A senior British politician has today launched a government review on issues around race, saying that class background is now a more important factor than race as an indicator of disadvantage and discrimination.
Perhaps he’s right, I don’t know, although the comments on the various news sites today demonstrate vividly and depressingly that there are still serious problems around race. What I found most interesting was how many white people wrote in to complain that they are feeling like the odd ones out because they are surrounded by “blacks and Asians”. One woman is disgusted that when she visits her doctor’s surgery, hers is the only white face there.
Well, folks, what a great chance to explore a different perspective. What does it feel like to be in a minority, what can we learn from it, what is really important in life?
In another different perspective, as we wake up in Britain to freezing snow and fog, people in Haiti are waking up to crushing devastation, or not waking up at all. If we were to look at satellite images of the Earth, our perspectives would spin between extremes.
We all bleed the same colour blood.
Image by al-Taqi
Elsewhere:
Hearts breaking for Haiti: Rebecca, Country Parson, Beyond Just Mom, Laurie, Anita, Facebook Folks, Ox Herding and many others. And yours, I know.
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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
My ob-gyn is Asian, so I am among very few white women in his waiting room. I don’t much care because I have been an illiterate “long nose” in Japan whom people liked to take pictures of and no one wanted to sit next to on the bus! For most in Japan, Christmas was not a holiday — I worked at a Catholic college, so I did get a holiday! I currently live in a neighbourhood with good numbers of Italians, Jews, Russians and Arabs. I can barely remember the time when I could pronounce all of my students’ names. The world is indeed a smaller place.
What I have learned from all this is that people are pretty much the same down deep. Whether from Togo or Colombia, Nepal or Italy, there are basic human experiences that transcend culture. It is all very enriching. You just have to learn to accept that things can and will change as people immigrate to improve their lives. And, dare I say it, it behooves immigrants to respect the norms of the society into which they move. Some gracious balance must be achieved.
As for class differences, there is a point there. If you are from a privileged segment of society, you can easily ensconce yourself in a homogeneous, gated community. The rich are getting richer and the poor even poorer.
We had the experience this summer of living in rural Malawi for a month. If we went to the market we were always the only white faces there and were stared at throughout the whole process of obtaining our fruits and vegetables. I felt deep down what it feels like to be VERY different, but not like it feels for a lot of minority groups, because in Malawi, I may have been azungu (white person), but being azungu automatically means that you are rich. So, we may have been treated a little differently some times, even looked down upon at times. (Like the time I wandered out into the middle of the market street without looking and got run into by a man on a bicycle who started yelling at me. I deserved it.) I still have no idea what it must feel like to be looked down upon because of the color of my skin.
I agree with you Tess. Get over it people. Look around you. We are one world now and we’re all in this thing together for better or worse.
Love….
yes, mine too. i have a friend working there for the UCC…
Get over it indeed! Thanks for sharing these experiences of enrichment. Towanda, I hope you get news of your friend soon.
It just occurred to me I should perhaps mention for readers who don’t know that in Britain we define the term “Asian” differently from in the US, where I believe it refers to people of Far Eastern ethnic origin. Here, it refers to people whose family background stems from the Indian subcontinent and Sri Lanka.
In Canada, Asian generally refers to Far Eastern and Southeast Asian to those from the Indian subcontinent and Sri Lanka.
Not long ago, Tess, you were talking of contempt and rage. The skin color is often a reason to feel superior — or inferior, as the case maybe. To be the only white person in a waiting room may feel unsettling to some. Racism is still very real everywhere.
Some are fortunate to have lived or still be living in places where we were or are in a minority. I find this healthy.
I was 28 when I went as a young wife and mother to the Caribbean. Yes, it felt strange to be white when everyone else was black or Asian. I could not disappear in the crowds as I like to do. But I loved the sensation of having the shoe on the other foot.
And yes, the disaster in Haiti brings out an entirely different slant on the way we may want to look at things. But how long will we be able to sustain our empathy before our attention is drawn to something else?
Haiti has been in a state of devastation through extreme poverty for a long time. No one would ever, ever wish an earthquake upon these innocent people, as some sort of blessing to wake up the world. But it has happened. The Obama administration needs to think through a comprehensive and ongoing outreach to the suffering there. Take the money away from one stealth bomber, and use it to rebuild in Haiti, in a way that makes life there worth living.
Living in New Mexico as an “Anglo,” as we are called here, has been an enlightening experience of being in the minority. The cultural and racial dynamics here are more complex than any other place I’ve lived. And I’m grateful for the experience.
Tess, hello from Japan. Your thought-provoking post raises a troubling and sensitive topic. I agree there are still very serious problems around race – the recent immigrant incident in southern Italy is yet another example. Fear is a large part of the human psyche and it is easier than ever now to manipulate that aspect in modern society. I have lived on four continents and have time and again witnessed how racism so easily and destructively surfaces. And Barbara, things have not changed much in Japan, despite the billions of yen spent on “internationalization” efforts, including English study. Last week I was shopping in a town that does see many foreigners, but two children gawked at me, open-mouthed – (oh, no, a FOREIGNER), until dragged off by their mother. So often in my life I have personally experienced how it feels to be in the minority, mainly because I have spent so much of my life in cultures and countries not my own – I have been a stranger in strange lands. When I was a young child it could be quite lonely. But as an adult I find that it taps resources of resilience and tolerance within myself. The loneliness still surfaces, but somehow it has become a way of connecting me even more deeply to the sense of our shared existence in the web of life. The poignancy rather than the separateness is what illuminates my understanding now, and like The Pollinatrix, I am grateful for it.
Thank you all for these thoughtful comments. I think there is a kind of default setting for all of us that switches back to looking for the familiar when we feel threatened, otherwise it would not be so easy for far-right nationalist parties to push those buttons in times of economic and political difficulty.
I wonder when we start to be aware of differences, though. I suspect it starts very young, but it must also depend on the individual family.
Tess, I think that cognitive science has proved that we look for similarity in times of stress – it’s hard wired into us as a means of survival. But in a more complex, interconnected world this type of anachronistic behaviour is unhelpful. Stepping out of the ‘science’ frame now… cultural and racial integration offers us so much learning – the chance to reflect on our sense of self in the wider world – how we might respond to the richness of our experience.
And we can begin to help each other too… A simple story: The Chief Exec of one of my local hospitals was challenged about the number of ‘immigrants’ that were taking places on the wards. Yes, he reflected, he was so grateful for all those doctors and nurses – without them the hospital would have to close…
Steve, I love that change of perspective employed by your hospital Chief Exec. Good for him!
when i very unexpectedly went back to school in my late forties, i wondered what my educational experience would look like. my first class was multicultural issues. it was the most thought-provoking, personally enlightening (& at times embarrassing) class i have ever experienced. one challenge was to literally seek out a venue where i was the minority, “the other.” it has impacted me in ways i am eternally grateful for. which leads to another thought… it certainly seems like the blogging circle i inhabit is predominantly white (& female). hmmmm. what’s up with that? the world IS getting smaller and there are still huge crevasses in the midst. as always, thanks for making me think, tess.