Randall Kennedy

And there is a greater risk that the black 25-year-old has engaged in various forms of criminality.

Okay.

Under those circumstances, what do I say?

Should the police officer, therefore, be allowed to take action vis-a-vis the black person as against the white person?

My answer is no.

I'm fully willing to concede.

Let's concede for the point of discussion that there is more risk.

There might be.

There might be.

But for reasons of constructing the sort of society I want, we should not empower agents of the state to act towards certain people

in a way that's adverse to them.

Let me try to break this down in a little different way.

Let's go back to, let's talk about what happens when you want to get on an airplane.

You know, it wasn't so long, you know, 9-11 wasn't all that long ago.

It was a while ago, but it wasn't all that long ago.

And this very issue came up with respect to the profiling of Muslims.

And there were some people who said, well, geez, you know, in the aftermath of 9-11, profiling of Muslims makes sense.

You know, no hard feelings, but, you know, the 11 people who were on those planes were all Muslims.

Now, there is a rationale.

You could just simply say it's not prejudice.