How do we go about improving our world? Simple. CHANGE HOW
WE RAISE OUR CHILDREN. Change what we teach our children. Change what our
schools teach children. We can change the past believe it or not. For example,
I was taught mainly through school lessons about racism. I learned about the Ku
Klux Klan, I learned about slavery, I learned about the white people racism in
the past… the list goes on and on. Guess what? If school never taught me that
stuff, I never would have known about racism existing honestly. Maybe that is
why black people are outraged at white people to the present day. Because their
parents and schools raised them by teaching them about slavery and inequality
in our history. I know that this is true because I am still learning about
racism against black people at nineteen. We talked about it in my history
class, fine arts class, political science class, and college writing class. That’s
all of my classes. The repetitiveness and years of stories of slavery being
imbeded into my brain and everyone else’s brain I am sure will always cause
racial tension between skin colors. If we literally do not raise our kids
telling horrible stories about what some white people in the past and pretend
like we do not know what racism is, guess what I guarantee that no one will
care anymore about racism. Our society just amps it up all the stories about
racist this and racist that. We should make it a law that if you talk about old
slavery stories and racist things then you get sent to prison. Just stop
raising our kids based on the past. MOVE ONNNNNNNNNNNN ALREADYYYYYYYYYYYYY quit
living in the past. It’s so annoying.
I agree! The world obviously has much to be improved on, but honestly, these improvements are already visible. This modern generation is growing up in a society pro that is for change, for equality and social justice. If we all continue raising our children in this fashion, the world will inevitably become a better place, and racist or close minded individual’s numbers will continue to decrease significant amounts. Yes, sadly there will most likely still be rasist and sexist individuals in this “better” society, but that’s inevidable, for it’s hard to change everyone who thinks backwards and wrong. The steps that we can take to better our society is educate our children, partake in protests or other such things to voice our oppinions, as stated in "Why the Revolution Won't Be Tweeted”- moble activism can increase the speed at which a revolution will spread and have an effect. While Shrinky feels otherwise, I disagree, for the modern American is addicted to social media, thus gets most of their news and influence from it. Racism is still an avid problem, as it was during the time period of “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, but we cannot deny that times are changing, and we are the ones influencing that through our children and teaching them proper mindsets. The way that “Good white people” are described in “I Don’t Know What To Do With Good White People” should be the qualities held by all people- love, open minds, compassion, empathy, and more. Parents need to show their children that this is the way we should all live our lives, not just as “good white people”, but as “good people”. As “Letter from Birmingham Jail” states, “Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear drenched communities”.. If we continue in the path that we are slowly but surely headed, this hope will become reality.
ReplyDeleteHow best should we go about fixing our world? I have no idea to be honest; I don’t think it’s really that easy of a question. I agree with you that discussing it in schools and in our early education are what establishes the racist ideas that use to be believed and still our believed by some. But there are also those people in the world that will pass down racism to their children whether or not school even mentions it. Some people in these societies are raised with racist ideals and if they ever are to understand why they were raised this way it must be taught in schools. In why the revolution will not be tweeted he talks about how it is not enough to spread awareness but also a physical effort must be made to start the revolution. If this is true then schools must continue to teach about racism. Maybe there is a different way to teach it to stop people from living in the past, but it cannot be eliminated entirely because the lessons it has to offer us about how things worked in comparison to now are invaluable. In “I don’t know what to do about good white people” the author uses personal anecdotes to justify her questioning of true motives and true thoughts people have and I think one of the best points she mentions is that there is no way to really know. Because there is no way to fully know how a person truly feels about the topic of racism I think we should just find a way to compromise as the best course. We should continue to teach about the past but find a way to open up teachings to modern day instead of just history and show how everyone is entitled to pursuing their own views.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree. The children from our generation and this new one are raised by parents who grew up listening to how we should all hate black people. I can see some of this changing but honestly it needs to disappear completely. Some people naively say that racism is a thing of the past. IT IS NOT. There is still racism, clear as day, everywhere in the United States today. The fact that it still being talked about and events caused by racism are still happening just proves that people are still not over it. I personally think racism is now being used to some of their advantage and now it has just turned into a pity thing and some use to get away with things. I think that its ridiculous and that it is time to make a major change. Stop talking about it so much in schools with our future children. If they ever hear negative connotations heard about black people then it will stick with them. Children remember a lot of negative things they hear especially if someone is constantly repeating it. Improving the world is so necessary for a more peaceful and unified one in the future. We need to stand up and take charge. Just like Martin Luther King Jr. says in his "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" “We can’t stop our discrimination while injustice still exists” and “Those who don’t recognize our equality will never negotiate with us” we obviously need everyone on board to make any progress at all.
ReplyDeleteIn addition to this blog entry, I feel like white people are just as guilty as black people, as black people are just as guilty as white people. Coming from a white person, pretty much every white person thinks the majority of black people are criminals. Also coming from a white person, it seems as if every black person think white people are racist against them, and are always out to get them because of the color of their skin. I am agreeing with the blog post I posted. Schools should stop teaching racism in our history. Because then for the rest of our lives black people will think white people were super cruel so they will always have resentment for them. I also think that white people after learning about racism in school will always believe that black people are raised from ghetto families and are dangerous and criminals. In the article “I Don’t Know What to Do with Good White People” The author says that she does not know if white people do good things just because they feel bad about the past. Guess what yeah sometimes they do because that’s what our parents taught us to do. On the other hand it is completely racist and rude to always assume white people judge you based on your skin color. That is completely false. To wrap this up it is wrong to make white people feel like they are always in debt to black people and should always treat them with more respect and they should get special privelages because slavery used to exist. Wrong. I refuse to live my life feeling like I owe something to other black people because of previous events. I have done nothing wrong like owned my own slaves. I could care less what other peoples skin color is.
ReplyDeleteI agree that people shouldn't be too hung up on what happened in the past but the reason people are is because it was such a big deal. The article "Letter from Birmingham Jail" states, "We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed." People have gone through pain to get their freedom, why shouldn't it be a big deal? Our past and history is what makes our future. The reason everyone has as much freedom as they do is because of the history made. I think so far we are doing a good job of making younger generations learn about our history. Society has grown so much from this. It does seem like racism is discussed everywhere, but maybe that's a good thing. I agree that is should be discussed in school but the problem with that is what if you get a biased/racist teacher? You will essentially learn what they want to teach you. This can be a problem to why someone might believe something about racism, but not everyone is going to have the same opinion of anything. I personally think that social media is a big part of where people get their information on racism and other subjects as well. Let's face it, as society continues to grow and aim for advancement of technology, social media will continue to be the fastest, most influential, and probably most reliable source. At least with social media, people are able to get actual facts of our history along with not so factual information. social media can also help spread ideas to help racism around the world so that people, like Brit Bennett, didn't feel so surprised to consider white people as good people (as explained in "I Don't Know What to Do With Good White People"). In the article "Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted", Galdwell explains how Social media isn't necessarily helping society as much as physical aspects are, such as talking face to face, posters, etc. Although I believe discussing something face to face will make the subject more intense, I disagree with him thinking social media isn't helping. I think in the end society will continue to learn more of racism and history as a whole as long as we continue to discuss these subjects in education facilities and on social media.
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