Black Men And Public Space Summary

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Response to Black Men and Public Space We still consider a black person as a bad individual in today’s society. In his essay, “Black Men and Public Space,” Brent Staples describes why he had to alter his behavior in order for the public to feel safe around him. Staples uses different examples in order for the reader to comprehend as to why he needed to do this. Staples further gives us details how he is being discriminated throughout all his life. Moreover, Staples tells us his emotions and frustration at how societal is prejudice towards black people. I agree he had altered his behavior because of the way society was treating him and how he lived day by day the injustices of society. There are many reasons why I feel he needed to alter his behavior. As he explains, he first recognized how much …show more content…

While Staples understood that the principles and beliefs of society were changing, he felt disturbed that black men were still being judged and misjudged by their appearance alone. One example, was around when he was a journalist in Chicago and rushes back to the office in order to meet a deadline and he is mistaken for a burglar. The office manager gets alarmed and calls security in the attempt to get him out of the building. The next example, he gives is where he is waiting for a job interview and decides to enter a jewelry store. As he came in the owner excuse himself and quickly came back with a Doberman Pinscher in hand. It was clear the owner was scared as she stood her ground, not even noticing the questions he was asking. One of his colleagues was arrested while trying to cover a story of a killer that lived in Waukegan, Illinois and he was wrongly erroneous mistaken for the killer. Although, he considers himself lucky so far he is thankful he did not get the same fate one of his colleague had. It is because of this that Staples continues to alter his behavior in order to seem les

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