Response Paper

What I thought was really interesting about the chapters at first was that they were about Asians (Chinese and Japanese) the most, and I had never really studied or read about Chinese racism before. Initially that was what struck me as I was reading, but then I thought about it and racism is racism, no matter what the racial group that is being discriminated against is. It is always a terrible and unjust thing and it shouldn’t matter what color you are, everyone should be outraged by it. Racism is totally irrational, as shown in the chapter 1, when the city of Los Angeles was portraying the Chinese as dirty and unsanitary, even though the city was responsible because it wouldn’t extend the sewage system out of the middle of their area. I cannot understand where racism comes from or why people would feel such a strong hatred for people because of their color. I don’t think anyone can completely understand it, even those who are racist, because they couldn’t rationally explain it to any non-racist. It doesn’t make sense, but what it does (as well as what these chapters did for me) is it made me wonder about what the people of the future will think about out time. I know there are still racist in America today, but it isn’t as prominent an issue anymore, I don’t think, so I wonder if there is anything that is going on today that the our children and grandchildren will look back on in history class and say how incredibly stupid what we were doing was, like how incredibly stupid racism is and was. It really made me think that I really need to think about what I believe in and do, in order to not be looked back on as spurring on an unjust system or living in an unjust word. It made me think about our need to make sure that when we are done living our lives, we are proud of our actions and have not made anyone feel less than they are, and have made as many people as we can happy but not at the expense of others.

One more thing I wanted to mention about the chapters is how it differed from Richard Wrights piece in allowing the reader to make their own conclusions.  Molina’s chapters said this was racist, this was bad, they thought this, and you should feel that and didn’t allow the reader to think anything other than that. It felt more forced and pressured and made me want to resist it a little. Where as Richard Wright’s style made the reader fell smart. Obviously any rational and sensible person would make the same conclusions about Wrights stories as Molina told us to make about hers, but the reader (or at least I did) feels more accomplished and opinioned when making conclusions about Wrights stories. Its kind of like in movies and shows when the older sister doesn’t tell the little brother what to do, but in a round about way makes him think he should do it, but he thinks the idea was all his own. When he is told to do something, he resists and won’t do it, but if he thinks he thought of it himself, well then he’s convinced it’s the right thing to do and he’s a genius.