(From Africans Perspective)
Imagine living in a world where you are always judged by the color of your skin, where no one would never believe in you because you are called black, a person of color—even though black is technically not a color. It’s not as if their distrust and disbelieve in your abilities is based on your incompetence or anything related to your lack of excellence, but merely because of your skin color. And as a matter of fact, no matter how smart you think you are, the world would question your worth, undermine your efforts and regard you as inferior until you’ve got to proof them wrong by showing what you are made of. That was exactly what happened to Michael Jackson. For a long time, the MTV had refused to play songs made by black people even if the song was topping the chart. And to stretch it to the extreme, they never shown the black celebrities on the front cover of their magazines, only but the white celebrities. But that was in the early eighties when the concept of racism was at its peak. When everything in the world was seen as black or white. Living in such time in the world as a person of color was really nothing but toxic.
The Origin of Racism.
There are few elements that formulated the origin of racism which includes, variation in social status, divers in religions etc. You can remember the time when it was a mission to Christianize the whole world because, each religion of the world was fighting hard to establish dominance over others. By that time, it was globally legal to have ownership of those in other religions. So it was more of a religious battle using racism as a weapon but, little did they know that they were practicing racism until it was too late which escalated to become what it is today. This was made possible because at that time, it was globally acceptable for someone to own those in different faith or religion as slaves. That means, it was legal for Christians to have non-Christian as slaves, or Muslim to have non-Muslims as slave, and so on.
With this historical background, it is easy to clearly understand that slave trade stems from racism. Because if people never thought that they were better than others, they won’t try to make them look worse than they were by putting them in a state of servitude. For thousands of years, humans acknowledged the equality among men, but the concept of racism didn’t fully develop until the transatlantic slave trade in the 16th century. The transatlantic slave trade was a major phenomenon which elaborated the impact of racism in the world. Even when the slave trade was abolished and the slaves emancipated, the misty cloud of racism still lingered in the atmosphere of the world, the lynching, the oppression, the discrimination, and the racial injustice became prevalent. That was when the real stigmatization of inferiority towards the black race became overwhelming even until the silent protest in 28 July 1917, which was a silent march of about 10,000 African-American people along the fifth Avenue in New York City. And even after the silent protest was held, things didn’t seem to change well enough which led to several other protest including the one held in August 28 1963 in Washington attracting over quarter a million people. It was a historic march which was where Martin Luther King, Jr delivered his legendry speech, “I have a dream.”
What Racism Means to The Race
The concept of racism means different things to different people. To most white people, it may mean normal, while to most negroes, it means injustice. If you are white, you may not really know what it means to be black in a white man’s country. You may not really understand what it means when someone, a white person, promptly leaves the seat he was sitting as you showed up just because he didn’t want to sit next to a black person. Or what it means when you couldn’t easily sort for help in a social setting because everyone keeps avoiding you, or treating you with a certain level of disdain all because you are black. But don’t get it twisted, some black people are racist.
Whom to Blame for Racism
Now the problem is not the people, but the system which stems from the history behind the reason why there is the existence of racial injustice. When black is regarded as inferior, it is not necessarily because of the color — black as they called it, because technically, black is not a color and shouldn’t be regarded as inferior, because, most of the valuable things we have in the world today are black in color; the black opal, Carbonados, etc, but it is not about the color, but the history behind the black race. The problem with racism is not because of the mere skin color, it is way deeper than that. It’s because of the history behind the skin color, black.
The Psychological Effect of Racism in 21 Century
The impact of racism is beyond the physical stigma that it creates, but it’s bound to having some psychological effects on the its victims. If you are new in a country that practices racism, you wouldn’t even want to associate yourself with victims of racism, in other words, you would never want to be black, and you wouldn’t even want anyone to regard you as such.
21 Century Racism
Over the years, the concept of racism and its practice had taken a drastic change. The impacts that it creates over the people and the society in today’s world would not be compared to the ways it used to be in the 17th or 18th centuries. In the early centuries, the impacts of racism were more brutally overt and blatant, while in 21 Century, the effects were subtle yet dangerous which can have some tremendous negative effects on the mental health of its victims. And it has a name, “Systematic Racism, or institutional racism. It is a form of institutional discrimination that is based on race or ethnic group which supports a continued unfair advantage to some people and unfair and harmful treatment to others. This type of racism is evident in many institutions in most walk of life, that may be the reason why you were not employed even when you are qualified, while someone you know who is less qualified is gainfully employment. It could also be the same reason why most incompetent leaders would be elected over competent and well educated one.
In 21 Century, the black people as we know it may not be the only victims of racism in the world as it can happen to anybody depending on where they find themselves.
One of the effective ways to solve the problems of racism is to acknowledge the existence of racism by encouraging honest conversations about racism.
Approach the world with an open mind by understanding that we are all equal as human beings and there is no need for discrimination and segregation, while we also remember that it is only going to get better.
Please say no to racism.
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