Scrolling through Twitter, it’s fair to say you’re going to find some dumb stuff. What I never expected to see, however, is minorities fighting each other on who has it worse. Let me preface this by saying, this is not an “all lives matter” piece for minorities. It’s a simple statement asking us all to work together, not against
each other.
As minorities, we can all agree that at one point or another, we have been mistreated by American society. The one we are most familiar with is the enslavement of African Americans, but unfortunately, that’s not the only one. All too often, we forget our long history of racial struggle, the earliest being the destruction of Native Americans. Further down the line, we have abuse of Asian immigrants, and more
recently, the attack on Latinx immigrants. The one I personally identify with among these is the belief that “all brown people are terrorists.”
Pointing these individual atrocities out does not mean I am trying to belittle them or ignore the many others. I want to remind you that we have all been used in one way or another to ensure the success of this country at our own expense. One is not worse than the other, and arguing that it is is truly upsetting to see. When talking to other minorities, I was relieved to see others share my concerns.
Junior Imani Dempsey noted that we will always remain at the bottom unless we work together. “We’re all minorities, and we’re already a small number; we should bring each other up rather than tear each other down,” she said.
The biggest hurdle against unity is political correctness, which can divide us because our focus is on ourselves rather than on others around us. We shouldn’t be so adamant on being heard individually that we allow ourselves to drown each other out. This exclusivity allows us to be recognized as individual groups with their own experiences, but it fails to highlight our similarities.
Our voices will be so much stronger when we work together. Cultural and racial identities are very important, but that shouldn’t hinder us from identifying with another struggling group.
According to research from Christina Chen of Carnegie Mellon University, when minorities lash out at other minority groups, it’s a defense mechanism. In her research paper, she writes, “Having negative views of others or treating other groups in an unfair manner is one method by which individuals can feel better about themselves or their own groups.”
Furthermore, she points out that much of it is learned to gain approval from the majority group. This is where we begin to see terms like “model minority” come into play. When the majority picks one of us out and says, “Why can’t you be more like them?,” we are pitted against each other, and resentment has room to grow.
When this situation occurs, it’s easy to forget the struggles of that group. Fortunately, to prevent this from happening, the solution is as simple as taking a step back and showing some empathy. We should take these collective experiences and use them to benefit all of us.
Historically, it has long been shown we accomplish more together. So, I implore you attend multicultural events on campus and show you are an ally. Multicultural groups — start holding events together and celebrating each other. The University of Iowa is an extremely diverse community, and we will all enjoy our wonderful campus more if we aren’t too busy fighting
each other.