The two articles, Ascher Lazear On compassion and Brent Staples Just walk on by: Black men and public space, are two essays that stand as a perfect societal mirror that reflects the treatment of black people in America and our of compassion for the poor. At its core, Staples gives a good description of the treatment and the backdated stereotype directed at people of colour in America. In his essay, he shows that even though it goes unsaid, racial profiling and discrimination still exists. Ascher, on the other hand, asks the fundamental questions to those that show compassion. She does this by taking a keen look at how the homeless in New York and other cities are treated. At the core of her discussion is the question, are gifts of compassion really as compassionate or are they given by coercion, blackmail or just fear?
At the beginning of the essay, Ascher skillfully draws the audience through well thought-out scenes that occur in our day to day lives and uses them to pose these specific and fundamental questions. Take an example of the first scene. A white woman hands out a dollar to a haggard homeless man at a crossing. Although the man hesitates to take the bill, the woman still hands it to him while holding her baby stroller tighter. Ascher poses “was it fear or compassion that motivated the gift?” This is a simple question yet one that elementary tackles how daily-society relates to the poor and the homeless. A similar perspective is brought in by Staples in his essay. His is a description of a personal journey to help the reader understand the effect his color and appearance have on his immediate public environment. Through imagery, he is able to show the readers the daily struggles of an average black man.
The two show a contrasting perspective of a white woman and the struggles of a black man and the stereotype both are faced with. On one hand, a polite black man who would not hurt a fly as described by Staples is deemed a threat due to how he looks(Staples). Two events in Staples journey bring out the stereotype in society and makes the reader feel sympathy for the average black man trapped in a racial maze they cannot escape. Staples writes of a day he was greeted by an “enormous red Doberman pinscher” when going to write an article about a jewelry shop(Stapes). His trouble is compounded by the fact that the author is a tall and visibly large man. The essay does recognize the source of fear among white women and the stereotype that surrounds young black men while at the same time making the reader empathize with the hardship faced by the young men.
As Staples openly admits, he has got accustomed to people walking on the other side of the road when they see him. Or as he calls it, “ the standard unpleasantries with policemen, doormen, bouncers, cab drivers and others”. In fact, the author has been reduced to a victim in the event troublesome people are screened.
The fear felt by the white woman in Ascher ’s essay is not misplaced. In fact, Staples puts it plainly as being an “accomplice of tyranny”(Staples). The woman in the alley makes a hasty getaway after seeing him on the streets. The diction shows the lengths white women will go in order to protect themselves and makes the reader recognize their own daily mistakes and prejudices. The quick getaway shows both sides of the coin. The fear in the woman for fear of being mugged and the hurt the innocent young man has to go through. His troubles also extend to daily activities such as crossing a road. For example, the thunk, thunk, thunk as people lock their doors for the fear of being mugged.
In Modern America, such fear is as a result of the higher rates of crime and incarceration in black communities. According to the Stanford Center on Poverty, on average, people of color are 5 times more likely to go to prison than white people. ( Assari and Shervin 223).
Ascher is of the school of thinking that compassion is learned rather than being inborn. According to her, it is “ learned by having adversity at our windows, coming through the gates of our yards, the walls of our towns, adversity that becomes so familiar that we begin to identify and empathize with it”(Ascher). She introduces the black man who by the description looks homeless.
Although the man did not ask for money, the white woman is compelled to hand over a note either out of compassion or fear. Whichever the case, the white woman recognizes poverty and need and hands over the bill. The anecdote describes the actions of the French owner of a food joint giving a smelly homeless man a coffee and a small bag of “yesterday’s Bread”(Ascher). She proceeds to ask the same societal questions of whether these actions are fueled by pity compulsion or explosion.
The contrast in the American society is clearly displayed in Manhattan where “ladies in high-heeled shoes pick their way through poverty and madness” Amidst all the increasing population, there is a concurrent increase in poor people and the homeless that remind us of how good we have it. “Yesterday's bread? Today’s croissant?”(Ascher) is a stark contrast to the ever-increasing complaints of cocktail parties.
Young black males are brought up and often educated in areas prone to more violence and crime making them more likely to commit a crime towards women(Short and James 14). Although that is the case, the author wonders why that relates and directly changes the look and feel of his daily life despite the fact that he is innocent. He actually admits that much of the fear streams from violence being perpetrated against women. According to Staples “women are particularly vulnerable to street violence, and young black males are drastically overrepresented among the perpetrators of that violence,"(Staples).
The examples presented in both stories possess a similarity in the fact that all interested parties handle the situations with calm as the final outcome. Despite the misplaced fear or lack thereof, the white woman in Ascher's essay plays her part perfectly to make the “transaction’ as smooth as possible. The French woman even hurries from the kitchen on sighting the dirty and smelling homeless man. To both, offering a small gift or a token in either fear or compassion hastens the problem the individual faces without going to the root of the problem. Staples has also taken a keen interest in making people around him feel less threated. He has taken it upon himself to even whistle melodies from Vivaldi and Beethoven in an effort to make other pedestrians feel at ease(Staples).
This is a challenge faced by all men and especially men of color. He writes, “Black men trade tales like this all the time.” This is when he describes a horrible experience told by a friend. To him, skin color often works as an inconvenience in particular when in his casuals.
Staples manages to persuade the reader that to come to terms with the fact that not all black men want to cause harm. On the other hand, Ascher show just how the honest actions of a Mayor can be questioned and misrepresented in the face of raw humanity. Here, she shows the irony of a looming winter and the clamor of several organizations to protect themselves from the awareness and acceptance of poverty. In the real world, not moving the old and the homeless from the streets before winter would be cause for death among them.
Ascher summarises the spirit of both texts and diagnoses the lack of compassion and our treatment towards the homeless in modern society as an absence of a clear reminder of our humanity. Even before we get to see the scourge of poverty at our doors and windows, why can we not learn and appreciate compassion in other abstract manners such as plays and education as the ancient Greeks who were faced with the same problems as we are?