Staying Wise

Time Wise visits SBCC

Throughout the United States, racism has always been a touchy subject amongst myriad of groups living here. Mentioning my Ethnic Studies class once again, we've focused on the Black American group this week. Next week, we'll be covering Latino/Hispanic Americans! Being a person of color myself, I've been in situations where racism was extremely apparent or I felt like I was looked at differently because I was Asian American.

For the past 25 years, Santa Barbara City College has held an annual lecture on anti-racism and ethnic diversity in honor of Leonardo Dorantes. Dorantes was a victim of hate crime when he was murdered in Santa Barbara in November of 1990. He was a Mexican immigrant who attended Santa Barbara City College as an ESL student. Because of his nationality, his life was forcibly taken from him.

Earlier this afternoon, Tim Wise, an anti-racism activist, paid SBCC a visit to speak at the Leonardo Dorantes lecture. Wise, also a nationally acclaimed writer, spoke about the reality of racism and its toll on the communities in the United States. Throughout his entire presentation, I had never been so engaged in something like that and all of the claims he made seemed absolutely true. Something Wise made clear to the audience was that we, as Americans, don't want to face the reality of racism and how it's affecting our country. We don't want to face the reality of police brutality, the voting system, immigrants and more because we're SCARED of the truth.

Racism is definitely still alive in America and with all of the ongoing movements, I feel extremely blessed to be living in Santa Barbara where there haven't been extreme riots or violence that is race-related. I am also very impressed and proud of our generation for trying to change the stigma that society hold on so many different groups of people. For the growing generation, it is undoubtedly important to make known the hidden issues of apartheid in America. In addition, it's strongly recommended that we not see the world as we want to see it, but for what it really is. If we don't start somewhere, how are we ever going to make a change?

See you next post,
Chey

Currently listening to Underneath Your Love by David Choi