When the Hansberry family wanted to move into a wealthier area of Chicago, the neighborhood didn’t want them there because they were black. Although this is blatant (obvious) racism, they covered up their racism by saying things like, “Well, we want to avoid conflict, especially for you. It’s easier if we live with people of a similar cultural background.”
Explore a similar circumstance: one in which a racist idea is covered up by what seems to be nice ideas. Please don’t repeat ideas here. Also, feel free to disagree with one another.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
9 comments:
There are ways in which people who have racist intentions try to cover up their opinions with a story that sounds like a nice idea. For example, let's say there is an African-American kid who wants to try out for a soccer team that consists of all white kids. Parents, teammates, or even the coach may not like this idea simply because they are racist against blacks. There are many ways in which each of these groups of people could react to the situation, such as stating that, "He may feel out of place or uncomfortable if he is the only black person on the team", or something of the sort. Teammates could also have similar ideas to the parents involving giving the impression that they care about this black child's feelings, when only they are racist and do not want him on the team. Coaches could make up stories such as "There are already enough players on the team", or "He isn't good enough for the team." No matter which story is told to cover up their racist intentions, it will come off suspicious to most people and lying like this is always wrong to do, especially if they are lying to make themselves sound good when they actually have dark intentions and opinions.
Some people try to cover up their racism. For example, some Americans don’t want an African American as their President, so they cover up their racism by saying they don’t like how Obama is handling their payroll, capital gains and estate taxes or something of that matter. What they are really saying is they just don’t like him in general because he has a different skin color. Many people cover up their racism toward Obama by saying the “things” he is does is wrong, they don’t want to come forward and say that “he” is wrong, everything about him is wrong. But people resist and cover it up by just saying his ideas are wrong because other people who are listening to them would probably not be fond of them anymore.
Racism happens all around us and people try to cover it up with ideas that make it seem less racist. For example, during the years when segragation was making it way out of people's lives some kids and adalts still weren't happy about the African-American people. Kids at school would all hang out together and and when an African-American child would want to play in a game they would say "You wouldn't know how to play this game because you're black." Also, Adalts would be working at a certain job and would not hire blacks. They would tell them things like, "You wouldn't be able to handle this kind of work." or "Maybe this isn't the right job for you." So that they wouldn't have to hire and African-Americans.
racism always will exist, it is something that has been around and will continue to be around. simply racism is one persons ideas and you cant change 1 persons ideas so there fore it will always be around. there are poeple that dont want to change thier ideas but they still want to express them selfs with out being mean. One of the most common places that it would be is in gangs almost all of the gangs only select thier nationality they say this becase they are 'brothers' and it makes them stronger if they all are the same. james stewart the number one motocross/supercross racer in the world, not only is he the best he is black. james is the only professinal rider to be black. at most southern races when the riders would go to the starting gates he would hear many racist comments, when he is on the track he ooften gets the one finger wave. he doesnt let that get him down it just makes him preform better, many people would say when he was young that he should quit becasue the white people are better than blacks at riding. it just goes to show that racsism goes on ever where from profesinal atheletes to gang members and even in politics.
To Becca,
Yes, some people are racist and do not like President Obama. But others actually believe that the president is not qualified, and their intensions are not to be racist. It is horrible that because of past generations that now everyone who says something bad about another person is almost immediatley considered a racist. Even though it had nothing to do with skin color. This is just like what happened when a cop went to a house where he got a disturbance call, and arrested a black professor. He was called a racist even though he did not know that he was going to a house owned by a black man. But in some situations that could be false, and that the cop was a racist. But otherwise it is sad that everone is a racist for their views.
Racism will most likely last forever. In some cases, people are just openly racist to people's faces, but in other cases, people hide their true feelings with kind, insincere comments. The Hansberry family deals with the second example, when they move in to the wealthier parts of Chicago. There are many cover ups people have, like white kids all get in a group and a black kid comes by, they just ignore him or her.
To Gabby,
I completely agree with how the adults acted toward each other, by saying, "They wouldn't be able to handle the job," or saying, "They aren't right for the job." This way the black person asking for the job couldn't recognize the racism as easily. However, with the example with the kids, they wouldn't just say, "You wouldn't know how to play this game, because you're black." The kids would just say, "We already have enough people for this game." This way the kids wouldn't have to play with people they didn't want to, and adults wouldn't have to work with people they didn't want to, which is the same thing.
A similar circumstance in which a racist idea is covered up by what seems to be nice ideas is when for example in the 1920’s or 1930’s African Americans were required to be seated in the back of a bus while white Americans had been allowed to sit in the front seats. When an African American would ask why they had to sit in the back of the bus when a white person demanded to sit at the front of the bus many times they would answer that it was best for them to sit in the back of the bus to avoid feeling indifferent or uncomfortable in an environment of a different race and that African Americans should all sit together while the White Americans sit together to avoid any racist or ethnical conflict. Also similar conflicts at this time period had included signs or public areas that were restricted to African Americans. The public had used similar reasons such as that it was better for African Americans to have certain public rights and White people to also have certain public rights to stay around people with similar cultural backgrounds and feel safer, although it is not true.
People in the past, and even today, try to cover up their racist intentions with nice, caring opinions. For example, a white boy can be having a birthday party and wants to invite everyone in his class, even the African- American boy. Right before the invites are about to be sent out, the mom tells her son that she does not want the African- American to come to the party because she thinks it would be better for the boy. She tells her son that she doesn't want to see the African-American getting made fun of and doesn't want a conflict to occur. The child's mom knows that a problem won't occur over the boy, but because he is African-American she will do and say anything to make sure the boy doesn't show up at her son's party.
It is really disgusting when people try to cover up racism with nice comments like that. One example of that I recall was the genocide in Rwannda. The Bantu leaders tryed to make the genocide look good by blaming the crash of the president's plane on the Tutsi. By doing that, hundreds of thousands of people were killeed. Other nations tryed to help, but it wasn't enough. Almost no one in Rwannda oppossed this genocide and if they were then they were killed right then. Blaming the crash on the Tutsi really seemed to have covered up their racism so much, that they could be killed at anytime. People need to really stop covering up their racism.
Post a Comment