The truth behind racism

[DaMulder]

The whole concept of racism always seemed strange to me. It did not make much sense to me why people with different languages and cultures should be treated differently. By now I am a but wiser and KNOW that the simple idea of racism is simply ridiculous.

I am not trying to start a debate about racism here (so don't move this threat please ;) ). I just want to explain what racism really is and why it exists and finally what we can do about it:

It is a completely normal natural behavior not to trust strangers, especially when they look very different. It has been like that since the times of the Neanderthals! When in those days one tribe got to meet another (and usually the tribes lived several walking-hours apart from each other) of course they were suspicious at first. These people looked different. Their language sounded a bit different and their habits were not quite normal as well. And these were just 2 tribes from the same area not trusting each other! Imagine what it must have been like when the European tribes saw the first colored people in Europe around 3000 years ago!
So racism is not more than this fear of things that are different. It is not so much fear as distrust though. I would never come to think of blaming anyone for not trusting someone who looks completely different and doesn't even speak the same language. Of course it creates distrust!
BUT there is one other very important reason for racism: It makes us feel better about ourselves! I am generally talking about the western world here (like UK, USA, most of Europe) where we live comparably excellent lives. Racism in these kinds of society is almost always created by the feeling of insufficiency of single individuals. That's why many unemployed people turn to racism and right-wing ideas. They think that foreigners take away their jobs and steal their social allowance! I also know that many people reading this think like that. And again, who can blame them? It is so much easier to blame a minority that nobody really trusts anyway than blaming yourself for your own situation!
This goes hand in hand with the kind of racism that is simply based on ignorance and stupidity. People were told by someone that black people steal and rape white girls all the time and the person hearing it might simply not be smart enough to question this. And he never quite trusted black people anyway.

Now what are we to do about it?

First of all: Foreigners do not steal away money, space, jobs or houses!
No western country is even near their maximum population and all the countries have laws that give advantages to local people compared to foreigners. A good example is Germany where the biggest reason for racism is unemployment. The unemployed say that foreigners steal their jobs away. This is simply not true because in Germany every available job has to be offered to a German person first and when he or she turns it down it will be offered to immigrants! These kinds of systems work in almost every country.

To help the racism that is caused by plain ignorance all you need to do is give these people a chance to get to know people from other cultures. These people use racism and fascism because they think it is cool. I remember a guy I met on the bus before and he told me how he once stabbed a gay Pakistani and he seemed to be really proud of it. I have no idea if anything he said was true but I couldn't help but feel sorry for this person. He was just 18 and already his view of the world was completely fucked up. I don't think he will ever get a chance to integrate into real society as his environment limits his possibilities to hate and violence. This kind of racism is relatively easy to overcome anyway.

But the strongest argument against racism is that is simply does not make any sense! Every living thing on earth is nothing more than a bunch of genes trying to reproduce. In the case of humans our genes are 99.5% identical in everyone of us! So if we are all build the same way, how can we divide into races anyway? Well, apparently the looks are enough to separate the human race into groups. Does that seem a bit superficial to you? I wonder why...
But sadly it is more than that. Our skin color and shape of the eyes and similar racial separators gives us a feeling of togetherness. It is some kind of team feeling if you wanna call it that. We grow up together as a team and stick together. When someone who looks different wants to join this team but doesn't even speak the official team language fluently he will have a hard time fitting in. You can guess what it all comes down to: Distrust.
The team is nothing more than an analogue for society. What we are not willing to understand is that a person's character has got absolutely nothing to do with race. It is only based on their environment and to a big extend on childhood experiences. A white person growing up in western Africa in a black family will not consider himself as a white person. He will be African no matter what he looks like. He will have to cope with racism himself but I know that racism can be overcome.



THERE ARE FUCKED UP PEOPLE IN EVERY RACE.

This seems like a very basic statement but if people would truly understand this then there would be no more racism in this world.

All I can say is that personally I enjoy the cultural diversity of different races. Of course people from different countries are a bit different. But this is only because they grew up in other countries with different cultures, values and societies. To some extend I am glad that racism is a solvable problem as the great majority of my friends is Asian. And I have been the only western guy in a huge group of Asians and nobody cared! I didn't actually notice that I was different from them until somebody asked me if I feel weird being the only westerner.

Finally there is a very famous quote by Fat Mike of NOFX:
"I take responsibility for what I've done, but not for who I am"


Phil

[Guest]

DaMulder, you are a racist that is in denial

DaMulder =












hehe j/k

[Araviel]

^that wasn't very funny

A good post, DaMulder, and very correct you are. Never understood the racism myself, it just seems too stupid to judge people by their skin colour, I never think about it when talking to folks...
Unfortunatly it has come a part of our world, and it sucks.
As for the genes, I actually think theres 99,8% similar genes in us, and the rest 0,2% is for seperating the genders (yes, we had nature science today...!) think there are like 0,001 % or somet, that makes the races...anyways, who cares, we're part of one race, humans. Lets trya nd stick together as humans as well.

[csmakio::]

that post is to long to read im lazy

to sum things up for me racism sucks, everyone needs to get along i have alot of minority friends.

[DaMulder]

To Araviel:
Thanks for your comment on the picture. I agree with "not funny".

And you were right about the genes. Well, my last real biology class was years ago so I forgot the details... But anyway:
As you said humans should try and stick together and accept that we are all the same, just some of us look different!


To cmakio:
Yeah, you pretty much got the point there!

Here is another try of making is shorter:

- Racism is based on mistrust because we don't trust people who look are different

- Racism can be avoided by getting to know other cultures

- Racism based on ignorance is not evil because the racists simply don't know better

Again my favorite quote ;) :
I take responsibility for what I've done, but not for who I am"

And
THERE ARE FUCKED UP PEOPLE IN EVERY RACE




Phil

[Daemos]

THERE ARE FUCKED UP PEOPLE IN EVERY RACE

Agreed. An we get an example of that every five minutes.

[Yukupo]

There isn't much more for me to add to this. So I was reading this article today about that school in Little Rock. Where a black girl wanted to go to school there and the mobs were saying horrible things. I just couldn't understand. I looked at that mob of people tormenting her, and wondering if they were actually using their brains? Probably not a common thing to use, I'm sure.

Well another good post DaMulder! There's nothing to debate about here.

[Mr. Frozen]

Yea, reacisim is pretty stupid.

We are all people, the color of your skin doesnt affect your thought pattern.

Note: I didnt bother to read that post either cause it was too long for me to read right now.

[shredder]

i too didnt finish phil's novel
someone prolly already said this but...
one word for racism...ignorance
one word for phil SUMMARIZE!


(im sure it was a good post tho )

[Yukupo]

He did summarize though, shredder. In his second post. (Though you really should read his whole post.)

Another thing I forgot to add. Racism will never go away. As long as there are other races, it will not stop. Sure the human race can unite more and more into one race that is tolerant of itself, but once you throw a new race into the mix, boom! I doubt there is an end to the diversity of races in this universe.

If a group of amphibious beings tried to take over Earth, would you trust another group of the same life that said they came in peace afterwards? Even if they explained that the beings trying to take over were not allied with them? Even after years of working together people will still be untrustworthy of them. (Even assuming there wasn't an invasion beforehand!) They will use all the film library of space aliens to warp their minds into thinking the aliens are evil.

I doubt racism will ever cease. (I know I said I had nothing to debate about, but I forgot about this point.)

And of course, the cycle will continue!

[shredder]

^^^ true true

thing is, races are groupes of ppl who all share a very specific 'quality '(lack of better word...) , say... religion that will pit them against other races. like the isralis and the arabs fo example... so there willl always be conflicts....

MAN! i swear i have a better grasp on this than my shitty vocabulary conveys...


:?


oh, and sry i neglected to read ur full post it was worth my time

[DaMulder]

First and most of all: Thanks to everyone who took the time to read the whole thing. I know my essays keep getting longer but I think that is just natural development ;)

Shredder: I do believe you understand this concept although you might not be able to express it too clearly!

Yukio:
Although it seemed like a wierd example at first I think you might be totally right about what you said! But then on the other hand this essay was written on the social aspect, not the philosophical and therefore I didn't really consider aliens and other things that are not part of the present problem. Still you have a very valid point there!

Still, as an optimist who believes he has many of the world's issues figured out I know that racism could easily be stopped if any serious effort was ever made. At least earthly racism!
The campaigns on racism we have nowadays only tell us about violence against ethnic minorities (which already is horrible) and tries to very carefully support integration of immigrants. But the way these campaigns are made even underlines the differences between the races.
It's worst in the USA where 2 white guys can beat each other into a bloody pulp but as long as they both agreed to fight there will not even be any police involved. Now change one of the white guys into an african american. They might have agreed to fight but if anyone sees this happening the police will come and the white guy will go to jail for committing a hate crime! And this kind of unequal behaviour makes is difficult to overcome racism. It actually supports racial thinking...

But still I believe that with the right kind of education at least the racism caused by ignorance can be stopped! I will keep trying!


Phil


P.S. I really hope that I can actually change only one persons mind with what I am writing here. If I can open one mind it was worth writing the whole thing!

[Yukupo]

Oh I fully agree that at least the current state of racism can be stopped. And yes, I definitly have noticed that the issue of racism is still seperating the races. As you said, if it's two of one race, it's just violence, but if it's mixed races, it's a hate crime. In fact, it's rarely that! If it's an asian guy and a black guy, I don't think they would call that a hate crime. It seems that all the years of oppression the white race has put on others is closing in with revenge. I just don't like where it's going.

Actually it's the same with sexism. Ever notice on television how they can make fun of men all they want, but the second they make fun of women it's sexism? They can have men getting hurt on television all the time and it's funny. A woman gets hurt; sexism.

People. Should. Just. Stop. And. Think.

[DaMulder]

Oh yeah... Very true!

Sad but true...


Not much to add here for me except that it is scary how the white race is not even the biggest one in the world as most people in the world are asian still the white race is seen as "normal". That's why I don't like considering myself white and that's also why I love the song "Don't call me white" by NOFX (again !). This song can simply express my feeling towards racism.

About sexism: Very very good point there. I guess I will write about Sexism at some point as well!

Phil

[Amin]

DaMulder, with all your knowledge of social, cultural, moral aspects to life, i reckon you should take up A level general studies . You'd get an A no probs. Anyway yeah good post. I agree with most of the stuff you say on these boards, seem like you've got your head screwed on.