Why do I find myself sometimes being inherently racist?

This will take a little while to explain. First off, I am friends with numerous other races (black, brown, asian). I don't have an issue with these people, and if they piss me off, I base it on something to do with their personality, obviously not racist.

HOWEVER, I go to a campus of 36000 people, so many different cultures and races. If I don't know a person of a different race (I'm white) and they do something that pisses me off, I find myself thinking, "uh, fucking brown people, go back to your own fuckin country." Same goes for asians. I don't seem to have this problem with black people though. I know these thoughts have no basis, but I just feel this hatred and I don't know why. I would never harm them, but I would gladly never see them again.

I've also realized that I only hate on them if they have accents, indicating that they are indeed foreign and not just born here and assimilated into our culture. Just hearing someone speak in a foreign language drives me up the wall. My thoughts are "YOU'RE IN CANADA, SPEAK FUCKING ENGLISH!" (or French I guess (we're bilingual), but don't get me started on the Quebecois and their whole bullshit separatism movement). I DON'T enjoy these thoughts and I have and never will express my opinions to people I know because I know I'll be labeled as a racist.

Even though I know that we raped and pillaged the natives to take this land and therefore we should be welcoming of other races and cultures, I still feel like, fuck these new cultures, if they want to bring their terrible ass culture to my country then they should take it by force like we did. I think the values instilled by traditional brown and asian families are fucked to shit, they're more centered around a collectivist theory more than an individualist theory and I don't want them dragging that shit in to my country.

I'm just confused as to why I disagree with these thoughts yet continue to have them?

 

Because unlike your friends who you’ve welcomed into your home because you share similar interests, you feel as if other cultures, languages, and religions are being thrust upon you and you're helpless to do anything about it

You're not alone in your sentiment

Hotwater

 

I think it is learnt response to that situation. I'm not racist either but I've heard people use those remarks so often I catch myself thinking it too.
Count upto ten and if you still think the same way then you'll need hypnotism.

 

Sounds like you go to UofT haha. I am in an Ontario university as well. I often get irritated when the Asian students speak their respective languages loudly on the bus and stuff, but then I try to think "Why am I angry? I would speak English in China if I went with friends."

 

Racism fights for equality! So we can have an equal white community. Just sayin'.

 

Thanks hotwater, makes sense

As for this, I have thought this as well, but the thing is, I'm sure if I did go to China and spoke English on the bus with an english friend, Chinese students would think the same thing, therefore I don't feel bad about it.

 

It is annoying isn't it? The other day, my best friend was chatting with me over the computer and she said a guy in the library where she was just sat down across from her and astarted bragging about his shoes. I hated myself for thinking it, by my first response was "is he black?" So I said to her "this is going to sound awful, but..." And there was a pause for a few seconds on her end, and she said, "no, but I know what you mean." And we shared a nervous giggle at how well we had been trained by our New Age touchy-feely teachers to recognize ignorance and not to tolerate it and also how well those same prejudices had been ingrained into us by the small, predominantly white, town we grew up in.
I'm going to say it's pretty harmless as long as you are aware of it and, like you said, you don't agree with it. You can only do so much about bias, except be aware of it and try to see past it when it counts.

 

I'm half black. My mother is white, and her family has been here since the 1810's. My father was born and raised in Manitoba, but his parents are from Trinidad. I'm patronized and treated as an immigrant when I have just as much a right to be here as anyone else.

With that being said, I do think that immigrants should be thoroughly screened before being allowed residence in Canada. The problem is with the more religious people and the traditions that they try to enforce on the people around them. Hell, in parts of Europe some Muslim immigrants are trying to bring Sharia Law intro action, which would make the judicial system like that of an extremely conservative Middle-Eastern country like Saudi Arabia or Iran. Hell, if we only accepted atheist immigrants, I think our nation would be a better place.

 

OP - you're a racist

nothing wrong with that. just be who you are and embrace it

 

Like I said, I would never act on my internal feelings, and if anyone ever got beat up simply because they were of another race, I would think that was terrible. I just don't want these people diluting the cultural values I hold true. I also used to be in this Karate class with about 25 students, and during break these 3 french women who were all bilingual would all of a sudden switch from talking in english with us to talking in french to one another (these weren't like high-school girls either, women 40+), completely excluding the other people in the group, I always felt like speaking up against this bullshit but never did. Now in hindsight I really wish I had but it's too late for that.

 

That doesn't sound racist at all.

Do you think you are superior to these other races?

It sounds much more nationalist than anything.

But I think what's more important is the root of your condition: you are uncomfortable with people outside of your culture. Perfectly normal; but something that's good to be aware of and it will make you happier if you overcome.



But more to odon's point:

If a fat black woman with long fake nails nearly runs me over in her shitty 90s Explorer with "fake" chrome rims; there's only one word I'm going to be thinking.

If a yellow-toothed man with a mullet and trucker cap nearly sideswipes me while blasting country and singing to his dog in his rusty unidentifiable 80s pick-up; it's gonna be another word, but it's gonna mean the same thing.

 

Sounds like Xenophobia

 

Everyone has some prejudices, you just have to let them go at some point.

 

That's the one I was looking for!

I even looked up isolationism to see if that could stretch to this situation (totally can't)

 

Where?

I know a handful would wish for it to be brought wholesale to the UK.
I also know a vast majority would like elements of it to be available through the established arbitration act.

Here it is in action...

The Muslim Arbitration Tribunal will operate within the legal framework of England and Wales thereby ensuring that any determination reached by MAT can be enforced through existing means of enforcement open to normal litigants. Although MAT must operate within the legal framework of England and Wales, this does not prevent or impede MAT from ensuring that all determinations reached by it are in accordance with one of the recognised Schools of Islamic Sacred Law. MAT will therefore, for the first time, offer the Muslim community a real and true opportunity to settle disputes in accordance with Islamic Sacred Law with the knowledge that the outcome as determined by MAT will be binding and enforceable.
http://www.matribunal.com/

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THE BETH DIN: Jewish Law in the UK
http://www.socialcohesion.co.uk/files/1236789702_1.pdf

(notice "social cohesion")

We all have the opportunity to use arbitration.

Alternative Dispute Resolution including Adjudication, Arbitration ...


All criminal matters are reserved for the UK's state courts.

Just sayin'

 

Can often be a knee jerk response for growing up white in a western country. It's your conditioning unfortunately.

 

What words would they be?

I've been known to think: "Why don't they just piss of home."
I've never been known to say: "Fuck off back to where you came from you black/Asian ****."
The race issue isn't part of it...as I think the same thing when I'm having my nerves jangled by the vast amount of Polish people here.
I think there is a subtle but distinct difference...or am I kidding myself?

 

You are suffering from ethnocentrism. The truth is there is no right or wrong way for a culture. I think when you have a problem with a person the first thing you Blame it on is their race/culture because it's the easier and most notable difference.

I think it's ridiculous you're angry at people with an accent, they took time to learn a language foreign to them and unlike you are exploring other cultures..

 

Maybe a little bit. The first implies that they don't belong, even though they have as much a right to be there as you do, that latter is a direct insult, with a racial observation thrown in. Both imply a racial dissidence.

The thing is, the bigger the difference between oneself and the person in question, the more the difference becomes apparent, and when something is apparent it stands out like a sore thumb and thus becomes the first thought on one's mind.

When you see someone in a wheelchair what is the first thought in your mind?

"Oh, they're in a wheelchair, they can't walk." is probably the first thought, 9 times out of 10.

The mind naturally points out differences between ourselves and others, so it's natural for the first thing to come to mind, if one is around someone of another race, to be the difference in skin colour and/or language.

It's the same kind of thing as people being attracted to people of other/various ethnicities for the sole fact that they are a certain or different ethnicity.

 

****** for the black example and redneck/hick/white trash for the white example.

Us pollocks are stubborn, prideful, nosy, traditional, gossip-y, and simple minded people. By simple minded I don't mean dumb, but we tend to have very grounded thinking and very generalized thinking.
But we have polka and pierogies, so I don't see what's the problem =P


My thing is culture over race. Race is just a color; culture is what shapes a person. I hate ghetto people with hip-hop mentality (no matter the color), makes me look racist when I'm calling a black one a ****** though.
But there are some races that have much stronger cultural ties...