Can We Be Indifferent?

I was reading Carol’s post on discrimination and stereotypes in astonishment. In my interpretation, she equates stereotyping to a major avenue to social acceptance. In addition, she also questions the idea of censoring racially derogatory language because it does nothing but “makes [discrimination] invisible.” Personally I found the analysis in this post not completely compatible with my experience. Therefore, I feel compelled to offer a few of my thoughts on the same issues in response to Carol’s post.

At the beginning of her post, the writer analyzes a video clip from Eddy’s blog and concludes that “we all discriminate and stereotype at some point in our lives.” I am in agreement. Discrimination and stereotypes often appear as generalized or falsified assumptions against a certain social group that the public lacks knowledge of. Very well illustrated in the video, children are individuals who possess limited knowledge and life experience hence tend to offer definitive, inaccurate responses to photo portrayals based on unfiltered outside influences. Nevertheless, society as a whole mostly consists of sophisticated, mature adults with well established values. Different from children, adults tend to evaluate their actions and judgments based on continuous learning and experience accumulation. As a result, I fail to come to the writer’s assumption that people choose to “continue [their] ignorance even though [they] are given the choice to become more accepting.”

Additionally, in her example the writer acknowledges her active stereotyping and considers the reason being her family upbringing, which I found interesting. People inevitably shape their first impressions about society from their first school: home. Nevertheless I believe people’s worldviews and ideologies are constantly deconstructed and reconstructed as their knowledge and experiences grow. Therefore, I have doubts about the writer’s rationale behind her decision of continuing to stereotype given that she is in constant exposure to new, well researched ideas and knowledge in higher education. Moreover, I am personally disturbed by the writer’s explanation of her action as a way to be “normal” and “socially accepted.” It would be tragic if our society had come to a point where people must acquire social acceptance at the expense of other ethnic groups. Fortunately, we are not such a community. As college students, we have a responsibility to examine today’s racial reality in America more carefully and critically. With injustice and prejudice still haunting different communities, we must remind ourselves that ignorance is not a luxury America can afford.

Lastly, the writer expresses her concerns about censorship on language against minorities, questioning if such action would make discrimination invisible. I would argue in favor of such censorship. The promotion of politically correct language should not be seen as a constraint to the freedom of speech; instead, it is an effective means to raise cultural awareness and respect. I completely believe in Carol’s good intent for an understanding world where people could be civilly open to each other about their dislikes or even hate. However history has vividly illustrated the danger of such degree of “freedom.” The Nazi orchestrated the Holocaust because of the hate for Jews. On-going genocide appears to be an everyday scene in Darfur, Sudan today because of openly pronounced hatred between ethnic groups. And America also had her share in racial hate crisis in the Japanese Internment Camp era during the Second World War. I believe in open dialogue. However as we learned from these historical lessons, openly sharing our hate, especially unfounded hate, does not seem to be the magic recipe to create understanding and love. To examine the stages of genocide, we can easily conclude that racial and cultural awareness in language is the key to the prevention of escalating hate between ethnic groups.

Sometimes I would question myself the value of a college education. Is it a diploma I can use to prove my intellectual competency? Is it the key to a financially stable life? Perhaps. But more importantly, I value the tools I have gained and the critical thinking skills I have developed in higher education because they are my light in examining the reality surrounding us, a seemingly fair, but highly racialized reality. In such reality, I fail to imagine equality being achieved by indifference and blind conformity. Nonetheless, with necessary skills and tools, one has a choice to break the silence and challenge injustices for the good of others. This is how the value of my college education is realized.