Judgements

The Effects of Prejudice

ziyanq3920 20-1 B , , 1 Comment
The Effects of Prejudice

 

Prejudice is defined as a pre-made opinion that is based upon a person, place, or thing without any real authenticity or experience within the situation. Oftentimes, they are made due to stereotypes that they receive from different types of media and content. Prejudice is a judgement on another person that can range from practically anything, and it is a shame whenever it occurs. Prejudice and prejudgement is a natural feeling that has been given to every human being, however it is up to our own free will and choice on what to do with that prejudice. Do we continue with it? Do we stop it? Is prejudice good at times? Or is it solely a negative concept? And, as human beings, will we ever able to stop prejudice and accept one another for who we are as people?

Prejudiced people are not born with this innate feeling. It is something that builds up over time, and as life experiences occur, the prejudiced opinion continues building or continues deconstructing itself. It is important to understand that one person doesn’t represent all, and that the reshaping of perspective on something or someones takes time. Prejudice is evidently shown in the short story “Cathedral” by American short story writer Raymond Carver.

 

In the short story “Cathedral”, the narrator’s wife has a blind friend named Robert, whom the narrator has not met, but his wife and Robert were close friends and haven’t seen each other in a long time. Shortly after Robert’s wife passed away, Robert comes over to the narrator’s house to stay the night. The narrator’s wife informs the narrator, who Robert nicknames “Bub”. From the get-go, the narrator immediately begins having a prejudiced and distasteful opinion regarding Robert and his blindness. The narrator has never met a blind man before, and has only seen what blind men are from the movies he’s seen. Many other details described in the short story reveal that the narrator and the narrator’s wife have a disarrayed relationship. This contributes to the fact that when Robert comes to stay, the narrator is visibly insecure, further downgrading the narrator’s perspective on blind people and Robert. With Robert’s blindness, the narrator sees him as a bothersome figure and is unenlightened on who blind people truly are.

 

After spending some time with Robert however, the narrator soon comes to realize that Robert is nothing as how he imagined him to be. The narrator becomes more knowledgeable about the circumstances around him, and begins favouring Robert for the person he is, ignoring the fact that he’s blind and that he was his wife’s old friend. The narrator had his natural feeling turn into prejudice against blind people based on a few things he had seen. But after truly experiencing how a blind person is, the narrator opens his eyes and understands how the prejudiced opinion he once had was entirely based on fiction. No matter what experiences the narrator had been with or seen with blind people, this pivotal part of the story reinforces the idea that one person doesn’t represent all. The narrator had free will, and chose to use it to be prejudiced. He halted his false opinions and began to open up more. He began accepting people for who they really were. It comes to show that it doesn’t matter how the person starts. What matters is how they end. Just like the narrator in “Cathedral”, I too once had been prejudiced.

 

During my grade-nine school year, there was this new boy who had joined my school at the time. He had a beard, only in grade-nine! Based on his looks, my friends and I immediately began prejudging who he was, despite the fact that we didn’t even say a single word to him or get to know who he was. He looked quite older than all the other nines, and so the assumption was instantaneously made that he was held back. The assumption and prejudiced opinion came solely from the fact of what we had seen before.

I had never met someone so young with a beard, and he looked like he was in his last year of high school. The year continued normally, until I was paired up with him for a school project. Up until that point, I had a prejudiced opinion on him. It was only after I spoke to him and got to know him better was when my opinion changed. With the free will I was given, I decided to make a judgement. In the end, I had changed. The reshaping of my opinion on him took time, and that’s when I learned that it was simply a stupid thought my friends and I had created.

 

All people will go through the state of being prejudice, or be the victims of prejudice. It’s important to understand the effects of prejudice, and what it can do to a human mind. People should be willing to accept one another and only judge a person once it’s evident. It’s been answered that prejudice and prejudgement are, in fact, negative concepts. Reshaping the human mind to become healthier and more positive will overall reduce the number of prejudice, and its negative effects. Humans will never stop being prejudice, but they can change their way of thinking, and that’s what overall matters.

 

 

 

 

Citations:
Image 1 – https://www.bbcchannels.com/
Image 2 – https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5000606/
Image 3 – https://www.florisumc.org/accepting-help/
Image 4 – https://nextluxury.com/mens-style-and-fashion/how-to-grow-a-beard/
Image 5 – https://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2017/11/20/565446970/can-science-explain-the-human-mind
Featured Image – https://www.jw.org/en/library/magazines/awake-no3-2020-nov-dec/prejudice-are-you-infected/

The City From Here / We Shoot Children Too

zarak334 20-1 B, Personal Response, Response to Literature, Writing , , , , 0 Comment
The City From Here / We Shoot Children Too

“Look At The City From Here” by Faiz Ahmed Faiz response:

The poem Look At The City From Here was really interesting to me because it focusses on how a situation can be viewed from so many different perspectives. I thought it was really interesting how the poet used a real-life example, such as the Karachi Riots of 1965, to emphasize on the point he was trying to make while effectively causing the reader to reflect on what happened in 1965. One line from the poem that really stuck out to me was, “And from here you cannot tell, Whether the colour steaming down the walls, Is that of blood or roses”. Taken literally, the poet says there are two possible ways to look at what is on the wall in the distance. The colour of it, or how we perceive it, is going to determine whether we see blood or roses. Likewise, a person’s mindset affects how they perceive and behave in a certain situation. One can either see blood in their circumstances or can see bright red roses. It all depends on where you stand and what position you take when presented with an issue. With a more calm and composed mindset, an individual can see how positive the results of any circumstance, both negative and positive, can be. But with an impatient, angered perspective, the results typically tend to be negative.

Being able to take a step back and truly understand the whole picture with deeper meaning enables people to be more considerate and cautious when analyzing a situation. When we talk the time to understand all perspectives, take a closer look at the deeper meaning of our circumstances, and accept differences we have with others, we create better social bonds, reduce stereotyping, and reduces anxiety because we are able enough and have developed the skill to be a critical thinker and not judge straight away.

As humans, we are always quick to judge because we have this need for immediacy and haste, a flaw in humanity. We always judge everything so quickly without taking the time to truly understand what is going on around us. For example, when we meet new people, we tend to judge based off of first looks without taking the time to know them for who they are on the inside, not what we saw. This bears fruit to false judgements because we simply assume stuff about other people that is wrong most of the time. I have been in situations like this before too, and after reflecting on what I did in the heat of the moment I go back and decide to get to know people better. I’ve made a few friends this way, and have understood more about people and understand what boundaries people may have set. Not judging people on the spot allows us to understand others potential and who they really are. People who we think we may not get along well with, situations that make us feel uncomfortable and we don’t want to get involved, or circumstances that make us feel rushed often prove valuable lessons to us that keep us in check far better than a first impressions would.

“We Shoot Children Too, Don’t We?” by Dan Almagor response:

You shoot children too, don’t you?
Burning our farms, stealing our homes,
Demolishing graves, kicking people around,
All for your own amusement.
Treating us like people with no lives,
Dehumanizing us, who do you think you are?
But we take the blame, every single time,
Just because we retaliate, just because we want peace.
You shoot children too, don’t you?
You make excuses, you hush up, you don’t answer,
You turn a blind eye to your neighbours,
As if God won’t judge you one day.
You’re brutal, unjust, strong.
You humiliate us like animals,
Treat us less than that.
We ask for peace each time,
But you continue.
We take the blame every single time,
Just because we retaliate, just because we want peace.
You shoot children too, don’t you?

Palestine and Israel conflict. Country flags on broken wall.

The poem that I chose to respond to addressed the ongoing conflict between Palestine and Israel and how it affected both sides. The poet, Dan Almagor, is an Israeli and had won government awards for various activities as a citizen, as well as awards for his writing, but took a controversial turn when he decided to side with the Palestinians on this poem. He emphasized on how Israel never addresses and tries to make amends, but only makes the problem worse. He mentions that although he is fond of his country, he sympathizes with Palestine because it is their land, their lives, and their homes being stolen from them. I chose this poem because it addressed a real-life conflict, but was also interesting because the poet sided with what his countrymen would consider “the enemy”. It really depicts the humanity the poet has and how his country could use some too to end this conflict of over 70 years. With all the chaos happening in that part of the world, people haven’t been able to stay true to, and affirm, their identities. With a little bit of humanity, not only would the conflict end, but two groups of native people could live peacefully side by side with order and compassion for one another.

References:

“City Horizon Pictures | Download Free Images On Unsplash”. Unsplash.Com, 2021, https://unsplash.com/s/photos/city-horizon.

“Pin On Music”. Pinterest, 2021, https://www.pinterest.ca/pin/688839705474767632/.

“Israel Palestine Peace Stock Photos, Pictures & Royalty-Free Images – Istock”. Istockphoto.Com, 2021, https://www.istockphoto.com/search/2/image?phrase=israel+palestine+peace.

“French Wisdom ‘S Quote About Judgement, Dangerous. Quick Judgments Are Dangerous….”. Quotescover, 2021, https://quotescover.com/french-proverb-about-judgments.