Discrimination: Race and Different Color Skin

Associate Program Material

Discrimination Worksheet

Write a 100- to 200-word response to each of the following questions. Provide citations for all the sources you use.

• What is discrimination? How is discrimination different from prejudice and stereotyping?

Discrimination is an act or prejudice toward a person in a negative way. Prejudice is a judgment we make before knowing the facts in a negative way. Discrimination starts from our thoughts towards someone. Discrimination is not different from Prejudice or stereotyping, it’s the same core concept. Discrimination deprives people of opportunities.

Discrimination is the denial of opportunities and equal rights to individuals and groups because of prejudice or for other arbitrary reasons. People in the United States find it difficult to see discrimination as a widespread phenomenon. “After all,” it is often said, “these minorities drive cars, hold jobs, own their homes, and even go to college. (Racial and Ethnic Groups Ch3)

• What are the causes of discrimination?

The cause of discrimination is the effect people have on other races. What they feel and think about people that are a different color skin, ethnicity, race, gender or different religion. Racism is the major cause of Discrimination. It creates a very big gap between people; the theory of it is hate for minority groups and the action to oppress them. For example to deny a black person that housing in a white neighborhood. Denny a Latino a job.
Discrimination is not an isolated occurrence today. A study released by the National Fair Housing Alliance and the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development found that discriminatory housing practices were routine. Consider the sobering results of a two- year study conducted in 12 metropolitan areas with 73 real estate firms: White real estate shoppers are steered away from houses in mixed neighborhoods even when they express interest in integrated areas. Latinos and African Americans looking for housing are steered toward minority neighborhoods even when their incomes justify seeing more-affluent neigh- borhoods. The challenge to being a minority homebuyer does not stop there. Studies docu- ment that Black and Hispanic homebuyers tend to pay higher interest rates than Whites with similar credit ratings. All things are hardly equal in home buying (Bocian, Ernst, and Li 2006). . (Racial and Ethnic Groups Ch3)

How is discrimination faced by one identity group (race, ethnicity, religious beliefs, gender, sexual orientation, age, or disability) the same as discrimination faced by another? How are they different?

Some groups tend to believe in discrimination or prejudice more than others by the way they were raised or the education they had. Some create discrimination from their own experiences. Some people act upon their discriminatory believes towards other people and that’s how war starts, people get hurt, or killed. For example In some countries gay’s are not accepted well, so many people are afraid of coming out with the truth so they live a miserable life in agony and torture within them self because they are living a lie.
There were official reports of more than 7,700 hate crimes and bias-motivated incidents in 2009. (Racial and Ethnic Groups Ch3) • According to the FBI Hate Crime Statistics Report, there were a total of 8152 hate crimes reported around the country. 4368 (53.6%) were racial bias motivated; 1483 (18.2%) were religious bias motivated; sexual orientation bias accounted for 1330 (16.3%); ethnicity/national origin bias was the cause of 927 (11.4%); disability bias was connected with 36 (0.4%); and the remaining 8 incidents (0.1%) were the result of multiple biases. • In January 2009, three men reportedly harassed several African Americans and a Hispanic man because of their political support for Obama and physically attacked three others. The final victim was mistaken for an African American and spent several weeks in a coma after being hit by their car. • In May 2009, a Pennsylvania jury acquitted two teenagers of serious charges, including ethnic intimidation, in the July 2008 fatal beating of Luiz Ramirez, a 25 year-old Mexican immigrant, in Shenandoah, Pa. The teenagers were convicted of simple assault and sentenced to up to 23 months in prison. The acquittal on these charges sparked outrage from the civil rights community who pointed to numerous reports that the attack was racially motivated. (http://www.civilrights.org/hatecrimes/united-states/)

This is some of the many stories we hear of in our daily life, a feedback of discrimination.