Monday, September 29, 2014
The Color Complex
The book starts, like many others, with an historical perspective of how we arrived to the problem associated with modern colorism we are so familiar with today. I like when ideas are presented from its very beginning, its fundamental core leading to its outstretch roots, that is the problem itself. That is something the book or at least its first chapter is able to do really well on. So basically, after slave trade would commence in the Americas and different human races began to coexist together, the problem of color complex would result. The first chapter play a huge emphasis on colorism( discrimination base on color) and its impact in society. Even though the origin of the color complex probably dates back to 500 years or even more it is still plays a major restriction on individual in modern days. The chances of even finding a job or a love partner for that matter can be influence by your skin color or backgrounds. In the US and many other places in the world, you are most likely to land a job if you had a lighter skin and have a "white" name. I like to think of this problem as to being more influence by society and the media rather than individual themselves. To be honest i think it limit us as human beings and as "intelligent" beings. A persons qualities should never be define by the color of their skin but by their actions and perhaps even their inaction toward certain things. Seeing as this problem is really old and unlikely to change from one day to another, it will be something we continue to live with and possibly our posterity as well.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
That sounds like a fairly pessimistic view towards the end of this post. Slavery was a really old problem that was unlikely to change, but in time an ambition great enough to dispell slavery was put behind many movements. Slavery still exists in certain parts of the world and is even watered down a bit in the form of servants. However, the issue isn't nearly as severe as it was a century and a half ago. So I feel that even though colorism will continue to be a growing issue in the future there will be a time where people of all colors come to see its faults and let go of the concept. Or at least make an effort to.
ReplyDeletei truly wish that things would turn out as you describe them but seeing as how an issue such as colorism is so related and/or influence by the society we live in, it will take a long time until people finally realize that deep down we are all the same. As long we don't have the same level of education or perhaps the same open mindedness this specific problem will continue to plague our environment.
DeleteI don't even think level of education is what makes it such an issue. A broke person from the "hood" will see what they want to see and a rich person living within the walls of a gorgeous mansion may see the very same thing, negative or positive. It's also hard for people to see something as uniform when it is so apparent that it is not. Language, accents, physical appearances, slang, interests, beliefs. All of these can have stereotypes attributed to them for every race. When there is no one else left to be racist against people will continue to establish new stereotypes for "sub-races". A recent example of sub-races amongst black people is the whole lightskin/brownskin/darkskin thing. People have been distinguishing features among their own races to find new areas to direct their hate or sentiments. The stereotypes could be humorous, but become a serious problem when people already form impressions of others based on insignificant factors like their zodiac sign and if they're #teamlighstkin or #teamdarkskin. Techniques like the study of physiognomy amongst other races will even be used just to solidify beliefs that we are all different. And we ARE all different, but does that make it right to mistreat each other?
DeleteEverything is base on our own perspective and understanding of the world around us. For instance, if we speak of individual in general then yes we are all mentally and and physically different. If we refer to humans in turn of race itself, then we are all the same doesn't matter how much some people try to denied it. i think placing humans under different racial categories base on phenotype is stupid on its own, i personally only see one race, the human race. To tell you the truth even if we someday happened to end racism as a whole people will eventually establish something else to be prejudice of and the never ending cycle will start again.
Delete