Am I racist?
August 23, 2008
I’ve been inundated with racist vibes over the past few weeks. Not as a victim, just as a bystander. Bystander best describes it, because I hardly ever partook in the discussion.
It’s not that I didn’t realize that racism existed, but it’s just that I’ve been made acutely aware of it over the past few weeks, or even months. Some of this was due to people I cared about being of the race which was the target of some racist remarks, and at other times, just due to realizations of how deeply divided we as the human race are.
We are so tribal in nature that we are compelled to divide ourselves into different sects. I’ve read that we are capable of treating a maximum of 150 people as ‘tribesmates’. Anybody beyond this number is outside the tribe, and hence, not of particular concern.
The implications of this is that we truly care for only about 150 people. Maybe that’s not accurate – maybe the number’s 1500. Or 15000. But the point is that after a certain degree of separation, we tend to think of people as ‘them’ rather than ‘us’.
For different people, this means different things. For some, it might not make much of a difference. With enough empathy, you’d cry every time you’d hear of anybody’s death or other tragedy. Clearly, this is not so. On the other hand, this might mean that you don’t give a shit if 1.5 million people die in a flood in Cambodia. This, I’m afraid, is closer to the truth.
But more importantly, this leads to other behaviors like racism, dishonesty, etc. After all, it’s easy to cheat somebody at a gas station when you don’t know them that well, and even easier if it’s the first time you’ve met them. But it’s far more difficult if you know and care about that person, like if it’s a friend.
It’s also not difficult to imagine somebody hating a particular race, until they become good friends with somebody of that race. Their being inside their ‘tribe’ forces you to change your view of the world. You have to either wrap (or rather warp) your world-view around them, by thinking “all except XYZ of this particular race are ____”, or to accept that “maybe this race isn’t _____”.
I’ve always wanted to believe that I’m not racist. I’ve never believed that any of the human races is superior to any other. I believe that over time, we evolve differently in different parts of the world, but in a very irrelevant, tiny manner, which leads to absolutely no differences between any two people of different races. Any characteristics we might observe in the current generation of a race is a short-term (a couple of 1000 years maybe) adaptation of that particular race.
I believe in individual superiority – that is the only measure that can have any importance. It doesn’t matter where you came from, who your related to, what color your skin is, what language you speak, what food you eat, what gods you pray to (or don’t), what area of land of the Earth you came from, what your previous generations had to go through, how rich/poor your forefathers were…………….
….all that matters is what you make of yourself.
Of course, I’m using the term ‘superiority’ lightly. I don’t believe that any of us is better than any other. I might be better than you in Football, but I won’t be better than you. There’s a difference.
The title of this post comes from the particular prejudices I know I carry. I feel strongly about certain sets of people. Just observing certain characteristics immediately leads me to conclude that there’s a high possibility of them having certain other undesirable characteristics. A certain style of dressing, might for example, indicate orthodoxy of religion. I do always try and account for exceptions – I don’t assume that my first impression is always true. I let the person prove who they are or aren’t.
But this prejudice might be unfair, considering the burden of proof is on them.
Also, what I view as ‘negative characteristics’ are of course, my opinion, and of relevance to me alone. I don’t pretend to think that anybody else should think that way, or that my way is always the right one.
However, I believe that this is the way it must be. If I assumed the best of everyone, I would be setting myself up for disaster. Trusting a stranger is illogical, and is asking for trouble.
What I don’t do, however, is hate somebody, based on one of these prejudices. If they turn out to be exceptions to my assumptions, I will gladly open my mind to the possibility that I was wrong about them.
Ponderings
August 19, 2008
I recently read a blog entry by an old classmate of mine. This was a guy that I remembered as being quite intelligent and rational. I was therefore quite surprised to see what seemed to be a narrow-minded, bigoted and sexist rant from him. I didn’t want to form an opinion until I had read the entire post, so I did. After reading the post, I was flabbergasted. Was this even the same guy?!
As if the post wasn’t bad enough, the comments were just ridiculous! I know my classmate well enough to know that he was probably just mistaken in his viewpoint. But most commentors, it was quite obvious, were just taking advantage of this opportunity to indulge in sexist drivel.
He was posting about ‘feminist bullshit’, and more specifically about a website called Blank Noise set up to combat eve teasing. According to my friend, eve teasing was not a real or common problem. It was just being blown out of proportion by the overzealous media, ‘elders’ and education system. He was apparently a victim of “fear of being teased”. The point he was trying to make was that women were being so over-protected that men were suffering massively as a result.
The ‘feminists’ were playing it up, apparently, to garner attention. I would like to state at this point that I don’t like feminists – or any other -ists. He has ‘never seen an instance of eve teasing in public’. Talking to women, he couldn’t come up with ‘one single first-person experience or be able to quantify it’. What utter bullshit! That’s A-grade horse manure right there!
Besides, what exactly was he trying to prove? That because he hasn’t seen this happening, it doesn’t happen? So I guess ’cause he’s never seen a rape, murder, dowry murder, sati burning, etc., that they’ve never happened in India? He must not have read the newspapers on the day that drunk revelers molested a girl in public near the Gateway of India (how fitting) – 70 men, in a crowd of 1500. Or when a 12 year old mentally handicapped girl was raped in a Mumbai local. India is not safe for women.
But more to the point, I don’t know how he’s never noticed any instances of eve-teasing in public – ’cause I’ve seen plenty. I don’t know if he’s ‘living in a very good society’, or if he’s just in denial. Or worse. I distinctly remember an incident in Kerala, where this and other classmates of mine were discussing a recent newspaper article. The article talked about a woman who an inebriated man ejaculated on in a public bus at night. What disgusted me was the retort that one of these guys made, and other nodded their head to – “She deserved it – what the fuck was she doing out at 8PM alone at night?”. Leaving aside the question of how utterly ridiculous that statement is, gentlemen, please – nobody deserves that. Eve teasing exists. It’s a real problem, it’s nasty.
Unwanted attention
I think I have some idea of where he was coming from. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, let me assume that was under the mistaken impression that him, and his masculinity were under attack. I remember reading about sexual harrassment, and being outraged at what I felt was extremely unfair and biased laws. These laws, I realized, could easily be misused to blame a guy of an offence he didn’t commit. Innocent actions could be misunderstood to be sexual advances. This can be devastating for a guy.
But then it hit me – these were in place to protect women, not punish men. Most women don’t want to slap a fake sexual harassment lawsuit on you. Most women don’t want to falsely accuse you of eve teasing or molestation. The edge-cases where this happens has the same distribution as false accusations of any other nature.
But what does it mean for the horny, red-blooded male and female? Must we now live in a society where we can’t flirt with a girl for fear of being ostracized? Must we now keep our distance and behave like asexual non-men? Do women want this?
Ha ha, snort, snort, that’s funny! Anybody who believes this just doesn’t get it! The only purpose of this is to prevent unwanted attention! If a woman says no, she means NO! Pursuing her, stalking her, molesting her is what the losers do.
I’ve always been a gentleman pervert. I flirt shamelessly with girls. I make crude, lewd jokes, touch them inappropriately, take liberties I shouldn’t. And they love it! They love the attention! Why? ’cause I respect their decision – if she says NO, then it’s over. I move on. But if it’s not, if she finds me attractive, then it’s game on!
Why this seeming hypocrisy? Well, it all goes back to evolutionary biology. I won’t waste time expounding on this, but in a nutshell, we’re all looking for excellent mating partners. If a women feels that a man might make a good mate, ’cause of his sexy genes, she’ll be attracted to him. Ditto for men. The problem arises when a female rejects a man. The man is trying to propagate his genes, so his goal is to have sex with the woman. This can’t happen if she rejects him, now can it? And this leads to all sorts of uncool stuff, like I’ve talked about above. Note that this doesn’t in any way excuse this behavior.
So where does this leave us? I don’t know about you, but it leaves me dejected. I look around, and I feel like there’s a war going on. A war between men and women. And I don’t understand it. There couldn’t be a more beautiful union than a man and woman*. Can’t we all just get along?
*Yeah, ok, that was a bit mushy – fucking move on already!
