Posted on July 19, 2013

More U.S. Blacks Satisfied with How Society Treats Them, Poll Finds

Emily Alpert, Los Angeles Times, July 18, 2013

A new poll shows that black Americans have grown more upbeat about their treatment in society after the reelection of President Obama.

Earlier this summer, a record 47% said they were satisfied with how blacks were treated in the country — more than at any other time since Gallup started asking the question in 2001.

However, Gallup cautioned that the question was asked before George Zimmerman was acquitted in the killing of Trayvon Martin — an event that could dim that rising optimism. Civil rights leaders have called the controversial verdict a wake-up call to those who thought the election of a black president heralded a post-racial era.

The Zimmerman case “could prove to be a watershed event in how not just blacks, but all Americans, perceive society’s treatment of blacks today,” Gallup senior editor Lydia Saad wrote in a summary of the results. The research group surveyed more than 4,300 adults, including more than 1,000 black Americans, in June and early July.

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If the Gallup poll were done again this week, “I think sentiment would have been radically different,” said Shana Redmond, assistant professor of American studies and ethnicity at USC. She said the Zimmerman case, which centered on the killing of an unarmed black teenager, has made black Americans feel newly vulnerable.

Even before the Zimmerman verdict, more than half of black Americans remained dissatisfied with the treatment of black people, the Gallup poll showed. They were much more downbeat than whites and Latinos, a majority of whom said they were satisfied with how blacks were treated.

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