Hypocrisy - Essay Example

Download file to see previous pages... Racial discrimination in the United States has been practiced from the era of colonization. The mostly affected were African Americans, Latin Americans and Asian Americans. These groups had no right to vote, acquire land, quality education and employment opportunities. From 1830s, Americans have been trying to abolish racial discrimination since abolishment of slavery and incorporating slaves as American citizens. The formation of abolitionist movement called for immediate reforms in political, social and economic sectors. Majority of Americans had and are still having a literal understanding of Declaration for Independence. Though with clear understanding that all human beings were created equally by God (Jackson and Weidman, 2004), Americans are still denying blacks their rights. Even with many abolitionists fighting for equality, majority of them believed that blacks are not rationally the same to whites. Jefferson, one of the abolitionists did not belief on equality in rational competence, but by the principle that all human beings were created equally. This was basically the Christian teachings since Christianity is against oppression of the weak. It is clear that there is hypocrisy in the American dream since they are not living according to it. The values of equality are not fully practiced as there are many conflicts for people fighting for equal treatment and fairness. Racial hypocrisy in the US is progressing from politics to institutions (Greenwald, 2008). Many institutions are not practicing democracy; instead, they pretend to have equality in many things. It is so ironical that, when Americans were fighting against Aryan superiority on matters relating to state- sanctioned principles, they segregated African American militaries yet they fought against racism. In the 20th century, the Americans forbidden formal racial discrimination as it is immoral and socially offensive. This did not end; instead, it took other modern ways like racial stratification, Symbolic racism and social class among many others. Racial stratification is where people of the same race separate themselves from others. Social class is a situation where people associate according to wealth, political power, economic status and social beliefs. Symbolic racism explains the belief that black people are lesser race compared to whites. This belief forms the basis for discrimination of people of a particular race in order to hold the belief true. People being discriminated against do not understand symbolic racism as a form of discrimination since it is indirect. Symbolic racism as a form of discrimination is mostly applied today as it is slight, modernized and indirect. This is hypocrisy since many whites claim they are against racism yet they are practicing it through symbolic racism. In order to justify equality and at the same time practice racism, five arguments were formed. The first one states that, racial discrimination among other forms of discriminations is not in operation (Greenwald, 2008). This is to ensure that all people regardless of tribe, color or religion are equal in The US. Any disparity in terms of incomes is because Blacks are lazy in work and hence low payment compared to whites. This argument explains why Blacks are getting low paying jobs in America and cannot secure white color jobs. They also argued that Black people should not complain and fight for equality ...Download file to see next pagesRead More