The Challenge of Educating

In class last week we were challenged to try to explain to a typical white male that racism does still exist and that there are still inequalities between the races. Coming into this class, I had a bit of knowledge of the concepts we would be discussing in class. I also knew that one of our goals for the class would be to learn to educate others on racism and its current existence. The only way that we can try and change the way things are is to educate others about what we are learning. I didn’t realize, however, how hard it could actually be to explain to someone that racism does in fact exist and that simply in being a white person, you are a racist in this society. I understand the concepts that we have learned and being educated on the topic in multiple classes, I understand that racism does exist, that being white comes with a privilege that minority races do not have, that we categorize people automatically when we meet them, that the categories that we create then infer characteristics about a certain group. Without even realizing it, we automatically assign someone that we have just met into a category and assign certain characteristics to them without even getting to know them.

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Judging a Book by its Cover

Hogg (2006) states that “Social Identity theory is motivated by two processes, self enhancement and uncertainty reduction”, this has been mulling over and over in my mind all week. I am stuck on its contradiction; instead of being a freeing process that enhances and reduces uncertainty instead brings about and perpetuates all of the magnificent “isms”. We as human beings categorize everything and everyone without even thinking; especially ourselves, we cannot help it; it’s how we are designed. This idea started me thinking about alcoholism. I know this is an odd jump but bear with me for a minute.

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How can we fix it?

This week in class we discussed psychological reasonings behind prejudice and racism. Through a couple readings we discovered that humans categorize others through an implicit automatic mechanism. Without even realizing that we are doing so, we are judging a person within seconds of looking at them, placing them into pre-made categories that society helped us create throughout our lives. Stereotypes form these social categories, which then become further reinforced whenever we believe that we witness a person fulfilling a stereotype. On the bright side, this research shows that humans are not deliberately placing others in categories, or more specifically, whites are not deliberately demeaning blacks and other minorities as “less than” them. However, this psychological mechanism implies that human’s brains are hard-wired to act this way, and once there categories are formed, there’s nothing we can do about it.

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Addressing an Individual of Another Race

This past weekend I went to see the movie Red Tails in theaters which is the story of the a group of African American fighter pilots during World War II. They are faced with a great deal of racism as they are viewed to be not as capable to fight against the Germans in comparison to the other White pilots. Towards the end of the movie the African American pilots start to conquer many missions against the Germans, gaining the respect of the white pilots. One day they are at a bar together and and one of the African American pilots says to a White pilot, “White people turn red when they become angry, green when they are sick, and they are called yellow when they are cowards but you call us colored!” This leads the White pilot to then ask him what their race prefers to be called. The African American pilot informs him that they prefer to be referred to as “negro.”

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Sterotypes, Generalization, Prejudice and, at best, Bad Manners

Recently, I suffered a sprained shoulder and after a doctor’s visit, I was referred to physical therapy for help in rebuilding strength in my right shoulder. Let me say this right from the start, I am in no way, shape, or form a malingerer. So on my first visit, everything was about evaluating and trying to gather as much information about the injury determine the best treatment regimen for me. By the second visit, one is supposed to have a plan of treatment tailored to his or her injury explained and agreed to. Well, I got more than that on the second visit.

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Moving Past Discomfort and On to Change

When talking about systemic racism, Connie addressed us as a class inquiring about who was a racist. Being asked such a weighted question has truly stuck with me and I have continued to re-address it since that class. I also have another class with the same teacher; while teaching a lesson she used me as an example and asked the same question (are you a racist) infront of the whole class. I was completely aware that she was just trying to make a point and although she then explained to the class that I was a student in her contemporary racism class, I completely froze. Although I knew the answer to the question and had just answered it a couple of days before in our class, I found it extremely uncomfortable to give my answer, and to be honest almost could not answer. At first I was very confused about how I could answer this question in one class, yet was so uncomfortable and uneasy when asked this question in another.

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But Cleopatra was Beautiful!

I had a professor once who asked the class to close their eyes and envision the “perfect mate”. He then went around the room asking each student to describe their “dream” mate and marked it on the board. After every one was finished describing their vision he proceeded to explain to the class that every time he does this exercise, the “ideal” ends up being Caucasian, taller, blue eyes and light hair. While there were some votes for dark hair and eyes, his statement held true and the Caucasian, taller, blue eyes and light hair ideal won out; even with the black students. The professor then went about explaining American WASP culture and how deep its roots really delve. Tatum, 2007/1997, hit on this when on page 124, a student, once discovering that Cleopatra was black, exclaimed; “But Cleopatra was beautiful!”. Why is it that within our society we have been programmed to believe that being black, or “of color” (“of color” always makes me laugh; are all white people really “white” and void of color somehow pristine and pure?), is so unworthy of the word beauty?

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