial concern for Muslim Americans following the terrorists attack on September 11. It was alleged that the attackers were of Arabic origin. Following the September 11 terrorist attack, there has been a spate of security measures targeting mostly Arab-Americans. However, there have been cases where the whites have participated in the attacks but they have not been profiled in the way Arab Americans have been.
Some proponents of racial profiling have argued that this practice is legitimate as it tries to combat particular crimes. However, the opponents argue that that is a form of discrimination, and it has proved ineffective in curbing crime. They have cited a number of research studies conducted in the war against narcotic drugs. It was found that, the law enforcement officers were targeting blacks and Mexicans drivers. But quite a substantial number of drivers caught on traffic stops were whites who were more likely possessing the narcotic drugs than black drivers.
Racial profiling as a form of discrimination has affected the immigrants in the U.S. Immigrants are considered to be the minority groups, this, therefore, means that its members have significantly less control over their lives. For immigrants, they are going to be treated unequally. The plight of immigrants is still worst even for the educated and qualified. This is because of discrimination that persists even to corporate, based on some arbitrary bias.
Another form of discrimination is white privilege. White privilege is granting of rights or immunities to people because they are white. Discrimination of this kind assumes two shapes; institutional discrimination, affirmative action. Institutional discrimination manifests itself where individuals are denied opportunities and rights arising from the operation of the society while affirmative action is evidenced in a manner that deliberate efforts are made to recruit minority members for jobs or education opportunities.
The idea of racial preferences to whites over the years is buried deep in the social history of U.S and multiple legislations that favored the whites. The attempt to give the whites more privileges started with the abolition of making white people as servitudes, which left black slaves as the only inferior person in the colonies that would become the U.S. For instance the Naturalization Act allowed any white to become a citizen while the black were left as alien. Other recent forms of affirmative action in favor of whites were the tight housing policies that only favored the white to take a loan and acquire houses.
It is indeed true that American cannot boast of equality given that it has perpetuated the same through its skewed laws. This kind of disparity is clearly seen by comparing the wealth of a family, education and size. For instance, if you compare the amount of salary a black man gets against a white it will indeed give the kinds of preferences white people are granted. This amounts to discrimination against the black. For this reason, the whites have no moral authority to pride themselves that they have worked hard, or they had a lot of ambitions. It is apparent that few of them know the advantage they have been granted in every sector. The policies that were made gave the white people many benefits over the black such as housing, education, criminal justice banking and business. It is undeniably that these services have not been made available to all other people.
It was alleged that unfair racial preference has found its way in the learning institutions because Michigan's policy of awarding 20 point to undergraduate applicants who are members of underrepresented minorities such as blacks and Latinos. The policies adopted by Michigan University met a lot of criticisms. Even many whites have proclaimed that such actions are the classical example of unfair racial preference. This is an action that was condemned even by the top tier leadership. Many white people failed to question that greater numbers of points are awarded for other things that amount to preferences for whites to the exclusion of other persons. It can be argued that both approaches on preferences are fair.
There is a need to shift the mindset and approaches to the whole issue of inequality. These privileges held firm by whites should end to stop the preferential treatment that has been in existence or else those rights will never end favoring the whites.

References

Shinn, M. (2010). Homelessness, Poverty and Social Exclusion in United States and Europe. European Journal of Homelessness, 19-43.
Waldfogel, J., & Smeeding, T. (2010). Fighting child poverty in the United States and United: An Update. Wisconsin: Institute for Research on Poverty University of Wisconsin.
Welch, K. (2007). Black Criminal Stereotypes and Racial Profiling. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 276-288.
Wise, T. (2003, February 19). Whites Swim in Racial Preference. Alternet. Retrieved from http://www.alternet.org/story/15223/whites_swim_in_racial_preference