My husband travels frequently for
his job and on occasion, I travel with him.
Several years ago, after September 11th, he was travelling
with one of his co-workers. My husband
is very representative of the dominant culture.
He is male, well educated, and Caucasian. His co-worker however is of Indian descent
and a Muslim. When travelling through
the security check, my husband was able to pass through without any
difficulties, but when his co-worker went through the check, he was
stopped. The TSA agents selected him for
additional security screenings, including pat-downs and looking through his
luggage. Since this time, they have
travelled together on many occasions and this same situation occurred. The security checks that were supposed to be random
clearly were not.
It was evident that because of
the man’s appearance, he was being prejudged and was immediately suspected of
having ill intentions. His equity was
diminished because he was not being treated in the same way as the other
passengers, including my husband. I felt
a sense of injustice for my husband’s coworker.
We knew him as a person and that he was completely safe, but because of
his appearance, he was being targeted by the TSA agents. Society would have to change in order to turn
this incident into an opportunity for greater equity. It is because of ignorance that this
situation occurred. In order to change
this, society needs to become educated on differences in cultures and how to
value diversity. As a society, we need
to respect and value the differences among people and stop stereotyping and
prejudging people based on looks.
Ashli, you are right. The example you provided was clearly prejudiced based on the man's race. Your example is definitely worth bringing to other's attention because we definitely are still practicing prejudiced in our society.
ReplyDeleteVery Good Post! The example you gave should be brought up, so everyone is aware of what is going on. We as a society deal with prejudice in one way or another. I think this is something that will take for every to change. It is very hard to change people from old ways to new ways.
ReplyDeleteYour posting has reminded me how generalization generates prejudice. I believe that the lack of knowledge about social justice leads people to establish generalized and unfair judgments about groups of people who have certain physical characteristics. Let us continue claiming justice!
ReplyDeleteGreat post Ashli! My husband name is Koran and the last time we travel when his father died he was discriminated against because of his name. He felt really bad even some of the people behind us was commenting on the way he was treated.
ReplyDelete