Propagating Negative Stereotypes

Recently, there have been stories in the news about a Livery cab union head who encouraged the practice of racially profiling passengers to avoid violent crimes from taking place.

Let's be realistic here.  He's admitting a practice that has been going on for years.  Just because he says cabs drivers should be able to racially profile their passengers doesn't mean it hasn't been happening before his public statement.

So what is worse? Subversively allowing a practice that propagates negative stereotypes?  Or publicly spotlighting an ethnic group unfairly for violent crimes against cab drivers?

I hope, for his sake, that he has the statistics to support his claims (which I doubt).  But I can't help but empathize with his sentiment that it could reduce the number of violent incidents towards cab drivers if indeed his claims are correct.

I've taken several cabs and drivers have been forthcoming about their passenger selection practices.  Some say they require a down payment for some of their passengers because they occasionally get stiffed by black and Latino passengers...  But again, this only propagates the negative stereotype.  One driver, as I recall, said that he would not have picked me up if I were black or Hispanic at that hour of the evening, especially if I'm driving into the Bronx from Manhattan, but he saw that I was Asian and immediately picked me up.

My question is, how do you go about fixing the negative stereotype?  Because it is not entirely based on individual bias, it is based on some statistically misguided truth (even if it is a negative label or a negative behavior that paints a bad picture for everyone in that ethnic group).

Don't get me wrong, I don't condone negative stereotypes, particularly when they promote unfair treatment to honest passengers with good intentions (which represents the majority of passengers of any ethnicity), but I can't help but wonder if it is equally unfair to allow cab drivers to fall victim to violence by ethnic groups (assuming his claims on the crime statistics are true).

One has to wonder if in a world where cab drivers were unbiased and chose random passengers how any union would attempt to address the criminal behavior of passengers if they noticed a legitimate, authentic pattern that identifies potential acts of violence before they enter the cab.

I make no assumptions about the intentions of anybody regardless of race or ethnicity.  A person's motivations and intentions are not a product of their race or ethnicity but a product of their circumstances and their upbringing.  But I am curious how any social body would solve the problem of this vicious cycle of propagating negative stereotypes.