Blinded By Colour- Racism

We were all human until race disconnected us, religion separated us, politics divided us and wealth classified us.

Hating people because of their color is wrong and it doesn’t matter which color does the hating. It’s just wrong. – Muhammad Ali

"NOURISHING" RACISM.

Tagging ‘Indians’ as hypocrite may be considered another harsh and “anti-national” comment but putting forth the following issue may get you thinking about certain important things. The unceasing racism in a developing country like ours.

If you catch a sight of the skin tones of people around the world, you would observe that their are myriad number of skin tones. For example, people who lived in the tropics usually had darker skin than people who lived in colder climates. Science says that human body takes up variations in skin color appeared to be adaptive traits that were passed through genes from parents to children. These traits corresponded closely with geography and the Sun's ultraviolet (UV) radiation. A person's skin color is determined by the amount of melaninin his or her skin. Melanin is a dark brown to black pigment produced by cells called melanocytes. Melanin's purpose is to protect the skin from the Sun's harmful UV rays. The more melanin your skin has, the darker your skin will be and the more protection it will have against UV rays.

Indians who leave the country to settle abroad tend to cry of how they are separated and distinguished solely because of their skin colour. The discrimination that they face due to dark skin colour stresses many. Surprisingly, they forget how they treat people with dark skin in their own country. The issue of racism is a not new social phenomena in India. The extreme obsession with fairness of skin and the aversion with the darker complexion persist stringently all across the world and also in India. The practices of racial discrimination against people with dark skin occurs yet the dominant mood among the public and government is that of denial of these social practices.

The very recent brawl and attack on 5 African nationals in Greater Noida drew global outrage though their came not strong stand by the concerned authority to curb such situations in future. Sadly, there exist the stereotyped brain that conceive these people as mere drug-peddlers. Apart from this, the by default framing them as criminals and then set of abuses that follows.

In yet another scenario where the people india discriminates fellow Indians. What a mockery to the great “diversity” here? On one side people boasting about the diversity and in another second they insulting our own fellow north-eastern clan. Its been hell long years and still their zero acceptance that the eastern people feel around india. The people from North East have to face continuous harassment on account of their racial features in their day to day interaction with the people from the ‘mainland India’. The nature of this harassment varies from passing derogatory comments based on structure of face, fashion sense, sexuality to open violent attacks without any provocations. Based on their looks they are called “Chinki”, “Momos” and “Chinese” so on. I wonder how education even building a better society.

We have seen high shooting percentage of literacy but how funny it is “acknowledge” that education hardly plays strict roles to mould mindsin right direction. In certain cases, however hard the awareness gets spread there will still be such prevailing thoughts for fellow humans. Breathing the same air doesn’t give the assurance of same and right kind of mindsets.

The issue is how hard it is for us to accept that this racism even exist between us and is not the problem of west only. The commercials have been following to portray how its “must” to owe a glowing skin. The dark shades fail to procure jobs as they lack confidence. Linking the inner attributes to the external visible traits tends to mould the brains of masses in a strange direction. The trolls across all social media slam and make fun of dark colour. Youth enjoys such stuffs and forward the word or tag friends motivating the mass issues more.

Dove ad presenting racism and suprisingly clearing through multiple layers of review on social media.

A happy family in India deserves equal treatment.

CHALLENGE YOURSELF

1.Stereotype replacement.
Recognize your automated reaction on seeing anyone darker than you. Rather than judging, realise it’s driven by a stereotype. Label the thought as ‘stereotypical.’ Then reflect on what drove your response. This process will push you through what made you believe the stereotype and then getting it replaced by more irrational view.

2.Removing Stereotypical imaging and judgments.
This is to challenge your by default conclusions and judgments that you make on seeing a black. It is wrongly determined that African Americans are smarter than whites or they are always a criminal or drug dealers. Also the eastern clan aren’t the ones who are just meant to serve you momos. These embedded thoughts should be challenged consciously.

3.Walking in their shoes.
Attacking the emotional side of your brain will certainly help you get rid of set prejudice thoughts. Try to interact with the ones who feel discriminated. Imagine how that would make you feel. The result will surely hit you hard and maybe eventually you will get into a more positive frame of mind. Try to spread this around amongst your peers. Be responsible to bring change.

Youth being aware of such prevalent thoughts is strongly needed. Certainly, there is a change that has come in and motivating such voices that speak against the wrong doings against humanity is needed. Educational reforms will do wonders. Passing the right words and thoughts to the coming generation will help a lot. We can’t always rely on government and court to guide the nation right. Being responsible as a citizen to spread right words is just the need of the hour.