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Racial discrimination and its effect
Impact of discrimination on society
The impact of discrimination on individuals
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The tone in which the word “black” is uttered is something to be evaluated. It drips with disdain and concealment as if there is something to hide. The way that we do not differentiate between facial structures, cultural characteristics and personality sets us up for faulty expectation in which black women are undesirable. The biggest issue is that they believe this too. The doll test was conducted in 1947 by Dr. Kenneth Clark and his wife Mamie Clark. They asked if the colored children preferred to play with black dolls or white dolls, the children all chose the white doll. They made these decisions based off of their personal rhetoric. With products like hair straighteners, skin lighteners and social media displaying the stereotypical angry …show more content…
and perverse African American woman, it is not wonder that they ebony women of the modern times are not hearing the “you are beautiful” message. The advertisements for hair relaxers portray multiracial women as their black women in the forefront of their catalogs and boxes.
There are no black dolls with naturally textured hair or cultural attire which says something. It speaks about our inability to see the value of the colored woman’s culture. Just because a woman is black does not mean she is African or southern. The doll test shows that there needs to be more done to show youth what makes black people beautiful and how much variety is within the various cultures. From African descents, to Haitian to the other Caribbean islands, each culture has something unique and wonderful to offer America, however, if they are just tossed under the general umbrella of “black” and then segregated by shades, the entire country suffers. The country should encourage cultural diversity and allow for the ideals of beauty to crumble so that children are not under the impression that beauty lies in the lighter skin tones alone. There should also be more encouraged discussion about women of color in all areas of life that is positive in tone and uplifting in content, especially within the black …show more content…
community. The Doll Test did not just reveal how people view races in terms of attractiveness but also intelligence. Below is an excerpt from the documentary: Facilitator: Show me the smart child. [A Black child's hand points to the fairest-skinned depiction among a spectrum of drawings of a little girl, identical, save for the skin color). Facilitator: And why is she the smart child? Child: 'Cause she is white. Facilitator: OK. Show me the dumb child. [The little girl, who is brown-skinned, points to the drawing of the child with the darkest skin). Facilitator: And why is she the dumb child? Child: Because she black. Facilitator: Well, show me the ugly child. [Again, the little girl points to the darkest drawing). Facilitator: And why is she the ugly child? Child: 'Cause she black. Facilitator: Show me the good-looking child. [The little girl points to the fairest drawing.] Facilitator: And why is she the good-looking child? Child: 'Cause she light-skinned-ed. As much as the black community wants to speak out against white society in trying to attain equality, there is still a need within their own community to see each other as equal. With the skin bleaching industry reaching new heights at this rate due to the number of people who seem to be having a hard time wrapping their head around their skin color. There seems to be a universal agreement within minority groups which teach that the lighter one’s skin color is, the better quality of life they must live. There is a documentary entitled, “Dark Girls” which explores this concept in depth by having black women expose their experience with their dark skin. There are three categories of skin color for the black women. They are light skin, brown skin and dark skin. Just as there are three types of hair textures which are permed, texturized or natural. The one thing girls get to decide is in relation to their hair and if they choose to chemically treat it. They also get to choose with hair chemicals if they want to bleach their skin and how much. With over $500 million dollars spent on bleaching products, it is clear that the darker skinned folks are not as fond as they would like to be of what they look like which later affects who they become. There are countless women who already struggle with insecurities as a result of things like family, past experiences and mistakes.
Color is just another thing to add to that list. However, these women need to know now more than ever that their beauty is not limited to their shade and that they are all beautiful regardless of how light skinned or dark-skinned they are. These women need to be encouraged to stay true to their hue and the multiracial women need to be accepted for all that they are so that women who are actually just black don’t feel the pressure to become a lighter quality of black to bleach themselves. There are countless of black women, who from the times of slavery, were able to pass as white. They spent their lives keeping one of the biggest secrets to themselves, that they possessed black ancestry. They allowed the secret to die with them because they were ashamed of it. In the CNN article, Roland Martin tells the tale of his own Aunt Rita who passed away. She was the kind of black woman who could be considered white because of how light she was in complexion. She spent her life hiding the fact that a fraction of who she was black and now her offspring will never have to know. Halle Berry faces a similar situation with her daughter Nahla who everyone wants to categorize as white because of how she looks. Berry refuses to speak on the issue much and has declared that she will not decide for her daughter, she will allow her to choose when the time is right.
The issue is, she should not have to choose. She is essentially African-American, Dutch, German, Irish and Spanish. She should be able to claim all of who she is. Disowning an aspect of her identity leaves her and countless other mulatto children asking the same question: why? The truth is, nobody wants to answer that question because even within the black community, the belief that light skin is the right skin and being black is not a privilege reigns supreme. Every person, regardless of shade is beautiful in a way that cannot be diminished because of color. What needs to be done is we must move from this state of colorism to a culture centered mentality where colored people are educated on the things which make them unique and where multiracial children can freely claim their other ethnicities without being quickly categorized solely by their color. Black people should be taught to celebrate their differences not to ostracize or suspect the darkest member or to idolize the lightest ones. It is a healing process which must occur all around which is long overdue but just as important as any other kind of healing.
Throughout history in the United States, what it means to be a black person has taken on different meanings. This is a result of forced the segregation that occurred during the post slavery era. Whites wanted to keep the Caucasian race “pure” and in order to do so, anyone that had one drop of black blood in them was considered black. This is very different from the way today’s society identifies black people. Presently, a black person is more likely to be identified by the color of their skin or their phenotype instead of their genotype.
In the book Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer wrote about Christopher McCandless, a nature lover in search for independence, in a mysterious and hopeful experience. Even though Krakauer tells us McCandless was going to die from the beginning, he still gave him a chance for survival. As a reader I wanted McCandless to survive. In Into the Wild, Krakauer gave McCandless a unique perspective. He was a smart and unique person that wanted to be completely free from society. Krakauer included comments from people that said McCandless was crazy, and his death was his own mistake. However, Krakauer is able to make him seem like a brave person. The connections between other hikers and himself helped in the explanation of McCandless’s rational actions. Krakauer is able to make McCandless look like a normal person, but unique from this generation. In order for Krakauer to make Christopher McCandless not look like a crazy person, but a special person, I will analyze the persuading style that Krakauer used in Into the Wild that made us believe McCandless was a regular young adult.
In American history, there are centuries upon centuries of black people being deemed less than or not worthy of. Never in were black people equal, even in the sense of humanity. White people declared black people as three-fifths of a human, so to the “superior race”, because one has darker skin that automatically takes away 40% of their humanity. Now, in white history they repeatedly dominant over other nonwhite groups and especially the women of those groups because they feel anything that isn’t white is inferior.
The Letter from Birmingham Jail was written by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in April of 1963. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was one of several civil rights activists who were arrested in Birmingham Alabama, after protesting against racial injustices in Alabama. Dr. King wrote this letter in response to a statement titled A Call for Unity, which was published on Good Friday by eight of his fellow clergymen from Alabama. Dr. King uses his letter to eloquently refute the article. In the letter dr. king uses many vivid logos, ethos, and pathos to get his point across. Dr. King writes things in his letter that if any other person even dared to write the people would consider them crazy.
It was at this point in life where Sarah Jane truly thought white was beautiful. This was solely because majority of the boys growing up complimented Susie on her looks and the fact that Sarah Jane correlated Lora’s financial status with her skin color. In Kenneth and Mamie Clark’s doll test, these psychologists tested children at their keen developmental stages (ages 3-7) to see how they viewed race (LDF). Performed during the same time as the setting of this movie, it was concluded that children were fonder of the lighter to white dolls because of societal views. As stated before, during this time period white people were seen to be superior to all other races. Just like in the movie, when Sarah Jane’s self-esteem was low because she felt as if Susie and Lora were better than her because they were white and well off financially, the children in the study felt the same. In the study, the results showed that children correlated positive attributes to the lighter to white dolls and negative connotations to those of the darker complexions. Kenneth and Mamie Clark concluded that this was primarily due to both segregation and discrimination, which ultimately lessened the self-esteem of other races and made them feel inferior to whites (LDF). Like this study, the movie Imitation of Life shows how segregation and discrimination negatively affected Sarah Jane, which results in her passing herself as a white woman
...black woman myth has not been studied as intensely as the Jezabel and Mammy images, it still has significance in present society. Sapphire, more commonly views as the angry black woman is viewed as, the bad black woman, the black “bitch, and the emasculating matriarch (88). The reason there may not be much research on this myth is because many researchers themselves acknowledge the stereotype (89). The stereotype is seen not as black women’s anger towards the unequal treatment and circumstances they endure, but an irrational desire to control black males, families, and communities around them (95). This stereotype bestows yet another double standard for black women in America today. While a white woman’s passion and drive may be seen as ambitious and exceptional, a black woman displaying the same perseverance would be seen in a negative rather than glorified light.
The article I have chosen for my rhetorical analysis is #Gamergate Trolls Aren’t Ethics Crusaders; They’re a hate group because it seemed interesting. The reason I was drawn to this article was because of the title, I was interested to know what it meant. This article, written by Jennifer Allaway, is about gamergate, an online gaming community, and the hate they show towards others. Jennifer does research on sexism in videogames and how it correlates to the gamers that play these games. She was collecting data from different organizations by using a questionnaire that gathered information on diversity in the videogame community. When some gamergate members
Pollan’s article provides a solid base to the conversation, defining what to do in order to eat healthy. Holding this concept of eating healthy, Joe Pinsker in “Why So Many Rich Kids Come to Enjoy the Taste of Healthier Foods” enters into the conversation and questions the connection of difference in families’ income and how healthy children eat (129-132). He argues that how much families earn largely affect how healthy children eat — income is one of the most important factors preventing people from eating healthy (129-132). In his article, Pinsker utilizes a study done by Caitlin Daniel to illustrate that level of income does affect children’s diet (130). In Daniel’s research, among 75 Boston-area parents, those rich families value children’s healthy diet more than food wasted when children refused to accept those healthier but
When I lived in Atlanta approximately 1 year ago, growing up as a child I would hear the term black queen. To my understanding a black women and a black queen are one in the same, but growing up the two words became different meanings. People began to change and no longer were they practicing their queen ways. People were now becoming ignorant and began following the crowd instead of being themselves, setting them apart as just black women. Black women have been around for several centuries and in that time we were vigorously known as black queens all over the world such as in, Africa. We were known for our strength, security, stability, and power also for our greatness. As poet Maya Angelou said, “I’m a woman phenomenally, phenomenal woman that’s me.” A black woman is a very powerful being and to me a great phenomenon, but why are black women not embraced as queens anymore? Personally I think being a black women and a black queen is a stereotype within itself. Black women cannot be considered black queens anymore until they start being themselves and not what society has made them out to be. The black women of today will always be profiled by people because it doesn’t seem that they want to accept who they really are, leaving them in the category of just a black woman. So, does history truly repeat itself? Will society ever come awake from this slumber? Several of the major stereotypes about black women are that they are being portrayed wrong. Just like in the Article Mother Tounge by Amy Tan when the mother was profiled by how good her English was it is similar to black women who are profiled by the stereotypes of today.
Jack Shakley’s “Indian Mascots- You’re Out” published on the op-ed page of the LA times, he impacted readers about the argument over professional and college sport teams whose mascots are using Native American names. Shakley is the former chair of the Los Angeles city/county Native American Commission. The author describes the history of using Indian mascots and how it hurt a group of people. He wants readers to know that it is necessary to remove Native American names and mascots from college and professional teams. Jack Shakley uses three strategies to present his argument to show his attitude to remove Indian mascots in teams.
The movie trailer “Rio 2”, shows a great deal of pathos, ethos, and logos. These rhetorical appeals are hidden throughout the movie trailer; however, they can be recognized if paying attention to the details and montage of the video. I am attracted to this type of movies due to the positive life messages and the innocent, but funny personifications from the characters; therefore, the following rhetorical analysis will give a brief explanation of the scenes, point out the characteristics of persuasive appeals and how people can be easily persuaded by using this technique, and my own interpretation of the message presented in the trailer.
Being a woman is hard work. We many have pressures on us from society to marry, bear children, be an upstanding citizen, and maintain some sort of career, all the while trying to understand our bodies and its changes; being a woman of color, or black woman, it’s even harder. Not only do we have to deal with everything a White woman does, and we also have the added pressure of defying stigmas and stereotypes within our own group of people. What stigma’s you ask? How about not being perceived as ignorant, uneducated, and or “ghetto”. The stereotypical misrepresentations of African-American women and men in popular culture have influenced societal views of Blacks for centuries. The typical stereotypes about Black women range from the smiling, asexual and often-obese Mammy to the promiscuous and the loud, smart mouthed, neck-rolling Black welfare mother is the popular image on reality television. These images portrayed in media and popular culture creates powerful ideology about race and gender, which affects every day experiences of Black women in America.
Jonathan Kozol revealed the early period’s situation of education in American schools in his article Savage Inequalities. It seems like during that period, the inequality existed everywhere and no one had the ability to change it; however, Kozol tried his best to turn around this situation and keep track of all he saw. In the article, he used rhetorical strategies effectively to describe what he saw in that situation, such as pathos, logos and ethos.
The African American community is supposed to be united under the Black race, but that is where the problems come in. Under the ethnicity of African Americans, and have pride in their skin color and are supposed to be joined together, there is a system of separation within the different shades of “Black.” In the black community, there are all kinds of shades of black, yellow, light, brown, dark brown, and other shades. According to Dr. Ronald Hall, a social work professor at Michigan State University, "As a result of having been colonized particularly by Spaniards, the British, etcetera, a lot of people of color internalize and idealize values for lighter skin because that is considered the norm.... ... middle of paper ...
Racism against African American began in the American society during the seventeenth century, when the practice of slavery started to flourish in the South. Racism is “a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior and has the right to rule others.” (Dictionary.com) Over the centuries, efforts have been made to equalize the lives of African Americans to their White counterparts. Though acclaimed that the days of racism against African Americans are over, it is infused in all parts of American life and therefore still affecting the victimized. The stratification of racial classes of olden days has left a mark in today’s society. African American racism though said not to be present today has influenced discrepancies in economic classes, self-esteem, and perception of one another, and stereotypes that affected the victimized.