A Muslim man wearing an arm cast boards a plane. The flight attendant helps him place his bags in the overhead bin, being that he cannot use his left arm, and asks if he needs any special accommodations. They man says no, and so she proceeds to help the other passengers. She was not rude to the man, and she showed no signs of being uncomfortable around him. She was respectful and treated him like any other passenger and even asked if he needed any accommodations when she noticed his cast. As she walks to the front of the plane again, she mentions to the other flight attendant that she has a strange feeling about the Muslim man, and that part of her wishes he wasn't on that plane.
A racist person will tell you they are not racist, in the same moment they demonstrate their racism. "I'm not racist, I just feel slightly uncomfortable with a person wearing a Burqa on the same plane as me." or "I'm not racist, but when I see a black man walking down the same sidewalk toward me, I put my purse on my other side." Blatant racism. Silent racism. Hidden racism. It is all the same.
The truth of the matter, is that we all have somewhat of a silent bias. It is undeniable, and it being taught to us is unavoidable, but it is not impossible to eliminate the racist aspects of it. Typically, African Americans have a bias toward other African Americans, primarily because that is who they were raised by, and first introduced to as a child. Muslims, have a bias toward Muslims, and white people have a bias toward other white people. This isn't the problem. The problem, is when we let these innocent biases play a role in how we treat and look at people of another race or ethnicity.
First, we need to correct ourselves. We need to address these internal thoughts and biases in the most obvious way possible; fix yourself first. One of the most difficult parts of changing how we think, is recognizing that we are, in fact, thinking a certain way. Whether you admit to yourself that you have racial biases or not, we can all become more aware of what is happening. Don't act upon first thoughts. Don't mention them, and do not let them have any influence on how you treat or react to people of other ethnicities, either to their face or behind their back. This is easier said than done. I am a strong believer that racism is taught, and although it is hard to re-learn things as we get older, we can teach ourselves to let go of these irrational beliefs of one race being superior. We can teach ourselves and we can teach each other that there is no one culture that poses a threat more than another. Cultures as a whole are not dangerous. Individual people are. Dangerous individuals can come from any race, whether it be your own or another. Either way, ethnicity does not play a role.
Secondly, we need to remind out brain that what we thought we knew is no longer true. We literally need to tell our mind to reject these thoughts that come upon us. If you reject a certain idea or theory enough times, and do this habitually, it becomes replaced with a new idea. For example, you have an alarm clock placed on the side of your bed. It's been there for years. Every morning at 7am it goes off, and you swing your arm over to hit the button on the top. This becomes habit. You do it every morning and the moment you hear it, your arm swings over to shut it off. One day, you decide to move your alarm clock to the other side of the room. The first morning it goes off, you swing your arm over to its previous location and nothing happens. This occurs for about four or five mornings, before your tired brain realizes that the alarm clock is no longer there, and swinging your arm to the side as a habit slowly stops happening, and instead you get up and walk across the room to turn it off. The same thing needs to occur in order to eliminate racial biases. You may swing your arm over to an empty desk a few times before your mind begins to get rid of the thought of the alarm clock being there. You will need to remind yourself to reject racial biases a few times before you no longer have as many.
Lastly, we need to not give up on ourselves. Unlearning something is extremely hard. Teaching your mind to think a certain way is not easy, but again it is not impossible. The way we are now, is dangerous. Racism is not safe for those targeting or being targeted, and the world we live in continues to become more and more diverse. So, if you chose to live with your silent biases, and you continue to be "not racist", but still make comments or double check your purse, then you are part of the problem were trying to eliminate. If we were intelligent enough to teach our minds to subconsciously fear an entire culture, then we are intelligent enough to consciously un-learn it.
