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Three-quarters of black Americans are worried that they or someone they love will be attacked because of their race, according to a Washington Post-Ipsos national survey conducted after a gunman killed 10 people at a Buffalo supermarket, allegedly aiming to members of the black majority. neighborhood.
The Post-Ipsos poll of black Americans finds that most are sad and angry about the attacks, but only 8% say they are “surprised.” Even before the shooting, in the previous survey, Blacks saw racism as one of their main threats. After the attack, only 10% believe that the problem of racism will improve throughout their lives, while a majority of 53% believe that it will get worse.
Authorities believe that The Buffalo shooting suspect published a 180-page diatribe before the massacre. detailing his plans to kill black people and describe himself as a white supremacist and a terrorist. Of the 13 people shot, 11 were black. Federal officials have said they are prosecuting the case as a racial hate crime.
“This proved my theory that it’s still out there. And it’s not getting better, it’s getting worse,” said Teeyada Cannon, a Buffalo resident who knows the store where the shooting took place. last year of Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin over the murder of George Floyd, had no hope that blacks would be safe attack, either by the police or by other Americans.
Like Cannon, black Americans generally see the Buffalo mass The shooting is not a marginal attack but a broader racism in the country, according to the Post-Ipsos poll. A majority of 70 percent of black Americans believe that at least half of white Americans have beliefs about white supremacy, 75 percent of black Americans say white supremacists are a “significant threat” to black Americans, and 66 percent hundred says white supremacy is a bigger problem than it is today. it was five years ago.
Read the results of the post-Ipsos survey
Black Americans cite a number of factors that lead people to commit hate crimes against blacks in the United States. Sixty-three percent say access to guns contributes greatly to people who commit hate crimes, while 57 percent say the same about “personal family and education.”
Just over half, 52% say social media contributes a lot to hate crimes, 47% cite “blaming blacks for their problems”, 46% cite political leaders and 45% blame for not having enough teaching of tolerance in schools. They cite less mental health issues, lack of personal connections with black people or cable news.
Black Americans’ fears of racial attacks are compounded by widespread disappointments about racial inequality two years after Floyd was assassinated in Minneapolis. A viral video of the incident sent millions of people across the country to the streets in protest, chanting “Black Lives Matter.” Dozens of elected officials across the country spoke of the need for police reform and more radical changes to combat social racism.
The survey finds that 80% of blacks say police in their communities treat blacks less fairly than whites, which rises to 88% when asked about police nationwide. Both represent overwhelming majorities, albeit slightly lower than two years ago.
Reaction to Floyd’s death initially sparked some optimism that police treatment of black Americans would improve and that whites’ concerns about discrimination against blacks would increase. But now, two years after the May 25, 2020 assassination, much of that optimism has disintegrated.
In June 2020, at the height of the Black Lives Matter protests a month after Floyd’s death, 54 percent of black Americans expected police treatment of black Americans to improve in the coming years, according to a survey then. But today, less than half, 19 percent, say they actually did. Another 38 percent say police treatment has improved “slightly,” while 41 percent say it hasn’t improved “at all.”
In June 2020, 59 percent of black Americans thought it was likely that attention to Floyd’s assassination would increase American whites’ concerns about racial discrimination by police. Today, 30 percent of black Americans believe that concern has increased among white Americans.
How George Floyd spent his last hours
Carl Davidson, 61, of Oakland, California, said yes they have been gradual steps in the right direction. But there has also been a backlash. He said criticisms of critical race theory, renewed gerrymandering efforts and other cultural wars are part of the reaction.
“Very soon after ‘Black Lives Matter’, there were knees with ‘Blue lives’ and ‘White lives matter’. It was a misinterpretation, which enacted a zero-sum perspective, whites have less, ”said Davidson, a sales representative for the wine industry. “But we want what everyone wants. And the Constitution guarantees it ”.
In this sense, he said, people seem more daring than ever to make clear their anti-black racism.
“The rock has been turned upside down and racism is out there, and people feel much freer to express it,” he said.
A bombardment of “endless shots”: inside the Buffalo massacre
The Post-Ipsos poll finds that 65 percent of black Americans say it’s a “bad time” to be a black person in America, 56 percent immediately before the Buffalo shootout and now equals the level of pessimism of January 2020, three years later. the presidency of Donald Trump.
Even before the Buffalo shootout, racism, gun violence and police brutality were the top three threats listed by blacks in the poll, with 84 to 86 percent saying each is a “major threat. “.
Most black Americans also described other issues as major threats to blacks in the United States, including 82% citing the criminal justice system, 76% citing the cost of health care, 73% restrictions on voting rights, 72% lack of economic opportunities and 71% drugs. Another 61 percent of blacks said lack of access to education is a major threat, while about half said the same for pollution (53 percent) and climate change (47 percent). ).
In Memphis, Dexter Banks, the son of civil rights activists, said open racism and white nationalism are even more tolerated by Americans of all backgrounds, especially white Americans.
For 48-year-old Banks, there is evidence that powerful forces are working to streamline what happened to Floyd and the victims of the Buffalo East Side community, curbing the momentum for substantial changes in the treatment of black Americans.
Racism “is considered more of an expression of free speech than it really is,” the Memphis resident said. “With what happened in Buffalo or Floyd, it is often felt on the one hand, specifically by the Conservatives, that it is just an isolated incident or rotten apples, but it is never recognized as part of a major systemic problem.”
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When it came to suffering a racist attack, the source of Johnathon Davis’ greatest fear used to be the police. But now, he cares everyday whites who believe they could be secretly extremist, racist and armed.
“At least [with] police, do you have any idea of the people you are dealing with, but the neighbor next door? You have no idea what happens when the door is closed, “said Davis, 57.
He catches himself being apprehensive at traffic lights, imagining a white man coming out and shooting him with his car. In grocery stores, he is hyper-conscious of his surroundings, he said, watching the whites move as they reach into his pockets.
But there is a small group of black Americans who do not care to be targeted by the color of their skin. D. Thompson, a Florida elementary school teacher who did not want to publish her full name for fear of reprisals, said police treat people of all races equally.
Floyd’s assassination made people talk and put the country on the path to improvement, he said. But “it was an isolated incident and not the norm. It was unfortunate, and I’m sorry a man lost his life, but that’s not holding me back,” Thompson said.
Thompson, a Republican, emigrated from the Bahamas in the 1990s. She said that background it gives you a different perspective on race. “I don’t wake up thinking what will happen to me because I’m black in America,” he said.
In a small town near Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 43-year-old Democrat Kwanza Boykin recalled learning about racial hierarchy in the United States as a child. From time to time she accompanied her grandmother, who was a maid, when she cleaned the houses. The owners were always white. She said the dynamic stayed with her.
A particularly vivid memory comes from when she was 5 or 6 years old, and she and her grandmother were looking through the window of a Macy’s store. A store employee came out and abruptly told them they could not enter the store.
Her grandmother said, “No, I was just teaching my granddaughter all the beautiful lights,” said Boykin, who is a notary. “But from that moment on … I thought there was racism.”
For her, this racism still hides, affects everything she does and threatens physical harm. The status of blacks in the country “is the same. There is nothing better for black people, “he said.
Floyd’s death has caused widespread concern about race and racism, but it is not yet clear what that means.
Black Americans have nuanced opinions on how best to solve crime in their communities, according to the Post-Ipsos survey. A majority of 72 percent say that increasing the number of police officers patrolling communities would reduce crime, although an even larger majority of 86 percent say more funding for economic opportunities …