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Happily The United States of America Is the country of immigrants with different believes, values, traditions, race and religion practices. We see that people do not know history and background of different cultures and that lead to discrimination all over the word, and we see it for a long time. Discrimination is a negative attitude against others. People should understand what discrimination is, why it occurs, what consequences it has, and how to prevent It. We can have a better future If people know all these and prevent discrimination from happening.
First of all, let’s find out hat is discrimination. Everyone knows that discrimination is something wrong and negative, but if we ask people what discrimination is, not everyone will know the answer and some will know only obvious forms. According to Bell, discrimination Is “differential and pejorative actions that serve to limit the social, political, or economic opportunities of members of particular groups” (Bell, 2012). Discrimination comes in two types, direct discrimination and indirect discrimination. Direct discrimination is sent to one group of people and tough only one aspect, for example, only age.
When people assuming that teenagers are not good workers because they are Immature and will not hire them, it is consider as the direct discrimination based on age. Indirect discrimination on the other hands occurs when there is the same requirement for everyone, but have some practices that can have an effect on different groups of people according to their sex, race, or age. For example, if a company stays in the ad that they will hire a tall and strong person to do the job it can be view as discrimination against women, some ethnic groups or elderly, because these groups may not fit in the requirements (Bell, 2012).
There are also many forms of discrimination, and usually people will think of them based on their experiences. According to Nelson, “People compare events against their prototype for discrimination and the more closely the event in question provide the prototype, the more likely it is to be labeled discrimination. Discrimination is prototypically viewed as an Intercrop phenomenon; that Is, as occurring between members of different groups rather than within the same group. ” (Nelson, 2009).
For example, If a black person will call another black person “NighВ??, it wouldn’t be offensive, but if a white ill call a black person “Niger it will be considered as discrimination. We need to know that, In America, we have many different nations living in one society and what can be normal for one nation can be considered discrimination to other. The US Census Bureau refer to all immigrants as “foreign-born” and it is estimated “there were 37. 6 million foreign-born people living in the United States in March 2010” (USC, 2013), and It is not including people who are illegal here and have no documents.
Knowing that we have so many people living In America with different lives, values, traditions and religion practices must people become culturally competent and sensitive to other, and that can decrease discrimination. There are many different reasons why discrimination occurs. First of all, people are not educated enough about different cultures. People do not know what Is normal and what Is not In regards to others. And some people do not know own cultural believes and do not examine how others react to them. People believe that what they do and 1 OFF leading to discrimination.
The other contributions of discrimination are prejudice, terrifying and assumption and most of the people practice them in some point of their life not even realizing that. Lets thing of our children, who believing and thinking the way their parents do because they are learning from their parents. This is one more reason discrimination rises in the nation. For example, if a child lives in family where parents discriminate someone based on race, gender or religion, the children will see that and will grow up with that on mind, and most likely will practice discrimination when get older, thinking that is normal.
I always question myself “If adults do not know anything about different cultures, how they will educate their children? ” So, both of the reason kind of correlate together. I think it is important to include cultural diversity studies in schools, colleges programs and have classes in workplaces, in this way both children and adults will be culturally competent, and that can decrease discrimination. Merriam-Webster dictionary defines ignorance as “The condition of being uneducated, unaware, or uninformed. ” (Merriam-Webster, n. D. ). Ignorance is the other contributor to discrimination, and that can lead to ensign and some problems.
I had a chance to see the ignorance in regards to stereotyping and prejudice. One of my family members is currently in the hospital, in hospice care. That is a woman, 87 years old with renal failure and doctor said that her life expectancy is couple of month. One day I went to visit her, and I saw terrible picture that made me very angry. The lady had generalized edema and the name bend on her wrists that everyone got when admitted to the hospital were so tight, that she complained of filling tingling in her fingers. Also, she had pressure ulcers on err back, complained of neck pain, wasn’t clean and smelled bad.
When I asked nurses why she looked that way, one nurse answered me that she doesn’t understand the lady and that lady does not complain. My family member does not speak English, and no one even tried to understand her or call interpreter. I asked her of her complains, and she said that she wants extra pillow and that she wasn’t clean for 2 days. I saw that nurses working there didn’t even worry that lady do not understand them, and they make prejudice and stereotype her as being old, not clean, and weird patient because she always answered “K”.
That situation made me very mad because no one deserves that care; I saw the ignorance which makes me think that the nurse Just discriminates her because of her age, race, and condition. According to Nelson, “stereotyping and prejudice are due to ignorance about stereotyped group and its members” (Nelson, 2009). That is only ignorance that let nurses carrying for my family member that way. Discrimination against the other person can affect a person’s self-esteem, could promote violence and can cause legal problems. Person can blame oneself and can get low self esteem if feel being criminate.
For example, let’s imagine one of the situation, where Maria, who is the only women working in the company, who is Latino and who has an accent is not getting promoted at her work because of all the above, so how she would feel? (Diver, 2014). This is an example of discrimination based on race, culture and gender. Not being promoted at work, or not getting hired, could make a person think that no one will ever hire him/ her because of being minority and which could lead that a person will Just give up, and will thing that he/she is Just different and not competent.
In his stagnated groups perceive themselves as being discriminated, “the lower their self-esteem, the more negative their emotions and, the poorer their physiological well being” (Nelson, 2009). Another possible effect that discrimination can cause is violence. Let’s think of another scenario, an immigrant, who finish college with good grades, have a great resume and was trying to get a Job for a couple of month, need money to pay off loans and pay for rent. That person was interviewed a couple of times but all the time was turned down because of an accent and no experience working in America.
How that person may hold that? We see a lot of instances where someone gets hurt because of similar situations. Some people Just can’t handle the pressure of being discriminated, got angry and want to scare other, want to show that he/she strong; that is one of the reasons we see violence. In addition, when people are discriminated they can think of or perform some legal actions against others. For example, if people feel that they being discriminated, they may open a law suit and bring the company to court. The University of Texas-Austin is in this situation right now according to an article in USA Today newspaper.
A case was opened against University where “the court recognized that race-based admissions are in tension with the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of “(Thompson & College, 2013). In this article we see some of the examples of discrimination in regards of race, where students had a different requirement in admission based on their race. “In 2009, for instance, Asians who were admitted had to score an average of 197 points higher on the SAT than incoming Hispanics” (Thompson & College, 2013). Student said about University “it uses skin color to help decide who gets in”. (Thompson & College, 2013).
From this article we see that University is the “loser”, and can lose accreditation. Company can also lose if someone opens a lawsuit against if being discriminated, and if it is happening, company can get out of business and can I lose a lot of money. Knowing all consequences, people should not Judge others based on their race, gender, and religion, because that is not in favor for both parties. Discrimination can be lessened if people will work out on some contributions to reduce it. First of all, everyone should know that discrimination is illegal and should follow the law in regards to discrimination.