# Did the non Caucasian races get their stereotypes honest? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 26, 2007, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077 "2007-10-26T05:16:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![diggleblop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac91a4/32.png) [@diggleblop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/diggleblop)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/1 "2007-10-26T05:16:11Z")
I have found that there are sometimes lots of truths within a steretype, but at times I can’t see how some stereotypes came into existence. Therefore, I thought it would be a good debate, because I’m sure there are statistics and people who know how to use them on this site to support or deny certain stereotypes. I am in no way racist, I just have a hard time with some of these stereotypes I’ve heard throughout my life. I will post some: Black people have a hard time getting cabs because they’re known to rob the drivers. Black people steal, more-so than any other race. Black people take advantage of welfare. Black people have more kids than any other race. There are more illegal Hispanics than there are legal ones in this country. Hispanics are the main ones “taggin walls” with graffiti in this country. Young Hispanic males are all gang bangers. African Americans have the highest level of HIV and/or AIDS. - This one I do think is truth, though. ---
**Author:** ![T\_SQUARE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9de053/32.png) [@T\_SQUARE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/T_SQUARE)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/2 "2007-10-26T06:17:24Z")
Well, some of these would be pretty easy to prove or disprove, like crime rates, reproduction, and AIDS. But how would you measure if someone is taking advantage of welfare? Young Hispanic males all being gangbangers is just silly. They all can’t be in a gang of course. ---
**Author:** ![diggleblop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac91a4/32.png) [@diggleblop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/diggleblop)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/3 "2007-10-26T06:20:24Z")
well, i guess with the welfare thing, you could see which races use it more and then find a study how much fraud there is within each race maybe? ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/4 "2007-10-26T07:50:59Z")
According to an article in the **Yale Law Journal** in 1996, most welfare recepients are **not** African-Americans. Also, on an internet site just this past week, I found a map that indicated that the states with the most welfare recepients are the northern Midwestern states – generally urban poor. **diggleblop** , if you don’t believe these stereotypes, why debate them? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/5 "2007-10-26T12:16:15Z")
[QUOTE=diggleblop] African Americans have the highest level of HIV and/or AIDS. - This one I do think is truth, though. [/QUOTE] I believe African-American _women_ are the fastest-_growing_ group in re AIDS infections. This has a LOT to do with the generalized homophobia within A-A culture and the consequent high incidence of men “on the down-low”, who have unprotected sex with other high-risk men and then go back to their socially-approved girlfriends/wives. But I don’t know that there’s any truth to the idea that A-A have the highest level of HIV in any absolute sense. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/6 "2007-10-26T12:18:43Z")
Where do the stereotypes come from? Lzy people generalizing from bad data so as to marginalize or demonize a people different from themselves, just as the overwhelming majority of stereotypes. [QUOTE=diggleblop] Black people have a hard time getting cabs because they’re known to rob the drivers. [/quote] Black people have a hard time getting cabs because they’re **believed** to rob the drivers. One person’s irrational fear is not the responsibility of the target of that fear. > [@](#): > > Black people steal, more-so than any other race. This is just old Jim Crow era nonsense to demonize blacks. Blacks are disproportionately present in the criminal justice system, but that is a combination of harsher drug enforcement in the inner cities along with the higher percent of blacks living in poverty. However, there is no particular predisposition among blacks to steal that is greater than that among whites. > [@](#): > > Black take advantage of welfare. People of all “races” take advantage of welfare. Since a larger percentage (not number) of the black population than the white population has used welfare, many people make the false assumption that most people on welfare are black and when they hear of welfare fraud, they lazily assume it is “black” people committing it. Many blacks do commit welfare fraud–as do many people of other ethnic backgrounds. > [@](#): > > Black people have more kids than any other race. My memory is that whites and blacks have very nearly identical “replacement” rates with Hispanics having slightly more (and I have not seen an estimate on Asians). Basically, this is an unsupported stereotype. > [@](#): > > There are more illegal Hispanics than there are legal ones in this country . Utterly false. There are claimed to be between 10 and 20 million illegal immigrants of all nationalities in the U.S. [According to the U.S. Census Bureau](http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/hispanic/cps2006/2006_tab1.1a.csv), the Hispanic population in March, 2006 was 43,168,000. > [@](#): > > Young Hispanic males are all gang bangers. Come on. This is absurd on the face of it. [With five and a half million Hispanic males between the ages of 10 and 24](http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/hispanic/cps2006/2006_tab1.1b.csv), there is no way that they could “all” (or, probably, even a majority of them) be gang bangers. > [@](#): > > Hispanics are the main ones “taggin walls” with graffiti in this country. Is there a thriving tagger culture in the Hispanic community (as well as in other ethnic communities)? Sure. That hardly means that all (or even the majority of) taggers are Hispanic, although it might be true in places like Southern California where there is a large Hispanic population. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/7 "2007-10-26T12:30:35Z")
> [@](#): > > A February 1997 report on rape and sexual-based crime published by the United States Department of Justice stated that of the crimes surveyed, 56% of arrestees were “White”, 42% were “Black”, and 2% were of other races. The report additionally noted that “[v]ictims of rape were about evenly divided between whites and blacks; in about 88% of forcible rapes, the victim and offender were of the same race.”[4] > > A subsequent United States Department of Justice report which surveyed homicide statistics between 1974 and 2004 stated that of the crimes surveyed, 52.1% of the offenders were Black, 45.9% were White, and 2% were Other Races. Of the victims in those same crimes, 51% were White, 46.9% were Black, and 2.1% were Other Races. The report further noted that, “most murders are intraracial”, with 86% of White murders committed by Whites, and 94% of Black murders committed by Blacks.[5] It should be noted that the document does not provide any details concerning what races or ethnicities are included in the designations “White”, “Black”, or “Other Races”. > > 70% of prisoners in the United States are non-Whites.[6] In 1998, nearly one out of three Black men between the ages of 20-29 were in prison or jail, on probation or parole on any given day.[7][8] > > A 2005 United States Department of Justice report on violent crimes stated that of the “perceived race” of the offenders in single-offender violent crimes, 43.3% were White, 21.0% were Black, and 9.6% were “Other”, with the remaining 26.0% of offenders of unknown race.[9] > **[Race and crime](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_crime)** > > Research into the relationship between race and crime has grown rapidly in recent years. More specifically, the research delves into the potential cause and effects of racial disparities in crime. This includes but is not limited to, disadvantages and inequality (racially, socially and economically), disparities in education, employment/unemployment, poverty, social status, and social/familial structure. Also of notable interest, is the role of exposure in childhood to violent behavior, anothe Re... ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/8 "2007-10-26T12:54:09Z")
[QUOTE=jayjay] I believe African-American _women_ are the fastest-_growing_ group in re AIDS infections. [/QUOTE] I’ve been hearing variations on “Heterosexual women are the fastest-growing group re AIDS infections” for fifteen years now. You’d think they’d all be infected by now. It nis true, however, that in the USA, [blacks are far likelier to have AIDS than whites.](http://www.thebody.com/content/art8861.html) For ongoing infections, however, the highest-risk group, percentage-wise, remains gay men (Same cite.) ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/9 "2007-10-26T14:36:36Z")
[QUOTE=diggleblop] well, i guess with the welfare thing, you could see which races use it more and then find a study how much fraud there is within each race maybe? [/QUOTE] White people outnumber black people in this country by about 6 to 1, and Hispanics by a ratio of about 5:1. I can’t find a breakdown of welfare rolls by race, but looking at poverty rates I think there are probably more white people on welfare than anybody else. ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/10 "2007-10-26T15:05:29Z")
[QUOTE=tomndebb] Where do the stereotypes come from? Lzy people generalizing from bad data so as to marginalize or demonize a people different from themselves, just as the overwhelming majority of stereotypes. Black people have a hard time getting cabs because they’re **believed** to rob the drivers. One person’s irrational fear is not the responsibility of the target of that fear. [/QUOTE] Cabbies also fear Black customers will ask them to drive to bad areas where they might get robbed, and/or they will not be able to get another fare as readily. [QUOTE=tomndebb] Utterly false. There are claimed to be between 10 and 20 million illegal immigrants of all nationalities in the U.S. [According to the U.S. Census Bureau](http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/hispanic/cps2006/2006_tab1.1a.csv), the Hispanic population in March, 2006 was 43,168,000. [/QUOTE] Do census numbers include illegal immigrants? If not that would mean that the true number of Hispanic in the US is about 50% higher than reported by your cite. I don’t believe that is the case. Some cites say they will be counted in the 2010 census, but I don’t know if they were in 2000, or if they are included in these projections we read about. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/11 "2007-10-26T16:14:54Z")
[QUOTE=brickbacon] Do census numbers include illegal immigrants? If not that would mean that the true number of Hispanic in the US is about 50% higher than reported by your cite. [/QUOTE] Only if all illegal immigrants are Hispanic. And 20 million illegal immigrnats is the highest estimate I’ve ever heard; I’m more used to figures in the 10 million to 12 million range. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/12 "2007-10-26T17:15:54Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] White people outnumber black people in this country by about 6 to 1, and Hispanics by a ratio of about 5:1. I can’t find a breakdown of welfare rolls by race, but looking at poverty rates I think there are probably more white people on welfare than anybody else. [/QUOTE] Looking at each population per capita would provide an accurate comparison. I would absolutely guarantee that there are more white people on public assistance programs of all types if you simply go by head count. Looking simply at sheer numbers seems to be an attempt to deliberately avoid getting the answer. ---
**Author:** ![diggleblop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac91a4/32.png) [@diggleblop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/diggleblop)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/13 "2007-10-26T17:24:32Z")
> [@](#): > > diggleblop, if you don’t believe these stereotypes, why debate them? I don’t understand what you mean. I’m just basically asking you guys if you think any of them are true and then explain why in the most non-racist way you can think of, though that will be hard to do, especially if you admit that you think some are true, but you can believe in something and not be racist. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/14 "2007-10-26T17:35:01Z")
[QUOTE=Evil One] Looking simply at sheer numbers seems to be an attempt to deliberately avoid getting the answer. [/QUOTE] You’re right, instinctively I was afraid I’d find the lazy blacks and Hispanics DO abuse welfare. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/15 "2007-10-26T17:46:02Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] You’re right, instinctively I was afraid I’d find the lazy blacks and Hispanics DO abuse welfare. [/QUOTE] I’m not saying they do or do not abuse it. I’m saying it’s intellectually dishonest to say “more whites are on welfare than blacks” without using the actual data to make the comparison. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/16 "2007-10-26T18:03:15Z")
[QUOTE=Evil One] I’m not saying they do or do not abuse it. I’m saying it’s intellectually dishonest to say “more whites are on welfare than blacks” without using the actual data to make the comparison. [/QUOTE] Eh. It wasn’t intended to be the final word on the subject; like I said, I couldn’t find data showing any breakdowns of welfare recipients by race (I suspect it’s because I’m busy, not because it doesn’t exist). ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/17 "2007-10-26T18:22:04Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] Eh. It wasn’t intended to be the final word on the subject; like I said, I couldn’t find data showing any breakdowns of welfare recipients by race (I suspect it’s because I’m busy, not because it doesn’t exist). [/QUOTE] I’m sure it exists, but it’s probably quite difficult to find. Questions like this are not politically correct, after all. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/18 "2007-10-26T20:59:00Z")
> [@Evil One](#): > > I’m sure it exists, but it’s probably quite difficult to find. Questions like this are not politically correct, after all. "“Probably quite difficult to find”? :rolleyes: Oh for heaven’s **sake** , people. The government itself has statistics out the wazoo on this very issue. To find them, you merely need to know what you’re talking about. For example, you need to know that the actual name of the government assistance program that most people mean when they say “welfare” is “Temporary Assistance for Needy Families”, or TANF. To anybody possessing even that minimal amount of data (rather than content-free ill-informed speculations about the suppression of “politically incorrect” information), it is perfectly simple to find statistics about various characteristics of welfare recipients including their racial categories, such as [this report from the Department of Health and Human Services](http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/ofa/character/FY2001/characteristics.htm#_Toc25546989): > [@](#): > > Ethnic/Racial Composition of Families > > The racial composition of welfare families has changed substantially over the past ten years. In FY 1992, it was 39 percent white, 37 percent African-American, and 18 percent Hispanic. In FY 2001, however, it was 30 percent white, 39 percent African-American, and 26 percent Hispanic. Viewed over the decade, there has been a shift from white to Hispanic families, which is consistent with broader population trends. This shift has been accelerated since FY 1996 and is particularly pronounced in California, New York, and Texas. Thus, in FY 2001, 70 percent of all Hispanic welfare families were in three large States (California, New York and Texas), as compared to 65 percent in FY 1996. In California, the proportion of Hispanic families increased to 49 percent in FY 2001 from 38 percent in FY 1996. In addition, the proportion of African- American families has trended up slightly since FY 1996, following a decline that preceded FY 1996. The result of these changes is that over the past decade the proportion of welfare families that are minorities has increased from three-fifths to just over two-thirds, primarily driven by the relative growth in Hispanic families. See the table in the linked article for more detail. And ease up on the paranoid conspiracy theories next time, 'mkay? ---
**Author:** ![T\_SQUARE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9de053/32.png) [@T\_SQUARE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/T_SQUARE)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/19 "2007-10-26T21:29:48Z")
There really isn’t any doubt that blacks tend to be poorer than whites, but the OP said “taking advantage of” welfare. I guess the answer depends on if he literally meant “taking advantage of” as in to utilize; like “Sally takes advantage of the gym at her office.” Or, if he meant taking advantage of as in cheating the system. I suppose like collecting welfare even if you have a secret income or something. As pointed out, the first one is easy. The government loves keeping statistics. I still maintain that cheaters by race is a much tougher nut to crack, because, at best, you would have fraud statistics, but those would only count the people who got caught. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2007, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077/20 "2007-10-26T23:25:18Z")
I’m wondering why the OP is focusing on stereotypes of “non-Caucasians”. Is the OP assuming that stereotypes against whites are all wrong, but there may be a grain of truth to stereotypes against other groups? Why limit the conversation to people of color? [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-the-non-caucasian-races-get-their-stereotypes-honest/424077.md?page=2)