Life matters. Not
just mine, or yours, but all life. I
have been told this by so many people that it has stuck with me every time I try
to discourage another person’s way of thinking. It’s not as if I needed to be right, but it
seems that even the most trivial view of some has a greater intolerance to
others. I have decided that taking Soc
101 is a great avenue to see the world as a whole.
Aristotle’s quote: “The Sum of the Parts is greater than the
whole” could be used in a greater context than even he thought possible. With so many people on this planet; you, in
your whole life, would only get to see a fraction of this. Still it would be only just a part of the
whole. You would think of the world as a whole instead of the many different,
wonderful, and yet, sometimes terrifying, things in this world that would offer
your view to be obscured in one way or another.
Take America, for instance, our country is founded by
English immigrants that came to settle here and the Natives that were already
here. The constant exposure to new
cultures has left us more tolerant, yet still unrefined, in our ambitious
lives. The Eclectic compilation of people
here is but a fraction of the whole.
The fact that in one city you would find a Native American
community, an African American community, an Anglo community, French, Asian,
Indian; it is these eclectic groups of people that would broaden your horizon
to distinguish where this person was from or that person and learn new things
about yourself that you had never even fathomed before.
Racism within communities is to be expected, because of the
ignorance of others. That is where you
could change your perspective on the matter as a whole. A person, whether they have light skin, dark
skin, brown or olive skin; it’s a matter of who
that person is, not what they are that defines them. When you take a person you just met into
consideration and act on the importance of actually getting to know that
person, you would see something that most cannot.
In my younger days I was bullied, so I became a bully. It wasn’t a bright and shining way of life,
so do you see? If you discriminate
against a person you are teaching your child that its okay, when it’s not; or
you are teaching the person that you are harassing that your entire race is the
same way. When that train of thought
enters a person’s mind it sticks and then you’re stuck with another bigoted person
that the world has no need for. Our
brothers-in-arms, so to speak, are the ones not afraid to stand on the front
lines beside you and tell your, bully, captor, or whatever, that no matter what
you have a support system.
It is with this way of thinking that I touch on a research
topic that stems from my brief lecture from my Soc 101 Professor. In his introduction, he spoke of the Pine
Ridge reservation in Pine Ridge, SD; But also of his home land across the ‘pond’. He said the similar conditions of Pine Ridge
and his home country had made him feel actually very homely. His approach of the reservation was actually
quite refreshing, as opposed to the tired sayings that ‘natives are good for
nothing’ and drunks. A native student
attending an all-Caucasian academy would be able to tell you how it feels to be
ostracized for the color of your skin.
I, myself, have been in that situation.
It is not pleasant. Using my
experience as the only native person in an entire school system, with the
exception of my younger brother, it brought with it an amount of attention that
I had never been accustomed to. I had
been accosted by many people asking what my ancestors were like. How did it
feel to live in a Tipi. It was actually
quite difficult to get through a day of school when everyone stared at you like
had an extra head and were the color purple.
I got through it and ended up making friends. The novelty wore off and I was more than
ecstatic to return to my home at the end of the first semester. I didn’t think I’d have been able to deal
with the new incoming students and their questions. My brother, on the other hand, loved the attention
he was given. He was, and still is, a
ham for attention. As I got older I found
that meeting new people broadened my views of the people in this world. It’s their way of thinking that had changed
my own. I was grateful to teachers that I
had once thought were not worth my time.
I will forever be grateful to my Elementary principle for
the patience he had with me and explaining the race issue that seemed to drive
people to do their ignorant actions. So
in conclusion, I just wanted to touch this little project that I will be
starting soon. Thank you for reading my
nonsense. Have a good day.
