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The Importance Of Colorism: The Often Un-Ism

Decent Essays

Colorism: The Often Un-discussed “-ism” in America’s Workforce Affirmative Action policies are being revamped. The revamp is due to views on workforce diversity. Institutes are seeing the benefits having a miscellaneous environment can bring. An obstacle that comes with diversity is discrimination. Matthew Harrison looks at the issue that is over looked when discussing discrimination. Colorism.
Civil Rights Act, Title VII “prohibits employers from discriminating against employees”. Employers are not to discriminate on the grounds of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. Race is given more attention than others due to the history of America. Slavery has shaped poor race relations between the black and white communities of today. Most race relation issues are labeled “Black versus White” …show more content…

Harrison continues addressing discrimination within the application process. His findings in the Fair Employment Council show that “employers are likely to treat black applicants less favorably than white applicants”. Applicants can have similar qualities; education and interview well but their skin color is the determining factor.
The article wants to express that color is it’s on entity. Race is not always the issue. The complexion of an individual’s skin determines their acceptability. This “acceptability” causes inequality amongst the black community. Individuals with lighter skin tones are given opportunities that individuals of a darker tone are omitted from. Employers may not discriminate when it comes to race but the might when it comes to the appearance of an applicant.
Dr. Harrison goes into the history of colorism in the black community. During the slavery era, your skin color depicted your tasks. Darker skin slaves were given laboring task. Task that usually involved being out in the field. Lighter skin slaves were given more desirable task. This divide in labor based on skin color established the divide in the black community regarding

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