Racism

Article 1 Racism in the West

In the first article, it talked all about how racism started in the west. It said how racism is more recent than we believe it to be. In ancient days they wanted the other races to be more like them because they thought they were greater. They just wanted them to believe in the same things and do the same things. They did not put them down because of who they were but rather tried to make them more like themselves because they believed they did it the right way. Because it was the west that started doing this to the darker skinned people, it soon evolved into today’s racism because people started thinking that they were less intelligent because they were not like them and made them lesser to the whites. Soon after the whites started using people with darker skin as slaves. They thought that did not have much of a purpose. This began spreading throughout the whole western world. Racism is a huge problem in today’s world. It has been the root of many wars in the past, including the Civil War between the American people. Racism was also the root of WW2.

Article 2 How Racist Are We?

This article starts out by them stating all of the racist thoughts that they have had. They tell us that no matter what, everyone is racist to a certain extent. Some of the racism we have is just stereotypes that we hear from people growing up.  Sometimes it is just because we do not think that they do as well as someone else could do it. In today’s society, it is racist to keep a black person from getting a job because they are not capable to do the job right. They go on saying that we sometimes judge a race based on what one person does. Racism in America is not anywhere close to as big of a problem as it is in other countries. In many of the Asian countries, they are very racist towards the other Asian countries. Racism in America has come a long way. It is still here but has evolved very much. Recent generations have come to accept other races much better than older generations. They go on to say that we need to look past the skin color. We need to start looking at what they have to offer.

Article 3 Cultural Bias for Racism

In this article, it talks about how these students studied about why racism is still alive. It says that most of what we see in our everyday life contributes to the problem. This includes TV, literature, movies, and radio. Not only is this true for racism, but also for sexism and ageism. We seem to develop our opinion about a whole group of people by seeing a few people. After developing a questionnaire, they found out that most of the prejudice that people have is gut level. They saw how certain words correlated with the different groups. Old usually correlated with the words lonely and wise. White correlated with greedy and successful and so on. It states that we should not always form our thoughts on people based on our gut. It is not always right. We need to see people as individuals rather than as a group. We have a right to not like a person but that doesn’t mean that we should base the whole group of people from something that one or two people did. We need to have control over our thoughts and have respect over all people.

Racism has always been around. It has been a problem for longer than any of us can remember. I believe that racism started in the west but is not just a western issue. Many different places have problems with racism as well. It started as a western concept but it is now culturally universal. Racism is a byproduct of western culture and media. First it started in the west. The media made it travel and made it way more a problem than it used to be. Racism started in the west with the white races. For example, while the ancient Greeks and Romans described other groups as “barbarous” and “savage,” they believed members of these groups could become “civilized.” This is how racism first started in history. It was not because they did not like people with their skin color, but rather that they needed to straighten them out with their ways. I believe that racism started in the ancient times when civilizations started discovering the other civilizations. “What matters most is whether someone is intelligent, capable, independent of mind, productive, honest...” This quote is how I believe everyone should be. It is not about the color of the skin but more about what they have inside and what they have to offer. “What is more important is your behavior, rather than your gut reaction.” We need to give people the benefit of the doubt. People need to be seen more as individuals than as a group. Racism is a problem in our society that needs to be defeated.