Bobadilla 1

Gissell Bobadilla
Jennifer Rodrick
English 115
16 October 2016
First Draft: Racism In Our Space
As long as human beings have been around, the dispute goes, and individuals of a
different nation or skin color have always been feared. In a diverse nation, such as the
United States, one may think it is a progressive country, but in reality its not. We are
constantly reminded by the brutality and hateful discrimination that occurs in our lives
today. The space around us has shaped the aspect of our identities by making us conform
to a title of someone were not, being influenced by our surroundings and having to
conform how people in public view us.
Each race is discriminated in their own ways. For instance, ever since the horrible
incident on 9/11, Muslims are constantly known as the terrorist. Everyone should be
afraid of them because you never know what they are capable of doing. While Mexicans
are the illegal immigrants who come into America stealing peoples jobs and causing
chaos. They bring violence, drugs and are rapists. According to a video by CNN, Donald
Trump had many allegations to make of people outside of America.

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He believes the best option there is to stop these people from coming into our country, is
by building a wall where no one will be able to sneak through. He also claims the United
States is run by unwise people and is a dumping ground for the worlds problem. Not
only is racism getting out of hand but also no one feels safe and protected. Furthermore,
African Americans absolutely cannot be seen doing anything because it is automatically a
suspicious act. Early this year there was an incident of a cop shooting an African
American for selling cds outside of a liquor store. Alton Sterling, father of five children
fatality dies in the hands of a cop. In the article, The Daily Beast Goldie Taylor
explains to us how this tragedy came to be. She comments, Sterling was standing alone,
his arms outstretched at his sides, when a Baton Rouge police officer rushed and tackled
him to the ground. A second quickly joined and, moments later, Sterling lay bleeding to
death from multiple gunshot wounds to the chest and back. The policemen, who were
involved, asserted their body cameras fell from their uniform during the altercation but it
was thanks to a bystander who captured the incident. Many believed if it were a white
man, none of this would have happened. The cops believed he was armed and dangerous
just because he was black but in reality he was a harmless man, selling cds, to help out
his financial issue.
Modern racism is said to have been derived from various spaces, the most common
being upbringing. As a child, you are reliant on your parents to assist you in whom to
become. Part of that implicates their own judgments, that of which kids dont have the
maturity to form on their own. Upbringing is an appropriate strong aspect of what
influences people to become racist, or to have even the slightest racial views. In the book
Puddnhead Wilson, the author Mark Twain, explains to us the readers that as a baby we

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are born with no sense of education or judgment. Switched at birth, Twain creates a
situation in which a white child (Tom) gets a "black" upbringing and a black child but
white of skin (Chambers) a "white" upbringing. At the end of the story, Tom is revealed
as being black and Chambers as being white:
The real heir (Chambers) could not endure the terrors of the
white mans parlor. The family pew was a misery to him,
yet he could nevermore enter the solacing refuge of the
nigger gallery, that was closed to him for good and all.
The false heir (Tom) a valuable slave, was sold down the
river by the creditors. (Twain 122)
Toms genes or his spoiled upbringing as a wealthy white master caused his cruelty as a
person. While Chambers ancestry or his less protected childhood made him a calm,
decent person. This book mainly speaks about the way our surroundings shape us. The
way one thinks and perceives the world is the way one was raised. If one grows up in a
racist family, most likely that person will grow up to be a racist himself or herself. But if
one comes from a more accepting family, most likely that person will see everyone
equally the same. Upbringing is the largest cause of racism. As we grow up, media
becomes a factor of our lives whether or not we want it to be, and is also a major source
of how racism keeps itself active. Since the 70s the media has been giving us racial
labels.
When you step out do you ever get weird looks from others because you look
different? Do you often feel like you do not belong in a certain place? If you have not yet
took that into consideration you should open your eyes a little more and see how others

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react when you are around them. Taking into consideration Brent Staples story of Black
Men and Public Space, he talks about his personal experience. He was seen as an
attacker to women just because of his skin color. He proceeds in his story by saying:
Over the years, I learned to smother the rage I felt at so often
being taken for a criminal. Not to do so would surely have led
to madness. I now take precautions to make myself less
threating. I move about with care, particularly late in the
evening. I give a wide berth to nervous people on subway
platforms during the wee hours, particularly when I have
exchanged business clothes for jeans And on late-evening
constitutionals I employ what has proved to be an excellent
tension-reducing measure. (Staples 143)
Brent Staples made sure to act normal when around people late at night because he did
not want them to be afraid of him. It should never be the case where you have to act
differently because people feel threaten of your presence. It must suck to seem as a target
by the police because of your skin color. Everyone should be treated equal and be
respected as one.
In most cases it becomes a joke to scream out racial slurs to people because you
think it is ok but no, that is never the case. The spaces that surround us shape each
individual differently. Many are categorize in different groups but we are all humans, we
share the same emotions and feelings. No matter the skin color, no one should be
considered more superior than the other.

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Work Cited
CNN. Donald Trump doubles down on calling Mexicans rapists. Online video clip.
YouTube. YouTube, 25 June 2015. Web. 16 October 2016.

Taylor, Goldie. Alton Sterling, Father of FiveOne More Black Man Shot Down by
American Police. The Daily Beast. 6 July 2016. Web. 16 October 2016.

Staples, Brent. Black Men and Public Space. 1986. The Norton Reader: An Anthology
of Nonfiction. Ed. Melissa A. Goldthwaite et al. 14th ed. New York: Norton, 2016. 141-43.
Print.

Twain, Mark. Puddnhead Wilson. New York: New American Library, 1964. Print.