Race to the Finish

Before I begin talking about this topic, I think I need to first establish a disclaimer: anything I talk about here, or really ever on this blog, unless otherwise indicated, is almost always a matter of my personal opinion and based on my experience. My interpretation, while functionally irrefutable, is also highly subjective. I ask that any reader realize such, and judge accordingly.

When discrimination is brought up, I immediately think of the history of the American south, the Rwandan genocide, or the indian caste system. These are all prime examples, I think, of discrimination. So compared to this, people talk about discrimination in America, my first reaction is that I have no idea what they're talking about. Well, The truth is, I discriminate. Against most people I run into. A lot. However, I don't discriminate on the basis of race. I don't think anything could be so errant and idiotic. I discriminate based on things like intelligence and mannerism. The truth is, time and energy are limited resources, and I like to hedge my bets on the people that I think both mean the most to me, and that I mean the most to. However, just because I internally discriminate in this way against a rude fast food employee who speaks to me with aggressive flippancy and shoves my change at me, the extent of my discrimination goes no further than a mental note that in the event of a zombie apocalypse, I wouldn't want him or her on my team. I still try to say thank you, make eye contact, and conduct myself in a generally amiable and proper manner. I don't think that, while "discriminate" is an ugly word, people object to this particular form of it. No, racial discrimination has a different flavor entirely. But the matter still remains that when people say they've discriminated against, they hardly ever mean that they were denied the right to vote, or that they were denied service in a store or restaurant, or even that someone spat at them or cursed at them, or stopped their child from playing with theirs on account of their race. Now, I'm sure that there are still instances of this going on, and the recent trend of reports of police brutality certainly prove this to be the point. But where I happen to be now, on a college campus in an affluent corner of the american northeast, so far as I am concerned, there is no racial discrimination of this type. However, people that I've talked to have said that there is discrimination here amongst the happy pretty stone buildings of this campus, and though, as a minority, I personally haven't felt much if any discrimination against myself, these people whom I've talked to, so far as I can tell, are reasonable, well meaning, intelligent, honest people. That leads me to wonder why it is that their conclusion is so startling different from mine. I see no one's civil rights or liberties being infringed on, I see no segregated bathrooms or drinking fountains, a great number of people that I run into on a daily basis are minorities, and they seem to be doing well enough. This leads me to conclude that the claim that racist discrimination is still a problem is invalid, at least for this place and this time.

I don't want to do that, because while it would be easy for me to dismiss their claims as the byproducts of narcissistic acrimonious pedantry, I do respect them as people and friends, and I very much want to respect their views; I think that that alone is enough premise to warrant a little more consideration. So in an effort to understand their claim, I decided to really look at the kind of actions that they find themselves subject to, that they label racial discrimination. And I found that what they mostly referred to was a very real phenomenon not of anything like denial of rights, but rather a separation between people of different backgrounds. When I say different backgrounds, I mean, of course, race, but also things like socioeconomic status, as well as customs, traditions, and upbringings. As diverse as this can sound, I think it's well recognized that there is a correlation between race and these other things. And while it certainly bears to mention that these other issues warrant address and solving on their own, the one I will continue to pursue here is the matter of race. The separations caused by race are a real issue, because if a person observes that everyone of their skin color or physical appearance is isolating themselves from the larger collective, they are more likely to do so. Once they do so, they are likely to be expected to do so, which leads to them being encouraged to do so. Given America's history of not being so nice to certain minorities, for instance, African Americans, it is no small wonder that this separation is perceived to be vestigial of that time and mode of thinking. Especially if a child grows up in such an environment, these minorities are in effect socially conditioned to accept this as a fact, a status quo that they are expected to follow and fear the repercussions of deviating from. This expectation leads to adherence, and adherences perpetuates the separation. Separation is a problem, because in many ways, self-segregation is no better than segregation. When a group of people share such an identity as a common minority race, it's difficult for people outside that race to see past that and very easy for them to dismiss them for it. While individually, these people may be recognized in conversation to be the fine, upstanding human beings that they actually are, when they are seen together, the are slapped with the label of racial identity. Once this happens often enough and for long enough, this sense of being labeled transcends the social behavior from whence it came, and people are often seen as only their race, and thus are still treated as isolated even when they're not actively isolating themselves. This is the racial discrimination that people are facing today. It's not being condemned to sit at the back of the bus anymore, it's being condemned to sit alone. And that is a real problem.

To combat this, one must first distinguish the fundamental differences between these types of discrimination. Whereas the first kind, let's call institutional discrimination, is perpetuated by social creed and often by governments (officially or unofficially), who if not out right support it, enable it by turning a blind eye to the issue. Institutional discrimination often takes the form of concrete denial of rights, different treatments and opportunities for the groups involved, and dismissal of human integrity on the count of race. The discrimination I described earlier, the discrimination of today, let's call implicit discrimination. This is often takes the form of social norms, perpetuation by figures of authority, such as teachers and administration (by the turning of a blind eye to these issues), different opportunities for the parties involved, and a dismissal of a person's human qualities on account of their race. Seems similar doesn't it? Startlingly so. However I have found that the biggest difference is this: institutional racial discrimination is a product of hatred, and implicit racial discrimination is a product of fear. There is no stronger human impulse than the urge to fear things that are different from what you're comfortable with, and more so different from yourself. It's no small wonder, then that in this day and age, when so much emphasis is put by nearly every society on clothing, and hairstyle, and general matters of appearance, that that's all we often end up seeing. After all, skin is only skin deep. The matter here is not to try to overcome this racial divide and shallow perception by combating hatred. In many a judicial case, crimes perpetuated by racism are often classified as a "hate crime". Judicial rulings, laws, prosecutions, and in general the judicial and legislative systems of government are effective ways of dealing with hatred. That's not to say that they can stop anyone from feeling hate. One of the side effects of living in a country with freedoms is that anyone has the right to be a bigoted racist if they want. The laws, however, can prosecute and ensure that no bodily or civic harm manifests from that. But like hatred, everyone is free to fear, and there's no authoritative figure that can really influence that to an effective degree. I believe that the way to combat this fear is through fostering personal relations between people from which we have nothing to fear from except fear itself, i.e. people simply different from us. If we want to solve the problem of implicit racism, we need to create a society that doesn't value how someone's hair looks, what clothes they wear, how big their biceps or how slender their legs are. There needs to be a society that sees people as first and foremost human. These qualities of physical appearance should not be understood to be diminishing of human worth, but rather additive to it. Nothing about how a person looks, speaks, lives, eats should change the fact that they are fundamentally human, and while they may not make the short list for your zombie survival team, they should make the long list of brothers and sisters in humanity.

Family

When someone is asked who are the people they love, family members will almost always be named. Most commonly a parent, but quite often a sibling, uncle, aunt, or grandparent will appear too. From my limited exposure to the world, this seems to be the case regardless of culture and creed. Everywhere you go, there is not only this understanding of more or less what a family is, but also that you should love them. I don't believe that anyone is explicitly taught that they should have a family and love them.

A family, typialy, contains an ableistic and temporal hierarchy between a "parent" generation and an "offspring" generation. At the beginning of their lives, the members of the offspring generation are entirely dependent, more often than not on the parent generation. Throughout their upbringing, the parents provide the offspring with more than just care and materialistic provision, but rather with characteristics that differ from parental unit to parental unit. Things like moralistic values, personality traits, arguably even sense of humor. Regardless of genetic predisposition, most commonly aided by the nature of the biological parenthood, these qualities and characteristics are undeniably exposed to and often imbued in the offspring. In this way, the keeping and raising of a family can seem entirely narcissistic, i.e. you only care for others under the condition that they are very much like you, and that their preservation is in essence tantamount to yours. Many a scientific mind would probably explain why so many animals across so many branches of the phylogenetic tree exhibit familial behavior. However, I speak here not of the lions, the wildebeests, and the swans. I speak of humankind. We, with our artificial shells of concrete and bureaucracy have in many ways transcended the need for simple food and shelter, and yet the family is still as integral a part of our civilization as ever. In a the pseudo-welfare state of this country at least, there are many places where one can find the means of physical provision. However, that is not enough. The need for family is more than the needs for physical things.

I firmly believe that within each human being, there are two impulses- an impulse to good and an impulse to evil (a yetzer hatov and yetzer hara, if you will). The impulse to evil thrives in differences and isolation. Consider the atrocities that have been committed when people are divided into "us" and "them", or blended into the camouflage of anonymity. When looking at the differences between another human and you, it's easy to disregard their humanity, and thus easier to no longer treat them the way you otherwise would. Conversely, the impulse to good dwells in seeking those common bonds between all mankind, to realize the fears and loves in tumultuous conflict inside each beating heart. Seeing this is what can make us kind and loving, human and humane. There in the family, is one of the deepest manifestations of this phenomenon. Because the people in our family are often so like us and we are in a position to fully realize that, our impulse to good is obstinately prodded. To look at a family member and their similarities to you is to not only acknowledge their mutual humanity, but to see your humanity in them. What they are, who they are, their dreams and desires, are undeniably commensurate to your own. How then, could you not want to be the best you can possibly be to them? How could you not want to be excellent? How could you not love them? Our families are more than arbitrary groups of people boxed in by societal utilitarianism and expectation. They are the the greatest testament to the human capacity of love that we can possibly find. The love that we want to be offered and offer ourselves is exactly the love that we have a chance to give to those who are the closest to us.