Brent Staples, the author of "Just Walk On By," defines the "hunch posture" from his essay as one where women "set their faces on neutral and, with their purse straps strung across their chests bandolier style, they forge ahead as though bracing themselves against being tackled." Staples admits that "women are particularly vulnerable to street violence, and young black males are drastically overrepresented among the perpetrators of violence," therefore their "hunch posture" is justified to some extent.
But perhaps, the cities and states in which Staples experiences this discrimination are more determinant of the perception of Staples than his race and gender. The first city Staples gives an example of is Chicago, a city that was close to a "surrounding ghetto" from which "muggers... occasionally seeped." Maybe this is what led Staples' first victim into a panic frenzy. Another location that labels Staples as a "suspect" is Soho, Manhattan. Manhattan being an undoubtedly crowded place, night walkers should seem to be a daily occurence that are in no way unnatural. However, Soho is a region that consists mainly of high-end stores and art galleries, making it very unnatural to be wandering through its streets in the middle of the night. Central Manhattan on the other hand is occupied by a "near-constant crowd," "[minimizing] the tense one-on-one street encounters," making it very normal to be out on the streets even in the middle of the night.
In Troy, night walkers are not much of a frequent occurrence, at least as far as I know. Consequently, if Staples were to take a walk in the middle of the night here, the discrimination he might face may be more attributed to his trait of being a night walker than to being a "young black male."
At the same time, this is not to say that racism is not a major factor in the labeling of a "suspect," but that the level of racism that Staples faces is an effect referable to the views of night walkers of the society in question and how that society "teaches" its residents to view specifically "young black men" on night walks as "suspects."
I agree with the fact that we don't have to worry about this sort of thing in Troy, and how racism in this story is caused by the setting. I also agree with how his actions could be viewed as unnatural by other people, which could have more to do with their treatment than racism.
ReplyDeleteIt's true that we have a hard time with the whole walking at night thing since we don't do that in Troy. I definitely thought the piece was odd in that sense.
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