Is America Racist?
This question is not in regards to America Vs. other countries. It relates to what we deal with within our own State. Are we a bunch of Racist people? If so, how did we get this way? If not why does it seem that way?
You know, I have given this question a lot of thought over the past few days. I am even writing a new hub titled "A proposal for the races." It's a proposal to end Racism once and for all.
The short answer is yes, America is Racist. While the long answer is "kind of."
Not everyone is racist, though most do have racial tendencies. I have the idea that we can end racism by simply ending discussions about it. Unfortunately, the media, will not allow that to happen. America loves drama. The media sells the drama to the American People.
Myself. I have racial tendencies, however, I am not racist. Would I feel more comfortable among a group of white teenagers or a group of black teenagers? Most likely I would be more comfortable with the group of white teenagers. This doesn't make me a racist, but it makes me have a racial tendency. I have more in common culturally with the white teenagers, than I would with the black. However, I do find myself curious about all cultures. I constantly try to learn about myself and how I can introduce myself with new cultures. Learn their war, learn their struggles.
Maybe if I am able to learn all about a group of people, I would feel more comfortable in a group of them.
I had the pleasure of experiencing a hip-hop concert, when I was younger. It was frightening. It wasn't because of the music, it was because of the crowd. The crowd acted a lot differently at that concert, than one at a let's say, KC and the sunshine band concert. It seemed more violent than anything. I believe the Hip-Hop Concert was 3-6 Mafia, if I am not mistaken.
Years later, I attended a Blink 182 concert. This is when I was introduced to the "mosh pit" mentality. It was seemingly more violent than the previous hip-hop concert.
I felt comfortable in neither concert.
So is America Racist? Yes, to a degree it is.
When we stop labeling ourselves as black or white, only then, will we make progress.
Everyone hates someone and those who say they don't are either lying to themselves, others, or are ignorant to their own thoughts. Some are racist, some are homophobic, some are sexist, and some are just racist when it comes to biracial or interracial issues. We are human and for as long as we have a brain we will hate that which doesn't fit into our own personal opinions and beliefs.
If you diligently follow major entertainment networks like CNN, MSNBC, CBS, etc...then your opinion would tend to be yes. If you just mind your own business and go through your day being a decent human being and interacting with the community, then you would probably have to say no.
Racism is greatly blown out of proportion by the media.
This isn't just an American problem but a worldwide problem- thus a HUMAN problem. I've lived in three countries aside from the U.S. and there was more extreme racism in them than the U.S. While the U.S. is not as racist as it was 100 years ago or 50 years ago (we elected a black president, after all), there is still pronounced racism among different cities and neighborhoods nationwide.
However...
Unlike other nations that will openly discriminate against you based on your skin color or tone, we as a nation are mostly decent enough to realize when discrimination is staring us in the face. Still a lot of work to be done though.
So racism is just against blacks right? It doesn't work the other way around?
Hmm, no, sorry if my comments were interpreted that way. Racism is racism, no matter the color of the one who is doing the discriminating.
"While the U.S. is not as racist as it was 100 years ago or 50 years ago"
Kinda threw me for a loop.
What I meant to state was America has taken steps over the last century, with our first black president and, for example, the acceptance of interracial marriages. It still exists but not as severe as in the past. Thanks!
I believe that we are all racist in some way to some extent regardless of how hard we might try not to be.
Every person is the sum of their life experience and we've all had bad experiences and good ones with people of other races.
As I grew up I had far more bad experiences with black people, mostly due to bussing and riots in my high school, and very few with Hispanics. I was married, though briefly, to a Chinese woman and now live with my Philippine GF and one of my closest school friends was Japanese so all good experiences with Asians.
As a result I am very reserved with my regards toward blacks. I don't hate them or even dislike them. When I meet them I treat them as I would anyone else and I've had a number of black friends over the years. But in the back of my mind I can still see 8 blacks jumping and mugging a white kid in a wheelchair just because he was white and couldn't get away from them. I can't erase that memory or deny it.
I would love to say I'm not racist but it wouldn't be completely true.
I talked to an Irish neighbor while i was in chicago and it was quite shocking to hear that he had felt the racism against him more in the west of america. the east was more welcoming. so i guess it's not just about the colour of your skin ... its deeper than that.
i will have to agree and disagree with johnsanrallen ... i have been in discrimination kind of circumstances and the worst kind is when its hidden. It totally knocks you off your balance when the truth comes out. Its much easier for the discriminated person to know that they are not welcome. that works better for me ... maybe different for other people.
i agree that's its not just in america ... its everywhere ... including your home countries... if not the colour of your skin then its your caste ... if not your caste then something else ... as the others have mentioned its hard wired in people ...
Finally one suggestion for Ashleign's hub on this topic... what i have noticed is that it is mostly people who have not travelled much in their life who end up being so close minded about issues like this ... people need to travel more, they need to see other cultures and understand them better ... everyone resists change ... its natural human behavior ... the more they know about the people they meet the less hostile they will become. so either accurate education or travel.
Of course it is...and has been since the very beginning. Our forefathers brought all the racism they could stand from the old countries in Europe and Africa, learned a few new thoughts on race from the American Indian Nations and bam - it's no wonder there was a civil war by the 1860's.
Actually, I think we're much less racial today than we were 20 years ago but we probably have another 250 years before we racial blindness.
I don't think America, as a whole or government, is racist in the sense that America's laws and policies don't inherently discredit people or assume they can't do something simply based on the color of their skin.
At least, not anymore... Remember when African-Americans were slaves? Or when they were considered only 3/5 of a person?
Or when women were property? How about women's suffrage? They are FINALLY allowed to vote.
America is slowly maturing away from that racist/sexist mindset, but there is still a long way to go.
by ga anderson 9 years ago
In a conversation about racism in America today, a young relative, made this statement'"It is worse than it was six years ago!"It took me a moment to catch his drift. He is a young, (many times naive), anti-Obama conservative and I took his comment to mean it is worse since Pres....
by SPomposello 12 years ago
My wife and I are an interracial couple, I'm italian and she's black/spanish mixed, and we live in NY. So I pretty much have no issues when it comes to different races and people. I work at a job that involves dealing with kids and teens who have behavior-related issues, most of these kids are of...
by Grace Marguerite Williams 12 years ago
Youtube presented a video of the 10 most racist countries in the world(the video is in Spanish). These countries are as follows in descending order: Austria(10), Germany(9), Russia(8), Argentina(7), England(6), Rwanda(5), Israel(4), South Africa(3), Spain(2) and in first place, the...
by Renee S 13 years ago
an African American president made it worse or better in your opinion?
by Don W 10 years ago
The recent DOJ report said there was a 'pattern and practice of constitutional violations (that primarily target African Americans) in stopping people without reasonable suspicion, arresting them without probable cause, and using unreasonable force.'The report is a scathing indictment of the...
by Ronnie wrenchBiscuit 9 years ago
The United States government, and the media, are filled with professional liars. This is not surprising, especially in government. Many elected officials, like Hillary Clinton, are former lawyers, and American lawyers are "the" best liars and con-artists in the world. Understanding...
Copyright © 2025 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. HubPages® is a registered trademark of The Arena Platform, Inc. Other product and company names shown may be trademarks of their respective owners. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website.
Copyright © 2025 Maven Media Brands, LLC and respective owners.
As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.
For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy
Show DetailsNecessary | |
---|---|
HubPages Device ID | This is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons. |
Login | This is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service. |
Google Recaptcha | This is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy) |
Akismet | This is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Google Analytics | This is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Traffic Pixel | This is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized. |
Amazon Web Services | This is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy) |
Cloudflare | This is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Hosted Libraries | Javascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy) |
Features | |
---|---|
Google Custom Search | This is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Maps | Some articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Charts | This is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy) |
Google AdSense Host API | This service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Google YouTube | Some articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Vimeo | Some articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Paypal | This is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Login | You can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Maven | This supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy) |
Marketing | |
---|---|
Google AdSense | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Google DoubleClick | Google provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Index Exchange | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Sovrn | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Ads | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Unified Ad Marketplace | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
AppNexus | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Openx | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Rubicon Project | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
TripleLift | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Say Media | We partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy) |
Remarketing Pixels | We may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites. |
Conversion Tracking Pixels | We may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service. |
Statistics | |
---|---|
Author Google Analytics | This is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy) |
Comscore | ComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Tracking Pixel | Some articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy) |
Clicksco | This is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy) |