Democracy and Multiculturalism Daryna Lapitskaya There is a good Russian expression: Treat people around you the way

you want to be treated by them. This phrase is based on the fact that people are all equal and they deserve to be treated accordingly. However, there are individuals racists who believe that the traits that are inherited biologically such as color of skin, shape of eyes, and type of hair are the ones which define the peoples behavior and their future. According to this, the genes and the blood in peoples veins are the indicators of persons value for the society, not his or her individuality and abilities. Nowadays, all these ideas are called prejudices and are not accepted in society, nevertheless, they still exist. Race prejudice presupposes, necessarily, that racially prejudiced individuals think of themselves as belonging to a given racial group. It means, also, that they assign to other racial groups those against whom they are prejudiced. (Blumer, p.125) There are a lot of projects that are designed to learn more about racism, figure out the problem, and then solve it. Racism is growing rapidly and turning into a threat for a happy living for a big number of people. In order to control it and fight with it humanity needs to understand what the roots of racism are. There is a number of factors that influences the development of racism: economics and the greed for money, history and families traditions and views, and religions and its interpretations. In this paper, I argue that as long as those factors I listed above and some others still take place in peoples lives, the racism would not disappear.

The majority of problems that worries people are done by people themselves. Racism as a result of a greed for money is one of the examples of such troublecreation. Money was always a power that many people were ruled by and led by to different deeds. In sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was not an exception; and searching for making big money people, Europeans, enslaved other nations, Africans, and made slaves work for them. That was the birthday of slavery following by the birthday of racism. Instantly, humans happened to be identified and judged by the color of their skin, and it was much more prestigious to be white back then. A set of attitudes toward black people became a norm, so many people felt the need to prove they are not black and join elite white part of the society. However, it was not that easy; whites did not want to let minorities in their circle, they needed other nations stay enslaved and be the items for trade, ownership, inheritance, and profit for whites. There is considerable uncertainty as to just what nationalities come within the term white person. (Roediger, p.325) There is no way whites would let other nations join them; on the contrary, they would appraise others and sell or buy them. Because whites could not be enslaved or held as slaves, the racial line between white and black was extremely critical; it became a line of protection and demarcation from the potential threat of commodification, and it determined the allocation of the benefits and burdens of this form of property. White identity and whiteness were sources of privilege and protection; their absence meant being the object of property. (Harris, p.279) While whites were worrying about their power, Blacks were forced to work, work hard; a big number of slaves were dying on the plantations. The conditions of living were horrible as well as slaves treatment while being brought to New World; whites would not spend their money on improving slaves

lives, they only wanted to get money from slaves labor. At a conservative estimate, over eleven million Africans were transported across the Atlantic; they were packed together like animals and at least two million died during the voyage. (Racism: A History, movie) Fortunately, it all happened in the past, nevertheless, it probably still occurs in some places, and definitely it still lives in many peoples hearts. As long as its current, the racism would be blooming. The humans mind and ideas are formed through the way he or she was brought up by his or her family and the way he or she was taught. The history people learn, the familys points of view they share, the friends opinions they hear: all that shapes a certain attitude toward any given problem or situation. Racism is not an exception; it is often inherited. For a long time in the history minorities were enslaved and had to serve and obey the rules of the master. Slaves were seen as savages who did not deserve any respect or rights. All these prejudices and stereotypes were stuck in humans minds for centuries; even over the years they survived and still take place in some situations. For many people skin color and biological differences are still the indicators for suspicion and lack of trust. The high visibility of black or Negroid physical features renders class position invisible to whites, so that even affluent blacks are suspected of criminal or pathological behavior that is actually found among a minority of very poor blacks. (Gans, p.115) Children are not born with racial views, they learn it while growing up through the media, through the talks they hear from their parents, through the environment they live in and later through their own experience in life. As long as humans are going to practice racism in their daily life, have negative conversations about it, and spread stereotypes, the nation would not be able to get rid of the problem

and solve it. It all starts with every single individual in the world and it ends there as well. Interestingly enough, another factor that influences the development of racism is religion. It seems that religion should promote the equality and peace on the Earth, fight and protect human rights; however, it is still crucial for the religion what the color of the rights is that they need to defend. The Bible, for example, is a book that can be interpreted the way it is convenient for the given period of time, nevertheless, it would still not lose its power over people. White powerful people worded the Bible the way it would support the slavery and give them the rights and approval from God for their deeds. Intellectual and social elites, public figures of prominence, and leaders of powerful organizations are likely to be the key figures in the formation of the sense of the group position and in the characterization of the subordinate group. (Blumer, p.129) The first human was Adam who was white according to the Bible; there is nothing mentioned about black people the output is blacks are not human beings. Few centuries ago people believed in this and compared people with dark skin with chimpanzees. It was very convenient to keep this idea alive and treat slaves as animals; that was a great excuse for what whites were doing and solid protection for their rights and position in social hierarchy. The concept of whiteness was carefully protected because so much was contingent upon it. (Harris, p.283) Nowadays, all that non-sense can be explained as a lack of education; nevertheless, it seems like people back then was not looking for a scientific explanation, they were only worrying about their interests and gains. As long as people would stay greedy in their desire to be more powerful than others, the racism would get only stronger and more distinguished.

The racism is a problem that grows larger every day, humiliates people, and derogates their rights. Factors such as economics and the greed for money, history and families traditions and views, religions and its interpretations, and many other stimulate the development of the racism ideas among population. Even though it is obvious that racism still exists and trouble many people, there is a hope it will disappear forever or at least improve a lot. At the end of the twentieth century, the country continues to be dominated by whites. Nevertheless, both immigrants who started to arrive after the end of the World War II and the political, cultural, racial changes that took place in the wake of their arrival have further invalidated many old racial divisions and labels. They have also set into motion what may turn out to be significant transformations in the least part of the basic racial hierarchy. (Gans, p.115) If humanity wants to stop the spread of the racism, they need to start with themselves first: control what they say, think what they do, change their view, and just smile to each other no matter what color of skin the person is. If the countrys racial mixing ever became so thorough than skin color and other currently used bodily features were sufficiently unrecognizable or no longer of sufficient interest to be noticed, race would no longer be associated with social ranking. If Americans then still needed to rank each other, new criteria would have to be found. (Gans, p.122)