Why can't we end Racism?

Question

I am not an expert nor do I claim to truly understand the racial divide in this country. I have spent many nights thinking about and trying to understand why some Caucasian people and African American people do not seem to be able to get along. The following is just my opinion and it is not meant to hurt anyone nor change people’s minds. All I am trying to do is to make people think.

I have always believed that if Caucasian Americans did or does not want African American people here then they have no one to blame but their own ancestors. It was the Caucasian man who invaded Africa and forced the African’s into slavery. Does anyone really think they wanted to leave their homeland and to be forced to work for nothing, and to be beaten into submission? I feel people need to think about what the world would be like if the roles had been reversed. What if the Africans had invaded Europe and forced the Caucasians to be their slaves. What a different world it would be.

I have and do continue to work with many African American people who are no different from me other than the color of their skin; they are hard working people just trying to support their families like me. Many of them just want their children’s lives to be better than theirs. I know that in the African American community crime is high due to a variety of reasons, but that is no reason to neither hate nor fear African American people. Many in the white community need to consider just what it would be like to try and raise a family surrounded by violent crime and injustice.

I want people to think about this: How do we expect people of all races to be productive members of society when the minimum wage is so low? How do we expect to raise good citizens when they are treated so poorly? I can understand why so many people are on welfare, and why they do not try to better their lives. It would be easy to let the government take care of my family and me if all I was going to earn by working was $5.15 per hour. How do we expect people to support their families on so little? Some people working a minimum wage job would still have to find child care for their children, maintain a car with insurance to get to and from work, and provide a home for themselves and their children, with food, water, electricity, etc. We can not expect people to survive and flourish under these circumstances. I know that the government will help provide some help with the above mentioned expenses if and when people work for minimum wage, but it is not enough to give the average person any hope of rising above the poverty level. People of both races need to feel that they have the chance to make a better life for themselves and their families. I believe that if we raise the minimum wage to one that will enable people to raise their families above the poverty level while enabling them to continue their education this will give all people of both races the opportunity to seek a better paying job.

We as a nation need to stop looking at the world and trying to save everyone else. We need to look deep inside ourselves and our nation and save ourselves first. How can we save another country when we cannot even save our own from poverty, crime and racism? I truly believe that if I had to live under the same circumstances as most African American people do today I would give up on myself and allow the government to provide for me. I would also have the feeling that the government owed me because of all that they have put my people through. We need to treat everyone as an equal. I know many people say this but few people actually do it. What is the Caucasian man afraid of? Does he really think that if the African American man was truly an equal that the African American man would try and reverse the roles of society, I do not think that would happen? I feel that if everyone was truly equal and we all treated each other with respect we could accomplish great things. I have and continue to work with many African American people and together we have achieved many things. I have always encouraged employees both African American and Caucasian to work together and to reach for the stars. I believe that everyone, no matter the color of their skin, can and wants to live a better life. I have had many African American employees in a supervisory position and they have been very successful in their jobs. They have had both races working for them and I have never seen a problem that we all could not work out together.

I do not want people to think I am laying all the blame for the racism I see in America today at the feet of the Caucasian people. African American people need to take a stand and aid in the fight as well. I am not sure I understand the reasoning behind African Americans giving up on themselves and just allowing the society around them to run their lives. I do however understand the feeling that no one cares or is willing to help me to succeed.

I think it is time for African American people to take a stand and say to themselves “I will not fail, I will succeed in life.” Now we all can aid in this mission by being supportive and giving the African American people the best possible chance to be successful. We need to begin to trust each other, we need to invest in all of our people and we can start by improving our inner city educational system, and by raising the minimum wage to one that people can see their way out of poverty. Let us stop worrying about the rest of the world, let us worry about ourselves and invest in our own people. Only then can we call ourselves a great nation.

I think that if African American people saw that they could achieve the same things a Caucasian person could, there would be less crime and poverty. We could lower the unwed birth rate, the drop out rate, and the crime rate among African American’s, and I think everyone of all races would see the benefits.

I know that most people blame all the crime in the African American community on drugs and poverty, but why is it like that? African American people are in pain and they are just trying to survive in an unjust world. If we all as one people took the time to listen and help the African American person out of poverty we could most likely lower the crime rate nationwide. Caucasian people are drug addicts as well and you do not see the same amount of crime in our neighborhoods. We are more inclined to help our fellow Caucasian person to recovery than our fellow African American person. This needs to stop!

I have spoken to many young African American men and they do not see much of a future for them in today’s society. I find this truly sad. We as a people and one nation need to work to correct this now before it is too late and we lose more good children to drugs, crime and the street. I think that people in New Orleans need to take the led in ending racism, beginning with improving our education system so that minority's can achieve success and become productive members of society. The people of the African American community need to start taking the responsibility to improve the conditions in their communities and to begin working with people of all races to create a more stable environment for people to raise families and to be a variable member of society. If as a country we do not hold any race of people back we will be able to become the great nation we want to be.

Answer 1

too long, didnt read.

but the answer is: because we cannot end stupidity.

Answer 2

There are two basic causes of racism - taught racism, and distrust of the unfamiliar.

Taught racism is passed down from generation to generation. It has improved dramatically but cannot be eliminated in a free society. Racism is really passed in this way at a personal level. It is not institutional. It is not by race. It comes from a racist parent passing their attitudes onto their children, a racist leader promoting it in their followers, etc.

Distrust of the unfamiliar is the real root cause of racism and is biological. Babies trust everyone. They don't divide the world into themself and other things even, so they see everyone as being good. At a certain stage in development this stops. They start seeing unfamiliar looking people as being different. When people see someone else as being not like them it is much easier for them to be prejudiced against them.

The solution to the distrust of the unfamiliar is social. People living in blended communities and blended media. If a person grows up never seeing a black person until they are 20 years old, they have no basis for judging them and may believe any prejudice told about them. If instead that person grows up interacting with black people or even just seeing them as characters on tv, they have their own basis for judging them. They are less likely to believe racial prejudice - unless their interactions have re-inforced it (a white person growing up on a plantation with black slaves has the view that blacks are inferior re-inforced by that experience).

Answer 3

I don't think this is the correct place to discuss this issue, and I would like to discuss this at length with you. So please contact me through this sight.

In the mean time, The key to start evolving out of racial tensions begins at home. Every home...with parents who are together....
Any other scenario has a point of breakdown....that usually leads to some level of dysfunction.

The wage issue is one that will continue to be a thorn in the side of every hourly wage worker in The US. This is a market economy
and as such the more we press for higher wages the more the essentials of life will cost.

We as nation can start with a different issue to bring things into a controlled situation again.
I believe that by separating boys and girls into different schools we can reduce the number of drop outs, and as a side benefit we can reduce promiscuity in young adults.... I know this sounds repressive and Victorian, or draconian if you will....But it would help to bring a more disciplined ideal back into our social structure. It is well known that men and women learn in different capacities. If we can nurture young women along why not the young men who are now falling behind.

We also have to acknowledge the fact that some people are more focused on the pleasures and what can I get out of life's...than trying to achieve....And that brings us to the entertainment that Hollywood and the media present to us....Idealizing the worst behaviors, making the rich and nasty into hero's of this age.. so much of what children absorb is crap from some warped adult mind....
Look at the games our children play....Videos game like "grand theft auto" which is about stealing cars and killing, and the violence in these game only escalates as you move up in game play.....This gives kids the wrong message...A don't say that it's just games.....these create ideals in their minds of a freely violent world which doesn't exist.
So why would a kid want to achieve when they are provided with such wonderful crap to fill their time with...you gotta admit the graphics are pretty awesome....

Drugs and violence on the city streets and in the poorest neighborhoods stems from an economic morass that perpetuates it self....j wants more money ...H wants to unload the junk hes been pedaling for years...so little Miss M is cajoled by a scanky girlfriend to try it ..she has now become another problem for someone else to deal with...so J gets more money and so does H and M gets trapped in a cycle of crap....
And the authorities can't or won't do enough to stop it because there aren't enough of them.....this sort of thing goes on and on...and it is all part of the situation that keeps people down...

The reason some are down is their own bad choices, and the fear they keep with them...You live in a bad neighbor hood ? so move!!!

Money can be saved , and people can move up but in order to save you must deny yourself....shut down your Internet and cable TV connections, don't buy junk food, deal with the cloths you have, enlist family to watch the kids so you can work the extra job or go to night school....and never stop looking for the next job...or the next connection to something better.

Society isn't going to pay for the up keep of the down and out, nor the underachievers...there just isn't the will to do it..nor the money.......Most people would need to give about half of what they earn to equalize the field in the US... and that won't happen.

Answer 4

I only read your question and skipped your dissertation that followed. But back to the germain issue here--ending racism. We will never end racism because it is human nature to do two things concerning race:

1. Blame bad things that happen in society on other's race

2. Blame bad things that happen to YOU on your own race

Both are generally excuses for the real reason for things going wrong in our lives. Crime in America is not because of the blacks. Poverty is not because of the hispanics. Inbreeding is not because of the whites. Bad driving is not because of the Asians, etc...etc...etc...

Conversely. if we are fired from a job it may be because we arrived late twenty-six times in the past six months, and not because we are black. If we don't make the soccer team it may be because we weren't good enough--not because we were white. If we feel unwelcome in America because we are here illegally it is not because we are hispanic, it is because we are here illegally.


But it will never end. Just learn to live and laugh with it.

Answer 5

I believe that we have such a long history of racism and its children (prejudice, bigotry, hatred, etc.) that it ending it completely is, in my opinion, an impossibility. However, we can certainly be more tolerable of each other, if and only if we begin to judge ourselves as God would judge us BEFORE we judge another person.

In addition, we must learn that racism is, in and of itself, an impossibility, because you cannot hate an entire race or ethnic group----at most, you can hate one or two people at a time, and then, only after he/she has done something really bad to you. The idea of hating an entire race or ethnic group is not only impossible, but illogical---no one person can know enough about each individual of any one ethnic group or race in order to hate the entire group.

It just doesn't make sense. Not to mention, you end up making yourself sick during the whole hate/racism process.

Answer 6

i have heard that minimum wage is being raised to around 7.00 and maybe some change, but all races struggle it is not limited to the blacks.
Ignorance needs to be eradicated to end raciscm. and yes,
Good luck to you and you r endeavors, maybe you can make a difference for the American people. the quality of the spirit knows no color. There are good and bad black and white.......

Answer 7

There continues to be racist and prejudiced people living in our society and they continue to hold on to the idea that caucasians are the 'superior race'.

Answer 8

Coming form a mexican American married to a white guy, it is really hard to get respect form his family because his father is racist...
I don't think that racism is just from one nationality. I think all people are one form of racist.

Answer 9

Way too much writing.

Answer 10

I would like to say up front that I agree with your claim that as a nation, we need to save ourselves. This is very true. But for the rest of it, let's start with a brief history lesson.

Slavery was started thousands of years ago. Not just black slaves, but white slaves, greek slaves, slavik slaves, jewish slaves, irish slaves, english slaves, european slaves, etc. The first slaves in North America were indentured English servants but back to your issue...African slaves.

The slave trade in Africa was originally perpetuated by Arab Muslims in the first millenium who captured and exported huge numbers of Africans to the Arabian peninsula. This was hundreds of years before the European slave trade began. It was common for warring African tribes to take captives and sell them as slaves...a practice still going on today in Africa. The Portuguese and Dutch became involved in the 15th century when they saw what was to become a very lucrative business. The slaves that they transported were traded to them by coastel African kingdoms who carried out the raiding parties and were rewarded with various European goods. The majority of the captured slaves were taken to the Caribbean islands and to South America. The first black slaves in North America ended up at Jamestown by accident when a Dutch ship floundered and was lost in a storm. Yes, Americans then became involved in the African slave trade but that ended in 1828 or so, and if I remember my history correctly, slavery in the United States ended in 1865.

Since then, there have been so many programs to attempt to assist African Americas (personally, a term that I struggle with...am I a European Native American?) I think that welfare is the downfall of some people as it perpetuates living in poverty instead of giving them a boost out. This is true of any race on welfare.

But there are also some racial populations of the United States that have it much worse than African Americans. Two examples that I can give you are the Native Americans on reservations and the people of rural Appalachia. There have absolutely been no worse stereotyping of race than what has been heeped on this two groups. And nowhere in the United States will you find more abject poverty and total loss of hope. But, oddly enough, you hear very little about them. They don't complain. Why don't we concern ourselves with improving their lives? What a paradox.

Now, I know many successful African Americans. Interestingly, most of them speak of their own race as being the handicap to success in the so called "White" world. If an African American tries to do well in school, he is taunted for trying to be like whitie. He is called uppity. Peer pressure has to do with the role of African Americans today. Therefore, they know that opportunity is there but the drive is so strong to NOT be like the Caucasions that it stops a lot of forward progress. Just ask any young African American male what he wants to be when he grows up and many will answer "a rap star." Not "scientist."

I am not trying to be prejudice. I am pointing out reality that has often been spoken of between me and my African American friends. Is it our country's fault or is it a mindset of the races in our country? A good friend of mine...the retired Undersecretary General of the United Nations...is very successful. He is from Cameroon and attended university in Paris. He is Black. He saw no differences of opportunity because of race. The difference that I see in Blacks from different countries and the United States is that the others don't set themselves apart and they feel that they have every opportunity afforded to them as their fellow countrymen. But here in the United States, African Americans do think differently than Caucasions than do Hispanics. After more than a century of handouts, it is hard to get off of the dole. I mean, African Americans still speak of the reparations. Aren't we beyond that? Who is going to pay my Cherokee ancestors for all the wrongs visited upon them? Reparations is not the answer. Some Caucasions probably feel that they've been paying reparations for a long time so does that contribute to the ill feeling between races and therefore is not a solution?

And as for the crime rate, yes, the U.S. Bureau of Statistics shows that proportionately, more crime is committed by African Americans. Mostly crimes committed against each other. Did you know that, according to those statistics, you are 4 times more likely to be killed by an African American if you are Caucasion than vise versa? But you rarely hear about that on the news. Mostly you hear if an African American is killed by a Caucasion. Why is that? And, by the way, after spending two years in prison ministry, I haven't met an African American male who admitted that what he did was his fault yet would claim that when he got out, he would probably do it again. You can't get rid of racism with behavior like that.

Nearly two centuries ago, a group of Abolitionist decided to assist those slaves who wanted to go back to Africa. They bought them a country...now called Liberia. This country is abundant in minerals and other valuable resources. They gave them money and free passage. They assisted in setting up a government. In Liberia, Caucasions were forbidden to live. Soon, the African Americans were creating a social divide between them and the native Liberians. The newcomers treated the natives as inferiors. This behavior has caused civil war in that country ever since. And instead of taking advantages of their resources and improving their country, they have fought, and killed, and blamed...mostly the United States for not doing more for them. So, I ask you, how much does it take to pull a race out of their own behaviors? Is that our responsibility? But think about that...given the opportunity, they chose to fail.

What about in the United States? There has been affirmative action...is it a good thing? I don't know. But, it did allow African Americans the same educational opportunities, it gave them an advantage in government jobs but not much is changed. So, I guess it is back to your original question "Why can't we end racism?"

Because the differences perceived between the races is not just perpetuated by how one race views another race but also by how one race views its OWN race. And until all races have the vision to empower themselves, there will be a divide.