Racial Discrimination
Pamela T. Dixon
English Comp 2 Friday
January 24, 2013
Abstract
The terms stereotype, prejudice , discrimination, and racism are often used interchangeably in everyday conversation. But when discussing these terms from a sociological perspective it is important to define them: stereotypes are oversimplified ideas about groups of people, prejudice refers to thoughts and feelings about those groups, while discrimination refers to actions toward them. Racism is a type of prejudice that involves set beliefs about a specific racial group. As stated, stereotypes are oversimplified ideas about groups of people. Stereotypes can be based on race ethnicity, age gender, sexual orientation almost any characteristic. they may be positive, but are often negative. In either case, the stereotype is a generalization that doesn't take individual differences into account.
Racial Discrimination What is an ethnic stereotype ? Racial stereotypes or ethnic stereotypes are a representation of a group of certain ethnicity or race in a generated manner, portraying all members to display certain typical characteristics. Stereotypes are more often than not considered negative, even though positive stereotypes exist. This racial stereotyping is often the root of many jokes. Stereotyping someone generally indicates that the person has all the traits that the members of the race are known to posses. The biggest problem that arises out of this kind of stereotyping is that it creates prejudice which can be the root cause of racial discrimination. "Racist" and "Racism" are provocative words in American society. To some, these words have reached the level of curse words in their offensiveness. Yet, "racist and "racism" are descriptive words of a reality that cannot be denied. African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, and Asian Americans (people of color) live daily with the effects of individual racism. Some Americans behave as if racial difference produce inherent superiority in European Americans (whites). Individuals respond to people of color and whites differently because of ethnicity. As a consequence, people of color are injured by judgments or actions that are directly or indirectly racist. Today, large differences among racial and ethnic groups continue to exist in employment, income and wealth, housing, education, criminal justice, health and other areas. According to its most simple definition Racial Discrimination is discrimination against the members of one or more races based upon race. Race is a significant social issue because people use racial differences as the basis for discrimination. It is no surprise to everybody that a person's life and achievements may depend strictly on their skin color. It is obvious that racism is not bad as it was many decades ago, but it sure has not gone away. With the world being so big it has a large variety of human shapes and colors. However, by nature, the human being tends to see others as black, white, yellow, red and brown. As humans spread throughout the world, their adaptations to different living conditions and genetic mutations added distinct characteristics to the people. In this sense, the concept of race, a group of people with inherited physical characteristics that distinguish it from another group is a reality. Chadsey High School, which is a high school with a lot of diversity in relation to people from different ethnic backgrounds. The majority group is African American students; the minorities groups are Hispanic, some Italian and Greeks. You cannot imagine the huge amount of discrimination against the minorities groups. It is unbelievable and disturbing how some of the teachers, the school police, and even the principle show indifference resolving a fight between African American and Mexican