A Summary of “The Death of the Profane” Patricia J. Williams; Fields of Reading pgs 101-106 In the article “The Death of the Profane” Patricia J. Williams indicates that people are perceptibly judged by their race even though racism is not stated. Williams indirectly points out that even the buzzers are used as a method to regulate customer’s race which consequently states that some people’s presence is not desired in some establishments. The author uses her personal experience to push the reader to see how racism is a present issue… Williams, a black woman, New York City attorney, narrates an incident where she was victim of racism.
Two Saturdays before Christmas, at one o’clock in the afternoon, she went shopping and an attendant from Benetton’s store, “a white teenager wearing running shoes and feasting bubble gum”; as she describes, stopped her from shopping at a Benetton’s store. The guy didn’t let her in when she pushed the buzzer expecting acceptance. Throughout her essay she offers us three renditions of the same story trying to heal the madness that boy caused on her. The first technique she used was to type up as much as she could about the incident that just happened to her.
After the story was typed she made a big poster of it and stuck it in front of the store which she had been prohibited to enter. On the other hand, later on in her essay, she says she was criticized by a law professor for her act. The second version she put out a few months later. She made up an essay amounting up her feelings about being excluded from Benetton’s. After her essay was done, she received its first edition. It was all messed up; they changed her words.
The Essay on Retail Racism Store Black Customers
Racial profiling is present in every facet of American life today. Minority groups, especially African Americans are the primary victims of this deplorable act. The beauty of racial profiling is that in any given incident, its practitioners can always claim that it was just a coincidence that the victim was a minority. Racial profiling is a practice that should be eradicated from the face of earth ...
They kind of transformed her fury paper into a simple declaration. Her words were different. Then when she received its second edition she found out that whatever she wrote in reference to the Benetton’s store was cut out of the paper. Because according to the editors it was defamatory, therefore they were afraid of being sued. When her paper was finally sent to press they took off all the reference to her race which made her very angry since her essay would mean nothing without the description of her race.
According to her it took out the sense of the story and left an opening for the reader to fill with whatever their clever minds thought of it. The third “telling of her story” was when she retold this incident in a “law school conference on Equality and Difference.” She made a speech about the condition of the blacks; their difficulty to get hired and to maintain in the job. How they ” ve been humiliated. And, specially, how the blacks are victims of racism and it is usually done with a smile, what she calls neutrality. Williams talks about this incident anytime she is too tired to come up with a new example to her speech. Even though her story is a good example of how racism is present in our days, she is not fair enough to discuss or even understand the boy’s side.
She was not able to listen to the guy’s version.
