Over the past year names have been thrown around to certain groups of people, including "racist", "xenophobic", "sexist", etc. However, recently it has been brought to my attention that some of us believe that these are only opinions, and opinions are meant to be expressed, right? At least, that is what I've always believed. I've always been a strong believer that you need to listen to everyone's opinions, no matter how ridiculous you may think they are, because they allow you to further your knowledge of any given topic. I do not, however, believe racism is an idea that should be openly shared or expressed. Therefore, I do not believe racism should be an "opinion", otherwise it would be something that we should openly share with each other. Racism, in its entirety, is a way of life.

Imagine that you or someone you know is pregnant. You're either pregnant, or you're not pregnant. You can not be "a little" pregnant, or just "partly" pregnant. You either are, or you are not. This way of thinking can directly correlate to racism. You can never be "just a little" racist, your comments or thoughts are either fueled by racism, or they're not racist. Being pregnant is a way of life, at least for nine months. Racism, is also a way of life, for however long one decides to be so. You can not just be a little racist here, or a little racist there, you can just be racist. There are no levels to how racist you are, therefore no levels of how much racism is too much.

By thinking this way, it has allowed me to see there are no levels to racist comments. If someone makes a "harmless" joke about someone's race, it is still racist. Just because that comment might not have offended that one person does not mean it is offensive. It was still racist. So then why do we feel the need to share racist comments? Why do we joke about someone's race? Why do we believe that these "harmless" jokes are not racist? How do these jokes or comments benefit society? I ask these questions because I do not know the answer. I do not see how these racist comments benefit society, so why should they be shared?

To conclude, I believe that although people might have racist "thoughts", these ideas should not be considered "opinions". Opinions are ideas that are meant to be shared, but generalizing/degrading/harming other groups of people are not ideas that should be shared. There are no "levels" to how racist a comment is, so therefore any comment that is remotely racist, is still racism. One could argue that silencing these racist ideas is wrong, but when these ideas only harm others, is it really wrong? How is degrading and threatening to harm certain group of people, solely for their looks/beliefs/orientation, not wrong? How does it benefit society in any way? Why should we allow for these ideas to be shared? Please let me know.