Black people in the United States have suffered from racial segregation and police violence which has prevented them from experiencing real freedom and justice, a researcher and historian in Washington says.
Since the formal ending of slavery in 1863, African Americans have largely “lived under a system of apartheid and police control,” said Dr. Randy Short, who has a Ph.D in African studies.
“The American dream of freedom and justice has never been reality for African American people,” Dr. Short said in an interview with Press TV on Thursday.
“There is no human rights that African Americans have that are protected and we’ve at the mercy of either unscrupulous political leaders or we’ve been under the mercy of white terrorist groups,” he added.
More than half of young African Americans have indicated that they or someone they know has been victimized by police violence or harassment, according to a new report.
About 55 percent of black millennials answered yes to the question "Have you or anyone you know experienced harassment or violence at the hands of the police?" according to a report by the University of Chicago released to The Associated Press on Wednesday.
African American millennials are also the most pessimistic about the US legal system, with only 27 percent agreeing with the statement that "the American legal system treats all groups fairly."
Only 38 percent of all millennials agreed that the US legal system is fair to minorities.
"We know that young blacks are more likely to be harassed by the police. We know that they are more likely to mistrust their encounters with the police," said Cathy Cohen, chair of the political science department at the University of Chicago and leader of the Black Youth Project.
The poll comes amid public outrage over several high-profile killings of unarmed African Americans by white police officers in the last two years.