Hey there, I was wondering if I’m the only one who feels like this or not.
So I grew up thinking that we people all look different and never had a concept of something such as “white” and “black” people.
But especially in the last years I noticed more and more that a lot of people make such a big thing out of whether someone is “black” or “white” and what their ethnicity is.
It feels like it’s to the point where they make this define their core identity as if it’s very relevant how people look and how bright/dark their skin is as if this changes their personality.
It’s like so many of these people constantly bring this up to the point where it’s brainwashing and they literally even use racial slur as slang that was used in the past to devalue and enslave people based on their skin tone.
Since I experienced this it made me very uncomfortable since I never had this concept before and now I constantly have to obsessively think about it and feel like it’s manipulating me and these people still bring it up all the time.
I think this is driving me insane cause I never would think about humans so strongly because of their skin or something since it simply isn’t relevant and it just feels wrong but I can’t escape it since so many people continue to make such a big deal out of it.
Edit: To the people saying people have different advantages because of their skin, I’m fully aware of that and I wasn’t intending to debate that. My question was primarily about if other people have the same uncomfortable feeling that many people differentiate between people based on their skin and make such a big deal out of it (so more a personal feelings question than a generale debate about why it exists) because imo in a healthy society this shouldn’t be the case. But in my opinion the fact that we continue this behaviour instead of changing it is the exact reason we have racism and the issues of inequality based on someone’s skin in the first place. We need to start to change at some place and not just give up on it. If we continue to see people as “black” or “white” instead of just seeing them as “people” and only look at the past we will never end this issue. Ignorance is certainly not the solution. I found these videos where I think Elon Musk and Morgan Freeman are pretty much hitting the nail on the head. (And yes I’m American if that matters)
The first half of your comment is an acknowledgement that you don’t understand American culture and the second half is you casting declarative judgement upon it.
I don’t know which one of your minds to respond to.
Both.
He’s an outside observer, and spot on.
Why would you judge it as something good to separate people based on how their skin looks like? (I am American btw sry for the bad phrasing ik it really sounded like I was foreign)
I wouldn’t say it’s “good” but it is what is. Humans connect with each other through shared experiences. Growing up black in America creates a unique cross section of obligate life events. Regardless of your culture or environment, there are things that connect you to other black Americans. Some black people prefer to engage with that identity, others prefer to ignore or actively avoid it. But either way, it’s a choice that defines a significant part of their personality.
The reality is because of the lived experiences of people based on the color of their skin, people are different based on skin color. You’re right that it’s a stupid reason to think differently of people, but if people had been mistreated for many generations based on the color of their hair, and there was still a good chunk of people that something so arbitrary was somehow important, then you would want to approach a person with that hair color with understanding of that history and current struggle.
So why does it matter? Because 100 years ago, their great-great-grandparents had any wealth they managed to build up taken from them, 70 years ago their great-grandparents were kept boxed into separate, substandard areas, and 50 years ago their grandparents were kept from being able to buy homes outside low-income, substandard housing areas, and 30 years ago their parents were told it was their fault for growing up in crime-filled, poor areas with under-funded schools. And the whole time police have continuously treated them as that same substandard, poor, likely-criminal, so they have disproportionately been put in jail or grown up with one parent in jail. This obviously doesn’t apply to everyone, but it’s enough to lead people to treat them differently, either because they presume (until otherwise established) that they are poor, poorly educated, and likely criminal (by basically racist assholes) or with a certain amount of respect for their presumed struggles.
Taking it to an extreme, if a person comes across a very old person with a number tattooed in block letters on their forearm, they will respond one of two ways: with respect and concern for their presumed struggles and trauma, or with irrational hatred (by neo-nazis). Judging or “separating” a person for a barely noticeable tattoo that they didn’t even put on themselves may seem arbitrary, but only if you ignore the entire history that makes them different.
Good? I don’t know that you have to judge it as good, but it’s easy to understand WHY and also that is serves a purpose in the US it may not serve other places.
People naturally separate into like groups as a matter of being fundamentally tribal, even though these are barriers we generally try to break down. The point though is that in the US there is often a cultural difference when splitting between white or black, just like there’s a cultural difference for “grows payot sideburns”, “dresses flamboyantly or effeminately as a man”, “speaks Spanish at home”, etc, etc. Sure, people are just people and we don’t need to point out differences maliciously, but we ARE different and those are often things we like to celebrate. At the root, we want our differences to be a positive not a negative, but by and large we aren’t changing our cultures anymore to blend into one big homogeneous, colorless group.
In most of Europe, black and white (or brown or purple or whatever) isn’t a meaningful cultural distinction. In the US it is. Now whether or not we should police language or even whether or not the situation is sometimes uncomfortable… those are different topics altogether.
I really thought you weren’t American, because of the way you see the situation. I’m looking at that dumpster fire from the outside, and can’t help but think about many of the same questions you seem to have. Sounds like you might have grown up in a multicultural environment, where modern hate media and polarization sounds completely alien to you.