A/74/274 chronic stress from enduring racism and denialism leads to biological, psychological, cognitive and emotional harm. 36 53. Such negative racial stereotypes both reflect and perpetuate cultural stereotypes that justify denialism, diminished expectations and divestment from communities of African descent. Racial discrimination continues to be systemic and rooted in an economic model that denies meaningful and effective development to people of African descent globally and frequently justifies or neutralizes the historical and ongoing exploitation of their labour, land and natural resources. Racial disparities are apparent and obvious in many areas impacting human rights, including education, due process under the law, the rights of the child, health, and others. The ongoing racial disparities that exist with respect to people of African descent are often grounded in pervasive racial stereotypes that facilitate social acceptance (and sometimes even the expectation) of the racial disparity. Racial bias and stereotyping in the justice sector 54. Racial stereotyping in the criminal justice system is common and can distort perceptions of the facts and lead to miscarriages of justice, harsher sentencing, excessive use of force and re-victimization. 55. One of the most enduring stereotypes that has harmed people of African descent is the association of blackness with criminality. As stated on the website of the Equal Justice Initiative: These racial disparities in our criminal justice system are a legacy of our history of racial injustice… Slavery evolved into convict leasing, whereby African Americans were arrested for ‘crimes’ like loitering and forced to work in whiteowned businesses throughout the South. The decades of racial terror lynchings that followed slavery grafted onto the narrative of racial hierarchy a presumption of guilt and dangerousness, as whites defended vigilante violence against black people as necessary to protect their property, families and Southern way of life from black ‘criminals’. The presumption of guilt and dangerousness assigned to people of African descent has made minority communities particularly vulnerable to the unfair administration of criminal justice. 37 56. The transition from slavery to racial apartheid was particularly devastating for people of African descent. They faced racial terrorism and higher rates of incarceration. They were caricatured as innately savage, animalistic, destructive and criminal. Misconceptions and prejudices manufactured and disseminated through various channels, such as the media, have included references to the image of black males as “savages” and “brutes”. The negative term “thug” has also frequently been used. 57. The long-term consequences are evident in everyday police-civilian interactions. This process of dehumanization often leads many to view black men and black children as older and more fearsome and menacing than they are. Even at very young ages, black children are seen as less childlike, more culpable and less innocent. This pattern of misperception is troubling. Police officers are often exonerated for killing black civilians on the premise that they fired their weapons out of fear for their lives. This was evident in the 2014 killing in the United States of Dontre Hamilton, an unarmed black man in Milwaukee who was shot 14 times by Officer Christopher __________________ 36 37 19-13272 See Derald Wing Sue, Microaggressions in Everyday Life: Race, Gender and Sexual Orientation (Hoboken, New Jersey, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2010). Equal Justice Initiative, “Presumption of guilt”. Available at https://eji.org/racial-justice/ presumption-guilt. 15/22