Power-holders’ anxiety displays read as bias and reproduce the very inequality they fear

Evidence

Our argument is that when a person is in a position of power, their discomfort can have consequential effects for several reasons. First, the behavior associated with identity and racial anxiety is not dissimilar to the behavior associated with bias. So when a police officer, criminal defense attorney, prosecutor, or judge does not engage in eye contact, appears uncomfortable, and is avoidant, the person who is on the receiving end of the behavior may feel anxious that they are going to be treated differently than others because of their identity (Godsil & Richardson, 2017). — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 1372

Categorization

• XREF: This is the legal-institutional analog of the conviction-vs-measured-bias divergence: a well-intentioned official whose avoidant behavior reads as bias to the recipient. — connects to: Performance-measure bureaucracies deliberately spread anxiety to erode professional autonomy — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 2215
• QUESTION: How does behavioral-signal anxiety diverge from professed nonprejudice in institutional settings?
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law: A Definitive Look at…, 1372