Reflect on what you've learned about Race and Racism.

This has been one of the most taxing subjects I have ever had to address in school. There has only ever been one other subject to do that to me and that subject is Global Warming, two very important subjects with seemingly no connection. But there is a connection. How can we even begin to show an understanding and appreciation for the planet that sustains us when it is clear that we can barely show it to one another? In reading the first essay, "Race": A Most Dangerous Myth, it became clear that humans are only satisfied when they have categorized and compartmentalized the hell out of the human race. Excuse my blatant use of the blasphemous term. I was discussing this matter with a friend and I explained that humans want to categorize everything, from animal species to written works (like books) and even themselves. And they do so because they can only begin to “live” comfortably knowing everything around them has a label. She thought my use of the term label was a little harsh, maybe even incorrect, but I stand by what I say. Labels make the world go round, not intelligence or decency. I work at a bookstore as I may have mentioned before, and even the books have been labeled according to the subject matter. Okay, from a business perspective I can understand separating Math books from Fiction and History from Science books, but within those sections are even more labels. When selling a product your main goal is to get it into the hands of the consumer as fast as possible. But within the Fiction section there is a Mystery sub-section, a Romance sub-section, a Sci-fi/Fantasy sub-section, and even those sub-sections are divided amongst themselves. If you ask me, any story that is written from the imagination of another is Fictional and therefore belongs in Fiction. Why the need to further complicate life and separate what you already know is Fictitious? Well, that is what we have done and continue to do when we split up the human race amongst itself. We are all Homo sapiens. But that is not enough, because of some discrepancy in skin color I am not like you and you are not like me. So we separate people using the most significant difference, skin color, lights and darks. What, are we doing laundry? But you see it’s not as easy as that. Because among those two groups are others who vary in features (like facial), attributes (like hair color), and even skin color yet again. The whites not white enough? It’s as if we will never be truly happy until everyone around us is labeled, catalogued, and tagged. In Racism: The Most Pernicious of All the "Isms", a sort of timeline was created for the Civil Rights Movement. It chronicled all of the people who unwillingly but full heartedly gave their life for the cause, both men and women, “black” and “white,” like Emmett Louis Till, Medgar Evers, Michael Schwerner, and Viola Gregg Liuzzo. It mentioned iconic people who will, in the minds of all who acknowledge this powerful movement, be remembered till their own life comes to an end, like Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X. I also became aware of the fact that racism is an old habit and one quite difficult to rid the world of. Racism wasn’t just saved for the Africans. Many native people, and when I say native I mean Native to the country in which they were discovered on including Africans, experienced the hazard of racism. People, like the Taino and Native American Indians. These people who learned to live humbly and eco-friendly among their environment, using only what they needed. Savages, I think not. Savages are the ones that can’t value human life in any and all of its forms. I can only imagine the type of world we would be living in right now if the European travelers would have adopted the same lifestyle of these people. There would probably be acceptance of the other cultures and less, if no, racism and Global Warming would be to a minimal. Talk about two birds with one stone.