Jayde Cross

Professor Connelly
English 261 T TH
3 December 2016
Research Proposal
Racism is one of the number one topics floating about in the United States. However, in
2016 African Americans took racism and started to turn it against police officers to came up with
the slogan Black Lives Matter. African Americans started to target the officers calling it
police brutality and started protests, or riots. For example, as said in the article, Black Lives
Matter, on the COS Database, The movement has highlighted incidents in which police have
harassed and killed black men and women. However, there is no proof that police are targeting
only African Americans only because of race. For instance, why would officers of the law
purposely harm another individual based on the color of his/ her skin, when there are African
Americans in law enforcement.
I wanted to explore how the Black Lives Matter protest and the connection between the
officers and the African Americans. Specifically, I am interested in the way this affects people of
the Central Valley in California, mainly officers. Because of this protest officers have been
forced to be more alert, due to civilians rioting and harming police officers. Especially when
Officer Frank Gale says, The assumption that law enforcement officers are using racist tactics
as a rule is deeply offensive, in article The End Racial Profiling Act Is Highly Flawed and
Should Not Be Passed on the COS Database. I believe officers are not able to do their job
correctly because some individuals, African Americans usually, want to claim the racist card.
However, do they realize the law enforcement has African Americans as police officers?

Personally I think if society and social media came together we could put an end to the hateful
side of Black Lives Matter and make it about all of us. We as a whole could protect police
officers and, in turn not make them out to be the bad guy for doing their job how it should be
done.
I chose to write about this topic because I see a future in becoming a Police Officer, or
even becoming a Federal Agent. However, this being said I believe police lives matter just as
much as anyone elses. Officers serve to protect and with crime rate escalating over the past few
years they take less caution to know if what you (the criminal) are holding is a weapon or not. I
believe protesting about Black Lives Matter is for a good cause because most of the shootings
that have happened involve African Americans; however, the movement is not for a good cause
when you only target while police officers. The organization to protect the BLM movement is
called the End Racial Profiling Act (ERPA). This organization was brought up by officer Gale
when he states that ERPA only serves to emphasize race and damages relationships between law
enforcement and minorities, (The End Racial..). By damaging the relations between the two, it
causes more outbreaks making it harder for officers to do their job.
For my research, I plan to explore the COS databases more in depth along with digging
up information from local news channels. Currently, I have many recourses from the databases i
have not mentioned, however the Black Lives Matter protest is huge in the U.S. it has started to
travel across the globe, for example, France and Sweden. I also plan on interviewing a few
officers in the Central Valley to get their opinions about the BLM protest here locally. As well as,
interviewing officers and exploring the databases, I would like to include examples of how
officers and African Americans can learn to come together to understand one another's basic
needs and regulations

Works Cited
"Black Lives Matter." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2016. Opposing Viewpoints
in Context, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/RMBGVS336742654/OVIC?
u=cclc_sequoias&xid=0fe38215. Accessed 10 Dec. 2016.
Gale, Frank. "The End Racial Profiling Act Is Highly Flawed and Should Not Be Passed." Racial
Profiling, edited by Carol Ullmann and Lynn M. Zott, Greenhaven Press, 2013. Opposing
Viewpoints. Opposing Viewpoints in Context,
link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/EJ3010572255/OVIC?u=cclc_sequoias&xid=dd90e598.
Accessed 11 Dec. 2016. Originally published as "Testimony of Frank Gale, National
Second Vice President, Grand Lodge, Fraternal Order of Police, on 'Ending Racial
Profiling in the United States,'," 2012.