Abstract
Racism in America is as old as America Itself and it’s like a rock of ages encroached within the geographical region. It had its roots when America was forming during the colonial and slave period. The arrival of African slaves in Jamestown in 1619 as an exchange for food cargo by a Dutch trader marks the birth of this python that has remained a disturbing Issue to America since then. Regardless of how powerful America is the poison, is still one of the most fundamental parts of the society and the social evil is still growing and spreading Its Impact despite all the efforts of fighting it. Today Racism in all its forms remains one of the toughest topical issues in America and scholars have spent a lot of time trying to research on how to curb it and also giving opinions on the status of the situation, Indeed America can be described as a fully racist society. Prejudice against African Americans, Latin Americans, and Muslims is widely experienced and the discriminated groups were under privileged by law in issues of literacy, immigration, voting rights, citizenship, land acquisition, and criminal procedure. To date the scenario has not changed as much and like old wine it’s getting better and basically tougher and the people are now tipsier from it than ever. The wineskin which is the society is experiencing a lot of corrosion socially from the impact of the old wine that is still fermenting and thus, racism cannot be understated owing to the fact that it’s the mother of majority of the other social problems like poverty, substance abuse, crime, homelessness, education inequality and health crisis such as HIV and Aids.
Description
Racism refers to the belief that natural different characteristics in human racial groups justify discrimination. The sociologists describe racism as a form of group privilege. Black people being mistreated, harassed and being handled brutally by the police are as old as the American society dating back to the slavery period. There are several types of racism practiced and experienced in America; personally-mediated, Internalized and Institutionalized. Personally-mediated racism refers to the specific social attitudes inherent to racially-prejudiced action whereby people have biased judgments about abilities, motives and intentions of others based on their race leading to differential treatment and actions according to race. This racism can be portrayed through embracing ‘practices such as stratification by skin color, self devaluation e.g. rejection of ancestral culture and resignation, helplessness, and hopelessness e.g. refusing to vote or dropping out of school (Dudley & Cozic, 1991).
Institutional racism is characterized by the existence of an institution with policies, practices and economic and political structures in place which positions non-white racial and ethnic groups at a disadvantage in relation to an institution’s white members. For instance rich neighborhoods are likely to have more whites than black’s better schools and teachers and also have more money to access better education facilities. Institution racism is the most prevalent since most institution that are set up have a racist’s ideology. The U.S. property appraisal system, made in the 1930s, tied property value and eligibility for government loans to race and thus, majority of the government subsidized housing went to the white consequently increasing the number of blacks without homes. Governmental, social, and educational policies also have been accused of endorsing institutional racism since most of the policies tend to favor the whites.
Impact of Racism
Racism can be described as a common disease amongst the racists that is highly contagious. Just like any other attitude it can easily be learned and in reality it has been passed down through many generations and it’s basically a resistant ulcer that America has lived with since the 17th Century to date. It has actually managed to be a mother to most of the social evils that affect America today. Persistent stereotypes impact on social relations and this can consequently lead to racial wars or riots like most recently in Los Angeles. The stereo-types also have facilitated the birth of class related institutions the rebellion of the blacks against their discrimination and social position trembled the foundation of the ruling class in the 1960’s. Racism also has an effect on believes held by people for instance almost half of the American republicans in the state of Mississippi believe interracial marriage should be illegal not to mention the many trickling effect this believe has.
Racism has actually acted like a governor governing the speed with which the world is fighting some issues like HIV and Aids by slowing down the response of the campaign against the epidemic. It’s too bad that the government is accused of supporting such policies because the support given to fight the epidemic to the minority is small relative to the proportion required and this in essence is like biting your own fingers. Moreover, racism also impacts on education in the sense that good teachers and good schools are mostly accessed by the whites and this further exaggerates the disparity in achievements and also alleviates poverty levels in the blacks. This consequently raises crime levels within the blacks and also behavior like substance abuse owing to hopelessness. In reality racism strangles the efforts of fighting social evils in the society by feeding the very stomach the government tries to starve (Crocker, 2007).
Causes of Racism-Conflict theory
America is a racist society basically symbolized by the persistent racial stereo-types that result to conflict in different forms like class or racial conflicts. The fuel that has kept the dangerous flame of racism alive is stereotyping; it has basically ensured the survival by carrying the social evil from one generation to another. In North America the blacks that were brought as slaves have been oppressed for centuries now based on their skin color. The ‘Jim crow’ laws in the south required separate facilities like the bathrooms, schools and nursing homes for the African –Americans. The belief that people from Middle East hate Americas which has been hyped by the media lately has a major contribution to the current sensitivity to terrorism.. Katz and Brally undertook a study in American University students in 1933 that proved the existence of negative stereo-types. They later repeated the study in 1951 and 1967 that demonstrated changes in the stereo-types and the extent of the stereo types. However, the belief that certain ethnic groups possess certain characteristic was still persistent (Feagin, 2010).
Stereotypes can result to prejudice and bigotry which can consequently result to violence, discrimination or genocide in extreme cases, for instance the holocaust that occurred during the Second World War is believed to have been caused by prejudice. Discrimination can take many forms and the civil and criminal justice systems have not applied the same measure. Some studies indicate that African-Americans Persecuted of murder have higher chances of being jailed relative to the whites. For instance in the year 2003, Penn State University researchers conducted a study on the correlation between crime and public perceptions of who is most likely to commit crime. The study found that many whites are likely to correlate pictures of blacks with violent crime.
Works Cited
Crocker, J. (2007). THE EFFECTS OF RACISM-RELATED STRESS ON THE PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PHYSIOLOGICAL WELL-BEING OF NON-WHITES. RIVIER ACADEMIC JOURNAL, VOLUME 3, NUMBER 1, SPRING 2007 , 3.
Dudley, W., & Cozic, C. P. (1991). Racism in America. Chicago: Greenhaven Press.
Feagin, J. R. (2010). Racist America: roots, current realities, and future reparations. London: Taylor & Francis.
