Dear Future President,

    The United States is symbolic of freedom and equality, or is it? When you come to America seeking out freedom and equality, you may be dissatisfied. This letter isn’t to dissuade anybody from coming to America, it is to simply gain the attention to talk about how the nation is going back in time due to the incline of discrimination against race and sex.

    So why does this matter some may ask. Well, the issue that is clearly shown to me is that the country is gradually taking steps back into the past. Back when segregation and sexism was thriving and life was unfair. The point of time is to move forward and to progress, but the nation neglects to follow the rules of time.

Racism seems to be becoming more problematic in America nowadays. This is a country that people come to, to try and escape discrimination in their country, and it isn’t much of a difference. Racism in America is more impacted towards African Americans. Some may argue, “African Americans are more racist than Caucasians.” (1) Although this may be true to some, we have to think to ourselves “What makes the treatment we place against them, different than the treatment that we get?”

Recently, and still in use, a hashtag on all social media was being displayed as “#Add to dictionary”. The hashtag is being used in regards to police brutality against African Americans. This is shameful that people even have to use this hashtag, we are a country that is meant to represent equality, but we fail to do so. A story was released, about an African American high school student, Brian Banks, who was accused of rape and sentenced 5 years in prison, later to find that the accusation was false. And a Caucasian college student, Brock Turner, was only sentenced 3-6 months in prison for rape. (2) The racial divide is quite severe here in terms of imprisonment.

Not only are people getting directly discriminated, but they are also being indirectly divided (meaning that a calculation needs to occur in order to define the differences between things). For example, according to this website, a study was conducted from the University of Arizona, over the course of 3 years, that concluded that a white male with a criminal record will be more likely to get hired for a job than an African American with a clean record. (same education levels were taken into part as well) (3)

So what? Why should this be an addressed issue? What importance does it serve? Racism is an issue in the country that has lingered since the beginning of time. We are taught as a youth that you should treat others the way you want to be treated. Just because you have a different skin color, it doesn’t mean that you are any different than everyone else. Think of this. There is a blue bird and a red bird displayed before you. Can you tell the difference between them other than the color of their feathers? No, they are the same. They have wings, a beak, and eyes. The similarity is stronger than the difference. So what if a Caucasian man and an African American man were placed in front of you? What difference can you tell about them other than the color of their skin? Again, nothing. They have a mouth, a nose, and eyes. So why are they treated so differently?

The importance of resolving racism is crucial because the country will go back in time and create wars again if it continues. The civil war didn’t occur just for racial divide to happen again, nor did Martin Luther King Jr. die for humans to discriminate against each other based on the color of their skin. Hope that the future president will defeat this issue is rising within me. Rules or laws need to be made to prevent this predicament from taking us into civil wars.

Another issue that has taken rise in America once again, is sexism. The discrimination is mainly reoccurring against women. Females are seen as less superior than males, they are known to be paid less in their jobs, and are seen as feeble. Some readers may challenge my viewpoint by insisting that women aren’t treated unfairly and that this is just a conspiracy. But, according to a study, by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, females are paid 77 cents for every dollar that a male makes, which is almost a $10,000 difference over the course of a year. (4) Females are also faced with stereotypical remarks like “ they can’t do certain jobs that are considered ‘men’s work’(4) “ Men’s work is seen as a masculine job in which apparently “women can’t perform” which is why I say that females are seen as weak, because males think that they are incapable to perform these “masculine” tasks.

Also, this year, people are asking to repeal the 19th amendment, which is the amendment that allows women the right to vote, because males want a “better outcome” for the presidency. Of course, this is another viewpoint of mine that will be strongly disagreed with. Some believe the matter to be minor and deserves little attention.

So I ask for you once more. Why is this important? Why is it being addressed? If you didn’t know already, the president has the authority to repeal any amendment so long as the congress’ majority vote agrees. Congress consists of 535 members (100 in the senate and 435 in the house of representatives)(5) but only 104 women (20 in the senate and 84 in the house of representatives) are in congress which is less than a quarter (6). This means that if repealing the 19th amendment becomes an even bigger issue, there is a high probability that the amendment will be repealed, because over ¾ of congress is consisted of males. (this is assuming that at least over ¼ of the men agree to repeal the 19th) Males are asking to take away the rights that females were granted not too long ago. I hope that the future president will be mindful of America, and its steps back into the past. The future president needs to create laws that will prevent the divide between sexes, in order to keep the country from creating wars.

    This nation is seemingly going into reverse. Martin Luther King Jr. didn’t protest and die just for America to revert back to racism and discriminate against one another. The women’s suffrage movement wasn’t performed so that women could be treated poorly again. America is presumably going back in time when life was unfair, which will soon bring upon more civil wars. The nation is supposed to represent equality and freedom, and it struggles to present that with these multiple acts of discrimination. A simple solution for the future president to analyze is just to formulate laws that can create an equality amongst the country, in which will prevent the nation from going back in time.

Thank you for your time,

                                        Jayce R.

Citations

http://www.opposingviews.com/i/society/majority-americans-say-blacks-are-more-racist-whites-or-hispanics-poll-says (1)

https://mic.com/articles/145788/brock-turner-gets-months-i-jail-a-black-student-got-5-years-for- a-rape-he-didn-t-commit#.o6EqY74YI (2)

http://www.rantpolitical.com/2015/08/17/11-examples-of-casual-everyday-racism-in-our-society/ (3)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/20/sexist-workplace_n_2718249.html (4)

http://www.thisnation.com/congress-facts.html (5)

http://www.cawp.rutgers.edu/women-us-congress-2015 (6)