GEL 101 project - Research Paper Example

Discrimination can be based on somebody’s gender, sex, income, and so on whereas, racism is also a kind of discrimination, but it is based mainly on a person’s skin color. When a person is trying to be a racist actually what he is doing is to compare others with himself on the basis of their skin color or their material possessions. One must never forget that comparing people based on such things, which they do not get by choice, is actually a false comparison. A white guy is not white because he wanted to be so, likewise a black guy is not black by his own choice rather they both are the way they are, because that is how they were meant to be.

Therefore, racism or discrimination is a very unrealistic approach on behalf of individuals. A realist would never be a racist at all because he knows the philosophy of life. There is another approach, which sounds pretty much unrealistic as well, is of considering others as inferior based on their material possessions. Material possessions are worldly things, which can be earned or which can be lost, somebody who lacks something today is only for today. No one knows for surety where he will be the coming day.

Then why bother and waste time in judging people which does not help one in anything but simply gives birth to hatred. Famous People who have experienced racism/discrimination: Oprah Winfrey, a famous TV artist, says that she has been a victim of racial discrimination, when she went to a store in Switzerland to buy a bag, which was designed by Tom Ford and named after Jennifer Aniston. According to her, when she asked for this bag, the sales girl showed some other bags and refused indirectly to show that particular bag saying it was too expensive for her.

Oprah says that it was because of racial discrimination that the bag she demanded was not showed to her and she felt embarrassed. While acknowledging the apology of the owner of the store and sales girl Winfrey said “Discrimination is there, anywhere around the world, every day” (Hall). The other celebrity that faced racial discrimination is Gabby Douglas, who is a star athlete and won two gold medals at London Olympic Games. According to her, she endured racism and discrimination while she was training in London.

She says,” One of my teammates was like, 'Can you scrape the bar?' And they were like, 'Why doesn't Gabby do it, she's our slave?' I definitely felt isolated; I felt 'why am I deserving this? Is it because I'm black?” (Hersha). By reading the statements of these two famous personalities, it becomes obvious that not only common people face such situations, but celebrities also happen to face this. Each human being is worthy of being respected and is not supposed to be treated as such. The color discrimination in America is increasing rapidly, recently some violent activities that took place in the name of racism and discrimination, include; Christopher Lane, who is an Australian baseball player, became the victim of three wannabe gang-gangers.

A 20-year-old guy named Javon Tyrek from New York, who has been charged with the first-degree murder and burglary, murdered a 99-year-old Fannie Gumbinger. These are merely accidents that are turning back the clock on racial discrimination, and have acted as a basis for the rebirth of this issue. Furthermore two black teens, Demetrius Glenn and Kenan D. Adams-Kinard, took the life of a World War II