I participated in my philosophers walk with classmate, teammate and friend Jeff Espinal. The questions that I posed for discussion were, what do you think causes humans to be racist and discriminate amongst each other? Why do we feel the need to separate ourselves from others? Will this ever change…in our lifetime maybe? I stumbled upon this topic of racism and discrimination by just contemplating the state of the world today. I picked out the biggest flaws in society and figured this would be worth investigating. I ended up being correct, for this was an enjoyable and enlightening experience that helped me grow my understanding of a sensitive topic through honest dialogue.
Prior to the discussion, I was thinking this was a good, very relevant
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For example, When I presented my question, Jeff answered by saying that they start with a few people who want to make themselves feel superior to others and then others bandwagon with those few. We contemplated the possibility that one some people see others being discriminated against they capitalize on the situation of others being the valued and use it to forward their own lives. Unfortunately, we came to a conclusion that lots of discrimination and racism comes from misunderstandings and the errors in human nature. Humans are naturally drawn to others and we have a basic, primal need to feel safe and secure. This is problematic for relations with others because if we do not know or understand another person then we are going to put our guard up and distance ourselves from then rather than try to understand them. We also hypothesized that racism occurs because humans are too quick to judge other individuals and that we use racism as an excuse for not learning about other people/cultures. Following this pinnacle in the conversation we thought that when individuals hold nothing in common they tend to distance themselves from each other rather than find something to enjoy together. We looked at this on a micro level by analyzing our own lives. We understood that once you have a group of friends you tend not to venture out as much to meet new people. …show more content…
This being said, my mind was not changed on this topic but rather I was able to see multiple points of views by the end. Additionally, I could understand some roots of racism and discrimination. Jeff helped me to see multiple other sides of the argument, none of which I would have seen on my own without collaboration. I learned many new things but mainly I was just able to understand the idea of racism and discrimination much better. I found through my discussion that racism is a very petty and unnatural thing. Humans are not born to hate but rather are afraid of new things so to secure ourselves we push away those who we do not know or understand and keep our circles closed
We both agreed how uncanny it was the the Holocaust during WWII is so frequently mentioned and taught but other genocides all over the world have been completely ignored by the schooling system. This is another subtle form of racism because we choose to acknowledge the horrors that took place to a White race but refuse to see the horrors in everyone else. I hope more African Americans, Muslims, Hispanics, etc. choose to speak out the way John Metta did to start an uncomfortable, but much needed
Tim Wise’s lecture was very interesting and made me see a side to race that I haven’t seen before. Many things stood out to me throughout his lecture, one being his perspective on why the slogan now and days is “black lives matter” instead of “all lives matter.” He made the point that being white and have white lives matter is the norm for many but when it come to black people they are felt as being outside the norm. One thing that could be done to join these races together is finding a way to change it for “black lives matter” to “all lives matter.
The approach Jose Antonio Vargas had for this documentary is intriguing. His comment, “we talk about race a lot in this country, usually without you (white persons)”. As I ponder that statement what came to my mind was race is talked about within groups of the same race whatever that race might be. It seems we rarely can handle talking about the issues with those we have issues with. Yet it seems we love to talk about race or issues with people that have the same mindset or agree with our opinion. This in effect does not solve any problems or incorrect stereotypes it only feeds them.
Racial bias, defined as “unreasonably hostile feelings or opinions about a social group” by Dictionary.com in which the social groups are different races, has been a problem for a long time, and it still exsts today. People cannot ignore the truth that is being shoved in our faces on the media. There are multiple examples of racial bias in the criminal justice system. If you don't believe this, here are some statistics by the Huffington Post: In a California study, the ACLU found blacks three times more likely to be stopped than whites, African Americans are arrested for drug offenses at rates 2 to 11 times higher than whites stated in a May 2009 report by Human Rights Watch, the U.S. Sentencing Commission in March 2010 stated that, in the
As of 30 June 2006, the national rate of imprisonment for Indigenous Australians was 13 times higher than the rate for non-Indigenous Australians [ABS]. In modern society, there is an assumption that over-representation of Indigenous Australians in the criminal system is due to systemic bias. According to Snowball and Weatherburn (2006), systemic racism refers to any set of arrangements, procedures or rules that results in systemic unfairness to a particular ethnic or racial group. [REF2] Snowball and Weatherburn also found that there was some small ‘residual effect of race on sentencing’ which may suggest that ‘racial bias may influence the sentencing process even if its effects are only small’. [REF2]
Racism in its most general sense can be defined as “social practices which attribute merits or allocate values to members of racially categorized groups solely because of their ‘race’”.There are three aspects of racism personal prejudice; ideological racism, and institutional racism. Ideological racism, is where culture and biology comes together to rationalize and justify the superior position of a dominant culture. Institutional racism is where the institution produce policies and differences between different racial groups. Institutional racism includes hidden action between police and minorities. One of the hidden Institutional racism practices in law enforcement
One of the major issues in our world is racism. Racism affects almost everyone and it is never a positive thing. Racism has been around since the beginning of time. Even if you aren’t racist in any way, we all have been taught to subconsciously have a stereotype for every race. Whether it’s how the dress, act, what they eat, or how they talk, there is some form of stereotypes for everyone. Racism knows know race or gender, sometime in everyone’s life we have experienced racism whether it be silent or loud. A time which I experienced racism I was walking with my dad to this restaurant not far from my house. The people working there were all Hispanic, as that is the majority
This was a presentation that everyone can get something out of whether you are white, black, hispanic, and much more. I learned that it is important to have conversations that make you feel uncomfortable and weird. It is crucial that we talk about these issues especially racism because we live in a world that needs to be reminded of its past. Our society tries to run away from slavery by saying it's been illegal for hundreds of years, but we live with the consequences of slavery.
There was a time when I would shy away from an in-depth conversation about race and race relations in social situations. I would participate in class, when studying race and health disparities, however when stepped out of the classroom and converse amongst my peers, I became more reserved. There’s something about asking those hard questions and discussing disparities as a result of oppressions and transgressions which made me uncomfortable to talk about race outside of the structured, politically-correct world of academia. Often emotions overshadowed a constructive and empathetic discourse and as a result I would be reserved or sometimes avoided those conversations. However, it is a conversation that I need to be a part of.
Racism is as old as history that’s because it was known in history everyone was divided by race. This division had caused trouble because of how they treated each other or how the powerful treated the others. There are plenty of examples of this, but only one of them stands out in my book .The biggest most memorable discrimination is the one between the Americans and the African Americans. The African Americans were placed in the lower and below class by the Americans. Their relationship if there was any was known as master and slave, owner and property, and exterminator and vermin. Basically, life for them was the hard knock more like the eternity in hell.
Almost everyone has heard the famous hymn, “Jesus Loves the Little Children,” but not all understand the true meaning when it says, “Red, and yellow, black, and white, they are precious in His sight. Jesus loves the little children of the world.” The moment sin entered into the world, perfection no longer existed. This loss of perfection changed the way humans viewed each other. It made one ethnicity view another ethnicity as inferior, and in doing so, created what people now know of as racism. For centuries, racism has been a part of society, shaping the way humans view each other, but with the aid of Young Women 's Christian Association (YWCA) - Stand Against Racism, racial discrimination and injustice can be eliminated.
Throughout this course we have learned about many things, one in particular would be Racism. We have learned about many different types of racism along with examples of racism. Before I go into specific examples of racism that I have learn about in this class, I will first define and explain the differences between racism, prejudice or also known as bias, discrimination, race, and racist so there 's a clear understanding of why I picked the specific examples. The definition of racism that we learned in class would be an “Institutionalized system with disproportionate unjust outcomes for a particular race”. Prejudice or also known as bias was defined as “A negative feeling, opinion, or attitude toward a certain category or people” this would be an feeling with no action acted upon, where discrimination is defined as “Action or inaction toward a category of people” which would be acting on the negative feelings or opinions of a certain group. The definition for race is a “Social construct, but a lived reality” while a racist is “Discrimination based on the category of race”. (Disadvantage privilege notes, 2016)
The reason to select this topic was because all of us in the group have gone through racism and discrimination in one way or the other. It hurts in many ways when you do not get equal opportunity and chances because of the color of your skin. This is unfair on all the levels. Every human deserves equal rights. The way we are deceived by other people cannot decide the way we live. There have been multiple meetings at the UN that have been held to eliminate Racism. If there is no law as such, we do we want to follow such a tradition that gives nothing but a complex to the same human race as anyone else is. Racism has polarised and shrunken the society and doesn’t offer much to the minority groups. The main motive of our group behind choosing this topic was that we all have worked hard enough but we did not receive the kind of appreciation, we would have achieved if we were of
One of them that I found interesting was the idea of situational racism, which in his words is, “Using prejudice and stereotypes against selected people of color, often those that you dislike”. This type of racism is explored in “Do the Right Thing”, when Mookie confronts Pino about how he feels about famous black people. Mookie says, “All of your favorite people are so called niggers”, to which Pino replies, “It’s different. Magic (Johnson), Eddie (Murphy), Price are not niggers”. Thoughts like this are dangerous when viewing a group of people because it works to dehumanize the group by stripping them of what makes them who they are. If we view successful black people as not truly black, then we are discrediting that black people can do great things. If white ideals can’t even give black celebrities credit, then why would there be an expectation that white people would treat the average black person with respect? The fact that these questions still need answers is a reason to take action toward true equality for all. Personally, through introspection in this class I have questioned my preconceived notions of race and have been more mindful of how my thoughts can lead to action. This is the beauty of conversation: it can make you open up your mind to different thoughts. I feel this is what Mr. Deggans is working to do and what our class has been able to do in my
Signs of Racism in The Work Environment • No diversity in higher management positions. • No promotion or very little advancement for people of color. • Only non-minorities employees offered training for higher pay and advancement in the company. • Your evaluations never reflect your true value or work. • A significant differential in initial salaries and pay raises.