Sexism And Bigotry: Museum Of Tolerance In N. Y.

Diuvska N. Quiñones August 26, 2013
Professor G. Pieri
Sexism and Bigotry. By definition the term sexism means prejudice, stereotyping, or discrimination, typically against women, on the basis of sex; in restricted job opportunities; especially, such discrimination directed against women. As well a bigot is a person who is intolerant of any ideas other than his or her own, especially on religion, politics, or race. As I researched for this paper in the Museum of Tolerance in N.Y., I learned that the human mind makes 11 assumptions about a person in the first 7 seconds of meeting them. We must be aware of this in order to take a positive action rather than a negative approach based on false assumptions. Is it fair to say that everyone
is a sexist and/or a bigot? I will be blunt enough to affirm that hypothesis, bases on the fact that our borrow values and our social construct drive us in that direction. As Mr. Anthony Porter verbally expresses in his lecture “A Call to Men” we must break from the so called “MAN BOX” and teach boys and men that not being part of the mainstream male dominant society is perfectly correct. The power that an image holds has depicted many things in American culture during the 20th and 21st centuries; such as propaganda, stereotyping, and the dehumanization of minority groups. In the same form, the power of words, which can lift a person, has brought down ethnic groups all over the world.

Words have power; they can inspire, incite, can be hateful, can terrify, can be destructive and intimidating, as well as have consequences… In the museum, I observed a propaganda poster from 1917 that stated: “Gee!!
I wish I were a man, I'd join the Navy. Be a man and do it - United States Navy recruiting station (artist Howard Chandler Christy 1917). The poster showing a young woman in a Navy uniform during World War I.” As I read and saw the visual I was livid not only about the sexism, but also about the exploitation of woman through the painting as sexual objects… How is it that we live in a world where in some countries it is a crime to be born a female? We live in a time where one out of three women is victimized by men (father, brothers, uncles, husband, or boyfriend). They experiment domestic abuse, traditional abuse, rape, and are trafficked… In some cultures if a woman is proven to have committed adultery she will be murdered or maimed (honor killings). These crimes are committed against women in the name of religion. A man will take sexual control over a woman by sexual organ mutilation or female circumcisions; which is practiced without any medical training and is commonly performed in countries like Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. This procedure is done lacking anesthesia and bring infections, shock, and death due to hemorrhage. In Kenya a women’s advocacy group has developed the term “Circumcision through Words” in order to prevent the female
mutilations.

Seven million women are trafficked annually for sexual slavery, the Russian mafia abducts these women and sells them in other countries; as a result the women are at high risk of contraction STD’s, rape, drug addiction (and abuse to cope), torture, and rape… This is a seven billion dollar a year “business and to my surprise, in some countries it is perfectly legal to sell a female into any type of slavery. In the Unites States a female is victimized by men every two minutes ranging in age from sixteen to nineteen years of age and less than 5 of the victims report their assault. One to three million women is battered annually and one to four will be murdered by their husband or significant life partner. This sexist and abusive behavior must be detained and we as an aware society must inculcate to our boys and men that a woman is not a sexual object or the pun of sexual anecdotes.

It is easy to write off bigotry to extremists, but how do you stop it from occurring?
In my opinion, we can stop bigotry through tolerance.
With the discipline to hold back and learn to co-exist, to respect thy fellow human and to pursue in harmony our goals as a positive society. In my walk through the museum I came upon a section entitled GlobalHate.com which features touch screen computer terminals that have unmasked the danger of a one sided story; the story of hatred. The proliferation of hate through the internet is greater than I thought, in fact it showed me how extremely saturated it actually is. The Khakriz Cultural Institute or KCI is an Iranian institution with an on-line fifty-seven page book, which claims that the Holocaust genocide was a lie. The Fateh Kids is a HAMAS site which published a comic strip in which “EVIL ZIONISTS” made beautiful toys that were actually bombs that were used to kill innocent Palestinians; they also used this comic strip to recruit children to become
Jihad.

People such as Adolf Hitler, Stalin, the K.K.K founders (J. Calvin Jones, Frank O. McCord, John B. Kennedy, John C. Lester, James R. Crowe, and Richard R. Reed), and Osama Bin Laden have been extremist bigots who have committed genocide than being tolerant of others. We must assume responsibility and take a stand against bigotry, initiate a Diversity and Tolerance group in our community, remember to always dialogue not scream, to commit to assist meetings, empower, support and above all educate people on what it means to be a bigot and how can we help to stop it.