Racism Today
There is an underlying problem that is promoting racism. It is the fact that
a
lot of people believe, and try to make themselves believe, that racism no
longer
exists. Many people today live their lives oblivious to what is
happening in the
world around them, often trying to convince themselves that
racism is not a
problem in their world. Others know all about the problem,
but don’t really
realize that they themselves could possibly be adding to the
problem by
discriminating against someone else’s human rights, and at the
same time going
around saying how open-minded they are. One of the main
problems of racism is
that many people live in racist conditions, without
even seeing it. Oftentimes
its in their school, workplace, community, or even
in their own homes. People
often tell jokes with racist slurs, and while we
know not to laugh at ones about
blacks, it seems that ones about other races
like Chinese and Hispanic are okay.
We tell ourselves that they are just
jokes, but not to those who they are
ridiculing. We are all perpetrators of
this and we usually feel that these types
of jokes are harmless. They can be
harmless and maybe at times we even think
they are funny, but they are also
hurtful and degrading. Some of the biggest
racists are those who don’t even
know that they are, and even say that they
aren’t. These people are racist
because they cannot comprehend what is
happening and do not realize what they
are saying is racist. Until they come to
grips with this problem, in their
minds there is no problem. They say that they
are not racist, even when they
don’t hire the East Indian employee who was the
most qualified of the
candidates, even when the athletic team they coach
consists of all white
athletes. Often times these people feel that just because
a person is a
certain color or race, that they must be a thief or a criminal.
This is
very typical in today’s society and no one deserves to be prejudged
like
that. The prejudice of people in the world is disgusting. The worst part
of
it all is that they don’t even know that they are doing it, often
thinking
that it is just normal behavior. There are people that don’t realize
that they
are racist and then there are those people who are ignorant and
unaware of
racism in the world. They walk down the streets, through the
stores and working
at their job, completely oblivious. We don’t see what is
happening around us
because we don’t want to see it. If you take someone and
put them in the heart
of a racist area, would they notice the problems then
or would they still deny
or overlook the fact of racism? Those people who do
not see that racism is a
problem are almost as bad as the racists themselves.
This is not to be taken in
the wrong way; some people who ignore racism are
those people who are trying to
push racism out of their own lives and out of
the world. However, as long as we
have people who are unaware of the problem,
it will continue to thrive.