Last week in my News Literacy class, we were asked to take a test from the Project Implicit website. The test was created in partnership with Harvard University, and works to test our implicit biases on various topics such as sexuality, race, gender, and presidents. The test works with word association for images and words, forcing the test taker to categorize items into "good" or "bad," relating to the topic they chose.
What I specifically noticed from my class in particular is how instead of accepting that their implicit bias existed, many tried to say "but I don't feel that way." This misses the entire point, in my opinion. It's not about if you consciously "feel" a certain way or hold a certain preference, but it is about the preferences that are held in your subconscious that are created from your sociocultural background.
One specific test that clearly upset some people, including myself, was the race test. Not only was the language used by my peers grossly inappropriate, referring to black Americans as "blacks" or "the blacks," but it was also a failed attempt to show that they were not racist. In my opinion, everybody is racist to some extent. Systemic racism is engrained in our society and people still are harmed by its existence. Even if you don't consciously believe you have racist tendencies, simple tests like these show that you may not know yourself as well as you think you do.
Race became an unnecessarily awkward topic when it popped up in the class discussion. White people are more tense when it comes to talking about race relations. It became even more awkward when instead of just stating the test results, an individual would try and excuse themselves and say that the result was not accurately representing them. While the test results should be taken with a grain of salt, it should be noted just why it is important and why so many people have taken these tests.
The purpose of the tests is not to make you feel ashamed. It is to make you more aware. By being more aware of implicit bias, you can better judge the situations around you by realizing that you are most likely looking through a lens with at least a little bias. It is nearly impossible to be unbiased, because it is human nature to be.
"It is well-established that implicit preferences can affect behavior. Implicit preferences have been shown to be related to discrimination in hiring and promotion, medical treatment, and decisions related to criminal justice."
Another topic I was upset about was the discussion about terrorism. It is true that it becomes more and more difficult to tell what exactly terrorism is when news organizations are hesitant to label something terrorism, especially when it is a domestic attack. For instance, the topic our class attempted to discuss was the murder of 3 Muslim students in Chapel Hill, North Carolina in February of 2015. What many found controversial at that point was that news organizations did not call this instance terrorism. But why?
Some claimed that this was because the attacker was white. It is increasingly common for a shooting to be labeled terrorism when it is committed by a Muslim or non-white person. Before some of you get upset at me for being overly general here, this is at least partially true. It is engrained in our society to view people who look Muslim as terrorists. Am I saying this is right? Absolutely not. To label all Muslims as terrorists is ridiculous. But this racist tendency is a part of society that still exists and still causes harm to individuals. Since 9/11, hate crimes against American Muslims have only increased.
What specifically angered me in class was that when referring to terrorism, an individual kept referring to terrorists as "others" or "from the outside", as if domestic terrorism did not exist and was not an issue to even be discussed. An article by The Washington Post talks about a study, finding that "domestic extremists have killed more Americans than jihadists since 9/11." So in response to that individual, I say that we are more likely, even though said likelihood is incredibly small, to be killed by a domestic extremist/terrorist more than a jihadist or foreign terrorist in the United States. It is normal to fear anything that may endanger the lives of you or the people around you whom you care about.
However, these fears should hopefully be rooted in facts, not in stereotypes, islamophobia, and racist tendencies. Otherwise, they are irrational fears. Being scared of someone on a plane, bus, or train because they wear a hijab, turban, or other form of religious clothing that you associate with Islam, specifically Islamist extremists, is an irrational fear. People are often so ignorant that they will attack any person who even looks Muslim, as seen with the rise in hate crimes against Sikhs. Sikhs are followers of Sikhism, a "monotheistic religion that originated in the Punjab region of the Indian Subcontinent during the 15th century." Sikh men and women are required to wear a dastar (also commonly known as a Pagg), and this has often caused confusion because people think that they are Muslim. Which of course, this wouldn't be a problem if our society was more educated about cultures other than our own, including religious and cultural practices. It really wouldn't be a problem if we also didn't have newscasters or political figures inciting violence against Muslims, and people who willingly go outside with the intention of attacking anybody who looks Muslim.
Of course, these are just my opinions. I attempted to back up what I perceived the issues to be with fairly reputable sources. I believe that when we talk about our implicit biases, whether those biases come from race or religion, we should not try to automatically brush off our biases and claim that they don't represent us. Instead, we should accept that it is more likely than not that these biases exist, and work to think about their impacts on our everyday lives and conversations. It is human nature to have bias and to categorize people, but it doesn't mean that that grouping is always ethical or morally correct.
I also acknowledge that I cannot fully speak on racial issues or bias because I am white. I will never have the personal experience or perspective that others will have, and because of this, my opinions should be taken with this knowledge in mind. While my opinions are still important, I cannot say that they have too much impact because I will never experience the reality of being anything other than white in American society. Lastly, before anyone accuses me of making white people look bad, let me say this: this article is not an attempt to scream "white people suck", because if I wanted to scream that, I could (and already have). What I'm saying is that our society gives white people the advantage in many situations, and also excuses their actions, and the actions that anyone takes that fall into the definition of terrorism should be labeled as such. Furthermore, when we talk about races other than our own, we need to watch our language. Using language that dehumanizes or generalizes an entire race makes an argument weak (and while I tried to avoid that language when talking about white people, it can only be avoided so much).
