Race and the White American Community - Term Paper Example

? Race and the White American Community School Race and the White American Community Members of my community are similar in their looks. White Americans have the same culture as that of the minorities in the USA. The only thing that obviously makes them different from the other communities is their white color. In contemporary America, most white Americans are influenced by the popular media in their looks. They prefer dressing in jeans and T-shirts. Their favorite diet is bacon, fish and chips and the signature greasy burgers. This is pretty much the culture of all Americans today be they white or otherwise. One factor that is common amongst all people of my community is that we have all immigrated to America three, four or five generations ago. We have been struggling over the generations in order to decide whether we want to adopt the identity of a pure American or at least remain, in part, associated with our background. There are few people amongst our community that are reluctant to break ties with their original homeland and thus, introduce themselves to the society as Italian Americans, French Americans or Scottish Americans. In my own family, we prefer to be called Americans, although we are originally Dutch. A vast majority of White Americans like me choose to be called Americans because this is what we are today. My ancestors were Dutch, but I am as American as anybody with the ancestors residing in this place for centuries is. In an attempt to adjust in this society, my ancestors have been working quite hard trying to dismantle their original identity, and I want to take their efforts to a further level. From the very moment my ancestors entered America, they were strongly urged by the society to forget their past, their original language and also make sure that we don’t get to learn or speak that. “For many, it was a difficult struggle to carve out a niche in the American political and economic landscape while preserving some sense of their own ethnic identity” (Howard, n.d., p. 3). This was primarily because we looked white and can easily make part of the majority of Americans. This is helpful in preventing racial encounters and is more facilitating in terms of adjusting in America. Hence, white Americans are similar in looks both within their community and outside it. Many people in my community are xenophobic, and they have the most unusual and strangest reason for being xenophobic than anyone can imagine. Conventionally, people develop xenophobia because they fear that the immigrants would consume the job and other opportunities that would otherwise have been available to them, but in this case, people of my community are xenophobic because they think that in-pour of the immigrants into US from all parts of the world would suppress white Americans as a community. White Americans have conventionally maintained an edge over other races in America because of the white American majority. Whenever we talk about minority, we generally mean the people of color. However, with the rapid increase in the number of immigrants, multiculturalism is heavily cultivating in America and people of my community fear that one day, the population of the people of color would be so much that it would be sufficient to outnumber the white Americans as a majority. Thus, people of my community are xenophobic because they see themselves as a minority in the near future (Blake, 2011). This is the fundamental reason why many amongst them want to make racism a norm because they see the display of racism as a way out of the problem. I am anti-racist. I am a white American but my thoughts are way different from those of the majority of people of my community. When I tend to study the cultural experiences of people belonging to other races, I find that they are quite inconsistent with the way we suppose a democratic nation to be. I believe that racism generates low socioeconomic status which together with its “correlates, such as lower education, poverty, and poor health, ultimately affect our society as a whole” (American Psychological Association, 2011). Leaders of my community don’t like members of their community that think like me. Racism is at the heart of the culture of white America (Abagond, 2008). Leaders in my community treat people like me as anarchists and fundamentalists while those that want to maintain the domination of white Americans in America are considered to be democrats, liberals and freedom lovers. Since a vast majority of the white Americans are against the people of color, accordingly they are similar to the leaders in their behavior with the anti-racist people like me and the racist lot. Although information about the anti-racist white American lot like me is not necessarily included in our texts and work manuals, yet there is always an emphasis upon the reasons why some things have to be particularly white American. There are white American parties, Bar B Q’s and events in my area which although are not apparently solely for the white Americans, yet the people of color have an idea from their experience that they would not have a nice time there. The local media mostly projects white Americans in their true color. Nevertheless, there is a growing population of anti-racist people like me in the white American community that lack representation in the local media. The white politicians in my community have conventionally discouraged the racial hatred and fear in an attempt to entice the cultivation of different kinds of constituencies within their camps. What makes them different from me is the fact that they are being hypocritical when they speak against racism whereas I am honest and consistently anti-racist. Representation of interests of the minority groups in my community is time-dependent. When there are elections, they are guaranteed the representation of their interests, yet things change for the worse once the elections are over. If I were to change something about the white American community, I would change their urge to rule over America. I believe in one culture. According to me, race should not be a criterion for distinguishing between people. America is our country and everybody should enjoy the same rights in it. I also believe that the people of America, including the white Americans have no right to have anything against the people of color because if there is an increasing populating of non-white Americans in America, it is happening with due consent and approval of the people in charge. We ought to have confidence in our government in order to have peace in our country. I can do this by challenging the perceptions of my community mates when they make anti racist jokes. I do this quite often. Few relatives of mine are quite particular about the cultural and racial differences, though I am not. I frequently hear my friends making racist jokes whenever we get together at some family gathering. Having brought up in such a culture, I had very biased opinions about people from other races. My perceptions about people from other races began to alter for the better when I went to the college. In the college, I got the opportunity to socialize with people from different cultures and races and the barriers that my community had constructed started to melt down. My time at college brought a revolution in my perceptions towards other people, and I can understand why my cousins and other community members cannot think about other races in an unbiased manner. Most of them did not have the opportunity to study in a multicultural setup. Even many of them come at odds with me when I speak in favor of multiculturalism and diversity in various fields including education and work. As I have started to build up a pro-multiculturalism identity amongst my community, I happen to come across very less racist jokes from my community members. They take a pause at least for the while I am around, though I can still sense their racist attitude. Nevertheless, I have a special liking for my community mates since we belong to the same roots. Although houses in my neighborhood are not strictly segregated on the bases of race, yet many white Americans in the locality prefer to occupy a house that has white Americans in the locality. White Americans have a long history of avoiding the neighborhoods with the people of color. “As African Americans poured into America's cities, the white community fled to the suburbs, using judicial means to exclude the "undesirables."” (Seitles, 1996). Again, I attribute this to their xenophobia. They tend to remain united as one race and overlook the fact that USA is a very big country and would not be dominated by the white Americans even if few strictly white American communities develop. There is dire need of significant change in the education and psychology of the white Americans in order for us to transit peacefully to a new America in which people are not position according to their cultural or ethnic roots. References: Abagond. (2008, Nov. 18). White American culture. Retrieved from http://abagond.wordpress.com/2008/11/18/white-american-culture/. American Psychological Association. (2011). Ethnic and Racial Minorities & Socioeconomic Status. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/pi/ses/resources/publications/factsheet-erm.aspx. Blake, J. (2011, Mar. 4). Are whites racially oppressed? Retrieved from http://edition.cnn.com/2010/US/12/21/white.persecution/index.html. Howard, G. (n.d.). White Americans in a Multicultural Society: Re-thinking Our Role. Retrieved from http://www.workforcediversitynetwork.com/docs/Article-WhiteAmericans01-03.pdf. Seitles, M. (1996). The Perpetuation of Residential Racial Segregation In America: Historical Discrimination, Modern Forms of Exclusion, and Inclusionary Remedies. Journal of Land Use & Environmental Law. Retrieved from http://www.law.fsu.edu/journals/landuse/vol141/seit.htm. Read More