“I can’t breathe” rasped Eric Garner as he fell to the ground.
According to NBCNEWYORK, Eric Garner was the 43-year-old father who died while being taken into NYPD custody last summer.
In the past few years numerous events, like this, have raised the question, has the United States made as much progress as people had thought it has?
According to 2012 U.S. Census data, whites represent 77.7 percent, African Americans 13.2 percent and Asians 5.3 percent of the population. Hispanics comprise 17.1 percent of the total U.S. population.
Sophomore Rasheeda Brumskill is an African American and holds a strong opinion towards racism today. “I feel like racism still exists, but it’s not like back in the day. We can actually all go to the same school and eat together if we wanted to. I feel like we are definitely making some kind of effort to change.”
In the most recent incident in South Carolina, the videotape of the shooting showed forms of abuse. The officer was arrested and faces murder charges.
“This race has become more ignorant to the fact of what racism is,” Tarenia Ford said.
In 2010, a Pew Research report trumpeted that “the younger generation is more racially tolerant than their elders.”
According to a Pew Research, In 2010, there were 31,672 deaths in the U.S. from firearm injuries, mainly through suicide (19,392) and homicide (11,078), according to CDC compilation of data from death certificates. Among racial and ethnic groups, blacks are over-represented among gun homicide victims; blacks were 55% of shooting homicide victims in 2010, but 13% of the population.
“It is definitely still here but it’s kind of hidden now. We have so much more to do to reach what our ancestors set out for us,” said Junior Cierra Bradsher.
According to slate.com, 62 percent believe that having a black president shows that minorities have the same opportunities as whites, and 67 percent believe it proves that race is not a “barrier to accomplishment.” “Racism is still alive but people just don’t show their feelings towards it out in the open opposed to how it was,” sophomore Taylor Thomas said.
