Racism

Racism

Racism is one of the world's major issues today. "Nine out of ten people in society today believe that racism does not exist and is something that affects millions of people everyday" (Hutchinson 5). Many people are not aware of how much racism still exists in our schools, workforces, and anywhere else where social lives are occurring. It is obvious that racism is bad as it was many decades ago, but it sure has not gone away. Racism very much exists and it is about time that people need to start thinking about the instigations and solutions to this matter. Many people today live their lives obvious to what is happening in the world around them, often trying to convince themselves that racism is not a problem in their world. Others know all about the problem, but don't really realize that they themselves could possibly be adding to the problem by discriminating against someone else's human rights, and at the same time going around saying how open minded they are. Many people also believe that it depends on if a person was brought into the world as a racist or not, but that is not the case at all. In fact, an individual cannot be born a racist but only learn to become one as they grow from childhood to adulthood.

What is racism really? Racism is not knowing anything about someone when you look at them, but disliking them anyway, not because of who they are, but what they are. Racism is cowardly. More importantly, racism is a weakness and an obvious sign of ignorance. So what is it that makes us racist? More than likely it is fear of the unknown. In other words, it is lack of education. The only way to better this ignorance is to educate oneself. Since racism is learned and not genetic, it is something that needs to be taken care of in school starting form young children. In Brown v. Board of Education, the whole issue was that schools could be segregated only if they were "equal". This was decided by the case of Plessy v. Ferguson. Schools in the South were not equal so Brown v. Board of Education was filed. "Supreme Court Judge Earl Warren decided with the rest of the Supreme Court that segregated schools were in fact unlawful" (Hutchinson 10). Schools went through drastic changes but some schools didn't like the idea. "Schools in Prince Edward County had closed due to the ruling and children in the county lost out on their education"(Hutchinson 10). This had caused some racism to occur in Prince Edward County. The most effective solution for solving the racial tension problem is to change the curriculum, textbooks, and to keep up, if not increase, diversity training in the work force today. First of all, there needs to be an agreement that a problem does exist. It is after all evident through racist groups such as Ku Klux Klan, Neo-Nazis, and Skinheads. These are hate groups that threaten and dislike people, not for the content of their character, but the color of their skin or what country they are from. Although these are extremes when it comes to racism, it is something that affects so many people everyday in the United States. That is why the key to solving the problem is not Affirmative Action, or bussing kids around different schools, but instead it is education and starts with the younger generation. The first thing that needs to be done is to update the textbooks and books in general that are read by the students starting from Kindergarten to first grade. The books need to be changed to include different cultures and their positive contributions to life, and