William

To the next Commander-in-chief, 

Racism. The belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races. Mr./Ms. President, I am of Filipino, German, and Scottish descent. Personally, I haven’t really felt discriminated against up until the past few years. This hurt me, and I knew I couldn’t do anything about it. Racism I feel is probably the largest issue in today’s society. Racism can be found pretty much anywhere you go in the world. It is a big topic in the media, our schools and in workplaces. Whoever is the next Commander-in-chief must see this and address it as soon as possible before racial tensions become too great.

While some forms of racism are very extreme, other kinds are very subtle. Job discrimination is one place where both kinds of racism can happen. For example, racial bias for jobs is still a huge deal in our society. Last year, four researchers conducted an experiment to see how race affected the job market for recent college graduates. They submitted over 9,000 fake resumes of nonexistent recent college graduates through online job applications for positions based in numerous states across the US. They sent four resumes per job and randomly changed certain variables in the applications, like what major they had, what their work experience was, gender, and race. To indicate ethnicity, the researchers gave the candidates typical white names like Cody Baker while giving other candidates typical black names like DeShawn Jefferson. Overall, African American applicants were invited for interviews about 15% of the time, while white applicants received invitations approximately 18% of the time. In short, African-Americans were 16% less likely to get called in for an interview. There are a ton of more studies very similar to this one that further exemplify the same point that there is too much racial bias and or discrimination in our country’s workplaces. The next president must take this into account and see that the concept of this type of bias can be applied to many more areas in our lives than just at work.

Personally, I have never really had any physical experiences where something happened to me due to my race. However, as stated earlier, subtle racism is now more popular than ever. I have had many experiences where hurtful words or comments were flung at me because of my race. I play basketball and I am on a club team. But one thing that does bothers me on the court is when someone shouts a racial slur at me, whether it be from someone in the crowd, or a player on the other team. As Americans, we have the right to say pretty much whatever we want. But, even though we have that freedom of speech, there is still somewhat of a standard about what we should say, when we say it, and whom we are saying these things to. There doesn’t necessarily have to be more laws to try to get rid of racism, but there should be a shift in attitude in our government toward this subject to try to influence change for the better of our country.