A/74/274 offered customer service, but because they were questioning why she was there. She also stated that: At the same time, I have numerous experiences where I am ignored or have to assert my position in line, as they skip over to the white person. I am sure that most black people can relate to the shopping experience where the teller drops your change into your hand from a height, while somewhat recoiling, and you see them place the change into the hand of the white customers. 25. These incidents reflect a series of stereotypes, expectations and entitlements that individual community members hold with respect to people of African descent. Each of the examples involves a person unknown to the complainant behaving as one normally would in particular public spaces. Yet, both the individual and the organizational representatives felt entitled to call the police or to police black bodies. This reflects the enduring power of stereotypes grounded in the historical exploitation of people of African descent, including the trafficking in enslaved Africans, colonization and the long-standing exploitation of black labour and livelihood. Social institutions, which developed in tandem with the modern nation -State and the modern human rights framework, are taught stereotyping generation after generation via the social conditioning of education, the media and community structures. Those stereotypes are reflected, codified and perpetuated in the social institutions, which, in turn, leads to the perpetuation of individual belief and expectation, in an endless cycle. 26. Negative racial stereotypes can have a profound personal impact on people of African descent. Racial profiling has a harmful effect on one ’s dignity. Victims sometimes lose their liberty, their connection with their families and communities and, in the most tragic cases, their lives. Racial profiling is associated with negative effects, including effects on individuals’ mental and physical health. The physiological and psychological impact of racism and discrimination is worth highlighting because those who endure discrimination every day often suffer higher rates of chronic disease. 11 Racial profiling contributes to barriers that prevent people of African descent from being able to achieve equal opportunity. Most importantly, it severely diminishes trust in public institutions and undermines the effectiveness and authority of many of those institutions. Racial stereotyping as political theatre: incitement to hatred and hate crimes 27. Political discourse and the exercise of State power may both habituate and reinforce long-standing racial prejudice. In politics, the deployment of racial stereotypes for political gain is becoming increasingly common and is particularly toxic. The rise of far-right political parties, the global financial crisis and longstanding fears about globalization and the dilution of national identity, coupled with the current movement of migrants and refugees, has resulted in strong anti-immigration backlash, the scapegoating of migrants, the stoking of racial prejudices and stereotypes, and violence against people of African descent. Political leaders have used these phenomena to seek power through appeals to racism, xenophobia, Afrophobia and nativism, which has had a devastating impact on people of African descent. 28. As the former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, recently cautioned: “We are growing accustomed to the stoking of __________________ 11 8/22 See American Psychological Association, “Physiological and psychological impact of racism and discrimination for African-Americans”. Available at https://www.apa.org/pi/oema/resources/ ethnicity-health/racism-stress. 19-13272