Racism - more than just what it seems

Racial Prejudice is one of the themes in To Kill A Mockingbird (TKAM), and one of the major themes that have been discussed. However, what has been discussed thus far has been mainly about white supremacy, which is the prejudice of white people against Blacks, as well as racial purity, which is the discrimination of all other races by one race. In general terms, racism is the belief that a certain race possesses certain characteristics and traits which make it inferior or superior to another. However, racism has become so common in the present context that terms such as “horizontal racism”, “reverse racism” and “internalized racism” have come up. In order to keep up to date, where the severity white supremacy and racial purity as forms of racism have lessened somewhat, I shall be talking about these other forms of racism.

Firstly, reverse racism. Reverse racism is basically racism against the majority group. For example, in a context with white people and Blacks, reverse racism would be racism practiced by the Blacks against the white people. However, even though the minority race is able to practice racism on the majority race, which most minority races probably do as a result of racism practiced on them by the majority race. However, even as the minority races try to make a stand for themselves by practicing reverse racism, they do not have the power to do so. Sure, they may be able to take a gun and shoot several people from the majority race; however, they do not have the power to practice discrimination without being arrested, such as allowing more people of a certain race have privileges like being given priority for a job. Also, by practicing racism themselves, the minority race would also be spreading a bad image of themselves, thus increasing the severity of prejudice practiced by the majority race.

Next, horizontal racism. Horizontal racism is racism practiced by a minority race against another minority race. For example, in Singapore, racism practiced by an Indian person against a Malay person would be horizontal racism. Horizontal racism occurs mainly because of two reasons. Firstly, the minority race practising horizontal racism would want to feel more powerful, instead of just being prejudiced against by the majority race, thus, they would practice racism on the other minority race. Horizontal racism also occurs because the racism practised by the majority group on the minority group may have resulted in generalizations and views being rubbed off on the other minority races, thus, these other races would also be racist against the minor-minority group.

Lastly, internalized racism. Internalized racism is similar to horizontal racism, except in this case, it is even worse, if possible. Internalized racism is when a minority race believes that that the majority race is superior, and thus, practice racism against one's own race. For example, in a western context, a Black choosing to hire white people rather than black people, even if they have the same credentials, is internalized racism. Internalized racism is practically admitting defeat, by believing that they are truly inferior. However, this may be due to the fact that the minority race have been exposed to racism against them for such a long time that it becomes ingrained in their mindset, so much so that they practise racism against their own race.

In my opinion, even though there are so many forms of racism, the root of the problem is still the same. Instead of judging people based on other people's opinions, one should instead not be bias and let a person prove for himself what he or she truly is capable of.