Far from being "unstructured", I think this is an obvious, yet overlooked, point clearly explained. Pre-emptive "stop and search" policing reinforces stereotypes and radicalises people who would not consider themselves within the "profile". There are countless psychological studies showing that when people are divided into "groups" or "profiles" it reinforces the normative qualities that the members of the group are supposed to possess. Needless to say it is far easier to separate people by the colour of their skin or sex rather than by examining whether or not a given person is likely to possess a bomb. The part about statistics also confuses me. Perhaps this superficial measure whether they have stopped equal numbers of "black" and "white" people is intended to disguise the fact that every stop and search undertaken without good reason is a prima facie violation of liberty?
Commenting by HaloScan
