The "Looking Glass Self"
To be able to understand morality, one must first understand that a person’s self grows out of a person´s social interactions with others and therefore is shaped by their direct influences. Although societal norms do play a major role in moral development, greater influence stems from interpersonal relationships such as close family and friends. This is known as the "me" side of Cooley's concept, or the socialized aspect of the person. The "I" in Mead's concept plays into a integral part of someone's life by being the part of the self that is spontaneous, impulsive and creative, or a decision that is brash in nature and essentially our unsocialized behaviors whereas the "me" side is a more concerned of how one is viewed in their current society.
Humans as Social Creatures
Socially there is a need to be liked and the need to be right, and at times the need to be liked trump's the need to be right to avoid becoming a social outcast, but the repetition of such behavior from a young age can influence one into believing that their behavior was "right" in the first place. Such examples of this would be hate crimes, persecution and other hateful behaviors that one could perceive as obviously wrong, but hateful actions reciprocate more hateful actions as a collective. In 1939 when lynchings were a common occurrence in Southern United States, African American artist Billie Holiday released a song called Strange Hanging fruit to showcase the horrors of the hateful behavior from white southern communities against the African American communities by comparing the hanging men as hanging fruit. At a time where Civil Rights were a taboo subject, she performed this song under grave threats and at high personal cost, and although this action could be considered stemming from the artists "I" aspect of herself, this kickstarted the movement that became an integral "me" aspect of society once the civil rights movement began rolling to full effect.
Holiday at the Downbeat Jazz Club in New York City (1947) by William P. Gottlieb
Gary Coyle states that Human history is the history of collective psychology and the collective psychologies that dominate society in different historical epochs, and as we progressed from a predominantly racist culture to a more socially "equal" society, one must always bear in mind that as a society one should not be complacent in the belief that all changes move in a linear, humanistic direction since the threads of society can be manipulated by major influences in negative ways. Slowly racism started becoming imbedded in the unsocialized behaviors of society (The I), when Trump came into power this slowly started becoming socialized behavior since being reciprocated by President of the United States. Although many already sought this behavior as unethical, biased and essentially hateful, his followers felt understood and heard and therefore reciprocated this hateful behavior as well.
Racism in our current society
Since the beginning of American history, racism was prevalent because it was beneficial for early human beings to deprive other groups of resources. In layman's term, Racism was a needed economic factor in the United States, but as new technological inventions reduced the need of this labor the feeling of superiority remained imbedded in American culture which was proven by the introduction of the Jim Crow laws and later systemic racism.
According to the American Psychological Association, Racist behavior is developed by the following factors:
- Categories
- Factions
- Segregation
These factors tend to occur one after another, since children begin categorizing by race as early as by 3 years old. Once categorizing occurs, the next factor is factions. This essentially means that people begin seeing race as "teams" instead of a collective as a whole, which finally leads us to segregation. This action is when one begins to seperate themselves from others on the basis of race. When choosing friends, one seeks for people that tend to be more ideologically aligned with oneself, and Race tends to play a major role in this ideology. One of the biggest issues is the denial of such racist behavior, since many are socially adjusted to believe this sort of behavior is within moral grounds.
Fighting Racism
Combatting racism can be an uncomfortable topic for many due to pacifist ideals since many don't believe that there genuinely is a problem at all. Prior to the Black Lives Matter's epoch since most men in power in the United States are of caucasian descent, most norms, ideals and political ideals were surrounded by this faction, and therefore negated the fact that racism was a problem in our country since there was no reason to empathize and if anything believed that these communities were at fault for their issues.
Woman attacked by Trump supporters (2021) by Raquel Nataliccio
Adversity introduces a person to themselves and with a recording device being essentially in every American's pocket it was easier to broadcast this behavior for the masses to see, and were used to "cancel" people for their negative behavior with hopes of avoiding the reciprocation of said hateful behavior in our society. Per my last blog, social media can be a very tricky space to decide who in society is a menace and who is an actual social activist since as a society we always want to be LIKED and/or RIGHT, and many use this concept to receive clout online by ruining someone's life for mistakes they made. Personally, there needs to be a in depth research of the issue at hand so I know that the claims are accurate or if someone is slandering for personal gain. As Admiral McRaven once stated; if you want to change the world, you must start by making your own bed. Making our own bed in this instance would be practicing Reactive anti racism (or fighting racist behavior as it occurs), and Proactive anti racism, which is when subtle signs of ignorance are being shown by the other person and must be educated to avoid ignorant behavior later.
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