What if all of a sudden we were all green? No more red, brown,
yellow, black and white? Just green. How would the world be different?
The news would sound different. “A green man shot and killed
a green man in a St. Louis suburb last night.” “A green woman heroically rushed
in to save a green child in downtown Minneapolis early this morning.” I suppose
we would fairly quickly drop the designating adjective and just speak of men
and women, girls and boys.
The designation of colors has become an important code in
our various cultures. When you speak of a white woman or a black child or an Hispanic
man, you have instantly summoned up all kinds of unconscious, preconceived notions of what
that person is like. We instantly think we know much about them - what kind of
food they like; perhaps their intelligence level or their education level;
maybe their propensity for violence; possibly their attitude toward people who
look like me.
A sociologist might call those preconceived notions “prejudice”
or “stereotyping.”
But if we all were green, we would not so easily be able to
access our stereotypes about what we call “race”. We would have to wait until we got to know
someone before drawing any conclusions about their likes or dislikes or about their
proneness to loving or giving.
Try this – whenever you meet someone or read about them in
the news, think of them as being green and see if it doesn’t change your
attitude toward them. If it does, then your attitude needed changing.
Click here to Check this blog on Stereotypes
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