![SASC - Student Academic Success Center - UNE [logo]](https://files.uneportfolio.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2022/02/SASCLogoSquare_Smaller-3-e1644936452801.jpeg)
For these past weeks, we have looked into different sources of media that give us the answer to what is race. As we think about ways we could work towards ending racism you notice that all these sources we have read, have led to working towards finding a solution to end racism. We focused on media that showed people talking about personal experiences on how race has affected them but almost how they have had encounters with other races. People will cover their true identities because they feel that they need to fit into the mainstream of today’s society and to meet everyone’s expectation of what a real person should be like and act like. Some examples of covering are pretending to be a different race, sex or hiding your sexuality. In these sources of Media that include Yoshino, Hochschild, the Blackness Project, and the Whiteness project we can see how the future depends on how we want to make a change.
In the Blackness project the people sharing their stories and experiences of there version of the deep story. These people want others to understand what the life of discrimination is like and how race shapes everyone’s reality. In the video a man named Byron shared “In a time when there was rampant discrimination and when African-Americans and other people of color were being unfairly denied opportunities and affirmative action programs were designed to level the playing field in this day and age many of those programs have been dismantled so those that think there are still many programs in that 1960s 70s affirmative action space. I think they’re wrong about that I think in this day and age when people are able to break through when people are able to succeed it’s because they put in the work is because they have the talent is because they’ve accomplished what they need to accomplish to be able to be in the position that they’re in”. Byron expresses how back then the African American community was denied opportunities and now they are stilled denied opportunities or segregated where they may be. Another man Julian expresses that “ I mean we have a new president who shows that he really doesn’t care about certain nationalities which are blatant racism and that’s our president so it’s definitely here in full effect in 2017 and we hope to get better but it may get worse as long as we as a people do our part and we come together.” We are in a time and place where our government is applicating racism and it may take a while for it to get better and it may not get better but working together to solve out these issues is the best solution. It starts with understanding that you have to love your people in order to love yourself and those who want freedom without fighting for it need to change their perspective. As the narrator goes on about racism and it’s issues he says“Black is a multidimensional thing It starts with understanding that you gotta love your people in order to love yourself and those who want freedom without fighting for it, people who want the rain without thunder and lightning, being black is being strong” Before they are able to change if you just want the freedom that will come with a fight. This comes with talking about the issue instead of brushing it under the rug. There are always people that are going to try and bring you down based on their own beliefs. The people that express their belief in this way are trying to tell there side of the deep story and trying to tell the reason why others assume based on their beliefs.
In this assignment and our last assignment, there are many similarities of what Hochschild is talking about and what these people from the Whiteness project videos are talking about. Now in the world, there are so many things that aren’t socially acceptable even if you’re representing what your beliefs are. In Hochschild, her interviewee explains “Then you see the immigrants Mexican, Samolis, the Syrian refugees Yet to Come. As you wait in this on moving line you’re being asked to feel sorry for them all. You have a good heart. But who is deciding who you feel compassion for? Then you see President Barack Obama waving the line Cutters for. He’s on their side. In fact, isn’t he a line cutter too? How was his father was black I’d pay for Harvard? As you wait your turn Obama is using the money in your pocket to help the line cutters. He and his liberal backers have removed the shame from taking. The government has become an instrument for redistributing in your money to the undeserving. It’s not your government anymore it’s theirs.” When people say that immigrants that have moved here are undeserving and are line cutters they aren’t. There are people here illegally but that doesn’t mean they don’t have a right to be here or are taking the easy way out. The majority of the US ancestors are not originally from the US. Everyone has different ethnicities and ancestors that came over like these people now. The people that express their belief in this way are trying to tell there side of the deep story and trying to tell the reason why they follow trump and why they base their belief off what he believes in.
In the Whiteness project, we got to look at many people view of what their life has been life. There were two people that stood out to me: Wade and Nicholas. For Wade, he expressed that “ I’m not necessarily happy that I am white. Because of all the extra stuff that came with it because of like the way our race has acted like through the course of history like they’ve done the most evil messed up things I’ve ever seen other than like using rape as a weapon in the Congo but white people have definitely done worse than that in my opinion What the place I work and stuff like that the people that say the most awful things that I’ve ever heard in person or those people are those white people to get drunk and sit at my bar and spout off nonsense and it makes me really disappointed that I have to be linked lumped into the same category as them for me is why I like the way that I look because I am separated in that way I think people of my generation are less tolerance to blatant racism but a lot of them don’t understand like what all comes with like the underlined racism systemic racism that’s happened I’ve seen like on the internet and on television and stuff like that a lot of older white men complaining about them being discriminated against because they’re right but I don’t necessarily agree with that . Wade is calm but also angry that he is white and that he represents a race that says such awful things and he is ashamed to be white. Nicholas however is a bit more forgiving by expressing that “The being white help them become who they are cuz they take a lot of pride in the fact that their family may have not been Rich, to begin with, and are not rich what I when I got my job example I walked in there and I just look clean-cut white person and they hired me pretty much because of that and it’s just small small things that no one really notices but I see a little bit easier being white I think we’ve come a long way since the Civil Rights Movement but kids nowadays tend to grow up thinking that the problems in the past and if they’re still just a civil like there’s an unjust civil system I don’t feel guilty about the fact that I’ve been given these advantages I just feel the need to use these advantages subtly or how it whichever way I can to try to make sure that other people of other races can have the same advantages that I have. Nicholas seems to be accountable for the way his race is and also happy that he was given the advantages he has but at the same time sorry that others can’t have that equality. They are talking about the issue instead of brushing it under the rug and by what was said in the article for this current assignment is unethical. Our civil rights should protect every aspect that we are as individuals and a group. There is a difference between individual and Group rights. Group rights are rights held by a group and individual rights are rights held by individual people. In this article, the writer talks a lot about individual and group rights and how we are categorized as groups with our identities. He wants individual rights so people don’t have to continue covering their identities.
With both these recent assignment, we are able to see a bit of Yoshino’s covering and hiding your true identity. In Yoshino’s covering he says“We must indeed build a new civil rights paradigm on what draws us together rather than on what drives us apart because covering applies to us all it provides an issue around which we can make common cause this is the desire for authenticity are common human wish to express ourselves without being impeded by reasoning demands for conformity.” Everything that defines us is what authenticity is and the writer wants us to realize that it times to build a new civil rights paradigm which can bring us closer together than driving us further away. Covering is something we do to shield us from hateful comments but we should have rights that say this isn’t okay. Race is something that drives us apart but if we talk more about it we are able to make a change in the beliefs that people in Hochschild view that race and being an immigrant is something that makes you a line cutter. Ia Yoshino’s view he is able to defend the people who are choosing to cover up their true self. Yoshino is an advocate for these people struggling to show their true colors to our society but no one is doing anything about it. Every day there is a someone hiding their personality, sexual orientation and parts of themselves that make them unique. He talks about how he wants people to embolden their identities so they don’t lose part of themselves. Yoshino’s wants to open everyone eyes to how we as human beings should have the basic right to be defined as the way we want to and not to have to cover our identities.
Throughout this assignment, I have seen how peoples words can make a change in the way others think. With Yoshino’s Covering, we see how we don’t need limitations that limit something that comes naturally to us and is an instinct. These limits that society puts on these human being is unethical and makes these people hide their identities because of fear of criticism. Being themselves gives them a way to be authentic and unique. They need to show who you are and to define yourself. In The Blackness project and The Whiteness project, we can see how race can put an identity on you that affects your life. Before they are able to change it you just want the freedom that will come with a fight. This comes with talking about the issue. There are always people that are going to try and bring you down based on their own beliefs. The people that express their belief in this way are trying to tell there side of the deep story and trying to tell the reason why others assume based on their beliefs. many people speak up on the issues that racism has brought upon us. These people want others to understand what the life of discrimination is like and how race shapes everyone’s reality.
Yoshino, Kenji. “Covering.” Kenji Yoshino, kenjiyoshino.com/KY/covering/.
“The Blackness Project Is a Featured Length Documentary Film about Culture and Race from the Perspectives of African American and Other Minorities.” The Blackness Project, theblacknessproject.org/.
Dow, Whitney Dow, and Michelle Byrd. “Whiteness Project.” Whiteness Project, whitenessproject.org/.
Hochschild, Arlie Russell, et al. “Special Report: I Spent 5 Years with Some of Trump’s Biggest Fans. Here’s What They Won’t Tell You.” Mother Jones, 23 June 2017, www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/08/trump-white-blue-collar-supporters/.
