Public service announcement: racism still exists

Thousands of Mizzou students, professors, and citizens join together to protest the hate crimes made by other students on the University of Missour Quad.

Photo courtesy of Jack Cashill

Thousands of Mizzou students, professors, and citizens join together to protest the hate crimes made by other students on the University of Missour Quad.

Roderick Wrice, Entertainment Editor

In case you have been living under a rock for the past few years, there have been a plethora of cases where young black men have been killed by police officers. Some names of these victims include Freddie Gray, Michael Brown, Sandra Bland, Eric Garner, LaQuan McDonald, and a myriad of other black victims. The baffling thing is, all of these victims have been killed by white police officers in the last two years.
Although the biggest news stories cover police violence and racism, the most recent outburst of public racism has occurred at the University of Missouri. Once again, unless you have been living under a rock for the past couple months, there has been an uproar of racist verbal assaults and threats of physical assault toward African Americans at Mizzou. Pablo Suarez, a legendary Oraclite and a freshman at Mizzou is disgusted by the acts of his fellow students on campus.
“Our student body president, who is black and gay has been part of the incidents in terms of having racial slurs yelled at him,” Suarez said.
Along with the racial slurs, black students have also been intimidated and physically threatened by white students on campus.
“White students would be holding Confederate flags and [the African Americans] would be put in situations where they just wouldn’t feel safe,” said Suarez.
These incidents have not gone unpunished. All of the students who have participated in the treacherous acts of racism at Mizzou have been expelled. Also, going forward, all incoming freshman must take part in a class training them in diversity and inclusion in order to raise awareness and prevent racist acts of any kind from repeating themselves.
Unfortunately, racism does not only occur between blacks and whites. The Muslim community is also being blatantly discriminated against. With ISIS terrorizing the world, copious amounts of Muslims have been publically discriminated against by society, labeling them all as “terrorists.”
For a country that preaches freedom and equality, we sure don’t practice what we preach. There is too much separation in the world for there to be peace. There is always racial tension. There will always be small-minded people who judge people by the color of their skin or where they are from.
On the other hand, the media tends to only report on the white crimes against black and other races, completely ignoring the fact that the racism occurs both ways. There have been plenty of cases where whites have been murdered by black police officers, but those stories do not grab America’s attention like the white-on-black murders.
Slavery in America lasted over 200 years and the Civil Rights Movement was only 50 years ago. There are many people who have grandparents or even parents who experienced racism and discrimination at its height, so there are still people in America who still have the same racist mindset. Because of this, racism will not go away quickly. It will take a long process of love and unity to eliminate not only America, but the world of this despicable ideal.
No one is born racist – racism is taught, and until the world learns to stop acting like one race is better than another, there will never be world peace. The bottom line is, everyone looks the same on the inside, and our outer appearances are what make us who we are. We need to realize that we are all a part of one race, and that is the human race. Sadly, Suarez said what the world needs to realize:
“Racism itself is an extremely difficult problem to solve in a very short period of time because it’s an ideology – it’s something that people believe. There have been steps in the right direction, but there’s still so much to go and I don’t necessarily have the answers for it.”