You CAN Judge a Book by Its Cover

The process of using one's general characteristics to validate an action against them, also known as "profiling," has a negative connotation. That's because some in law enforcement have abused their authority in instances of illegal racial profiling whereby someone is stopped only because of their race. Some people now believe they're in danger of being stopped for "driving while black," for example, which would be an obvious injustice but, hopefully, not as prevalent as some fear.

But, profiling does not equal racial profiling and isn't illegal or even wrong. In fact, it can be helpful and, in some very important cases; necessary. The FBI's Behavioral Analysis Units use profiling everyday in order to solve an array of serious crimes. Conversely, we've all heard stories about how, in an effort to avoid profiling, airport security has detained grandmothers and children because they were the "7th" person in line. Meanwhile, those much more likely to be terrorists walk on through. A little profiling in those instances would have been helpful.

As a citizen with a family that, like all families, needs protection from criminals, I can tell you that stopping criminal activity is the priority. But, in law enforcement today, rather than profiling criminals, many police officers and, in some cases, entire police departments, use a "blanket policy" in deciding how to approach people or make traffic stops. In other words, they will stop anyone committing a violation. They do this for one or more of several reasons; they want to be fair, they want to generate revenue for their community, and/or they don't want to be accused of profiling. But, the traffic stop is a powerful tool in locating criminals, which I would like to think is a much higher priority than the revenue generating speeding tickets many officers are satisfied to write. If catching criminals is the priority, it would serve us much better if officers targeted their stops toward those most likely to be criminals. Of course, not everyone fits a profile. But, when you're attempting to locate the most terrorists or other criminals, wouldn't it make sense to look at those most likely to be criminals?

So, why do criminals look like criminals? I've been watching people now for about 50 years and, like everyone else observing human behavior, I've learned a lot about us. One thing I've noticed is that nearly all of us care about our appearance and that's what makes profiling work. We present to the world a persona that we want the world to see and, because of that, we can tell a lot about a person. People who dress and act like "rednecks," for example, probably are. No one else would want to look like a redneck. In the same way, people who aren't "criminals" likely wouldn't want anyone to think they are and would not knowingly dress or act in that way. The same is true of many types of people. So, when someone says, "You don't know anything about me," like I've heard countless times, he or she is only partly correct. Of course, there are some people, especially young people, who only dress and act the way they do because some star whom they admire dresses and acts that way. Of them I would say that admiring someone who wants everyone to believe they're a criminal is suspect in itself. A warning to those followers: Don't be holding dirty.

Another aspect of profiling is observing a person's associates. My mother used to say, "birds of a feather flock together," which means that people usually keep company with others similar to themselves. I've noticed that this is nearly always true. It's very similar to my wife's old proverb; "Show me your friends and I'll show you your future." These sayings are based on the truth people have been observing for years. But these old witticisms aren't always true. My mother also used to say, "You can't judge a book by its cover."